Increasing swing speed has become a bit of an obsession for me. Over the past eight months or so, I’ve devoted a lot of time to hitting the ball longer off the tee, and the pursuit is intoxicating.
You see, I always knew I was leaving a little meat on the bone when it came to my driving distance. But for the longest time, I just didn’t care. Driving accuracy was my specialty, and as long as I hit the fairway, the lack of distance didn’t bother me.
The problem is that the lack of distance limited my head a lot. Despite being a low single digit handicap for most of my adult life, I have never been able to achieve my ultimate goal of getting to zero. However, with a little more distance, this goal becomes much more attainable.
With dedicated time each week in the simulator (and in the gym), I slowly increased my maximum muzzle velocity. But I knew I needed more help. That’s when I called GOLF Top 100 Teachers Bernie Najar.
Bernie is the perfect teacher to call when you need more speed. In addition to being the 2026 PGA of America Coach of the Year, he’s also somewhat of a speed guru. He has worked with a handful of World Long Drive pros, including Kyle Berkshire, and knows just about everything there is to know about putting the drive. fast.
At last winter’s Top 100 GOLF Teachers Summit, I had the opportunity to learn from Bernie first-hand as he took me through a one-hour speed session — and the results were incredible. On my first swing of the day, I was at 97 mph with head speed. A little under an hour later, I hit 109 mph.
Watch the video below to see how Bernie increased my club speed, or read on for more.
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How I gained tons of speed in 1 hour
1. Loosen up
As with any physical activity, it’s wise to stretch and loosen up your body before you really step things up. This means lots of stretching and partial swings to get the body fired up the right way. If you don’t “start the engine” properly, you can’t expect to swing the club at your fastest speeds.
A stretch I did under Bernie’s guidance helped maximize my rotational mobility. He handed me an exercise band and asked me to hold it taut in front of me in my golf stance. Then, I did a nice, full turn at the top, keeping the resistance in the band the whole time.
2. Understanding my body
I have extremely high arches in my feet and this causes my knees to naturally buckle when I stand. Bernie noticed this right away and came up with a quick fix to combat it: wearing a resistance band around my legs.
With the resistance band around my legs, he instructed me to push off with my legs during the swing. It made me feel like I had arched feet, but in reality, it was just returning my feet to a more neutral position.
“A lot of what we need to do in your golf swing is create a better base to work within,” Bernie said. “When your legs are beat, getting a little wider will help you push off a little more.”
For anyone trying to get up to speed, understanding your body is essential to maximizing efficiency.
3. Set a base
During any speed training session, it’s important to get a few swings in early at “normal” speed. For me, that was in the high 90s, with my “game speed” at 97 mph.
This does a few things. 1. It helps you loosen up with some normal swings and shows you how your body is moving. And 2. It sets your baseline for the day.
4. Shortened oscillations
After those “normal” swings, we started getting into the speed session in earnest. One of the first tricks Bernie taught me was how to do powerful short swings.
With my foot back, Bernie instructed me to bring the club back to parallel and then swing through impact, stopping the clubhead just after contact with the ball.
“We’re not trying to go high speed,” Bernie said. “We’re just trying to get the energy at the head of the club in the right place.”
Despite taking shortened swings, the radar showed my clubhead speed around 80 mph for these swings, which shows how much speed is generated in the impact zone on each swing.
5. Crack the whip
As we made these shortened swings, Bernie threw out an analogy that I found quite instructive: “You have to know where to crack the whip.”
When using a whip, you stop the handle quickly when you want it to “crack”. This deceleration sends all the energy from the handle to the bottom of the whip, culminating in a satisfying “pop”.
The same principle applies when moving the driver quickly. If you watch elite golfers swing the club, you’ll notice that the grip actually slows down near impact. By doing so, they send all the energy to the driver of the club, which helps to maximize its speed.
“A lot of people just go off on a speed session,” Bernie said. “We’re trying to improve energy transfer.”
If you can learn how to break the whip efficiently, you can generate a lot of speed without looking like you’re trying.
6. Increase the intensity
When you speed train, you can’t stay in your comfort zone. If you really want to go fast, it’s important to increase your intensity.
“I’m a big believer in raising your intensity,” Bernie said. “In your case, you should raise your heart rate.”
Then, he asked me to dance. It might sound silly to do some cardio work in the middle of a distance session, but to hit the ball with maximum effort, you need to increase the intensity – and the heart rate.
7. Don’t worry about where the ball goes
One of the hardest things to do when speed training is to let go of the result. We’re programmed to care where the ball ends up, but when you’re trying to increase your top speed, you can’t.
“One of the things Kyle Berkshire would tell you,” Bernie said. “If you’re in a speed session, if you don’t have a big mistake, you’re not going fast enough.”
Remember, speed training isn’t about helping you hit more fairways. It’s about training yourself how to increase your top speed.
8. “Low and slow” is BS
One of the most popular sayings in golf is that you should swing the club “low and slow.” But if you’re trying to hit the ball longer, that’s a load of BS.
To get the maximum amount of energy into the golf club—and generate the most speed—it’s important to put that energy into the club as quickly as possible.
“Putting more into the golf club means you really have to liven it up a bit,” Bernie said.
9. Go beyond your comfort level
Speed training is not supposed to be fun. If you want to hit balls and barely break a sweat, that’s fine, but you’ll never reach your maximum potential doing that. To get the most out of your swing, you need to be a little uncomfortable.
“You have to go way beyond your comfort level,” Bernie said. “If you’re busy being comfortable, you’re not going to push the speed. You’ve got to get out of your head that accuracy is important. Get out of your head that you’ll be comfortable. Get out of your head that you’ll move easily. Throw it all away.”
Only when you get into that uncomfortable zone will you be able to fully maximize your swing speed.
10. Use external signs
Bernie had another trick up his sleeve to squeeze the last distance out of me: external cues.
As I lined up to hit my last set of balls, Bernie asked me to imagine I was hitting a ball over the houses at the far end of the range. Now, this would be an impossible feat for even the tallest drivers in the world, but the goal served as a great cue for me to swing as hard as I could.
A few swings later, I hit a new personal best: 109 mph.
Bernie Najar is a Top 100 GOLF Teacher and Director of Instruction at Caves Valley GC in Owings Mills, Md. If you want to learn more about his teaching philosophies, check out his book Speed/Power/Finesse: How to Play the Three Games of Golf.
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