Just because you say you have studied it, I mean, who knows right? And as a player what do I care for someone who has studied it!?!? I want someone to talk to me who can play and also has won.
Actually I would like to see you hit a 2 iron please Mr Mann. What you have said is just a total cop out. Or some footage of you in your prime. Or your current handicap. Or tournaments won. Because you must inhabit an alternate universe where not being a player matters.
Last time I asked, Jeff was playing off 7. He is an armchair expert. No harm done, take it or leave it.
I want to hear from people whose concepts stand up in real life.
Couple of days ago I scratched the back nine of a very difficult course on holiday at 6600m. Warming up my shots were going right so that was the bias. My chip shots into grain - very unusual, stiffer grass than home - dug in. Had to hit them harder, wasn’t going to muck about coming super shallow twenty minutes before tee off.
Went through a fairway and had an into-grain shot from the next fairway, 5 iron, I have zero offset zero bounce irons. Had to really hit it hard and come down steep, no possibility of taking a smidge of turf. Sort of shot you can’t theorise about you’ve got to see and feel.
Par three 190m, up hill, flag left, tight, bunkered. Two club wind in face. Next hole, Driver on a very tight hole OOB down the right, waste land left. Got nervous on all of these and others as I was making a good score. Was going with a pivot only feel. Hands and arms dead feel. Because under pressure it was working.
No disrespect Mr Mann, but I want to hear from people who are (much) better players than me and done it under pressure, on very difficult courses and can demo it.
Swinging without a ball… club is above the ground slightly past lowpoint… using the Hogan style transition and pivot acceleration…
Holding shaft flex past lowpoint is not an easy feat. On good days I am better at doing it than others. I need to have the body working well. Regardless, it’s always my intention to do it… strive for it and the deeper into the downswing the better. I have posted plenty of examples of myself doing it as well as others.
Jeff,
For fun, I’ll try to get a video up soon where I can help you in your analysis. I’ll find a driver with a looser shaft that will help you to see it visually.
The super stiff pole shafts I use certainly mask a lot of what is going on… along with the stretching dynamic of the shaft from longitudinal acceleration.
I’ll again swing without a ball… because we need to be looking at the swing… not the ball. The swing can exist with or without a ball. The presence of a golf ball just gets in the way of the swing… it can be there or not. However, we know the ball can have an effect upon the shaft, so I’ll take that out of the equation.
John,
I look forward to your forthcoming video.
When you do a repeat video please make sure that one can see what happens in the early followthrough. I am particularly interested in seeing whether you can keep your hands ahead of the clubhead so that the clubhead end of the clubshaft does not flip passed the lead arm (from an angular rotational perspective).
Cameron Champ
Collin Morikawa
Note that both of those pro golfers can maintain a bowed lead wrist, and avoid lead wrist extension (breakdown), to well beyond impact and that the clubshaft never bypasses their lead arm (from an angular rotational perspective). Note that they also do not allow their trail wrist to prematurely straighten during the early followthrough time period.
Jeff.
Well, we can certainly see the camera distortion here, right?
It’s a problematic issue when trying to analyze such a topic with scientific accuracy.
Science did create these cameras… just saying…
I tried to watch one video of Jeff Mann. And he was in his rose garden just babbling for 2 hrs and 15 mins…11 years ago. He was looking at his watch a lot. And I was thinking the same thing. Slinger, you got 2 plus hours of this junk left. His internet provider must have to prep their grid heavily with some of his 2 plus hour downloads. He is slowing down the whole continental divide with those babies
With the lightweight modern drivers… it’s extremely difficult to hold shaft flex into impact because with the clubs so light… they just get moving so quickly from the top that it’s just beyond difficult to keep acceleration happening all the way down.
I am sure you can understand that.
The old way of doing things… was to swing as heavy a club as possible so SLOW the transition and work the club’s velocity more GRADUALLY into the downswing so that there would be a much greater chance of holding shaft flex into the strike zone. Plus of course the added benefit of FEELING the club and the clubface at impact through the tangential pressures felt in the hands supplied by such a loaded shaft.
