Instructional Video Critique Topic

[ChetlovesMer]

7 hours ago, Vinsk said:

Brendon wasn’t bad on this video, but in many others he’s hard to watch. He’s a motor mouth and often interrupts, over talks and doesn’t pay enough attention to what the guest instructor is saying.

As for the ‘ not addressing your specific problem’ I’m not sure this applies to that. IMO this appears to be instruction on what they feel all good players do. They’re not suggesting things like path, grip changes, hip spinning, etc…things that may not be an issue for some players and may hurt. 
 

This might not be useful for those who perform this movement, but I don’t think people working on this will be ‘harmed’ by trying to learn this mechanic. Just my opinion of course. 

Good comments. This was my first time ever seeing these guys. 

I don't watch much youtube golf instruction videos as a rule. I realize, of course, that a lot of golfers don't have access to good instruction so youtube is where they find their "fixes". But I find they get me in trouble. This one, for example, if not done correctly, I could see me getting into a lot of head movement. Getting giant up and down moves with my head. To be fair, in the video they do mention that it is your center of gravity not your head that needs to drop and then fire. 

My problem is that when I'm working on a portion of my swing I tend to fall into the trap of if a little is good then a lot must be great. Then I'll screw up some other part that I've already "fixed". For me the golf swing is like holding a big ball of jelly in both hands. If I squeeze hard over here, some of it oozes out through my fingers over there. 

[iacas]

14 hours ago, ChetlovesMer said:

As far as the content…

To be fair, that's what this topic is about, I think. Obviously any video may not apply to you (your first paragraph). But… we're just evaluating the clarity, usefulness, etc. of the videos here, I think.

14 hours ago, ChetlovesMer said:

Overall, I'm not a huge fan of the stop motion drill. I think I might prefer to slow-motion into their stop position, take a moment to check positions, then slow motion out of that position. Then gradually speed the whole thing up. Or just start in their stopped position. Then try to incorporate that into the full swing. However, I'm sure their are many people the stop motion drill would work for. 

I'm not sure I know what the differences are as you see them between the things you said there.

What's the difference between "stop motion into their stop position" and "slow motion into the stop position, slow motion out of that position"? Just the speed of the rest of the downswing into impact?

5 hours ago, ChetlovesMer said:

This one, for example, if not done correctly, I could see me getting into a lot of head movement. Getting giant up and down moves with my head. To be fair, in the video they do mention that it is your center of gravity not your head that needs to drop and then fire.

I  bumped on that too. They say it's not about your upper center moving, but every time they rehearse it or demonstrate it, the head moves like 12"+. I get that it's an exaggeration, but 12 >> 0 or 1.

My other "bumps":

In the first two minutes… Brendan said it, not Ryan, but I don't like to "think of the center of mass as an inch below your belly button" because it moves around a good bit during the swing. Stand with your arms down and raise your arms up and the center of mass moves a decent bit (depending on your size). He could have just talked about the center of the pelvis (which we can see on GEARS). Tiger's COM doesn't move quite like his belly button shows. (GEARS can show a "center of mass" dot, too, but it's obviously not measured as it doesn't know individual segment weights.)

At 3:40, Ryan says that when you're "coming down into the ground" (lowering), you're getting heavier. A scale (or a pressure plate) beneath your feet would register the opposite: you'd exert less force overall and "weigh less" in that phase. You're creating some downward momentum, so that when you do push back up (or slow down the rate at which you're dropping) you'll have to exert more force than if you didn't go down, but you're lighter when you're dropping, not heavier.

Same deal at 6:45 or so (and 7:30)… but it depends on how you interpret "the most force going into my lead leg." That's not when pressure or forces spike if you're still going down. It's when the left knee extends or "jumps" that you spike that force. That peak force occurs in the early middle of that left (lead) knee extending, not at the max "down."

Finally, even though at about 3:11 Ryan will say "what's key is that the upper half is not doing that [going down and up]," nearly every demonstration of this has the head dropping 12"+ or something. It's exaggerated, but even 3 or 4" is a significant, notable drop.

I use a drill that's pretty similar, and Ryan knows too that you're not still going down until nearly P6 as demonstrated, so he's not entirely wrong about when you exhibit the peak force. It is at about P5.5 or so (depending on the golfer), because that's when you're exploding back upward. In other words, the feel isn't the same as the real, and the way to teach it isn't even the same as the real, because you're super exaggerating one thing over the other.

[JetFan1983]

I prefer this recent AMG video to the one @iacas just posted for discussion. I think they explain it better than the "push your pelvis way behind you" feel Tiger was working on at the range that one time a couple years ago. 

Granted, I've tried to practice that Tiger feel myself, but I've made more progress (IMO) by doing it AMG's way here. 

For some reason, AMG turned the likes off for this particular video, so maybe they're getting a lot of negative feedback on it. I found their explanation very useful to me though. 

Edited December 21, 2023 by JetFan1983

[ChetlovesMer]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

What's the difference between "stop motion into their stop position" and "slow motion into the stop position, slow motion out of that position"? Just the speed of the rest of the downswing into impact?

