Symptom
Getting stuck
On the way down the club drops too far behind you and the arms feel trapped, so the shot either blocks straight right or flips hard left.
A ball curves because the face and the path through impact disagree. The flight alone cannot tell you which of the two is out of place, because a face problem and a path problem can produce the same shape, and that is exactly what the questions separate.
Common ways golfers describe this
Club getting stuck behind me
Club drops too far behind me
Getting stuck and blocking it right
Why do I block it right then hook it left?
Swinging too much inside out
- Target line
- Club path
- Clubface
Narrow it to one cause
Each question is here because golfers answer it differently, and that difference is what rules a cause out. Nothing is generated while you answer: every question, cause and fix was written and checked in advance.
A few questions · no account needed
What you will be asked
- When it gets stuck, what does the shot actually do?
- Hold your finish for a count of three. Where is your chest pointing?
- Rest your seat lightly against a wall at address and make slow swings. Does it stay there until after the ball?
- With a mid-iron off grass, which way does the divot point?
- Which clubs feel stuck most often?
Where this can come from
These are the causes this symptom resolves to, in the order they turn up most often. That order is not a diagnosis and it is not your answer: two of them can produce a shot that looks identical from behind. Each has a fix you can read now, whether or not you answer anything.
In-to-out swing path
The club is travelling right of the target line through impact. With the face closed to that path the ball hooks; with the face square to it the ball is pushed straight right and never comes back. It is frequently the residue of an over-applied slice fix, which is why the miss often changes sides rather than disappearing.
Read the fix
Body rotation stalls through impact
The chest and hips stop turning before the ball, so the arms and club are left to catch up on their own. Whatever the hands then do decides the shot: held off, the face arrives open and the ball leaks right; thrown at it, the face turns over and the ball dives left. It is a different fault from a slide, where the body keeps moving but travels instead of turning.
Read the fix
Hips sliding instead of turning
The lower body moves laterally toward the target without rotating. The low point travels forward with it while the path stays right of target and the face is left behind, which is the combination that produces a block one swing and a hook the next.
Read the fix
Face closed at impact
The face points left of where the club is travelling. The ball starts left of the path and keeps turning left, and because a closed face also removes loft, the flight is usually lower and more diving than the golfer expected. The same closed face that produces a playable draw produces a hook once it outruns the path by enough.
Read the fix
Face open at impact
The clubface is pointing right of where the club is travelling when it meets the ball. Start direction is governed almost entirely by where the face points at impact, and the curve comes from how far the face sits open to the path. An open face is why the ball starts right, curves right, and loses height-adjusted distance: loft is effectively added as the face rotates open.
Read the fix
Early extension
The hips push toward the ball through the downswing and the body stands up out of its address posture. The hands and club are forced up and away with it, which moves the low point of the swing arc backwards and upwards. The result is a club that is still rising when it reaches the ball, which is why the strike catches the ball above its equator.
Read the fix
Related symptoms
These are not here because they sound similar. Each one can come from a cause on the list above, which is why fixing one sometimes quietly fixes another. The closest matches are first.
- I can't hit a fadeYou try to move the ball from left to right and it draws anyway, or it starts left and stays left, so the controlled fade off a tee or into a right-hand pin never comes off.Shares in-to-out swing path
- Hooking the ballThe ball turns hard left and runs a long way after landing, whether it starts left and dives further left or starts right and crosses back over the target.Shares in-to-out swing path
- Not releasing the clubThe face never seems to turn over through the ball, the finish feels held off, and shots either block right or fade away weakly.Shares body rotation stalls through impact
- Everything is going rightYour misses all finish right of the target, some flying dead straight on a line right of it and some bending further right as they go.Shares in-to-out swing path
- Chicken wing through impactThe lead elbow bends and pulls up and away through impact instead of extending, so the club rises early and shots come out thin, weak and often curving right.Shares body rotation stalls through impact
- Divots pointing left or right of the targetThe divot after the ball angles clearly left or right instead of running along the target line, which is the plainest record on the ground of which way the club was travelling.Shares in-to-out swing path
What this rests on
- 40+ TrackMan Parameters ExplainedTrackMan, accessed 2026
- How to Use Face to Path Data to Improve Your GolfFlightScope, accessed 2026
- The Influence of Face Angle and Club Path on the Resultant Launch Angle of a Golf BallPaul Wood, Erik Henrikson, Chris Broadie, 2018
- The Physics of GolfTheodore P. Jorgensen, University of Nebraska, 1999, second edition; Springer reprint 2013
If something here contradicts what a launch monitor tells you, say so. Corrections change the page.
Discussion
Golfers who have had this shot, on what it turned out to be and what sorted it. Read it as experience rather than diagnosis: the questions above are what narrow it to a cause.
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