How to Grip the Golf Club With the Right Hand

After gripping the golf club with your left hand, it’s time to grip the golf club with your right hand to perfect the golf grip.

The right hand golf grip plays an important role in the accuracy and swing path of your golf swing and it’s often gripped too tightly or incorrectly with the thumb and trigger finger. Here, we’ll show you a step-by-step guide to the perfect right-hand grip placement. We’ll cover everything from what to do with the right thumb and trigger finger, to the grip pressure to apply to the golf club with your right hand. 

For left-handed golfer, follow these steps with your left hand. 

Why the Right Hand Placement on The Golf Grip Matters

We covered this briefly in the introduction, but to be more specific, the right hand plays a significant role in your golf swing path. From the wrist hinge at the top of your backswing to the angle of attack prior to impact, the right hand grip controls almost every aspect of it. 

Additionally, it is the right hand that give us the ‘feel’ of the impact. Hence why the right hand plays a much more crucial role in your irons and wedges than ever. For some, the right arm is what helps create that ‘punch’ directly underneath the golf ball, a key element to hitting down on the golf ball consistently. Hence why some golfers prefer to be more right-hand heavy when it comes to their short game.

However, we need to be careful about how much to involve our right hand in the golf swing as most golfers struggle with an overdominant or overactive right hand where the downswing becomes over the top or the club face closes too quickly before impact, both of which leads to nasty golf slices. This issue is what makes beginners swing with their hands instead of establishing the golf swing through the rotation of their hips.

How to Hold the Golf Club With the Right Hand

1. Right Palm Meets the Left Thumb

The easiest way to start the right hand grip is to open your right palm, keep your arm extended while keeping it relaxed, and meet the center of your palm to the upper right cheek of the left thumb. The fleshy part of the palm that’s directly below the joint of your right pinky should touch the nail of the left index finger while your right middle finger should point directly towards the ground. 

Close your pinky, ring, and middle finger around the grip while leaving your thumb and trigger finger extended creating a finger gun hand sign. At this position, you should notice the ring finger slotted between the left index finger and the right middle finger. As for the pinky, for now, it will sit somewhere above the fingers of your left hand! One to that next.

The placement of the right pinky will dictate if you’re an overlapping or an interlocking golfer.

For the overlapping grip, rest the right pinky on the notch created by your index and middle finger of the left hand. Some golfers may prefer placing the pinky on top of the index finger of the left hand, ultimately it’s your call.

For the interlocking grip, wedge the right pinky in between the index and middle finger of the left hand where the pinky exits to the non-palm side of the left hand.

The proper trigger finger placement on the grip gives mobility to the club face and should create a cradle that supports the weight of the golf club. To do this, curl/ hook your index finger inward wrapping around the grip. Ironically, looking from the back of the grip, the trigger finger looks much like squeezing the trigger of a gun as it wraps around the grip. 

A small gap from between the middle finger and trigger fingering plays an important role in guiding the club face to ensure a solid ball strike. Some golfers like to straighten the trigger finger to match the grip. I’ve seen golfers make it work (like my dad), but I’d advise against it as it can hyperextend your trigger finger. However, it does seem to help me with my pitching from time to time. 

With the right thumb placement, hover the fleshiest part of the palm of your right hand above the left thumb. From there, set the right thumb down where you can place the right thumb either directly above the grip so that it points directly to the club head or you may open up the thumb to rest the right cheek of the thumb on the grip where it points left of the club head. For me, I prefer the latter because it lets my hands feel more mobile.

A good way to check that your right thumb is placed correctly is checking for a ‘V’ that’s created between the thumb and knuckle of the index finger to the base where the thumb and trigger finger should not be touching.

Unless you’re gripping the golf club stronger or weaker from neutral,  seeing 2 to 3 knuckles when the right hand is properly holding the golf grip is normal. However, this may differ depending on hand size, but for most golfers, this will be the case.

The final step to establishing the perfect right hand grip in golf is to check you have the right amount of grip pressure applied. The correct grip pressure for the right hand comes from a slight pinch between the trigger finger and the thumb. Not too much though, or you’ll start hitting with your hands!

Summary of The Perfect Right Hand Grip Placement In Golf

Gripping the golf club correctly with the right hand can be quite tricky. For most beginners, positioning the trigger finger correctly would be the most confusing part of the grip, but the illustration above should show you how to do it correctly. With the proper golf grip placement with the right hand, you should have more control with hitting down, and help generate more power in your swing.