These pics above would look totally out of sequence biomechanically if the objective were to apply a hitters protocol. I see almost zero pivot rotation going on here… independently pushing the arms and hands ahead of the ball without pivot support… … just hold on for dear life and pray something good happens at impact. The ball has to land somewhere, so it should work some of the time.
John,
You wrote-: “I see almost zero pivot rotation going on here… independently pushing the arms and hands ahead of the ball without pivot support… … just hold on for dear life and pray something good happens at impact.”
We are definitely perceiving reality differently. I think that Cameron Champ and Collin Morikawa have an amazing amount of rotary pivot motion through impact that allows them to more efficiently perform a DH-hand release action through impact.
Jeff.
Jeff,
In both series of stills from impact to P3.75 that you posted, it’s plain to me that their hips and torso are hardly moving, if they’re moving at all. Their hips and shoulders are in—practically speaking—the exact same spot in every still. The only things that change position from still to still are their arms and club. To me, the only conclusion with respect to pivot rotation going on is that there is zero of it, or very nearly so, in both of those swings from impact to P3.75.
What “amazing amount of pivot motion through impact” are you seeing in those series of clips that makes you think you’re “definitely perceiving reality differently”? I’m genuinely curious.
Hanisch,
I agree that you cannot see any further rotation of the pelvis and upper torso in those capture images of their early followthrough and that is because they both already have a very open pelvis and a very open upper torso alignment at impact due to the fact that they have an excellent amount of pelvic/upper torso rotation happening in the late downswing between P3 and impact. Their open pelvic/upper torso alignment at impact allows them to direct (release) their lead arm in an unimpeded manner in a targetwards direction with such great efficiency that they can keep their lead hand ahead of the released clubshaft so that the clubshaft does not ever bypass their lead arm (from an angular rotational perspective) during their early followthrough. Also, note how they can keep their trail elbow slightly bent and their trail wrist also slightly bent to well beyond impact because their open shoulder alignment through impact allows their trail shoulder to move far more downplane in a targetwards direction than the average PGA tour golfer.
By comparison, here is Phil Mickelson’s hand release action through impact - presented as an animated gif.
Note that his trail shoulder is so far back that he “runs-out-of-trail arm” and that causes his trail arm to straighten through impact and that secondarily causes his trail forearm to pronate causing the trail hand to roll-over the lead hand through impact. That phenomenon does not happen in Cameron Champ’s and Collin Morikawa’s driver swing because they have a much more efficient pelvic/upper torso rotation happening pre-impact.
Another point.
Here are capture images of John Erickson’s hand release action.
Note that his pelvis is not open at impact and it does not open more during his early followthrough. Note that he is only using the rotation of his shoulders to move the two arms targetwards in a similar manner to Cameron Champ and Collin Morikawa. The main difference is that they direct their hands in a more targetwards direction during the early followthrough while John directs his hands more inside-left.
I would agree that the “gold standard” is Ben Hogan’s early followthrough action - as seen in the following swing video at https://youtu.be/LJdChWnxDvU
His pelvis is continuously rotating counterclockwise both pre-impact and post-impact so that he can direct his hands more inside-left (which I call a CP-arm release action where CP is "centripetal), while Cameron Champ and Collin Morikawa’s hands move more targetwards (which I call a CF-arm release action where CF is “center-fleeing”) because their shoulders move less horizontally and in a more “ferris-wheel” manner.
Jeff.
Jeff,
In the stills of John, you can clearly see his shoulders and his hips rotate from one still to the next. It’s not as much a Hogan’s, but whose is? It’s not a huge amount, but clearly it’s there, and moreover it’s not decreasing from one still to the next, which shows that he’s not pivot stalling. The point is that with ABS (like with Hogan) the intention is to rotate through and (well) past impact. Those others may be rotating hard from the top to just before impact, but then they are pivot stalling at (or just before) impact. It’s a very different move and intention.
