Pull Slice in Golf (Get Rid of The Pull Slice For Good, Causes & Fixes)
As a golfer, I tend to expect a golf ball to go straight, left or right. However, when a pull slice comes up, the ball goes left first before it takes a big swing to the right. It’s a lot to take in!
If you are struggling with a pull slice and would rather just hit shots straight down the middle, I’ll show you what you can do to adjust your swing and get the pull slice fixed.
As a little hint, I’ll tell you that a lot of this has to do with your wrist position in your golf swing.
How to Fix a Pull Slice in Golf – In Short
To fix a pull slice in golf, start with your clubface square to the target at address and ensure that your ball position is centered. Your backswing should start with the hips turning back and very little extension being added to your lead wrist position.
From the top, let your lead hip start the downswing and ensure your lead wrist is moving more from an open position to a closed position. At impact, the wrist needs to be flexed in order for the clubface to be square.
Lastly, ensure your swing path is a little more inside to out as opposed to outside to in to encourage that right to left shaping.
Contents
Why Am I Hitting A Pull Slice?
Before I teach you how to fix a slice, I will run through the causes of this undesirable shape. There are 4 core reasons you hit a slice shot, starting with your setup and ending with your club path through impact.
1. What do you want to improve in your full swing?
1. Left Alignment
The first cause of a pull slice could stem from your alignment. You’re setting yourself up to swing inside through impact and cut across your body if you’re constantly aiming to the left of your intended target. This leaves the clubface open to the path.
The outcome of aiming excessively left of your target is an open clubface to your path through impact. Your setup prompts ball flight to the left of your target, while the open clubface to the path creates the left-to-right curve that leads to a slice shot.
2. Ball Too Forward in Your Stance
Placing the ball excessively forward for your club length forces you to stretch out and reach for the ball. This action prompts you to cast the club at the top of your backswing and swing from the outside in, resulting in cutting across your body.
Following this direction complicates your ability to release your hands through impact and square the clubface. The result is an open face to the path and a ball that starts left before changing course and slicing right.
3. Casting From the Top
Casting from the top of your swing starts your club on an outside-to-inside path on the downswing. This eventually causes the clubface to cut across your body on the way down and remain open to the swing path at contact.
Casting is caused by your shoulders initiating the transition from the top of your backswing down instead of your hips. When your shoulders make the first move, it propels your clubhead over the top from the outside, sending it on an inside line down to contact.
Since casting causes your club to follow an outside path, your club cuts across your body, and your face remains open to the swing path. The outcome is a shot that viciously slices to the right after lift-off.
4. Out to In Swing Path
The out-to-in swing path in a pull slice is caused by activating shoulder movement too early in the downswing and casting your club. An out-to-in swing doesn’t guarantee a pull slice, but it does send your club face on the path most likely to generate the undesirable shape.
An out-to-in swing path means your club starts from the outside at the top of the swing due to casting. Once your body is in this position, it is challenging to correct the club path. Instead, you send it downwards and left.
To correct the club path, you leave your clubface closed to the target but open to the swing path at impact. This angle prompts your ball to shoot off the face to the left, but your open clubface to the path imparts the right curve on the ball, and your shot slices to the right of your target.
5. Excess Wrist Extension
By tinkering with my HackMotion sensor, I found that my wrists were extended at impact whenever I sliced the ball. Cupping my wrists into contact caused me to steepen my attack angle and open the clubface relative to the swing path, causing my ball to slice to the right.
To better understand wrist extension, hold your hand out flat in front of you, with your palms facing the floor. Now lift your fingers upwards until the back of your fingers aligns with your eye, producing wrist extension.
Next, maintain the wrist extension and reposition your hand as if you’re preparing to shake an opponent’s hand. You’ll notice your palms are open to the target, which is what happens to your clubface when you extend your wrists.
1. What do you want to improve in your full swing?
6. Clubface Open to The Path
Steps 1 through 3 are all possible causes for why your clubface may sit open to the path at impact. However, your clubface angle at impact has the final say in the shape of your golf shot.
Players suffering from a pull slice leave the face open to the path at contact, prompting a right-shaping shot. In this instance, a golfer swinging leftwards through impact will see their clubface pointing further right of this path.
With the clubface traveling in one direction and the clubface aiming in the other, you launch your ball to the left before the slice spin kicks in and sends your ball right.
Read More: How to Stop Pushing a Golf Ball.
How Do You Fix a Pull Slice in Golf?
1. Clubface Square to Target at Address
The first action I take when I’ve developed a pull slice is to check that my clubface is square to the target at address.
In addition, I ensure that my toes point parallel to the target to discourage an inside path through impact and produce a straighter launch.