No. I'm actually okay with going fast out of the halfway point. I mean more like the speed of getting to the position where you are supposed to stop. 

I'm just not a fan of swinging full speed and then trying to stop. I feel like that causes a myriad of other problems. If I'm going to stop mid way I'd prefer to go slow and controlled to get there, especially if you really want me to bullseye that spot... if that makes sense. OR, if its a certain position you really want me in, just have me start in that position. 

Way back when you were working with me on my hand path and you had me move slowly into a spot, check that the spot was right and then speed up from there. Slowly increasing the slow speed part faster and faster making sure I'm still getting to the same position.

You also had me start in that spot. Then over time I could combine the two. Not sure if you were just doing that to compensate for my extreme lack of coordination or if that's just a better way to do it. But to my mind, that makes way more sense than racing into a spot, stopping quickly, then trying to make sure your are in the right position before restarting. I foresee that getting pretty sloppy as I'm let loose on my own to practice. 

..... Not sure if I'm explaining that well, but hopefully you get the idea. 

[iacas]

14 minutes ago, ChetlovesMer said:

I'm just not a fan of swinging full speed and then trying to stop.

When did they do that?

If you're talking about the follow-through, then there are a number of benefits to be had from learning to slam on the brakes at chest height (or below).

Plus, the "jumping" as I tend to call it is a speed piece. It is best practiced fast. Doesn't mean you don't get anything out of doing it slowly, but fast is good for this.

[ChetlovesMer]

2 minutes ago, iacas said:

there are a number of benefits to be had from learning to slam on the brakes at chest height (or below).

I believe you. I'm not sure I'd be good at it. 

[iacas]

22 minutes ago, ChetlovesMer said:

I believe you. I'm not sure I'd be good at it. 

Which is one of the reasons why it might be good for you to practice.

[ChetlovesMer]

7 minutes ago, iacas said:

Next time I come for a lesson perhaps you can teach me the method and the benefits. 

[Big C]

Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I found this advice from Phil Mickelson to be some of the worst that I have ever seen posted online. 

I played two rounds last week and every single time I thought about keeping my "hand speed" up on my chips and pitches, the results were downright disastrous. I laid so much sod over my short game shots that I'm pretty sure the greenskeeper needed to put in overtime this weekend. 

Bottom line, I understand that different thoughts resonate differently with different people, but it's hard for me to see how getting fast with your hands can ever be considered worthwhile advice. 

Thoughts?

 Phil Mickelson Hand Speed Video

Edited March 11 by Big C

[ChetlovesMer]

2 hours ago, Big C said:

Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I found this advice from Phil Mickelson to be some of the worst that I have ever seen posted online. 

I played two rounds last week and every single time I thought about keeping my "hand speed" up on my chips and pitches, the results were downright disastrous. I laid so much sod over my short game shots that I'm pretty sure the greenskeeper needed to put in overtime this weekend. 

Bottom line, I understand that different thoughts resonate differently with different people, but it's hard for me to see how getting fast with your hands can ever be considered worthwhile advice. 

Thoughts?

 Phil Mickelson Hand Speed Video

I guess it's fine. I couldn't help but giggle at all the negative comments toward Phil in the sidebar though. 

[iacas]

3 hours ago, Big C said:

Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I found this advice from Phil Mickelson to be some of the worst that I have ever seen posted online. 

I played two rounds last week and every single time I thought about keeping my "hand speed" up on my chips and pitches, the results were downright disastrous. I laid so much sod over my short game shots that I'm pretty sure the greenskeeper needed to put in overtime this weekend. 

Bottom line, I understand that different thoughts resonate differently with different people, but it's hard for me to see how getting fast with your hands can ever be considered worthwhile advice. 

Thoughts?

 Phil Mickelson Hand Speed Video

Feel ain't real.

[Ty_Webb]

On 3/11/2024 at 2:07 PM, Big C said:

Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I found this advice from Phil Mickelson to be some of the worst that I have ever seen posted online. 

I played two rounds last week and every single time I thought about keeping my "hand speed" up on my chips and pitches, the results were downright disastrous. I laid so much sod over my short game shots that I'm pretty sure the greenskeeper needed to put in overtime this weekend. 

Bottom line, I understand that different thoughts resonate differently with different people, but it's hard for me to see how getting fast with your hands can ever be considered worthwhile advice. 

Thoughts?

 Phil Mickelson Hand Speed Video

 

Speaking as someone with significant chipping issues (rhymes with tip, but starts with a y), I find my worst chipping happens when my hands go and the clubhead doesn't. I wind up with my hands at the ball and the clubhead about 2 feet behind. My hands can't instantaneously stop, so I have to make all sorts of adjustments to basically everything to get the club head down to the ball. That's like a perfect recipe for total disaster. Clubhead rarely coming in at the same place and the speed it's going at is all over the shop. If I follow Phil's advice here I'd probably have to quit the game. Or putt from everywhere. I have to feel like the clubhead is getting to the ball while my hands are still going backwards (I'm exaggerating) to avoid that spot and I wouldn't be at all surprised if when I get it right my impact looks fairly similar to Phil's despite the totally different feels and goals that we have.