The intention with ABS is to start down slowly from the top and pick up speed (accelerate) into and past impact. To do this we delay the torso rotation, and employ it later in the downswing (from P3 on). That’s a very different move and intention than those others are doing. They are starting down fast from the top and slowing down (or at least no longer speeding up) right before impact. The ABS intention is the exact opposite. Can we at least agree on that? If we can’t, then I don’t think there’s much point in pressing the issue further.
William
This is irrelevant, IMO. You can pressure the shaft through angular acceleration, which could have the appearance of early breakdown in the lead wrist. The position you posted that Champ has is not a requirement for hitting it solid.
Knudson below with early lead wrist breakdown.
William,
You wrote-: “The intention with ABS is to start down slowly from the top and pick up speed (accelerate) into and past impact. To do this we delay the torso rotation, and employ it later in the downswing (from P3 on). That’s a very different move and intention than those others are doing. They are starting down fast from the top and slowing down (or at least no longer speeding up) right before impact. The ABS intention is the exact opposite. Can we at least agree on that?”
Yes. I can agree that the intention is different. Cameron Champ and Collin Morikawa are not trying to maximise clubhead speed after impact. However, they are ensuring that they can keep the clubface square to the clubhead arc in the early followthrough by using a DH-hand release action where they avoid any hand cross-over roll action through impact due to rapid lead forearm supination and also avoid any clubshaft flipping action due to lead wrist breakdown (rapid lead wrist extension) that can cause the clubshaft to rapidly bypass the lead arm soon after impact.
k2ballo - You showed an image of Knudson exhibiting early lead wrist breakdown and you think that it is irrelevant. I disagree!
If the lead wrist breaks down (rapidly extends) at impact and the clubshaft flips rapidly passed the lead arm then it is possible for the clubface to still be square to the path soon after impact (as seen in that Knudson image). However, during any rapid lead wrist extending motion happening through impact it is possible for the lead wrist to simultaneously circumduct and that can close the face relative to the clubhead path. I therefore think that it is advantageous to avoid any rapid lead wrist extension or any rapid lead forearm supinatory motion (roll-over motion) through impact, which Is why I favor a DH-hand release action.
By the way, it is impossible for Knudson to be using a “hold shaft flex” technique in the early followthrough - as recommended by John Erickson - if the clubshaft is bypassing the lead hand, which means that it is traveling faster than the lead arm/hand. Under those conditions lag tension cannot exist.
Jeff.
Jeff,
I’m glad we agree that the intentions are different. The two methods are not just different, but different in many important and incompatible ways.
I can understand and appreciate that you are skeptical of the ABS method, and thus question it and ask for evidence supporting it. That’s fair, and can even be helpful. But bringing up those who use a very different method to question the veracity and efficacy of ABS only confuses things, and prevents any meaningful discussion.
If your larger goal is to compare and contrast these two entirely different methods, then it’s only meaningful to do so after you understand and accept ABS as valid and achieves what John avers. (If you don’t accept it does what John claims it does, what’s the point of comparing it to another method?) Until then, please understand why I and others find your posts of those employing very non-ABS methods on this particular thread distracting and thus unhelpful.
William
Sure, and that’s fine you have a preference on the release style. But, it’s pretty clear in Lag’s DTL video that the clubface isn’t closing shortly after impact. So, probably not a concern he needs to work about.
That’s not correct. The shaft can (and does) move faster than the lead hand and arm and still have lag tension. In a golf swing, it’s further away from the center of a rotating body than the hand and arm, so that will often be the case.
Lag tension is the result of forces applied to the handle that accelerate the club, manifested in either a change of direction and/or speed. It is not the difference in speeds between two objects. For example, if you had a club traveling at a constant speed but in a circle. It would be constantly changing direction, and therefore be accelerating. Such a situation could produce lag tension.
