Don’t listen to this ‘disastrous’ golf advice, says Peter Kostis

Anyone who has played the game has probably heard some version of this advice: “Keep your head down!“

While the advice is well-meaning, and intended to keep players from lifting up through impact and topping the ball, one top instructor says it’s advice you shouldn’t bother following, and in fact, doing so is “disastrous.”

“There may not be anything any worse than, ‘Hey, keep your head down,” said GOLF Top 100 Teacher Peter Kostis on the latest episode of Kostis and Gary McCord’s “Off Their Rockers” podcast, a GOLF Production. “Keeping your head down is disastrous.”

Why is this such bad advice? According to Kostis, it has to do with the makeup of your spine.

“Your spine consists of three parts: You got the lumbar spine, you got the thoracic spine and you’ve got the cervical spine,” Kostis said. “And if you keep your head down, you’ve locked your cervical spine. What’s that gonna do? It’s gonna reduce your ability to turn back. And if you really keep it down coming forward, you’re not gonna have any kind of follow through to speak of.”

To avoid this, Kostis recommends keeping the head relatively still in space, but still rotating through impact, which he demonstrates by using a long stick.

“I’m gonna get my head just against this stick, get my posture set up,” he said. “So now I’ve set my spine angle, I’ve set my head position behind the golf ball. Now, what am I gonna do? Well, I’m gonna rotate my head a little bit to the right preset it so that I can make my full turn. Then as I come forward, I’m gonna stay back with the head to there. And then as I swing through, I’m gonna let my head rotate.”

As Kostis demonstrates, using the stick in this way will train you to allow the head to rotate in line with the swing, without moving up or down, side to side or back to front.

“This allows me to keep my spine angle coming forward and allows me to release the club from underneath me rather than from around me,” Kostis said. “Just like any other sport, you want to keep your eye on the ball.”

But instead of focusing on watching the your club hit the ball, think about letting your head rotate naturally though impact.

“That’s the only way that you can complete your follow through,” Kostis said.

To watch a video of Kostis’ tip, check out the full episode of “Off Their Rockers” below.

Golf.com Editor

As a four-year member of Columbia’s inaugural class of female varsity golfers, Jessica can out-birdie everyone on the masthead. She can out-hustle them in the office, too, where she’s primarily responsible for producing both print and online features, and overseeing major special projects, such as GOLF’s inaugural Style Is­sue, which debuted in February 2018. Her origi­nal interview series, “A Round With,” debuted in November of 2015, and appeared in both in the magazine and in video form on GOLF.com.