Finding The Slot Position

‘The Slot’ is a term professionals use to describe the positioning of the club in relation to the arms at a specific part of the downswing. Consistently finding the slot will help you to dramatically increase your distance and accuracy for your irons and woods.Amateurs tend to have problems finding this position due to an …

‘The Slot’ is a term professionals use to describe the positioning of the club in relation to the arms at a specific part of the downswing. Consistently finding the slot will help you to dramatically increase your distance and accuracy for your irons and woods.Amateurs tend to have problems finding this position due to an improper transition at the top, or a poor swing path.

When watching players on tour and comparing their backswing and downswing shaft angles, for most you will notice a trend. Their downswing angles are much flatter. A fine example is the difference between these two images of my swing. You can clearly see how flatter I am coming into impact. This difference comes from the proper uncoiling of the hips and body coming into impact and the speed at which the club is moving.

slot finding fix

slot finding fixes

The slot can be seen in the second image. My arms create close to a right angle in this position; if you can find your club intersecting anywhere between your arms in this position you’ve found the slot. Another important note is that my club is still quite upright and my wrists have yet to un-cock. These two features are the crucial to finding the ideal slot position.

An added bonus of the slot position is it creates an incredible amount of lag while maintaining the tension created by the rotation of your shoulders versus your hips (also known as Jim McLean’s X-Factor). This combination greatly increases the amount of power you can generate.

Coming over-the-top means the club is attacking the ball very steeply… the exact opposite of what we see going on in the image at right. So in short, if you pull the ball consistently, you will not find the slot. The only way to find it is to properly sequence your downswing (ie. hips and lower body first, followed by the arms dropping down and body rotating) and attacking the ball from the inside into impact.

Give this a try on the range with a video camera and start hitting the ball further with more accuracy!