Range Rat,
My whole concept has changed from down and out to way inside, open, flat, laid off, rotating into the strike from a very shallow plane with a late load and big gravity drop…at least thats what I try to feel and yes certainly…the golf swing has been very counter-intuitive for me.
I can appreciate that there are people for whom it is like falling off a log…I am just not one of those people.
That’s it! To be aware of why one would fall of the log is the KEY. Is it because you have shoes, or not? Is there a strong wind affecting balance? Are you standing on the log or cradling it? Is the log wet? Your body and brain will almost always be in sync to the task at hand. Ever walked on a pitched roof before. If you have then I guarantee you that within a nanosecond your body and brain will compute thousands of variables with your body to do one thing- which is to put your spie angle at the correct relationship to the roof pitch so you won’t fall. A survival mechanism. One more point and I’ll leave it go…getting back to matching components, I would argue that “big gravity drop” and “flat” are generaly not compatible components. You may want to check on that.
I don’t think aiguille needs to check on that.
RR,
Wrong forum pards.
robbo
Papi
Thanks for posting that video. That was a lightbulb for me…and others can comment if I am wrong, but to me it was a convincingly good demonstartion how a “hit” is not the “palm strike” created by straightening the right elbow that the TGM’ers claim it is.
LCDV,
Thanks for that impressive video also of the pumpkin throwers. 
That image is still precolating in my brain, trying to connect and improve to what I think about the golfswing.
Since there is no explanation accompanying it, and I am not an engineer or physicist or a really good golfer, could you help me understand by explaining how the model relates to the swing…which movements and parts of the machine corresponds to which movements and parts of the body and club. It would seem, as a model, it also( like the baseball bat) falls short in that there is no component that represents the clubhead, thus the rotation of the shaft and clubhead is not represented.
I know I know…“you 're giving it away for free”…thanks in advance…I promise to support your efforts to get balatas made again. 
eagle
Sorry, not sure where the post should have gone. Please pardon my ignorance. I guess I’ll just turn this stupid thing off and return to the old days. Later…
RR,
My bad… my post does sound a little snotty. Sorry about that… I’m not trying to chase anyone off.
I guess I don’t understand the incompatibility you mentioned between a gravity drop and swinging flat. It “sort of” implies that a gravity drop would be compatible with swinging upright? Can you explain it a bit more?
I just think it’s dangerous to tell a student who’s been drilling hard and seeing some great results that a feel they have needs to be checked without detailing why? You may be spot on, or you may not be, but the student might totally misunderstand it either way.
robbo
Of course either way can be done…
a gravity drop is simply a feeling of passivity at transition… this can be done with ease by initiating transition with proper application of the lower body, mainly knee flex…
Dropping the club “flat” and few do this better than Robbo… of course can be a passive act.
I have also seen some good players drive it down very actively with the arms packing in, and not initiated as much with the lower body.
But here is the deal…
If you have the hand action at the bottom, and proper ground pressures that create a solid resistant platform for post impact pivot acceleration…THEN you would be doing yourself a huge favor to get the golf club coming from as low, flat, and behind you as possible.
Once you fully understand the advantages of flat entry into impact from P3 along the 4:30 line, and the advantages of setting up your gear in your favor, you create a significant geometric advantage over golfers that don’t. Then that geometry really sets you up for applying the forces and physics of the golf swing in the same way that Hogan, and Trevino, and Knudson, and Player did, as they were all obviously all over it.
Traditional thinking suggests everyone has a lie angle to set their clubs based upon their height and arm length… you go in, swing on the mat, get fitted, pay your money and walk out the door with that perfectly matched set as Tom Wishon and others preach… but this is very limited tunnel vision thinking.
I am 6 feet tall, played most of my career off standard lie angles, and I fought the dreaded “long and left” pull shot my whole career. The weak right shot I used to hit was often a bailout move to avoid long and left. I have my irons now 6 degrees flat… and I could not imagine going back to more upright clubs.
I had always wanted to flatten our my swing, and to do this, you also need to flatter out your gear, or you are missing the point. It’s really the flat gear you want, not the flat swing. The gear sets up your golf swing. I wish one of these so called brilliant teachers I had years ago would have told me this… I’d be typing these words from my hill top Malibu mansion.
Now I can release the club as hard as I want actively with the hands, and the ball is not going left. Nothing helps you make good contact better than a bit of aggression through impact… and knowing you can really go at it without the fear of long and left is gold dust.
If you think about it… an over the green or even back left on the green leaves you typically a down hill, big left to right putt, chip or pitch shot. That is why I really stress my students to get their gear set up correctly right through the set…
This stuff is nothing new…
Trevino in his book talked about how he was able to beat Nicklaus, because Jack had his wedges way to upright, and Trevino would just kill him inside 120 yards all day long. Jack was usually putting down hill with a left to right putt, while Trevino was up the hill right to left and closer.
Hackers fight the slice because of their horrible golf swings… and pro shops sell them crap gear compensate.
On this site, there has not been one student yet that has not learned to draw or even hook the ball by the time they are done with module #1 and #2.
