Golf Swing Basics: The Fundamentals You Need to Know

If you’re just getting started with the game of golf, don’t get frustrated or overwhelmed too quickly. There’s a lot of information out there on how to swing a golf club. It can be a little difficult to sort through what’s right, what’s wrong, and what’s optional.

We’re going to go through all the golf swing basics that a beginner needs to know. The goal is to give you a clear list of simple things you need to focus on at first. As you progress in the game, you might seek out more advanced and complex instruction, but for now, here’s a great place to start.

We’ll divide this up into few different sections. The first three (grip, aim, stance, and stance & posture) are all about the pre-swing set-up and the next three (backswing, downswing, and finish) are all about the swing.

Beginner's Guide to the Golf Swing

Let’s divide the swing into two parts to keep things simple, the pre-swing and the actual movement we all think of as a golf swing. Make sure you don’t just gloss over the pre-swing. Mistakes made there will compound into big errors in the actual swing.

The Pre-Swing

The Grip

The first thing you need to do is get a good grip on the golf club. Your hands are the only part of your body that comes into contact with the club, so you need to make sure it’s done correctly. If done correctly, it’ll help the rest of your swing work properly.

Open your front hand (left for a right-handed golfer), so the palm is facing out.
Lay the grip of the club diagonally across your fingers, starting at the tip of your pointer finger and going across towards the base of your pinkie finger.
Close your hand around the grip.
Lift the club up in the air and try to swing it like a hammer. If your club is too much in the palm then it’ll be difficult to control, but if it’s correctly in your fingers then it’ll be more controllable. This is a good way to check your first hand.
Take your other hand and touch your pinkie and thumb together. This will create a “pit” in the palm of your hand. Imagine that “pit” is a hotdog bun and the thumb on your first hand is the hotdog.
Put your second hand on the club, so that the hotdog and bun fit together. Similar to your first hand, make sure the grip is in your fingers, not palm.
After that, you’ll want to get the positioning correct. Both of your thumbs and base of your pointer-fingers should create a “V.” Make sure that both of the “V’s” point, parallel to each other, like arrows towards your back shoulder (right for a right-handed player).

Finally, the pressure of your grip should be not super strong, but not super loose. Imagine you’re holding a tube of toothpaste with the cap off and the opening pointing down. Hold it tight enough that you don’t drop it, but loose enough that no toothpaste comes out of the tube.

Aim

The second thing you’ll need to make sure is correct is your aim. Too many amateur golfers think that they need to aim their body at the target, but that’s not exactly true. You want to aim your club face towards the target and your body parallel left (for a right-handed player) of that.

Before you hit a shot, stand behind the ball, so that the ball is between you and the target.
Find something on the ground, like a piece of dirt, that’s in-line with the ball and the target. Consider that your secondary target. This should only be a couple feet in front of the ball to make it easy to aim.
When you step up to the ball, set your club face, so that it points at that secondary target you’ve chosen. From there, you can set your body up parallel to it.
To set up your body, you’ll first want to focus on your feet. Imagine a line being drawn between your toes and extending infinitely in both directions. That line ought to be parallel to your target line as well as similar lines at your shoulders, forearms, and hips.

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