When I think I am aligned with my target, I look down at my clubface and draw an imaginary straight line. If it points to the left or right of the intended target, I adjust the clubface until it is square to my starting line.
2. Progressive Ball Placement
If my alignment is on point, I check my ball position and ensure it’s not too far forward in the stance. Follow a progressive setup, depending on the shaft length you swing.
The furthest forward your ball should sit is on the inside of your lead heel for drives. Since the ball is teed up, you need to strike it marginally after the low point of your swing to launch it. Next, fairway wood and hybrid shots off the deck perform best with a forward-center setup.
Next, I move the ball an inch back from its fairway wood position for long iron strikes and place it in the center for my mid and short irons. Finally, I set the ball up back of center for wedge strikes.
3. Forward Shaft Tilt
I always employ forward shaft lean at address to give me the feel of where my hands should be through impact. When my hands lead, I am more likely to generate lag, shallow the club, and close it slightly into contact.
The closed face relative to my path executes a marginal right-to-left curve opposite to the shape of a pull slice. Forward shaft lean doesn’t guarantee a clean strike, but it prepares you for the task ahead.
4. Hip Rotation Drops Your Club Into Place
Avoid leading with your shoulders from the top of the backswing, as they will cause you to cast the club and swing from the outside in. Instead, I commence my downswing by activating my hip rotation and shifting weight from my back leg forward.
Rotating my hips at the top causes the club to drop into place on the inside, allowing me to produce an outside path. This causes your golf ball to start to the right of the target and requires a slightly closed clubface into contact to work your ball left towards the target.
5. Add Wrist Flex
The final piece on how to stop a pull slice lies in your wrist flexion or bowing. Start by holding out your hand as if you’re going to shake a buddy’s hand.
If you push your fingers towards the target, you notice that your palm ends in a closed position to the target. This position is a consequence of wrist bowing or flexion, which causes you to close your clubface and shallow the shaft, enabling an outside swing path down to contact.
The HackMotion wrist sensor guides amateur golfers to optimize wrist angles from address through impact.
How to Fix Your Pull Slice with HackMotion
HackMotion wrist sensor is the perfect tool to fix a pull slice because it can bring attention to the aspects of your wrist motion in your swing that are incorrect. HackMotion breaks down wrist motion to set up, top of the backswing, and impact.
To fix a pull hook, you will need to work on all three of these areas of the game
Here are a few of the best HackMotion drills for working on your pull slice in golf.
Wear Your HackMotion to Collect Data
Do you honestly know where your wrist position is at the top of your backswing? I didn’t until I started working with the HackMotion. Wrist position is difficult to measure without this sensor, and although it can be seen in video, you have no real indication as to how far off you are.
Golf has no perfect wrist positions. However, we can use patterns to fix your pull slice.
Collect data so that you can determine where the issues causing your pull slice are originating. For most golfers, the issue is too much extension at the top of the backswing.
Use Audio Feedback with the HackMotion Swing Analyzer
Now that you have some data, we can look at the pull slice and the patterns that players normally see.
After analyzing more than 1,000,000 golf swings, we know that the best golfers start with a small amount of extension in their wrists. As they swing to the top, they do not add any extension; from the backswing down to the golf ball, all extension is lost, and instead, golfers move towards flexion in the lead wrist.
The impact position should be considerably less extended (more towards flexion) than the address position.
The audio feedback on your HackMotion swing analyzer can be set to notify you when your wrist position is incorrect. The pull slice usually occurs because of an incorrect moment at the top of your swing.
With audio feedback mode, you can finally identify the EXACT timing that the mistake occurs.
The biofeedback mode on your HackMotion wrist sensor is one of the only golf training devices that allows you to work on your swing in the middle of a shot.
Half Swing Check / Pre Shot Thoughts
The HackMotion works in real-time. Therefore, you can use it to check your position as you are taking practice swings.
Setup at the range with your phone or iPad in a position that you can see what the HackMotion is saying. As you swing back and through the ball, look at how your wrist position changes and what it takes to get into that flexion point at impact.
If you can do that, your clubface will be square, and the chance of you swinging more from the inside out is also going to be possible.
Combine these half swing shots and checks with the proper body rotation and turning, and you will be well on your way to eliminating the pull slice.
1. What do you want to improve in your full swing?
Final Thoughts
The pull slice is a shot that has to go; there is just too much going on to feel confident with your ability to hit the center of the fairway.
Start with aligning your clubface to the target and induce progressive ball placement. Next, implement forward shaft tilt in your setup and use the HackMotion to get your wrists in the right position.
Finally, initiate your transition to the downswing by optimizing hip rotation and employing wrist flex prior to impact.
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