Pro's and cons of the LPG swing method

So over the past year or so I've been trying to learn a new way. My change was prompted in many ways by getting older and seeing my game starting to degrade as I got more inflexible, less powerful.......well you know, age creeps up on us all. It's especially hard to see your game go downhill, when for years I played golf that was around par. It's especially hard to stick to a new alien method that would make me look like some sort of retard and set me back to playing 90 shots per round ....all over again

1 step forward, 5 steps back.

So the reason I'm writing this is two fold. In the last month or so I've realized "I'm back!". No more duffed shots, no more scrambling around a course knowing that I only played half a dozen good shots. No, I feel I've got my swing. 

The other reason is to say, jump on in ,the waters fine. I mean if your a mid or high handicapper having trouble with your conventional golf swing.......well, there is 1 alternative , at least.

anyway....THE PROS

1/Distance. My distance with all my clubs has improved. For a while my distances only seemed to be improving on my irons but in the last month or so I've got the driver going as well. Today I drove 2 greens, 300 meters and 270. 

2/Accuracy. Accuracy was the thing that first struck me about this method. Even when could hardly hit my wedge 80 meters or so I was amazed by how straight I was. Even the crappiest of miss hits would go at the target. And it has continued.

3/Height. All clubs fly higher. good and bad! 

4/Spin. More spin(I think) The combination of high flight and more spin makes the mid irons stick even on hard Melbourne greens.

5/It's easy to learn.......kinda, but once you've got it, then you've got it

 There's more little things, but that'l do for now.

THE CONS

1/The swing involves relearning and there's some saying about old dogs and new tricks or something. And man, that little guy that lives in your head does not want to change for anything. Even now, when I've been bending my lead elbow for thousands of strikes I'll just swing the most ridiculous concoction of conventional and LPG.....the results are not good!

2/ the swing is a hitters swing. I mean there's not alot of "stroke" to this swing. You hit the ball. 

3/ Making 1/2 swings is more tricky. 1/2 shots tend to go lower. I find that I prefer to make full swings with the "right" club

4/ Tempo can be a bit tricky too  The conventional swing seems to be gradual and pendulummy. You build speed up gradually, whereas the LPG swing is a bit shorter and the acceleration starts early and kicks in hard.

5/ Balance. Conventional golfers tend to want to put a large percentage of their weight well forward. In the LPG swing weight starts as 50/50 but you tend to hit with your head behind the ball and your shoulder turned away from the target. So at contact weight can be 75/25( 75 rear foot). You have to keep an eye on it or you can "spin" on your rear foot.

Anyway just to summarize. I'm loving the new swing at the moment. It's long and straight but very dependent on technique. Once you've got it though it's very rewarding. 

I wish I'd jumped ship and discovered LPG earlier. 

So next time you're at the range, just for a joke try bending your front elbow on the backswing at the same time try to hold your front wrist as solid as you can. Yes it's weird, and they'l be all sorts of shots but see if you can feel the straightness of your hits. If you stick with it distance will come.....and then some

Quote:

Originally Posted by David in FL 

Collapsed front elbow and falling back......  Sounds like the swing that a lot of my 15+ hcp buddies already use. 

Mate, this swing is for real. Last week I hit my longest drive ever,  320 meters. Downhill, I turned a 440 meter par 5, into driver/ 9 iron. Yesterday I drove 260 meters into a strong seabreeze then drove the green (310) on the next......with the breeze. I don't want to come over as some sort of Me,Me,Me.......I,I,I sort of guy. But I'm 54, with bad knees and arthritis.....and I'm hitting the ball further and straighter than I ever have. Maybe your buddies could use a bit of a change?

Quote:

Originally Posted by 14ledo81 

I think the big thing Logman is forgetting is that he played good golf BEFORE he tried this method.  I think many low handicap golfers could swing differently and still be ok.  Maybe not as good as they could be, but still ok.

I did play good golf before but it tended to be "freaky" golf. Sort of great in patches, then good, then poor then great again.....and back in the bushes!!! I definitely feel I'm more consistent now. And I know most of the golf coaches on here disagree with me but I feel the elimination of the front wrist in making power is the reason.

