GEARS Pro Data: Axis Tilt (Drivers and Irons)

[iacas]

I have 61 swings (29 drivers, 32 irons (two of which are wedges) with full club and body data of men and women Tour players (or former Tour players) in my GEARS system. I've put some of the data from all of them in a spreadsheet and with that, I can plot a number of things against each other. I'm open to soliciting and creating charts that show you any of the data.

In each of these topics, I'll present the data in a chart of some kind and share the data in the quartiles (min, 25th, average, 75th, max) as well as the standard deviation.

Here's the chart for a selection of the better players in the database with irons:

Here's the chart for a selection of the better players in the database with drivers:

The plots above shows the axis tilt of the "virtual spine" (center of shoulders through center of pelvis) as viewed from face-on. 90° is vertical, < 90° is leaning toward the target like / for a righty, > 90° is tilting away from the target like \ for a righty.

The charts below show the independent min, max, quartiles, etc. at each position.

Irons

                A1      A2      A3      A4      A5      A6      A7      A8
Low            87.7    84.7    81.0    80.7    84.0    91.9    94.5    98.0
25th           90.2    88.6    86.1    86.3    88.2    96.8   100.4   104.8
Average        92.0    91.8    90.6    90.2    91.9    99.2   102.7   107.1
75th           93.5    93.7    93.1    93.3    95.6   101.4   105.5   110.1
High           98.4   101.0   101.7   100.7   101.5   106.9   112.6   117.5
Range          10.7    16.3    20.7    20.0    17.5    15.0    18.1    19.5
Std. Dev.       2.8     5.0     6.3     5.9     5.1     4.1     4.4     4.9

Drivers

                A1      A2      A3      A4      A5      A6      A7      A8
Low            88.9    88.0    84.4    82.7    86.4    97.4    102.9   106.7
25th           91.9    90.8    89.8    92.6    93.5   100.1    105.0   110.4
Average        93.6    94.3    93.8    94.6    94.7   102.7    108.1   113.4
75th           95.9    99.0    97.8    97.0    96.9   105.8    109.3   115.2
High           97.2   102.0   104.7   105.2   102.9   109.3    118.4   125.8
Range           8.3    14.0    20.3    22.5    16.5    11.9     15.5    19.1
Std. Dev.       2.6     4.5     5.7     5.3     4.1     3.7      4.3     4.7

 

If you'd like to request some processed GEARS data, please send me a DM.

[iacas]

This is one takeaway:

Irons           A1      A2      A3      A4      A5
Average        92.0    91.8    90.6    90.2    91.9

Drivers         A1      A2      A3      A4      A5
Average        93.6    94.3    93.8    94.6    94.7

There's not much tilt from 1-5, even with the driver.

[Ty_Webb]

8 hours ago, iacas said:

This is one takeaway:

Irons           A1      A2      A3      A4      A5
Average        92.0    91.8    90.6    90.2    91.9

Drivers         A1      A2      A3      A4      A5
Average        93.6    94.3    93.8    94.6    94.7

There's not much tilt from 1-5, even with the driver.

This is basically what my coach told me when I first went on GEARS. I had way too much axis tilt. He had me feeling like I was leaning forwards to get me back to close to vertical. It’s also interesting that some of them are actually tilted that way fairly significantly especially at the top of the backswing. It’s really A6 before the hips are meaningfully closer to the target than the shoulders. 
 

Thanks for pulling this together!

[iacas]

1 hour ago, Ty_Webb said:

This is basically what my coach told me when I first went on GEARS. I had way too much axis tilt. He had me feeling like I was leaning forwards to get me back to close to vertical. It’s also interesting that some of them are actually tilted that way fairly significantly especially at the top of the backswing. It’s really A6 before the hips are meaningfully closer to the target than the shoulders. 

I plan to put a little video together on "spanning" the golf ball or "the good kind of flip".

[iacas]

Here are these averages visually:

 

[John T]

Can you do a chart showing there relationship of distance to the amount of tilt?  Thanks.

[iacas]

4 minutes ago, John T said:

Can you do a chart showing there relationship of distance to the amount of tilt?  Thanks.

I could but it's not going to show you anything. The R^2 value would be darn near zero, and these aren't all swings from 2022. Some are from 2016, 2018… etc.

[saevel25]

Set up position tends to be the most consistent between better players (lower St. Dev.). I wonder what the comparison in rate of axis tilt change is between different points. Like, if a golfer sets up with axis tilt of 90 versus someone with 96. Does the 96 try to lose axis tilt at a faster rate? Maybe the rate of axis tilt change is more consistent between better players.