Left Arm Action Is Like Throwing A Frisbee - Mike Austin Teaches Pros

The left wrist is used very inefficiently by most people. Most people have some amount of “cup” to their wrist at the top of the backswing. This is not a position from which to release any power. The left wrist should have a bit of “bow” to it during the backswing, but by the time the club gets to the top, most of the bow will disappear and the wrist will appear almost flat. This is the correct way.
Frisbee toss is a perfect place to see the left wrist release in action. If I gave you a frisbee and told you to throw it as far as you could, you would not start the forward motion of the frisbee with a “cupped” wrist as there would be nothing to snap at the release. Instead, I’m sure you would start the throwing action of the frisbee with your wrist in a “bowed” position so that you could snap the wrist at the release and generate some speed. Actually, the wrist snap alone will generate sufficient speed to throw a frisbee quite well.
That is the action used when striking a golf ball the Mike Austin way. The left wrist is snapping through the release, with the clubhead passing the left arm soon after impact. When this is done correctly, high clubhead speeds can be generated with little effort. This action is not the same as “flipping.” Flipping is when the clubhead passes the left arm before impact in an effort to help the ball in the air. We don’t want that. Flipping is bad. Releasing the left wrist in the proper manner is ideal.
The movement of the arms in the backswing is a mirror image of the follow through. And, the right arm in the backswing moves the same as the left arm in the follow through.
This mirror action of the arms combined with the correct pivot will produce long and straight shots with little effort.