My Swing (Tepi90)

[Tepi90]

Worked for 2 hours on "flighted" wedges between 30-90m distances. I feel I'm not quite doing it right and have a slight stop at impact, but they fly like 1/3 or 1/2 of the normal swing height, which is nice. Haven't used the gripping lower part of the instructions, should probably see how it feels, wedges just feel so short in my hands to begin with. Finally found use for my driver aswell, it works great as a marker for distance!

Used the clock system for these, I think the lead arm indicates somewhat close to what I feel with 8 o'clock and so on. Realized I don't really want to go even to 10 o'clock feeling, rather just pick a club with lower loft and keep the motion smaller. Wind started to pick up towards ends and it was circling around directly left to right and left to right headwind. Will keep marking the carry distances in notes to hopefully remember them better and see how they evolve.

60 degree wedge:
8:00 - 30m
9:00 - 40m

56 degree wedge:
8:00 - 50m
9:00 - 60m

52 degree wedge:
8:30 - 70m
9:30 - 80m

PW:
8:30 - 80m
9:30 - 90m

Wasn't supposed to work on full swings today but couldn't resist myself and had to hit one bucket. I gave the pump drill a revisit but with a little different perspective that is still on a drawing board. The way it felt and produced power felt nice tho.

 

[Tepi90]

Been pretty cold lately, we have had some snow even. 🙈 I think the axis of rotation is becoming tighter and I feel like I produce more power and distance with less effort everytime I pick up the clubs.

Will open up the thoughts later on what I've been thinking/experiencing. Been having little pain in my right shoulder tho (believe its the rotator cuff), wondering should I lead with the rear elbow more/differently? Any drills/ideas regarding that and everything else is welcome.

The swing trace at the end shows I'm pretty deep with the dowswing. 🤔 Backswing being quite shallow, equal and opposite...

[Tepi90]

I've tried to think the swing from a bigger picture to get better idea of how I want to approach this problem. My understanding of kinematics is really small, mostly work with flows and fluids so excuse me if this makes no sense, not making any precise calculations just putting things into perspective. I wanted to know the forces that we are dealing with at impact and I took the PGA tour average swing speeds and some clubhead weights I found with google.

At first, I had them as Newtons and those didn't ring much bells to me, but it gave some perspective as the force at impact is almost twice as high as the force I use to tighten my car tires. Then I stumbled upon a unit called kilogram force, that let me get kilograms out of it so I could actually pick something as heavy as the club head at impact:

Club	Clubhead weight  [grams]	SS            [mph]	SS            [m/s]	Kinetic energy        [Nm]	Kilogram force         [kgF]
3 iron	240	98	43,8	230	23
4 iron	247	96	42,9	227	23
5 iron	254	94	42,0	224	23
6 iron	261	92	41,1	221	23
7 iron	268	90	40,2	217	22
8 iron	276	87	38,9	209	21
9 iron	284	85	38,0	205	21
PW	292	83	37,1	201	20

Although this is very small window, it was quite eye opening in a way. To get better idea I actually went to hardware store and picked up a 6kg (couldn’t find heavier) sledgehammer and started to swing it back and forth. That made me feel like I don't want to rotate with it, but instead make it go in straight lines. Then I remembered that Moe Norman said, "I'm the only man that plays with straight lines". Out of nowhere I had these words come out of my mouth "rotation is an effect of linear forces on fixed axis" in Finnish though, so not sure did I translate it right. 😄 

Also started to think about tightening those car tires, I do it by applying force straight up and down, but it goes along the arc since the other end is fixed around the bolt. Talked about this idea to friend who has been studying disc golf form for over 10 years and he immediately linked this to me:

I tried this for first time during my last round of golf and the feeling was very different, like I was glued to ground at my follow through and someone had taken the brick out of my washing machine. Hit some of the longest 3 woods I ever have aswell.

Imgur

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Post with 2 views.

