LONGER DRIVES YOU DON’T NEED FASTER HANDS TO PICK UP MORE DISTANCE
En route to his best year in professional golf, which included three wins and 12 top-10 finishes, Ben Griffin made a boatload of birdies – 427 of them, in fact. He also finished in the top 10 in 12 scoring categories. Bottom line: He knows how to efficiently get the ball from the tee box to the bottom of the cup. For that reason, we asked the 30-year-old rising golf star if he could share some of his advice on scoring with regular golfers like you. In an interview with December!) Griffin offered some smart and simple tips that are ideally suited for players who don’t have a lot of time to practice but would love to shoot their career-best score. Golf Digest (72 hours before his wedding in
I got my ball speed up from the low 170s to over 180 miles per hour by spending a lot of time in the gym doing things like pushing sleds, bench
presses, squats,” Griffin says. “It’s more like a foot- ball workout than golf training. You might think the result is that I’m swinging harder, but I’m actually swinging smoother because I can put more force into the hit. Even if you don’t have time for the gym, the thing I’ve learned is that when you go at it harder, you tend to get your hands and arms too involved in the swing and not use your big muscles as much for power. That can get you out of sync. Instead, I like to feel like Cam Young or Sam Burns. When they get to the top of the swing, it looks like they just rotate their bodies and the club simply falls into the ball. Here are two ways to get your body more involved: First, set up open to your target. You’ll find it really frees you up to rotate better and let your body stay ahead of the club. Second, rehearse some downswings like I’m doing here ( right ) with the idea that the club doesn’t get ahead of your body rotation. It’s lower body first, then upper body and finally your arms and club. Trust me, you’ll pick up distance this way, which means you’re going to be hitting shorter clubs into greens – a huge key to scoring.”
PHOTOGRAPHED AT APOGEE GOLF CLUB IN FLORIDA
50 GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA
MAY 2026
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