A lot of golfers grew up hearing the same advice: keep the head down, stay down through impact, and extend the arms as far as possible toward the target. The idea was that more extension meant a longer, lower path through the ball and more power.
Here's the catch. Reaching the arms all the way out pulls the upper body — torso, spine, head — forward with them. Once that much forward lean has happened, getting the club back up into a tall finish becomes a fight. Instead of folding naturally and rising up over the shoulder, the arms get yanked back around and in low, leaving the finish wide and deep.
Two long-time students ran into this not long ago. Both had worked for years on getting up into a clean finish, and both kept ending up a little too wide despite all that work. When the swings were broken down side by side, the cause was identical for both: over-extension through the ball.
One image that's helped a lot of golfers over the years is picturing a 50-pound bag of cement — picking it up, swinging it up and over, and laying it on the shoulder like Santa Claus tossing a sack over his back. That feeling of lifting up and over, rather than reaching out and around, is the key.
The simpler way to think about it: hit the ball and stand up immediately — almost like a pop tart popping out of a toaster. No forced reach, no locked-out arms. Because nothing is being stretched out, the arms fold naturally and rise on their own, the same way a flat rock skips and hops up off the surface of a lake.
The target finish position is the back hand finishing close to the ear — close enough that the hairs on the back of the hand are nearly touching the hairs on the ear. From there, the body can recoil and relax toward the target.
If the finish keeps ending up too wide or too low instead of tall and over the shoulder, over-extension through impact is often the hidden culprit. Letting the arms fold and rise naturally — without forcing that reach — tends to clear it right up, and the payoff is more solid, more accurate contact.
Early season is a good time to get a second set of eyes on a setup, and alignment is one of the most common places things quietly go wrong before the swing even starts. The Ultimate Alignment Video walks through the setup details that affect everything downstream — including how cleanly the swing can fold and rise to the finish.
What's the one finish-position cue that's made the biggest difference for you? Leave a comment below.