How to Do the Pendulum Golf Swing

The secret to a more consistent golf game lies in a simple, rhythmic motion that feels less like a violent thrash and more like a smooth, effortless swing. This is the core idea of the pendulum golf swing, a technique that leverages gravity and body rotation to create startlingly predictable results. This article will guide you through the fundamentals of the pendulum motion, from putting and chipping all the way to feeling its profound influence on your full swing.

What is a Pendulum Golf Swing?

Imagine the steady, reliable swing of a pendulum in a grandfather clock. It moves back and forth with a consistent rhythm, powered by a simple mechanism, not by erratic bursts of energy. The pendulum golf swing brings this exact concept to your game. It’s a method that prioritizes a simplified motion, using the big muscles of your shoulders and torso as the engine while allowing your arms and the club to “swing” freely and naturally.

The goal is to eliminate the small, twitchy muscles in the hands and wrists that often lead to inconsistent contact - the jabs, pushes, and flips that plague so many golfers. By creating a unified movement where your arms and shoulders work as a single, connected unit, you create a wider, more stable arc. This stability is the foundation for consistency, whether you're standing over a three-foot putt or hitting a 50-yard pitch shot.

Start Here: Mastering the Putting Pendulum

The putting green is the purest laboratory for the pendulum motion. With no need for immense power, you can focus entirely on rhythm, stroke length, and solid contact. For many players, mastering this feeling on the greens makes it easier to apply elsewhere.

Step 1: Build Your Triangle

Your setup is the foundation of a great putting stroke. We’re aiming to create a stable structure that can move back and forth without changing its shape.

• Stand with your feet about shoulder-width apart, with your weight balanced evenly between both feet.
• Let your arms hang comfortably from your shoulders. Your hands should be directly below your shoulders.
• Grip the putter, and you will notice that your shoulders, arms, and hands form a distinct triangle. This triangle is your entire putting engine. Your goal during the stroke is to maintain the shape of this triangle from start to finish.

Avoid any tension. Your grip pressure should be light, and your arms should feel relaxed, not stiff. A tight grip encourages the hands and wrists to become too active.

Step 2: Let the Shoulders Rock

Once you are set up, the motion itself is surprisingly simple. The pendulum putting stroke is not powered by your hands or wrists. It is powered entirely by the gentle rocking of your shoulders.

• Your lower body and head should remain completely still. They are the anchor for your stroke.
• Initiate the backstroke by rocking your shoulders. Think of moving the entire triangle unit - shoulders, arms, and hands - together as one piece.
• Allow the putter to swing through the ball with the same smooth, rocking motion of your shoulders. You are not "hitting" the ball, you are simply allowing the putter to swing through the space where the ball is.

The key here is that the length of your backstroke dictates the distance of your putt. A short putt requires a short, rocking motion. A long lag putt requires a longer, smoother rocking motion. The tempo remains the same, only the length of the arc changes. This is how you develop reliable distance control.

Simple Drill: The Forearm Clamp

To really feel the connection, take an alignment stick (or even an extra club) and press it against your forearms as you take your putting grip. Then, try to make a putting stroke. If your wrists break or your arms move independently, the stick will fall. This drill forces you to keep the triangle intact and use your shoulders as the engine, ingraining the feel of a true pendulum stroke.

Extend the Pendulum to Your Short Game

Once you've felt the pendulum on the putting green, extending it to your chipping and pitching is a natural progression. The fundamental principle is exactly the same: a bigger engine for a longer shot.

Pendulum Chipping

For a basic chip shot, think of the motion as a slightly larger putting stroke. You'll introduce just a tiny bit of body rotation and a minuscule amount of natural wrist hinge.

• Setup: Stand with a narrower stance, feet closer together, with about 60-70% of your weight on your lead foot. This encourages you to strike down on the ball. Your hands should be slightly ahead of the clubhead.
• The Motion: Just like with putting, the power comes from a rocking of the shoulders and a small turn of your torso. Because the club is longer and the swing is bigger, your wrists will hinge just a tiny bit on the backswing, but you should not try to force it. It's a passive hinge caused by the momentum of the clubhead. On the way through, your body keeps turning toward the target, pulling the club and arms with it.

The "triangle" you formed in putting remains intact. Your chest, arms, and club move back and through together, finishing with your chest facing the target.

Pendulum Pitching

For pitch shots (typically 30-70 yards), we're just creating an even bigger pendulum. The backswing goes higher - from waist-high to chest-high - and the body rotation becomes much more significant. It's the primary power source.

• Setup: Your stance widens back toward shoulder-width to create a stable base for a bigger turn. Your weight is still balanced or slightly favors the front foot.
• The Motion: The swing is a rotation of the shoulders and hips. As you take the club back, your body turn will naturally allow your wrists to hinge more significantly, setting the club. The downswing is initiated by the unwinding of your lower body, which allows the arms and club to drop into the slot and just "swing" through impact. You are not trying to create speed with a frantic chop from your arms, you are letting the speed generate from your body's a smooth, powerful unwind.

Feeling the Pendulum in Your Full Swing

While a full swing isn't a literal gravity-based pendulum, applying its feeling and principles can drastically simplify your motion and add consistency. It's about moving from being a "hitter" of the ball to a "swinger" of the club.

The core concept is this: your body's rotation is the engine, and your arms and the club are the weighted end of the pendulum. You don’t force the club into position, you let your body’s turn smoothly deliver it through the impact zone.

1. The Rhythmic Takeaway

A jerky takeaway that relies on the hands kills the pendulum feel before it even starts. Instead, initiate your backswing by turning your torso - your chest and shoulders. Feel as if you are moving the club, arms, and upper body away from the ball in one smooth piece. This promotes a wide, on-plane start to your swing.

2. The Downswing Drop

This is where the magic happens. Many amateurs start the downswing by firing their arms and shoulders from the top, resulting in an "over-the-top" move and a weak slice. To maintain the pendulum feel, the downswing must start from the ground up.

After you complete your backswing rotation, initiate the downswing with a slight shift of your weight to your lead foot and a turning of your hips. This "unwinding" of the lower body creates space and lag, allowing your arms and the club to simply fall or drop into the slot behind you. It should feel effortless, like gravity is helping you. You’re not pulling the handle down, you're letting it be pulled down by your body’s rotation.

3. Swinging Through the Ball

The logical conclusion of this smooth, body-powered downswing is that the club just keeps swinging. Amateurs often try to hit *at* the ball, causing deceleration and manipulation through impact. A player with a pendulum feel swings *through* the ball. Their focus is on reaching a full, balanced finish with their chest facing the target. Impact is simply a point on the arc that the club travels through on its way to the finish. This mentality promotes acceleration through the ball and a powerful, free release of the club.

Final Thoughts

The pendulum swing isn’t a complex method, it's a simplification. By focusing on a rhythmic, body-powered motion and keeping the hands and wrists passive, you remove the primary sources of inconsistency in the golf swing. Mastering this feel allows gravity and momentum to become your allies, not your enemies.

Building that consistent feel takes practice, and sometimes you need in-the-moment guidance. Because understanding a concept is one thing, and applying it under pressure on the course is another, we built Caddie AI. If you’re stuck on a tricky lie and unsure how a pendulum-style pitch shot applies, you can snap a photo, and Caddie will give you smart, simple advice on how to play it. It’s like having a 24/7 coach in your pocket to ask for a specific drill or a quick strategy refresh right when you need it most, taking the guesswork out of your game so you can focus on making that smooth, confident swing.