I second that Aiguille!
dinkbat
Any of you who are fly-fishermen may appreciate this light bulb. When I was first learning to cast a fly many years ago I struggled with forming a reverse loop. For those of you who are not familiar with fly-casting, a reverse loop is exactly what you don’t want to have happen and the inverse of what you do want to accomplish which is forming an aerodynamic loop that—when done correctly—is so powerful it about pulls the rod out of your hand. Nothing prettier and more satisfying –other than a big Steelhead on the other end of your line—than your line forming a loop that looks like the wing of a plane flying out in to the river. What does the reverse loop have to do with the golf swing? It is caused by over-acceleration from the top of the stroke. In other words, it is not allowing the rod to load and “fling” the line out and therefore the fly similar to over-accelerating at the start of the downswing and not allowing the shaft to load.
In order to form the correct loop with a fly rod one must— as Bradley puts it as it applies to the golf swing— wait…wait…wait, and then stop the rod. The waiting allows the rod to load from the weight of the fly line and the stopping causes the fly to be propelled to the target. It is slow and smooth acceleration keeping pressure on the rod until the pressure is released flinging the fly to the target. It appears with ABS that pressure is maintained post impact keeping bend in the shaft just like in the fly rod. Maybe this is the effect Mr. Hogan was referring to when he spoke of “flinging” the ball toward the target?
Once I made this connection, it became easier to apply slow building acceleration in the Module 1 exercise. I could feel the shaft flex similar to the rod bend and then…bam…into the bag which is the metaphorical stopping of the rod…same feel…different sport. It also brought together the visual of maintaining the bend in the shaft post impact.
So if any of you decide to take up fly-fishing sometime in your life, remember slow acceleration and then stop the rod. If you do that you will learn the art of fly-casting much quicker than I did…littealm
Littlealm,
Anytime you visualise and accomplish maintaining the bend/flex/pressure in the shaft post impact…I think you are absolutely on a good path and I think your golf ball will like it.
I am going to post a recent feel/lightbulb that I have been playing with for a while now since getting to grips with module 5. I posted this today on the module 5 forum but I have also posted it here also because I wanted to share it with all the ABS students.
I’m only in my 2nd week in Module 1, still have plenty of CF going thru impact. However there’s some lightbulb moments for me:
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M1 is simpler than I thought it was. Right hand is a bend and unbend of the wrist. Left hand is a swivel of the wrist. Avoid using the arms to get the clubhead to the impact bag. I’ve seen this from other members and was doing it myself when I first started…we really get too worried about the post-impact pivot in M1 instead of just focusing on retraining the hands.
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My backswing is a turn of the torso, shoulders, etc and do it until you get on the 4:30 line, stay there on the line and drop down to that 4:30 line on the downswing.
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My downswing thought (and pretty much my swing thought) is ‘pitch then fire.’ Meaning get to the 4:30 line and get that right elbow into the pitch position. The fire the hands. Should feel the right wrist fully bent once you are into pitch elbow.
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Being 6’4" tall, I really need to bend my knees. Flex them at address and really make sure to flex them in the downswing.
3JACK
1 Like
After doin about 150 reps on mod 1 then goin out to hit a few balls with a 7 iron i can really feel the hands ripping thru impact and i mean very active are you guys getting this same feeling?
I had my best ball striking round ever yesterday after practising with that feeling I posted above which basically gives me the feeling of rotating into the ball from a wide open laid off position on a very, very shallow plane.
I discussed this with Lag and wanted to share some insights that emerged from our discussion….
I know from the module work that we did that in fact, this is actually on the correct plane…it just feels extremely shallow.
I had the very new feeling that I was rotating my body through the ball rather than flailing my arms at it.
I now have a deeper understanding of the F = ma formula that Lag quotes. It does feel like I am accelerating my body’s mass through the ball…its not a hit, more like a collect and compress, causing a deeper and firmer compression of the ball. The shaft now feels like a conduit of this compressive force rather than something I use to flail at the ball with.
The shaft suddenly feels way more important than it ever has before…it’s the conduit of my torso’s force…the body is the master power source……the accelerating torso….thats why a full shoulder turn is important, to give the torso the maximum amount of room to accelerate in and in so doing create force.
I now feel that my power is effortless because I am not using arm muscles for a violent strike at the ball, instead I am just using the mass of my body to rotate and compress the ball….
I almost now feel that I would want to use the heaviest and stiffest shaft I could turn with so as not to dissipate any of my body’s force which is stored power in the shaft.
Lag says that this is using the shaft actively…the basics of hitting.
2 Likes
Aiguille, it sounds like there are a whole load of lightbulbs going off within a very short period. Good for you! How much do you think it is due to Module 5’s effect? Have you now found the 4:30 line thanks to this module and now really know what it’s like to rotate hard with the pivot from that position with a lot of angles ready to fire?
Teddyirons,
Module 5 has been instrumental in bringing all the previous modules together for me such that I can now start to see and feel the big jigsaw picture…obviously I still have a very long way to go. I do think that other students may find these keys even earlier especially if the more ‘advanced’ students continue to report their lightbulbs in this fashion although the module work is critical, for example, its very difficult to be patient and wait for the gravity drop into the slot unless you know that you have the minerals from the module 3 work to pick up speed post impact.
