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Drive for Power and Accuracy

Every golfer wants to hit the ball longer and straighter off the tee. To drive the golf ball with power and accuracy, you must be set up correctly. In this Play Better Golf segment, Callaway staffer, and top-ranked teaching pro, David Leadbetter, gives us some helpful tips for proper setup when hitting the driver to hit the long ball straight down the middle of the fairway.

David Leadbetter: If you’re going to hit the driver well it’s essential that you understand the dynamics, meaning that you actually have to make sure that you’re striking the ball slightly on the upswing. So you have to adjust your set up for that compared to an iron where the ball’s more in the middle of your stance.

The first thing you’re going to do is get the ball forward in the stance, almost off the left heel. Widen your stance slightly because this is important for good balance. And the big thing you want to do is to actually just pop your hip forward. Your left hip needs to be higher than your right. So what this does it raises my left side and puts my right side behind the ball. So you really put yourself in a position where you can actually hit up on it.

So it’s all about setup. We see so many golfers they set up to the ball like they’re hitting an iron. The ball back in their stance, their shoulders are level, if anything they have their weight on their left side.

So ball forward, slightly wider stance ,pop that hip up, you might find that a small fraction of your weight is a little bit more on the right side compared to the left side but this gives you the sensation especially in, the last thing, which I almost forgot, feel like your hands are very slightly behind the ball. So everything is geared to sort of get you to hit up on it.

So remember get your set up right that will allow you to launch the ball up in the air because that’s key for good driving. Launch it with very little spin and hit it a long way. You’ve get a lot of speed I can tell you. So here I go, set up to it, pull forward, pop my hip up just a little bit, here we go. So work on that set up. You want to hit your tee shots long with a lot of speed.