Feel the Sequence: Three Tour-Tested Drills That Could Transform Your Swing

There's something almost sacred about watching elite players work on their craft. I've stood behind practice ranges from Pebble Beach to St Andrews, and what strikes me every time isn't the raw athleticism—it's the deliberateness. The way a tour pro can isolate a feeling, drill it into muscle memory, and then deploy it under pressure worth millions of dollars.

So when GOLF Top 100 Teacher Tony Ruggiero recently gathered PGA Tour player Rafael Campos and DP World Tour Q-School hopeful Ty Gingerich for a performance session, I paid attention. What emerged wasn't some esoteric sequence reserved for the gifted few. These were three drills that any golfer—yes, including you—can use to find more speed and power.

The Performance Session Philosophy

Ruggiero's approach is collaborative by design. Working alongside Jackson Koert, one of the brightest young instructors in the game, and Kolby Tullier, who trains numerous PGA Tour players from his Florida base, the session combined golf instruction with fitness and strategy in real time.

"Instead of one coach trying to cover everything, we combine what each of us sees best and put it in front of the player at the same time," Ruggiero explains.

That multi-perspective approach produced three drills that cut to the heart of what separates elite ball-strikers from the rest of us: sequencing, ground force, and spatial awareness.

Drill One: Assisted and Resisted Rotation

The first drill addresses something most amateurs misunderstand completely: what it actually means to "load" into your backswing.

Here's how it works. A strap loops around the player's shoulders while their arms stay crossed over the chest. The coach pulls one direction to help the player load into the trail leg, building real tension there. Then the pull reverses, forcing the player to brake against it rather than simply running out of turn.

This is where things get interesting. Most players think braking means getting to the top and waiting for the arms to catch up. That's backwards, according to Ruggiero. The energy has to come up through the ground first.

Do this drill correctly, and you'll feel your lead shoulder rotate all the way over your trail foot at the top. There's a genuine stretch you can hold for a count before starting down—a sensation most weekend warriors have never experienced.

Drill Two: Sequence Isolation

The second drill targets the transition itself, that critical millisecond that separates tour-quality strikes from everything else.

Ruggiero holds the other end of a strap and physically pulls the player into the transition, ensuring the left hip becomes the first thing that moves—not the hands, not the shoulders.

I'll be honest with you: this is going to feel deeply strange for most golfers. Many have literally never made a swing without throwing the club and hands out first. It's instinctive, hard-wired, and almost universally wrong.

You can recreate this at home with a partner and a resistance band. Have them pull you toward the target right as you start down, then pay attention to what leads. If your hands win that race instead of your hip, the band makes it obvious immediately. No guessing, no video analysis required—just instant, undeniable feedback.

Drill Three: The Electric Fence

The final drill is Ruggiero's personal favorite, and the name alone should tell you something about its effectiveness.

The setup is simple. Hold a foam roller or alignment stick just in front of your hips as you make slow-motion downswings. The constraint forces you to turn your hips correctly—the left one must move around and back, creating space for the downswing to happen.

Here's the genius: if you pitch forward or spin out, you'll hit the roller immediately. No instructor needed to point out your flaw. The foam roller becomes an impartial judge, catching your body's tendency to cheat its way to the ball.

I've seen versions of this drill across three continents, from dusty driving ranges in the Australian outback to pristine academies in Scotland. The principle is universal—give the body a physical boundary, and it figures out the correct movement on its own.

The Takeaway

What I love about these three drills is their accessibility. You don't need a $50,000 launch monitor or a biomechanics lab. You need a strap, a willing friend, and perhaps a foam roller.

The deeper lesson, though, is about sequence. Every amateur wants more speed, but speed without sequence is just violence against the golf ball. These drills teach your body to fire in the right order—ground up, hip leading hands, rotation creating space.

Rafael Campos competes against the best players on Earth. Ty Gingerich is grinding toward his tour card. And yet the drills they're using to prepare are the same ones you could try in your backyard this weekend.

That's the beautiful democracy of improvement. The path to better golf isn't hidden behind some velvet rope. It's right there, waiting for anyone willing to feel a little strange for a while.