In answer to your second sentence containing several questions, the answer is yes to all!
ABS and distance.
I am relatively new to ABS, now on Module 3. I played a few days ago and had a several hole stretch where I was hitting my drives solid. On one hole, I knew it felt really solid, and the paint mark from the tee was in the middle of the sole. I looked for the drive where a good drive would be…but it was about 40 yards beyond. It was a record drive for me by about 20 yards. Did all the forces of the universe line up just right, or was it ABS and Lag’s 5th accumulator kicking in? I have been playing this course for about 40 years, and I am in my upper 50’s now, so I am not really expecting to be setting new personal distance records…but I still enjoy it when something like that happens. And that good feeling lingers a while.
Anybody else seeing this?
Eagle
I wont worry about one shot. Last year I drove a three wood 320(I dont know how much of it was roll) yards without wind yet I struggle to reach 260 yards with my driver.
Clearly it was sympathetic harmonic forces from the Chilean earth quake moving through the igneous rock structure. Sorry, Eagle…it’ll never happen again. 
Captain Chaos
Priceless, Captain
Ok Ok Ok macs, CC, RR …it might have been a fluke. The old statistical “Black Swan”.
but maybe not. Someone, without thorough knowledge of ABS, had posted about a week earlier that the ABS course would lead to “power leak”. That didn’t match what I was seeing, or the more frequent solid compression feeling I was getting. I was sure of that.
Module 1 gave me permisssion and training to use my hands with the pivot
Module 2 started training the lower body to use ground forces
Module 3 is developing that mysterious 5th accumulator ( I think), and about 3 weeks after I start Module 3 I see and feel real changes.
I’m hoping, but no longer counting on, it continuing. I’ll hesitate before mentioning again.
Eagle,
It sort of depends on where you’re coming “from” in terms of your golf swing. Even with modern gear you can’t under-estimate the importance of hitting the sweetspot of the club. Although the 460cc drivers claim to have a “bigger sweetspot” you are going to max out your distance only by hitting it right on the sweetspot which it sounds like happened to you on that pb drive. I assure you that most touring pro’s are wearing out the middle of the face on their driver.
I think some folks will pick up some clubhead speed and some may gear down a bit (both for a multitude of reasons). In either case I think the student is going to improve their percentage of “direct hits” which to me is more important than adding a few mph to my swing speed.
It’s a long process and some of the early success could be simply because you’re doing something different, but no doubt some of it is because you’re doing some things “better”. I’ve learned to not get too excited or too frustrated, knowing that over time (I’m not talking 6 weeks or even 6 months) things are improving.
Good luck with it,
robbo
Eagle: I’m not an ABS student…and I was really only reacting to Captain’s wit…I think in another life he may have been a comedian
We’ve all been there Eagle… if one considers how many molecules have to be in perfect alignment for a hole in one at 185 yards, or any yards for that matter…it just baffles the mind…glad to see you are making progess…stick with it.
We’re about the same age and next week I’m going to take Mr. Form 1 for a test drive. As sure as I’m sitting here typing, distance loss is not going to be an issue…maybe within the first week or so as the body gets used to a new motion template. I weigh 115 pounds in the summer and trust me I would never ever put a motion into play that would result in distance loss… I can’t afford to. In fact, I know my carry distance is going to increase with much more accuracy.
You’re on the right track…you will be able to find your average carry distance, and max carry distance and play from those two. It will free you up to let 'er sail and see how well you and nature can line up those molecules… 
RR
Eagle, I was only teasing. You should count on those changes…they’re real and you are already on your way to lifelong improvement. This is the real deal and what a comfort to see, touch and drink from the grail. Ignorance and stupidity is banished. We get to enjoy the game in a much different light from now on. I count myself so lucky to have found this oasis in a desert of sh!te.
Captain Chaos (Who has been many things in other lives, but never a comedian)
I took it in the proper light…no harm done. CC, you do have a good wit.
My intent was to lay it out there and share …like group therapy. I appreciate the comments, and especially Robbo’s advice to not get too excited or frustrated. It is a long road. It is easy to start going at it with reckless abandon like a teenager when you start seeing and feeling the good things happen. ( that’s a softball for CC 
)
(Putting down the aluminum bat and walking away from this one)
CC
Captain: That was right up your alley You shouldn’t have let that pitch go by…I do so enjoy your comments.
Eagle: That’s what great about golf and ABS…you lay yourself out there and see where it takes you. ABS is a phenominal place to be…even for us oldtimes- for even we can have lightbulb moments. I’ve had many since roaming around this site. One moment really hit hard with me. It concerns acceleration and shaft flex.
For some ungodly reason several years ago, I got it into my noggin that since I’m aging I should build some gear that was lighter and therefore easier to generate more acceleration. It was precisely at that time that my ball striking acuity diminished…perhaps it was purely motion related…perhaps not. My point is, I’m going back to my old gear which is much stiffer and heavier because one of the nuggets on ABS that I had forgotten, or maybe never paid enough attention to, is that the lighter gear almost forced me to overaccelerate and then lose shaft pressure.
Have used my old gear last two times out and amazingly it’s like finding an old friend again. It really puts one in touch with what’s important. RR