Hi Mchepp, just watched the Denny Alberts vid and he seems to be using elements of Kuykendalls LPG swing and E2E. The big difference seems to be the use of the body. Kuykendall prefers the swing to use a passive lower body that reacts to the arm swing. Also the LPG swing uses the wrist trainer which eliminates the influence of the wrist. I posted a couple of swings in the "my swing" area a couple of days ago so if anyone wanted to see the no wrist(front wrist) swing it's there. The trainer is fundemental.......and it's a pain in the arse. When you first start using it you can't help but think someone is playing some kind of elaborate practical joke on you. I'm told that some people just "get" the swing in 1/2 an hour, others(like me) take much longer. 

The "elimination" of the body's below the waist is a 2 edge sword IMO. An active lower body leads to spinning, timing, and alignment issues but it can add drive as well. My best shots are when I feel my arms drag my body around.

Quote:

Originally Posted by WUTiger 

I had never heard of Kuykendall until today. I went onto his site, and found out you need to buy a membership and a training kit to join the priesthood. It would be nice if K gave a 2-min. YouTube summary of what he's all about.

 

I would like to see analysis of his Q&A comments on club design and construction. His assorted comments on golf clubs were interesting, to say the least.

 

Also, I liked K's analysis of the "suboptimal swings" of Five Golf Greats. His comments on Nicklaus enlightening  - I tried to model Nicklaus for years, and like K said, I had trouble with spinning out on bad days. 

I've never had much to do with Jack but those that have report him as.......shall we say idiosyncratic. I'm a member of his site, I've emailed him about problems with my swing and he's always responded in a helpful way. Apparently he can be a bit abrasive but I have no doubts about his swing methods

Just a thought about a couple of threads that are being posted at the moment and how they relate to the swing I'm learning. Golow59 posted about " squareing the forearms" and then mentioned about his grip.

Just a view from my side of the fence. 

Since I started the LPG stuff questions about grip and club squaring have kinda become moot. Sure I think about them but in a way they're "set" by the swing.

Kuykendall recommends very thick grips. The Idea of the thick grip, for me anyway is to further reduce the influence of the wrist and the hands. They just feel right to me. There is so much grip in your hands that wearing a glove isn't important at all. Anyway before I changed swings my grip would tend to get "stronger" and stronger over time. I'd then realize my grip was overly strong and I'd twist it round to a more neutral posi.

IMO, strong grips(in the conventional swing) are compensations for what is being asked of the wrist and hand. If you take up a strong grip on the club, the whole structure of your hand,wrist,forearm,shoulder "feels" stronger, but it's a position that causes compensations later. It really is a case of "feel not being real". 

Anyway with the bent arm /no wrist swing the whole moving mass of the wrist/arms etc makes sense.

The thumb runs at zero degrees to the club face, the back of the hand faces the target at address and contact.....That's it.

The bottom hand gives you power and stability, and because the elbows bends and not the wrist you get that strong feeling that you get with a "strong grip" in a conventional swing...... but without the complications. 

When you swing to the top, the top hand and forearm rotate 90 degrees. If you hold your front arm out in front of your body with your hand flat and the back of your hand facing the target then just elbow bend the arm to your back shoulder(like you're swearing an oath but a little further to your shoulder).........There, that's ALL the front arm and wrist do. There's a couple of "finer points"  but in essence......That's all the front arm does.  There's no wrist cocking, no timing issues, no "flipping"etc etc.

IMO It's a much simpler method.

Anyway, the front arm, hands, grip, forearms questions, to me, are now the least of my problems. In a way I'd like to think that I wont have to think about that stuff much at all. Now if only I can get my tempo right, and my back to the target longer, and my squat happening,......etc,etc

OK

Had a good day yesterday, 71, 1 over at Ararat golf club. Pretty pleased with it even though I was more that a little streaky at times. But it was really encouraging me and the swing method.. Most of the round I was 2 under but I fell to bits dropping 3 shots on the last 3 holes. Infuriating!!

Swing wise I'm still battling to keep my tempo under control. It gets too fast and I start falling back. I guess it's one of the downsides to this swing. It's definitely not a swingers swing, it's punchy and powerful but it's not a pendulum type action. 

Anyway summers coming to an end and I'd love to shoot a par round........Yeah, I know that's going to come back and bite me on the arse

Thanks, David in Florida. It was a day out!