The One-Footed Balance Drill

Proprioception is your body's ability to sense its own position and movement in space — essentially your internal GPS. In golf, it governs how well you maintain your posture, balance, and tilt through the three planes of motion: sagittal (up/down), frontal (side-to-side), and transverse (rotational). Golfers with poor proprioception tend to have big, unintentional postural shifts — rising out of their spine angle, sliding laterally, or crashing down through

Brian Jacobs places the TrueStrike block under the toe of the trail or lead foot, creating a slightly unstable surface that forces the nervous system to work harder to maintain balance. When your standard base of support is removed, your brain actively recruits stabilizing muscles and recalibrates your sense of ground interaction. The result, as Brian explains, is that when you remove the block and hit normally, your balance and movement patterns are noticeably improved — the nervous system has adapted.

Posture loss — whether it's standing up through impact (early extension) or lunging toward the ball — typically stems from an unstable or disconnected relationship with the ground. When the lower body doesn't have a reliable anchor, the upper body compensates with vertical and lateral movement to find the ball. Brian's balance drill addresses this at the root level by training the body to find its own stable center, rather than applying a mechanical fix that the body hasn't earned the stability to maintain.

Brian recommends starting with your trail foot toe on the block, as this challenges your stability on the side that typically bears more weight during the backswing. He also suggests doing the drill on the lead foot — and notes that one side will almost certainly feel more stable than the other. That asymmetry is useful information: the weaker side is where your balance and ground interaction need the most work. Practice both, identify the gap, and focus your reps accordingly.

Brian recommends an 8-iron with a target of 80–100 yards — roughly a three-quarter swing. The reduced distance goal takes the pressure off trying to hit it hard, which is important because the drill's purpose is balance and proprioception, not power. A shorter, controlled swing gives your nervous system enough challenge without triggering the instinct to over-swing. Once you feel comfortable and balanced at that effort level with the block, remove it and hit the same shot — you'll notice the improvement immediately.