Watched some of the Malaskas club shallowing and rear elbow ideas aswell and I think I could benefit from starting the downswing sequence more with my arms. To activate latissimus dorsi (2^nd biggest muscle?) to create linear forces it would have to be a pull I guess, the ideas of direction seem to vary a bit. When I watch @iacas swing you seem to “pull” the right elbow to your right side, what’s the feeling for you? Do you feel like you start from the top more with arms and to which direction?

Just couple swings from last night:

 

Edited May 17, 2020 by Tepi90
Table fixed

[Tepi90]

Continued the work with flighted wedges yesterday. Wasn't happy with the tempo I had, duffed some quite badly. Didn't get much practice in before we had thunderstorm with hail.

Feels were:

60 degree wedge:
8:30 - 35m

56 degree wedge:
7:30 - 45m
8:30 - 55m

 

[Tepi90]

Too many swing thoughts going in head atm regarding club and hand path in swing that have resulted in some horrendous golf shots. Put my focus today back on linear hip movement, which made things better again.

At the moment I feel my backswing throws the clubhead to wrong direction, making it impossible to have shallow in to out path in downswing (Do I want it?). There's just too many variables that could fix things/make them worse that I finally decided to book my first ever lesson from local pro. He had 17 years of experience from teaching golf and lots of experience from different sports aswell so really looking forward to it!

 

[billchao]

You have a very good swing. The thing I see is you take the club back a little under plane and get your hands too far behind your body. Your downswing is on a good plane, but I think you’ll see more consistency in your ballstriking if your backswing plane was closer to your downswing plane.

[iacas]

Here's what's causing the inconsistencies and the feeling of "throwing" at the stuff.

You come down too shallow, and that forces you to throw the clubhead out, which means your hands have to swing around to the left sooner than they otherwise would.

There's a lot to work with here - you've got a generally good swing - and a lot of little pieces that all go into this, too.

Consider this, though:

• Your left wrist is arched at the top.
• Those who play like this - Dustin Johnson for example - typically have to rotate HARD coming down.
• You're still almost square just before impact.
• The hands have to go somewhere.
• Your wrist CUPS during the downswing.

Consider also Day 4 in my 30-day plan.

I'd love to hear what you think about the above (all, not just Day 4).

[Tepi90]

1 hour ago, billchao said:

You have a very good swing. The thing I see is you take the club back a little under plane and get your hands too far behind your body. Your downswing is on a good plane, but I think you’ll see more consistency in your ballstriking if your backswing plane was closer to your downswing plane.

Thanks, been looking at it but haven't been able to figure how to make them closer to same without feeling like I'm gonna hit myself on downswing. 😄

1 hour ago, iacas said:

Here's what's causing the inconsistencies and the feeling of "throwing" at the stuff.

You come down too shallow, and that forces you to throw the clubhead out, which means your hands have to swing around to the left sooner than they otherwise would.

There's a lot to work with here - you've got a generally good swing - and a lot of little pieces that all go into this, too.

Consider this, though:

• Your left wrist is arched at the top.
• Those who play like this - Dustin Johnson for example - typically have to rotate HARD coming down.
• You're still almost square just before impact.
• The hands have to go somewhere.
• Your wrist CUPS during the downswing.

Consider also Day 4 in my 30-day plan.

I'd love to hear what you think about the above (all, not just Day 4).

Seriously impressed you see all this from a video, really displays how great understanding of the golf swing you have. Will surely put in the work changing my wrist action according to day 4 drill and see how it feels because I'm no Dustin Johnson, thanks!

I've watched only couple of your 30 day practise plan videos so far and based on those I think they are amazing, you explain the drills in detail and can see you are passionate about what your doing. Only reason I haven't dived more into them yet is because I have felt overload of info coming into head which I haven't been able to process, surely digging into them if I ever get on holiday from work. 😄

Got the lesson tomorrow, interested to hear how he approaches this.

