How To Stop Overswinging: Unlock Your Untapped Power

A common misconception in the game of golf is that you need a really big backswing to generate power, when in fact understanding how to stop overswinging could be the key to more distance.

The best golf tips will tell you that swinging within yourself, with great rhythm and tempo, is a far more effective way to get around the golf course and regularly put yourself in good positions.

In this article, Golf Monthly Top 50 Coach Jo Taylor shares some great advice on how to stop overswinging the golf club.

How To Stop Overswinging

An overswing is generally the result of a golfers arms going too far back in the backswing. This can be caused by bending the left arm, which allows the club to travel much further than actually required, but it can also be due to the body turn. When you have too much rotation at this stage of the golf swing, this can cause an overswing, but this is a lot less likely for amateur golfers.

Instead, you should focus on creating a shorter, wider backswing, much like the one adopted by Major champion, Jon Rahm. To achieve this, turn back and load your weight onto your right side. A good reference point is checking your left shoulder comes across to just inside your right foot. Learning how to get a straight left arm in your golf swing will also help, but don't become fixated on this becoming too rigid as this will also affect your swing.

When it’s a compact swing, like the one in the image above, it's far easier to time the delivery of the club back into an efficient impact position for a better combination of accuracy and distance. A golf swing that moves past parallel doesn't tend to produce this outcome.

It's hard to gauge how far you’ve swung the club, and most of us will tend to swing further when we’re actually hitting it. I like to feel that my hands are almost level with the centre of my chest with a good bit of width. To achieve this, feel like you are pushing your hands away from your head, and not too close to the body.

The Golden Position

This (above left) is a good image of a great position to try and keep in your head. With your irons, power comes from hitting down and learning how to compress the golf ball - this is the position you want to strive for. 

When you overswing, there is a good chance you will reverse pivot, meaning you need to work on your weight distribution in the golf swing. When your weight shifts forward in the backswing, returning the club to the ball becomes very difficult to achieve with any sort of consistency. The result is that contact will be poor and you'll be relying on your hands to bail you out more often than not.