Standing Too Close to the Golf Ball? Here's How to Tell and Fix It

If you're hitting it off the heel, pulling everything, or you just hit your first shank in years, chances are there's nothing wrong with your swing. You're probably just standing too close to the golf ball. Here's exactly how far to stand with every club, and a two-second test to check it.

When you stand too close to the golf ball, your arms run out of room, and your body has to find that room somewhere during the swing. That's where the bad shots come from.

So if your hands are jammed up against your thighs at address, your arms have nowhere to go on the way down. You stand up out of your posture, your hips push toward the ball, and the club comes in from outside the line and catches it on the heel. You'll see it in your misses: pulls, weak little fades, dead heel strikes, and every once in a while, the shank. The good news is the fix is usually one small step back.

Tour players stand about 32 to 36 inches from the ball with a 45 to 46-inch driver, measured from the toe of the lead foot to the center of the ball. With a 5-iron it's about 22 to 26 inches, and with a 9-iron it's about 18 to 22 inches. Those three are averages from more than 100 tour players.

Everything else falls in between. A fairway wood lands somewhere around 28 to 32 inches, a 7-iron around 20 to 24, and your wedges around 17 to 21. Treat those as a starting point, not a rule. Your stance gets narrower and the ball moves back as the club gets shorter too, from a driver stance about 2 inches outside each shoulder down to a 9-iron stance about 2 inches inside them.

Your own number can move a little, and that's normal. Taller golfers, golfers with narrow shoulders and hips, golfers with shorter arms and golfers with bigger feet all tend to stand a bit closer. And if you choke down an inch on a 7-iron, move a touch closer to match.

You find the right distance by getting your posture right first. Get the posture right, and the distance is pretty much going to be right too.

Starting with step one, stand tall with the club out in front of you, feet about shoulder width and the grip around belt high. Which brings us to step two, the hinge. Push your butt back and tilt your chest forward from your hips, not your waist, until the club touches the ground. Don't squat into it. Add just a little knee flex so you feel athletic, with your weight in the middle of your feet.

And step three, let your arms hang straight down from your shoulders. With an iron, you want about one hand-width between your hands and your lead thigh. With the driver, your hands sit a little farther out because the club is longer.

Here's a tip. Have a buddy take a picture from down the line. The butt of the grip should point somewhere between your belt buckle and your belly button, and a line straight down from the back of your trail arm should land around the laces of your shoes.

The fastest way to tell is the trail-hand test, and it takes about two seconds.

Set up like normal, then let go of the club with your trail hand and let that arm hang. If your hand swings out in front of the grip, you were jammed too close. If it falls back toward your body, inside the grip, you're reaching. And if it drops right back to where the grip was, you're good.

You can feel it too. Too close, and your elbows feel pinned to your sides and you feel tall over the ball. Too far, and your arms feel stretched out, your weight pulls onto your toes, and you hit it thin or off the toe. Either way, fix it with your feet, not your posture. Step back or step in instead of standing up or reaching.

Yes, standing a little closer can fix early extension when the real problem is that you're reaching for the ball.

And if you're asking what the heck early extension is, it's when your hips push toward the ball on the downswing and you stand up out of your posture. Most people assume it only comes from crowding the ball, but it works the other way too. When you're too far away, you rock onto your toes trying to stay balanced, and your hips move toward the ball to save the shot. So if somebody told you that you stand up through the shot, do the trail-hand test before you back up. If your hand falls inside the grip, moving in a couple of inches is the fix.

You stand closer with your irons and farthest away with your driver, because the driver is the longest club in your bag. The setup itself doesn't change. You still hinge from your hips and let your arms hang.

Where golfers get in trouble is using one feel for every club. Set up to a 9-iron with your driver reach and you'll be too far away. Set up to your driver with your wedge posture and you'll crowd it. So let the length of the club decide where you stand.

The easiest way to lock it in is an alignment stick. Lay one along your toe line, set up with a 7-iron, and lay a second stick from your toes out toward the ball. Do the same with your driver, and you've got two checkpoints you can go back to any time things feel off. Keep that stick in the same spot in your bag so it's there when you need it, and if your bag's a bit of a mess right now, here's how to organize your golf bag.

This is worth fixing if you're hitting heel strikes, pulls or shanks, your hands feel cramped against your legs at address, or your setup feels different every time you step up to the ball. Start with the trail-hand test on your next range session.

If you're already hitting it in the center of the face, your distance is probably fine, so leave it alone and work on something else.