Then we can set up their gear correctly for a proper release… then everything else is just refining the golf swing, and tightening up tolerance standards.
I hope RR doesn’t pull the plug on ABS, that would suck. I think it always gives me a little perspective to remember a little Socrates and Voltaire: I know I know nothing. We’re all just running aroung the bid ol’ maze looking for a little cheese.
And to Eagle and everybody else too I’m kidding obviously about money when I’m going through my diatribes. If I wanted to make money with this I would. I’ve given my share of lessons and been well paid for it. But I like it more having it out in the open and debated, to really make it better. I’ve always been learning and always will be. I’ve never had the opportunity to share what I’ve learned over the years about the golf swing like this before and I think this makes it a lot better. All those posts I put up on compression and the move are the first time anyone’s ever seen my views on all of that. My whole life it’s been a series of pretty short discussions with one person or a couple at a time and then all the trial and error. Having so many other opinions and viewpoints that I never would have thought of makes it a ton easier to do it right. Plus it helps everyone else just as much. I put the little jabs in about the dough to give myself a hard time, nothing more.
The ‘pumpkin tossin’ trebuchets are a pretty cool way to look at like an overhead view of one plane of the golf swing but I think more important than the technical motions is getting to a place where you’re looking at an engineered process which makes the whole so much more dynamic than the sum of the parts. You can look at a trebuchet to propel a bowling ball over a kilometer with 95% accuracy or a winch to lift a piano or even the Golden Gate Bridge built to survive an 8.5 earthquake. You can look at a golf swing in the same amazing way. You shouldn’t really be able to do something like this with such consistent accuracy with simple sticks, but you can with sound principles and engineering just like the trebuchet. I look at it and see the accuracy created in an organic fashion. That’s what I want to do with a golf ball, have that type of consistency not just the power and speed which is pretty obvious.
this is the worst playoff game I’ve ever seen in my life
At the risk of getting blasted myself can I comment on this post?
We learn to walk - how? By trying and failing - over and over and over again.
We learn how to shape shots - how?
By hitting golf balls, over and over and over again! Hit a bag as often as you like, it is the ball that gives feedback.
Styles,
Did you know Albert Puljols hits a baseball off a tee in practice, and also works with an impact bag? Yes, we need to practice live, but the golf swing (baseball swing) are happening to quickly to work on mechanics. However, once we go live, full speed, all you have is intuition to go on.
I thought you all might be interested in how the hands roll in the baseball swing. they roll by extension, not by rolling the wrist over one another. Here’s a nice example:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1a_T1SKqzM[/youtube]
This video is Manny Ramirez (ignore the commentary). this is as flat as a swing as you are going to see, Watch how he cups his left wrist well into the downswing, as he initiates the swing the hands get a free ride down, hips rotate so that his hands are coming from inside the ball (aka 4:30) , and his follow through where a full extension naturally rotates the bat.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iS4tvvPgbKk[/youtube]
this video is also of Manny Ramirez’s swing. The commentary is worth a listen, as it relates to ABS mod 1 and 2. especially at 1:08, a good flat spot in the swing eliminates the need for perfect timing!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4e7p6nvA6po[/youtube]
Papi, thanks for that fascinating post…
The first thing that struck me was how deep Manny would get underneath to set up the strike into the ball…
I listened to the commentary, and it reminded me so much of golf commentary where everyone is always so caught up with everything that is happening before impact.
The most impressive thing I saw in his swing was the incredible post impact torso rotation. We might think of this as our module #3 work.
Again, a lot of insightful commentary, but I think the secret lies in what he does after impact more than what he does before…
The finishing it off, and the intentions of doing so inevitably trace back to a lot of good things pre impact. This is absolute truth because I can swing the golf club around my head looping it like a rodeo cowboy and still hit a golf ball breaking all the rules of proper engagement… but I cannot strike a golf ball if I stall the pivot, and just flick the hands at it… no matter how pure I set up… or how on plane or perfect at the top I am.
here’s one more point that also help me understand what we are trying to accomplish with a pivot driven swing and post impact mechanics. i get the feeling that the hands have to be on the inside of not only the ball, but also inside our left hip at impact.
in a good baseball you hit with the hands inside the ball. i think when we are making a good pivot, our hips are open to the target and we will feel that we are hitting inside the ball (feeling the 4:30 line) and as we rotate to p4 our hands will be inside the left hip (righties) and the ball will seem like it’s out in front of us.
here are two examples of hitting inside the ball:
pete rose
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PO7-Hl_wWHM[/youtube]
ben hogan
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fw3dhY1Qi1k[/youtube]
nice explanation on staying inside the ball, and it explains and confirms to me lag’s insight on the hitter’s release and a recent post where he discusses why people struggle with hitting the ball long and left. you have to be inside if you are going to hit it straight or fade it.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki15iI_q4dQ[/youtube]
Michael Campbell on an interview premiering on TV last night–yet another pro not liking the bomb and gouge game golf has become, and glad to see the new grooves in effect:
Talking about the ball:
“When I first turned pro in '93 I was lucky enough to play with all the great players like Norman, Langer, Seve and they had such control of the golf ball, and it wasn’t so much how long they hit it was actually how they worked the ball… Now the club and the ball are manufactured so the ball moves less.”
