That crisp, compressed feeling of a perfectly struck iron shot is what brings us all back to the golf course. It’s the shot where the divot appears on the target side of where the ball used to be. To get that feeling, you have to move the bottom of your golf swing forward. This article will show you exactly how to do that by breaking down the key moves that get your low point ahead of the ball for pure contact, shot after shot.
Imagine your club head swinging on a giant hula hoop angled down towards the ground. The very lowest point of that hoop, where it comes closest to the turf, is your "swing bottom" or "low point." For great iron play, that low point must happen after the golf ball.
When you watch a professional, you'll see a distinct sequence: their club strikes the ball first, compressing it against the clubface, and then it continues downward to brush the turf, taking a shallow divot in front of where the ball was. The sound is a dense "thump-click."
Most amateur golfers struggle with the opposite. Their swing bottoms out too early, so the low point is behind the ball. This causes two major problems:
If you're constantly battling fat and thin shots, you don't have a swing problem - you have a low-point problem. Shifting that low point just a few inches forward is the difference between frustrating inconsistency and that feeling of pure ball striking.
Before we get into the "how," let's address the "why." For a huge number of golfers, the low point stays back because of a deep-seated misunderstanding of how a golf ball gets into the air. They believe they need to help or "scoop" the ball up.
Instinct tells you to stay on your back foot, tilt your shoulders back, and use your hands to "lift" the ball. This is a survival move, but a disastrous one for your golf swing. It forces the club to bottom out early. You are essentially trying to do the golf club's job for it.
Here’s the truth: You don't lift the ball, the club's loft does. Your only job is to deliver the clubhead downward and through the ball. By presenting the club with a downward angle of attack, you allow the grooves and the loft to grip the ball and send it up into the air with spin. The sooner you can trust the club to do its job, the sooner you'll commit to the moves that get your swing bottom in the right place.
Moving your swing bottom forward isn't one single action, but a sequence of moves. Think of it less as one big, complex thought and more as three simple steps you can learn and feel.
The transition from backswing to downswing is where most golfers go wrong. When the instinct to "hit" the ball kicks in, they fire their arms and shoulders from the top. This throws the clubhead out and away from the body - a move called "casting" or an "over-the-top" motion - and it sets the low point far behind the ball.
The correct move is for the downswing to start from the ground up. Before your hands and arms do a thing, your first move should be a gentle shift of pressure and a small lateral slide of your hips toward the target.
How to feel it:
This is not a giant, aggressive lunge. It's a subtle but powerful first domino to fall. By shifting your weight and center forward first, you create space for your arms to swing down from the inside and guarantees that your club will be traveling downward as it approaches the ball.
Once you’ve made that initial shift forward, your body’s rotation becomes the engine. If the lower body shift puts you in position, the body rotation is what delivers the power and pulls the club through impact bottoming out ahead of the ball.
If your body stops turning, your arms and hands have no choice but to take over. They will flick at the ball in an attempt to generate speed, once again ruining your low point and sacrificing all consistency.
The goal is to feel like your chest and belt buckle are facing the target at the finish. This proves your body has rotated all the way through the shot.
A great way to connect this move:
This feeling of being "pulled" through the shot by your core rotation, rather than "pushing" with your arms, is foundational to a forward swing bottom.
You’ve probably heard of "lag." It often sounds like some mystical move reserved for the pros. In reality, lag is simply the result of doing the first two steps correctly. It's not something you have to force.
When you initiate your downswing with the lower body shift and then rotate your core aggressively, your arms and wrists will naturally trail behind. The angle you created in your wrists during the backswing is "maintained" for longer. This is lag. When you maintain this angle, the clubhead reaches its maximum speed through the impact zone, right where you want the low point to be.
Trying to consciously "hold the angle" often leads to tension and worse results. Instead, focus on a smooth sequence: Shift, Turn, and Release. The weight shift and the body turn work together to keep the hands ahead of the clubhead, delivering that downward blow that good players all have.
Knowing is one thing, but feeling it is another. Take these simple drills to the range to ingrain the correct pattern and move your swing bottom forward for good.
This is the simplest and most effective drill.
This exaggerates the feel of dynamic weight transfer.
This gives you immediate feedback on a mishit.
Learning how to move the bottom of your golf swing forward simply means learning the proper sequence of weight shift and body rotation. Stop trying to lift the ball and learn to trust that a downward strike with the proper body motion is what creates pure contact and a soaring ball flight.
Perfecting these mechanics on the range is one thing, but taking them to the course is the real test. That's where we designed Caddie AI to help. When you're standing over a tricky lie in the rough and unsure if you need to hit down on it or pick it clean, you can snap a photo and get instant advice. Our AI analyzes the situation and gives you the exact kind of feedback a real-world tour caddie would, so you can commit to your swing with confidence and keep applying the right fundamentals when they matter most.
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