Stop Sliding in Your Downswing for Better Ball Striking

I've stood on hundreds of first tees across the world, watching golfers of every caliber take their opening swings. And there's one movement pattern I see again and again among mid-handicappers that makes me wince before the ball even leaves the clubface: the slide.

You know it when you see it—that excessive lateral lurch toward the target during the downswing that looks more like a baseball player stepping into a pitch than a golfer rotating through the ball. It's subtle enough that most players don't realize they're doing it, but its consequences show up everywhere in their game.

The Hidden Cost of Sliding

GOLF Top 100 Teacher Mark Durland has been diagnosing this issue for years, and he puts it plainly: sliding rather than rotating creates a cascade of problems that seem unrelated on the surface but share a common root.

Poor driver performance? Often the slide. Inconsistent iron compression that leaves you wondering why Tuesday's 7-iron felt pure and Thursday's felt thin? The slide again. A steep angle of attack that produces those chunky divots or thin shots that never feel solid? You guessed it. Even that excessively inside-out club path generating blocks and over-hooks—it traces back to too much lateral movement.

Durland explains that the golf swing blends three forces: vertical, lateral, and rotational. Every golfer uses all three to some degree. The trouble starts when these forces fall out of balance, and for the sliding player, there's simply too much lateral movement crowding out the rotation that creates consistent, powerful contact.

A Drill That Makes You Feel the Difference

I've always believed that the best instruction doesn't just tell you what to do—it makes you feel the difference between wrong and right. Durland's drill does exactly that, and you can set it up in your backyard in about thirty seconds.

Here's how it works:

Place an alignment stick through your belt loops, with most of the stick extending out from your lead side (left side for right-handed golfers).
Take a second alignment stick and push it vertically into the ground about a foot behind you, aligned with your lead heel.
Without a club, make a backswing and then rotate through as if you're making a downswing.
Your goal is to have the alignment stick through your belt loops contact the stick in the ground.

Durland notes that for golfers who slide excessively, this drill can be genuinely eye-opening. They're often surprised by how open the pelvis needs to feel through impact. That sensation of true rotation—of the hips unwinding around a relatively stable axis rather than drifting toward the target—is foreign territory for the slider.

The Lead Leg Secret

As you work through this drill, pay particular attention to your lead leg. Durland points out that allowing the lead leg to extend through impact helps the pelvis work up and around rather than continuing its lateral march toward the target.

This upward movement carries an often-overlooked benefit: it helps shallow your angle of attack. For players who've been fighting a steep, divot-gouging descent into the ball, proper lead-leg action might be the missing piece.

Balance, Not Elimination

The goal here isn't to eliminate lateral movement from your swing entirely—some lateral shift is natural and necessary. The aim is to create a better balance between lateral and rotational forces. Think of it as turning the dial down on one and up on the other until they work in harmony.

If you're sliding excessively, replacing some of that lateral motion with rotation can improve your club path, angle of attack, and contact throughout the entire bag—from driver to wedge.

The Takeaway

I've played courses where the turf was so perfect that a well-struck iron felt like butter, and courses where hardpan fairways demanded absolute precision. In both cases, the players who thrived were the ones who rotated rather than slid. Durland's alignment stick drill offers a simple, feel-based way to join their ranks. Set it up, make some swings without a ball, and let your body learn what rotation actually feels like. Your ball striking will thank you.