Anyone have trouble 'trusting' a neutral grip?

[ColinMB]

Hey folks,

I just finished a weekend of massive golfing content. It was fun but I realized as my shooting was degrading in quality a bit, that my grip was slowly getting stronger, and stronger!

When I caught this habit, I would slowly do an NSA style twistaway, and by the time I'd get back to the ball, the club head would be doing some pretty funky stuff by impact (not to mention weird path traits).

So I'm wondering how many of you, might be like me and have had a moderately strong grip in the past, and now have adjusted to the more neutral Brian Manzella grip. Was it a tough transition?

What I find is, if I have a strong grip, I don't need near as much twist. I find if I deliberately use a neutral grip then I MUST twist away/and to the ball or else it's a slice. But doing a bit of both (strong grip/twist) ? Usually results in disaster.

I'm wondering how many of you have experienced this 'trust the twist' issue and have adapted from strong to neutral grips? How long did it take to... trust it?

A

 

[Bigwill]

I'm in a similar transitional phase as you, the result of having just had a trackman fitting. I've tried to go neutral before, but as soon as I miss a few to the right, I've always panicked and gone back to strong. I'm looking forward to seeing what comes out of this thread.

 

[jeffreycharris]

I have moved from a strong grip to the neutral via NSA and it as helped me to finally understand how to release the club, and also to not flip it (at least not as much). Maybe more than anything, the neutral grip has helped with clubface control. . .keep messing with it, I think you'll be glad you did.
jch

 

[Jim Kobylinski]

I have moved from a strong grip to the neutral via NSA and it as helped me to finally understand how to release the club, and also to not flip it (at least not as much). Maybe more than anything, the neutral grip has helped with clubface control. . .keep messing with it, I think you'll be glad you did.
jch

Quality answer and the reason why we teach a lot of people the neutral grip. you don't always have to keep it, but it's good to learn for clubface rotation and learning not to flip.

You can always move back to something stronger, i did.

 

[dashfan87]

When I was younger, I always used a stronger grip to combat my slice, however, I naturally want to grip it neutral... My brother on the other hand, he grips with a Freddy couples strong as can be grip, and has horrible hooks... I cant get the kid to grip it neutral for the life of me.

 

[grs]

I struggle with it as well, my hands just seem to want to be strong on the club especially the driver and hybrid, I hit my best shots with the neutral grip but for some reason my hands are more comfortable being in a stronger position. Im alot better at it now than I was 6 months ago, I very rarely snap hook one anymore, but when I do its partly to do with my hands getting too strong again that and not enough axis tilt.

 

[birdie_man]

I used to think neutral was weird. It used to feel weird hit the ball with the back of my left hand. (vs. more of a left hand "hammer punch") But that was when I used to overrotate the clubface open and get under the sweetspot. (pre-twistaway ERA)

Dash your bro probably just needs some NHA type stuff. (plane line more left) It depends on what the golfer needs.........but there's nothing wrong with a strong grip in itself. Good golf obviously can be played with it. Your bro probably just needs to trace a more left path. (if he is hooking THAT bad)

 

[watson08]

Quality answer and the reason why we teach a lot of people the neutral grip. you don't always have to keep it, but it's good to learn for clubface rotation and learning not to flip.

You can always move back to something stronger, i did.

I too have been using what is very close to a Manzella neutral grip for a while, but the other day I started leaking it a little. Ugh! When I could not stop the leak immediately, I went to a stronger grip and was back to hitting high draws within a shot or two. I consider moving to stronger grip a temporary fix, but potentially poison long term. Why? Because I feel I'll get used to this new position and eventually start leaking it from there. This is going in the wrong direction.

As such, I was thinkng about going weaker than Manzella neutral to try and force myself to get more forearm rotation into my swing. What are your thoughts on this?

 

[dashfan87]

Dash your bro probably just needs some NHA type stuff. (plane line more left) It depends on what the golfer needs.........but there's nothing wrong with a strong grip in itself. Good golf obviously can be played with it. Your bro probably just needs to trace a more left path. (if he is hooking THAT bad)

Yeah, hes a mess though... he is totally afraid of hitting the ground. He tees the ball up super high even on iron shots off the tee box, and when he does have to hit it off the fairway, he chunks it. However I have seen him hit some nice shots, and he has out drove me on more than one occasion, thats impressive, because hes a little dude, at 5'11'' and 135 lbs... I'm 5'9'' 200... He STARTED golfing in the low 90s but as time went on he got worse and worse, till he just gave the game up. Its sad because he has so much natural talent, but when he gets discouraged, he just gives up on it. I haven't been able to get him on the coarse in about a year. and he has a bag full of nice equipment.

The more I'm on here, the more I learn, hopefully I will be able to use it to help him out...

 

[ColinMB]

I struggle with it as well, my hands just seem to want to be strong on the club especially the driver and hybrid, I hit my best shots with the neutral grip but for some reason my hands are more comfortable being in a stronger position. Im alot better at it now than I was 6 months ago, I very rarely snap hook one anymore, but when I do its partly to do with my hands getting too strong again that and not enough axis tilt.

This is why I decided to post on the topic just in case I could see how 'common' this problem is (Hey , misery loves company. )

Seriously though in my recent troubleshooting I started to think: Why was I having such amazing success so early after watching/employing NSA?

The answer (I think) is because I was _consciously_ employing twist away/twist to the ball, and consciously employing a neutral grip. The two are like peanut butter and jelly, they go well _together_.

In truth it took my instructor about 2 months to drill a 'strong' grip into my head, so it's very hard for me to go neutral, but just like you I would have a few fades leak out and think, oh here we go, time to strengthen the grip. But combined with the twisting stuff, it just gets ugly.

So I've come to the conclusion that going to a strong grip is like putting a band aid on a broken leg. I'm not sure how many of you agree with me. All I know is that when I go neutral + twistaway/twist to = much better direction control AND contact. Something about a strong grip makes me coming on plane a little wonky too.

I'm glad it's not just in my head, and wanted to confirm it with some of you. Thanks for the feedback.

 

[fronesis]

I played with a strong grip for almost 20 years, but I'm convinced that if you REALLY want to learn clubface control, if you really want to improve your ball striking, and if you want to finally discover, as jeffreycharris put it, how to release WITHOUT flipping, then the neutral grip is absolutely essential.

 

[shady1475]

I gotta say that I agree with you guys. Until I changed my grip and started the twistaway, my swing was horrid. I finally understand what it feels like to release the club and have a good follow through. It's like a revelation when that feeling hits you and you finally understand what everyone is trying to show you. Keep at it and you'll get it going for your swing.