How to Stop Picking Up the Golf Ball

Nothing ruins a good round faster than the dreaded topped shot. You swing with power, expecting that satisfying thwack, but instead you catch the top half of the ball, sending it skipping a frustrating 30 yards down the fairway. The common advice you hear is always, you picked your head up! but fixing it is never that simple. This article will show you the real reasons you’re lifting up in your swing and give you concrete, actionable steps and drills to keep your body down through the shot, leading to pure, consistent contact.

Why "Keep Your Head Down" Is Terrible Advice

Let's get this out of the way first. While your head does come up when you top a golf ball, the head movement is a symptom, not the cause. Forcing your head to stay buried down long after the ball is gone is one of the most counterproductive things you can do in a golf swing. Players who obsess over keeping their head down often end up restricting their body's rotation, which is the true engine of the swing. When your shoulders stop turning, your arms have to take over, leading to a weak, disconnected motion.

Think about the best players in the world. As they swing through impact, their chest and shoulders are rotating open towards the target. To do this, their head must also rotate and release naturally with the rest of their body. They aren’t staring at a patch of grass once the ball is gone. The goal isn't to lock your head in place, it's to maintain your posture and the "height" of your body as you rotate through the ball. The real issue has nothing to do with your eyes and everything to do with your spine.

The Real Culprit: Losing Your Posture

The root cause of "picking up" is losing your forward tilt, or what's known in coaching as your spine angle. At setup, you create a specific angle by bending forward from your hips. A good golf swing rotates around this spine angle, almost like a spinning top. The club moves up, around, and back down on a consistent arc because the center of the rotation - your spine - remains stable.

When you lift up during the downswing, you're not just lifting your head, you are prematurely straightening your spine and your legs. This move is often called "early extension." Your hips push forward towards the golf ball instead of rotating out of the way. When your body stands up, the low point of your swing arc rises with it. If it rises just a little, you hit the ball thin. If it rises a lot, you top it or miss it completely. Your brain instinctively knows you're going to crash into the ball, so it stands up to create space. This is a survival move, not a powerful golf motion.

A great mental image is to imagine you’re swinging with your back against a wall. A good player's rear end would stay in contact with that wall throughout the backswing and much of the downswing. A player who "lifts up" would see their hips move forward off the wall at the start of their downswing.

Building a Foundation: A Stable Setup for Success

You can't maintain a good posture in the swing if you never had it in the first place. A stable, athletic setup is the non-negotiable foundation for staying down through the shot. This might feel bizarre at first because it’s a posture we don’t use in everyday life, but it's essential for creating space for your body to rotate powerfully.

Follow these steps to build a solid setup:

1. Bend from the Hips: Stand with your feet about shoulder-width apart. Instead of slumping over, focus on pushing your hips and glutes straight back, as if you were about to sit down in a high bar-stool. Your chest will naturally tilt forward over the ball, but keep your back relatively straight. This hip hinge is fundamental.
2. Let Your Arms Hang: From this hinged position, let your arms hang down naturally from your shoulders. They shouldn’t feel like they are reaching for the ball. Where they hang is where your hands should grip the club. This ensures you are a proper distance away from the ball and creates the space your arms will swing through. If they feel jammed into your body, you haven't hinged enough from your hips.
3. Introduce a Soft Knee Flex: With your hips back and your spine tilted, add a slight, athletic flex in your knees. You should feel stable and balanced, with your weight centered over the middle of your feet, ready to move in any direction. Avoid squatting down too much, the main bend should come from your hips.

Don't be surprised if this feels overly athletic or even a little silly. Many amateurs stand too tall and too close to the ball. When they adopt this proper posture, they feel very "bent over," but when they see themselves on video, they realize they finally look like a serious golfer. Embrace this feeling - it’s the posture that allows for a rotational swing.

The Correct Downswing Move to Stay Low

The moment of truth happens in the first fraction of a second of the downswing. Most amateurs who lift up start the downswing with their upper body. They swing their arms and shoulders aggressively from the top, causing the club to come "over the top." With the club moving out and away from them, their body's only option is to stand up and pull in to avoid hitting the ground behind the ball.

To stop this, you need to learn the correct downswing sequence, which starts from the ground up.

Step 1: The Shift

Before you do anything with your arms or shoulders, the very first move from the top of the backswing is a small but definite shift of pressure onto your front foot. If you are a right-handed golfer, this feels like your left hip moves an inch or two towards the target. This subtle move does two powerful things: it drops the club into the correct "slot" on the inside, and it ensures your momentum is moving toward the target. This forward move is what allows you to make contact with the ball first, then the turf - the classic sign of a compressed iron shot.

Step 2: The Turn

Only after this initial shift does the rotation begin. With your weight starting to transfer forward, you can now begin to forcefully unwind your body. The hips lead the way, rotating open toward the target. Your torso and shoulders follow, pulling the arms and the club through the impact zone. Because you shifted forward first, your body will now rotate while staying in its posture. There is no need for your brain's "survival move" of standing up, because the club is approaching the ball from the inside and on a shallow path.

This "shift-then-turn" sequence is the heartbeat of a good golf swing and the direct antidote to early extension.

Drills to Ingrain the Feeling

Understanding these concepts is one thing, feeling them is another. Here are a few simple drills to help you train your body to stay down through the shot.

1. The Chair Drill

This is the best way to get instant feedback on early extension. Set up so your rear end is just touching a chair or your golf bag. As you make your backswing, your right glute (for a righty) should stay connected. The key is in the downswing. As you shift and turn, your goal is to have your left glute then work its way back to touch the chair through impact. If your hips move foward and off the chair at the start of the downswing, you’ll know instantly that you’ve stood up.

2. The "Walk Through" Finish Drill

Hit a mid-iron shot at about 70% speed. As soon as you make contact with the ball, take a step forward with your back foot and walk towards your target. It is physically impossible to do this drill if you are hanging back or lifting up. It forces you to get your weight transferring towards the target and promotes a full, committed release where your body continually rotates instead of stalling.

3. The Quarterback Drill

Hold a club across your chest with your arms crossed. Get into your golf posture. Now, simulate your golf swing. As you "swing down," feel your lead hip shift left and your body rotate while keeping your chest pointed down toward where the ball would be. Do this in front of a mirror. You should see your chest and shoulders turn on a tilt, not level off. This trains the core rotational movement of the swing without you getting distracted by the ball.

4. T-Rex Swings

Place a headcover or a glove under both of your armpits. To keep them from falling out, you have to keep your upper arms connected to your chest. Now, try to hitting little pitch shots. You'll quickly discover that the only way to move the club is by rotating your body. You can't lift with your arms or separate your hands from your body. This drill is fantastic for synchronizing your arms with your body rotation, which prevents the disconnected "lift" that causes so many issues.

Final Thoughts

Stopping yourself from picking up the golf ball is not about forcing your head down. It’s about building a stable, athletic setup, and then training an effective downswing sequence where you shift your weight forward before you start rotating. Committing to maintaining your posture allows for a powerful, round-the-body swing that generates compression, consistency, and confidence.

We know that changing a deep-seated swing habit takes trust, especially when you bring it to the course. It’s hard to commit to a new feeling when you are worried about the outcome. That’s where getting simple, objective guidance can make a world of difference. When you get stuck on the course - maybe you're facing a tricky lie or unsure of the strategy - using an AI tool like Caddie AI can give you that clear, unemotional advice you need. A quick check can offer a smart play or a simple tip, taking the guesswork out of the shot and letting you focus on making the confident, committed swing you’ve been practicing.