Daily Video Blog

Is Your Takeaway Ruining Your Swing Before It Starts?
Is Your Takeaway Ruining Your Swing Before It Starts?
Authored by: Brady
Posted on: 5 May 2026

You've probably been told your whole golfing life that you need to keep moving before you swing. Waggle, forward press, rock the knee — whatever it takes, just don't stand still. Surge heard that too. He just never agreed with it.

His thing was this: if you're pressing forward to start a swing that needs to go backward, how do you make that feel exactly the same every time? With every club, every lie, every round? After a while, you start to realize — you can't. That little forward move changes just enough, just often enough, to mess with your timing without you ever knowing why.

What Surge taught instead was to come to a full stop before starting the swing. Feet planted, waggle done, one last look at the target — then still. From there, a simple three-count: squeeze the grip equal in both hands, press the knees out slightly, and go. The toe of the club moves first, the arms follow, and the club finds its way back up the plane. Nothing fancy, just quiet and controlled... Read More

Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 15 January 2012
Comments: 62
Last month Steve Smith made a comment in the blog about the importance of keeping your head still in the backswing that I think is important for everyone to hear. "Many golfers have their head and... Read More
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 14 January 2012
Comments: 127
Three weeks ago I did a piece on Hitting Knockdowns The Correct Way and it generated a good back-and-forth dialogue on the blog. Here's an exchange from that day between frequent commenter Keith Kent... Read More
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 12 January 2012
Comments: 119
Richard Griffith wrote me a very good email a few weeks back and asked a question about one of my basic tenets of the Surge Swing: "Don't Hit Down!". "Dear Surge, I have been devoted to the Surge... Read More
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 9 January 2012
Without a doubt, the portion of the swing that generates the most questions to me is The Bump. Regardless of how many times I have covered this topic from any number of conceptual angles, someone... Read More
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 7 January 2012
Comments: 83
Last fall, I got this short question from Harley Ruth, a Surgite of "an advanced age" who lives down in the San Antonio area. "When I was much younger, I hit the ball around 300 yards. Now, at my... Read More
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 6 January 2012
As you all know, I like to cruise the comments in the blog to keep my finger on the pulse of the Surge Nation. Two weeks ago, frequent commenter, Kevin McGarrahan, posted this self-diagnosis of some... Read More
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 5 January 2012
If you can't view the YouTube video above try CLICKING HERE. You must allow popups from this site for the link to work.
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 5 January 2012
If you can't view the YouTube video above try CLICKING HERE. You must allow popups from this site for the link to work.
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 4 January 2012
Comments: 81
I spent the quiet time between Christmas and New Year's reading the blog and catching up with some of the conversations that have taken place recently. I do this regularly because I find that it's a... Read More
Authored by: Don Trahan
Posted on: 4 January 2012
Comments: 56
Today's tip comes from a question that Mike O'Shay, of County Limerick in beautiful Ireland, posed to me a few weeks ago. "Hello, I have totally bought into the Surge Swing and am getting into the... Read More