Do any pros actually like the bomb and gouge game? I haven’t heard any vocally defending it, but quite a few against it. I don’t even believe the amateur likes golf better just because they can hit it farther. They’re still trying to get an extra 20, and now drive themselves crazy trying to get the precision needed to keep a ball that long on the fairway.
Totally manufacturer driven propaganda IMO.
Hey LCD,
Have you heard about the new balls Titleist are producing only for profesionals?
They are called the Pro V1 Spin and Pro V1Plus Trajectory.
Could be we see a ball rollback yet!
blogs.golf.com/equipment/2010/01 … wedge.html
Having experimental and better gear for the tour players is nothing new. See Greg Norman when he was playing a non-conforming Spalding Tour Edition experimental ball back in the day. Maxfli/Slazenger was notorious for eons for giving the highest quality and highest compression balls to Tour Players and Club Pros and putting the lesser quality schlock on the shelves. I could play 36 with the pro issue DDH Tour Ltd ball without scuffing it or knocking it out of round but with the off the shelf ones the first wedge I hit shredded the cover. It works like Nascar or F1, the pros get the best of the best because they need it and the experimental stuff to see if and how it works before marketing it. That’s all good because it’s their livelihood but the new customized balls just make the situation worse. This is the only game in the world where all the pros use different balls (maybe bowling but you can do that without putting your beer down so…). You don’t see different baseballs for fastball pitchers and curveball pitchers or customized tennis balls made for Nadal or Roddick. How the hell are you supposed to know who the best player is if they all use different balls and ball/club combos nobody regulates? Science class rather than sport.
Remember Caddyshack 2 where Jackie Mason hits a ‘12 guage’ driver? That’s the tour now and it’s as bad as that awful movie. You got guys like Sneneker who can barely break 80 with real clubs making millions and it’s not a contest of skill. It’s like a video game you get tired of after 2 days. The new prov’s are more of the same. Titleist used to be ‘the Company who Never Paid a Pro to Play The Ball’. Now they’re the pathetic little man behind the curtain pulling the strings and creating the illusions. And collecting all the checks. To hell with that, if the players could play they they wouldn’t need all the garbage…
I guess I got time to make a few posts because it’s absolutely pouring as it’s been the last 2 days. Boy did y’all luck out on the weather over at National. Best it’s been in a while.
On Saturday my buddy and I went out to the muni to play. He doesn’t believe yet how bad all the new techno junk is but still doesn’t understand why in the last 10 years he’s gone from a 4 to a 12. He showed up with a brand new set of Adams irons/hybrids set way upright and a 460 TM Frying Pan, and he can’t break glass with any of them. All arms, no pivot. He left with a ‘new’ matching Hogan Speed Slot Driver and 3 he bought at the shop for 5 bucks where we cranked his 5-W down flat so there’s hope. He was hitting the 3 wood pure on the course with a nice pivot like he used to have with everything.
I’m gonna need a hardhat I guess and a good left hook. While we were playing the group behind us was hitting into us constantly. It was 3 guys, one alleged ‘golf professional’ and one other guy about 22, 225 lb with a bazooka. This son of a bitch flew me twice in the first 11 holes. The first time was on 5 when I hit my drive in the left rough and had 170 into an uphill 418 hole into the breeze. We’re waiting on the group in front and he hits one in the right rough that lands way inside the 150. Second time is the ‘pro’ who bounces one through 7 green from about 200 out right by me as I’m picking up the flag. Then on 11 I boom a running draw on the 500 yd 5 par and only have 190 in. Again waiting the kid rattles one in the trees left of me 10 yards ahead. Now I’m pissed.
I got in their ear on the next tee. Just ripped the lot of them. The ‘pro’ announced himself as such and told me to calm down and chill and I told him where he could shove it, and that if they were gonna play a 6300 yard course with plastic trash that hits it 320 they damn well better wait their turn. The look on the kid’s face showed the realization of how close he was to getting a inverted Cleveland Classic tattoo on the forehead. Getting flown by anyone is pretty new to me by anybody but a select few and it’s insane. I was watching where these guys were hitting it and it was literally 100 yds left and right. I never saw them in their own fairway. If they were at the Olympic Club they never would have finished a hole. But they were all tricked out with the gear and bags and clothes even with the collars turned up and holding the pose as they snapped it OB left. I can’t wait to get in all these guys’ pockets because they all suck worse than ever. I’m gonna ask for pictures of the looks on their faces as they pay out the guy who shot 68 again with clubs and balls older than they are. I’ll have a nice scrapbook along with a building bankroll.
Welcome back LCD
What was this good bye all about it? We need you here; this world needs more level heads.
More than anything getting cabin fever from the rain. There’s only so many sit ups and chip shots I can do inside without going buggy. Gotten used to running out to the course or range before and after work pretty quickly. I may need a boat rather than the truck to get out of here in the morning. 