Martin Kaymer tuition tips: The Draw

Exclusive tuition tips from US Open 2014 Champion Martin Kaymer – here he explains how he used the Draw in the US PGA in 2010.

Stand tall

Though this is only a medium iron I am still standing relatively tall to the ball. Maintaining your height is important for the draw. To hit this shape you need to develop a shallow angle of attack; with the shoulders rotating at right angles to the spine, the more upright your back, the shallower the swing gets. Feeling my weight back towards my heels also helps keep my turn shallow.

Use the toe

For the draw, I will address the ball off the toe of the club. This encourages me to swing in-to-out through impact – needed to start the ball right of target – to bring the sweetspot into the back of the ball.

Set your lines

The draw starts right of target before curving gently back to it. The ball’s initial direction is controlled by the swing path; the curve through the air is anti-clockwise spin, imparted by a clubface that is slightly closed to the swing path at impact. So much of the work is done at address; by aiming my feet, hips and shoulders right of target – and the clubface between this line and the target – I preset an in-to-out attack with the face a little closed to that line.

Backswing

Use your toe line: As for the fade, I use my feet to help me set the swingpath. My key feeling is to take the club back along my toe line. With my feet closed to the ball-to-target line, if the club moves along this path I know I’ll be in good shape for the inside backswing that helps send the ball right of target.

Throughswing

Feel your right arm extend: Much of the work for the draw was done in the set-up and backswing, but I have one further key feeling – to extend my right arm out to the right of the target on the way through. The in-to-out swing path has been set, but this final thought just helps me ensure the club follows this path until well into the followthrough, and sends the ball right of target.

Here, with the club, you can see how this feeling of right arm extension blends with natural clubface rotation. My forearms are rotating and at this point of the followthrough, with the clubshaft horizontal, the toe is already pointing to the sky. The draw is reliant on the clubface rotating from open to closed through impact, so be sure to mix a feeling of forearm rotation with that sensation of the right arm extension.

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This was originally published in the Feb 2011 issue of Golf World Magazine – click here to subscribe to Golf World.