[Tepi90]

The lesson was bit "meh", could of been partly because I had really bad headache. It's been actually so bad that I've taken few days off course completely and had a visit to a doctor.

Instructor basically told me three things:

1. My upper back and chest are extremely tight, have so called "facet lock" if that's the right term in English
2. I slide a lot towards target during my downswing, making it hard to hit driver
3. I should check the lie angles of my clubs, 1 degree or so upright could help.

For number 2 he gave me a drill where you set yourself to impact position and start the backswing from there. I pointed out this could work as a trigger move for me, he agreed. Will work on this surely, but I feel now it's not the time. I asked him few times about my wrist condition at the top of backswing, but he didn't feel that's a problem which made be bit disappointed because I feel it clearly is after watching the day 4 drill.

Taking the wrist action as my number one priority to fix, because I feel there's many things that arched position at the top is preventing me from doing. Been working on it bit inside and today got to hit some balls.

In order to have a chance to get that cupped wrist position at the top, I felt like my backswing direction had to change, the plane looks completely different now.

I checked the wrist position multiple times before swinging, but I couldn't hold it at the top. However now it's atleast flat instead of arched, but I guess this needs much more work:

Imgur

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Post with 1 views.

Left wrist looks better to my eye at impact, but could it be I'm rolling my wrists over more or something? Thanks in advance!

[Tepi90]

Did 250 repetitions of day 4 drill yesterday without hitting any balls. Today went to field to hit ~50 and was bit disappointed seeing the left wrist is still arched at the top/early during transition. If something good, my divot pattern starts to go more right, it used to be left.

Work with the drill continues.

"I fear not the man who has practiced 10 000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10 000 times." -Bruce Lee

After the instructor told me about the lie angles, I've started to feel bit uncomfortable with my standard clubs at address and contacts are bit toe sided I think. Never thought equipment could make any difference, but think I'll head to store to check what's right for me sometime soon.

 

[Tepi90]

Haven't been able to practise/play much due to health and work issues, luckily get on holiday soon. I went to check the lie angles on my clubs and they were fine. We hit from top of plate with tape at the bottom of club and it struck the plate pretty much in the middle of face or even slightly to heel side.

Had first round where my ball striking was actually okay apart from driver, just too hard club for me to hit. However if I keep striking the ball like I did with irons, I believe it's finally possible to score in a way that doesn't require too much booze after every round. 😄

Work with the day 4 drill continues. I fear I'm not doing it quite right tho. Shaft looks in Eriks words laid off at the top and toe maybe slightly too much down?

With actual full swing hitting a ball the momentum seems to pull it to different position tho (shut face and more towards target).

[Tepi90]

Having a mini vacation in northern Finland at my old home town. Picked up my push cart and some old clubs, including full set of Ben Hogan apex irons. Got to play my old home towns practise course (9 holes of short par 3's). Started golf by playing this multiple times a day with only 9 iron. Season lasts aprox 3 months here, which is probably one of the reasons I never picked golf as my main sport.

Condition is really good considering its been only couple weeks since snow melted here. The full course (18 holes) is really beatifull here with water on every hole both sides. Sadly don't have enough time or the clubs to play it this time. Filmed the practise course tho, was fun althought the clubs I had was bit unfamiliar:

Greens were quite bumpy but I need to start working more on putting when I get back home, it's pretty much all over the place atm.

[Konsta]

Your left wrist gets arched, resulting in a laid off position at the top. This means you have to steepen the shaft during the downswing. Steepening results in less body rotation at impact. The list goes on

[Tepi90]

All the efforts still in finding a way to proper wrist position at the top of the backswing. Might have figured something out just 5 minutes ago about how backswing "direction" might be the solution, have to film some once rain stops. Meanwhile I've been playing with the idea of using stronger grip to help with cupping at the top.

I think it makes my setup look better aswell, like I could deliver better to target instead of hitting the ball into ground. Also contacts felt stronger.

