Our hands are the only thing in contact with the club when we play golf, so having a grip that's going to help us perform at our best is absolutely vital. In the video and article below, PGA pro Ben Emerson discusses one of the most common faults when it comes to the grip and shares his tips on how to fix it...
Strong golf grip: What is it?
So, what does a strong grip look like and how can you identify it yourself? Knowing the answers to these questions is vital if you want to work towards a neutral golf grip that will help you control the clubface better.
As mentioned, having the perfect golf grip is so important as our hands are the only thing that’s connecting us to the golf club. For right-handers with a strong grip, what you’ll notice is that your top and bottom hands are turned too much to the right. So you’ll see three or even four knuckles on the left hand and none on the right.
This is how a strong golf grip will look from face on
What this promotes in the swing is active hands through impact, which leads to inconsistency due to a lack of control. Shutting the clubface down like this means people who have a strong grip tend to hit the ball predominantly from right to left, and will often wonder why they struggle with hooking the golf ball.
Strong golf grip: How to fix it
So, how do you grip a golf club? First thing’s first, you want the clubface pointing towards the target, and it’s easier to get a good visual of that with the club raised off the ground. Check Ben's demonstration in the video above for more detail.
From there, you want the grip to run through the pad of your lead hand. A nice checkpoint to see if you’re getting into a neutral position is to take all your fingers off, except the index, and see if you can still grip the club. If you can’t, try again until you are able to, and if you can, simply put the other fingers back on the grip and get a sense for how that neutral position feels.
This checkpoint will let you know if you're gripping the club properly with your lead hand
Rather than the three or four knuckles of earlier, you should now be able to see two or two-and-a-half knuckles on the lead hand. Additionally, the thumb and index finger should form a ‘V’ with the line pointing towards your right shoulder.
With the other hand, keep the club raised and come in from the side so it naturally slots into place on top of the other - again, you want to see a couple of knuckles. If you've managed this, you’ll be in a really neutral position with the grip so you can deliver the club nice and square through impact and start to hit the ball straight.
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