[Tepi90]

Drilled the changed backswing direction some and hit balls. Path looks different but other than that I don't know was there any success. When doing the drill, toe of my club points straight down which @iacas mentioned is no bueno, what do you recon, is this grip or path related?

 

[Tepi90]

Last month been mostly just playing "golf", far too few range sessions, but I feel there's been alot of progress that isn't however ingrained yet and can't keep it together when playing. Have just accepted the fact that I will be struggling with scoring for quite a while when I'm trying to get this puzzle bit more together. However have enjoyed the playing probably most I've ever had, because the good shots are the kind that I have never seen come out of my clubs. Main priority has been and still is my wrist action, but I feel there's alot of things tied to it.

At one point I started to feel like I freeze behind the ball and I finally found a trigger move, thanks to @iacas for day 10 drill and @mvmac for providing information that made me figure what could work for me.

"For right now the left hip feel is similar to the right with the inside of the left foot pushing away, almost doing a skater stride or floor board slide. Gets me to loads the leg and "post up" into it. " -mvmac

The trigger is a little bump into my left leg, almost feeling like I take a little skating stride and I think this could have two benefits for me in the future. First being the obvious flow to swing and being able to avoid that feeling of freezing over the ball. The other big one imo would be the feeling of how I want to land on/against that lead leg, which I can't/don't know how to do yet.

I've been thinking alot what @Konsta said about the left wrist being arched, resulting in laid off position. This might be semantics, but I feel it's more other way around, the shaft being laid off results in left wrist being arched. I played around with this thought and tried out what happens if I shorten my backswing and sort of keep the shaft loaded at all times. The feeling is like swinging to 10:30 if 12 would be my full swing. It looks very different, but more importantly I was hitting the same distances if not more with this shortened swing and it felt much more effortless.

I really need to get some tan on those calves or atleast get some mass into them...

I couldn't figure out how to track my hands with those bubbles like @iacas did earlier, but I think my hand path is slight steeper, not sure has there been much change to club path tho?

What comes to rotation, I don't understand the meaning of it when it comes to shoulder rotation. I look to be square with shoulders at impact or even slightly closed. I think I read somewhere PGA tour players vary from square to 15 degrees open, not 100% sure about this tho. With more shoulder rotation, do you get more parametric acceleration to create speed and is there something more to it?

I also don't know what my numbers are or is it possible to see them from video. My hips look quite open and chest slightly open?

Hopefully haven't gone too much offtrack with this. 😬

[Tepi90]

This is first summer I'm actually using my driver and it's starting to become quite a weapon. The work with wrist condition is still unsuccessful which shows more with the driver, however it has brought some good things into my swing, one being steeper hand path at the start of downswing (maybe?), which I believe has made it possible to be more consistent with driver.

The good contacts are pushing to 290-300 yards based on what I've been investigating from course maps, but would like to get some trackman data at some point to see where I'm at. The launch angle is however quite low and I suspect I'm not hitting up on the ball, atleast not enough. Believe that could add some distance especially when hitting in calm conditions and down wind? The good thing is, this launch angle is providing really penetrating ball flight, it's cutting throught the wind really nicely and been getting pretty good distance to heavy headwinds aswell.

Only got DTL view tho as I had to hurry for my tee time, so not much help to see the up/down path I reckon. 🙈

 

[Tepi90]

Did combined day 1 takeaway drills and day 4 wrist condition till my forearms hurt, I will need to start working them now that I'm not working as pipe-fitter anymore. 😄 Not sure is this the right way, felt more like being under the shaft I'd say.

The top position looks better than earlier with this drill I think, still slightly toe down but my arm position is higher this time, so if I dropped them slightly I'd be closer to Erik's? Transferring this to hitting balls is gonna be whole another story tho.

Clubface works very much outside/infront of me to top. Bubba Watson is someone who seems to work it that way? Matthew Wolf more extreme so at least it's possible. This is actually more like the way I used to hit bandy ball from right side.