My Swing (majorchamp)

[majorchamp]

I need to work on this as well.

not really, I just didn't note my 5 iron :) which is 185-200

[majorchamp]

7 Iron, Down the line

[majorchamp]

WOW...I didn't realize this..but only 2 weeks ago I was keeping my right foot on the ground much longer.

wtf, I can't imagine what I changed in my swing that would promote the right foot to leave the ground sooner in my most recent footage

Stop the first video at 1:13 to view posture, stop next video at 0:17 to compare.

August 17, foot on ground longer





August 31



Only difference I know I worked on specifically was my posture. In the latest video, I am focusing on a bit more bend in my knees

thoughts?

[majorchamp]

So I have a theory as I have spent the last couple nights just thinking about my swing, the lag, the impact zone, my hips, etc...

The more I watch my hips in slow motion...the more I questioned whether they "really" didn't move forward enough, especially watching slow motion swings of other players like Woods, Els, etc...

I started to question whether the problem was LESS the hips not pushing lateral enough and MORE my hips not initially turning enough on the backswing.

We are talking inches here, because the swing is so fast, its easy to miss..but the more I was doing swings in my house just trying to feel things, the more I started realizing that if I focused on staying on my left side, trying to sync up hip turn with the start of my backswing, and focusing on straightening my right leg more...realized I was definitely turning a few more inches in my hips, which resulted in a more natural unwinding of my hips and even my arms dropping down a bit more naturally.

Typically, my backswing the first few feet are more arms then hips...so maybe when my club gets parallel to the ground do my hips start to rotate, so on camera...it looks like I got a decent hip turn...but because I might be 2-3 inches of turn less then where I should, it causes my hips to "spin out" and my club to even slightly come OTT hence promoting a pull, lack of lag, etc...

by introducing those extra 2-3 inches of hip turn, and especially focusing on turning more on the initial moments of the backswing with straightening the right leg, once I reached the top, I felt even my body and left shoulder is more rotated behind the ball and I feel like its a more natural move to "fire" or unwind those hips and the club comes down on a more natural downswing path.

These are my initial thoughts because these were swings in my house with no ball...so the real test is with a camera and the range again. Maybe Sunday I can do this.

I talked with Deron Sizemore (member on here) about this and he agreed that very well likely be the case.

Hopefully my description was clear enough :)

[iacas]

Typically, my backswing the first few feet are more arms then hips...so maybe when my club gets parallel to the ground do my hips start to rotate, so on camera...it looks like I got a decent hip turn...but because I might be 2-3 inches of turn less then where I should, it causes my hips to "spin out" and my club to even slightly come OTT hence promoting a pull, lack of lag, etc...

That's part of the things I've been saying.

You go forward more than most (which is why you're a low handicapper), but no, I'd suggest you need to get them forward more. And not just "more," but

You go forward and then spin. You need to go forward longer. Less (later) spinning.

I know I've talked about your right heel staying down longer and being "pulled" off the ground rather than you lifting it off (with your right knee), and that's a part of this too. Your right hip is spinning through too fast. Your knee flexing in towards the ball and lifting the heel off the ground is part of it. In other words...I doubt that you're going to "fix" everything here with a more synchronized hip turn on the backswing, BUT a better hip turn and better right leg work on the backswing WILL help, yes.

[majorchamp]

That's part of the things I've been saying.

awesome, glad to know I am at least on the right path.

That is the amazing thing about the golf swing...everything is cause and effect...you fix one thing or at least work on it, other things down the line get improved. practice practice practice.

[majorchamp]

7 Iron, Caddy View with slow motion

another thing....after watching this video. Do my arms start to fall too early when compared to my hips firing?

I think I remember a video of tiger and his hips were well on their way before his club truly dropped down...so part of my lag problem I guess is letting my arms fall too soon into the downswing. yes?

[iacas]

another thing....after watching this video. Do my arms start to fall too early when compared to my hips firing?

No. Your arms are late getting down. Phil's are not. His hands get to the front side of his pants, yours are almost at your back leg at impact. Look at his impact here. His hips aren't super open, his handle is forward, his shoulders are still pretty square.

His hips go but they go forward lazily. They don't just snap forward and then spin open. His left heel's even down in this video (not always common for Phil).

[majorchamp]

No. Your arms are late getting down. Phil's are not. His hands get to the front side of his pants, yours are almost at your back leg at impact. Look at his impact here. His hips aren't super open, his handle is forward, his shoulders are still pretty square.

Typing from my phone, sorry for typos.

I don't get it. I don't understand how one can rotate their hips and shoulders, laterally slide the hips, spin them while the arms fall, create lag where the butt of the club is where the inner left thigh is at impact. When I swing in my house right now, the only way to get the club still leaning forward with the butt of the club near my left thigh, yet the clubface is impacting the ball in the center of my stance, I literally have to lower my arms with minimal hip slide or rotation. When I watch video of hunter Mahan he looks to be having impact near his back leg, at least dtl view, though caddy view suggests closer to the left leg. I just don't see how its possible to have all that happening and not have impact closer to my right hip. I am seriously dumbfounded right now. Just waiting for a lightbulb to go off, when it does I will understand.

[colin007]

i *think* what erik is telling you is that you need to pull your left arm down faster, sooner in the downswing.

i could be (and probably am) completely wrong.

[majorchamp]

I guess my confusion lies in this. If u watch one of my slow motion caddy view swings and compare it to says tiger woods caddie view swing, onlookers closely at the moment the club stops at the top of the swing, the moment the hips begin shifting forward, and the arms start falling...and I don't see my arms taking longer then tigers. His hip to downswings time ratio doesn't differ much from mine, and I thought the arms fall because the hips have started their transition, I thought u don't want your arms falling before the hips begin transitioning.

[iacas]

i *think* what erik is telling you is that you need to pull your left arm down faster, sooner in the downswing.

You're completely right, actually.

In these two images the impact positions of the legs and body are the same. And yet as you'll notice, the angle between the left arm and the shoulder in the first image (A) is much less than the angle between the shoulders and the left arm in B. The only difference is how far across the chest - in the same amount of "time" as defined by the position of the body (i.e. "top of backswing to this, the body's impact position") the left arm has moved FARTHER across the chest in B than in A. Of course, this is aided by not overswinging, too.

I guess my confusion lies in this. If u watch one of my slow motion caddy view swings and compare it to says tiger woods caddie view swing, onlookers closely at the moment the club stops at the top of the swing, the moment the hips begin shifting forward, and the arms start falling...and I don't see my arms taking longer then tigers. His hip to downswings time ratio doesn't differ much from mine, and I thought the arms fall because the hips have started their transition, I thought u don't want your arms falling before the hips begin transitioning.

Look... what's that got to do with anything? Who's talked about "timing" like you've done. Phil and Tiger both get their hands to the front side of their body by impact. You do not. You're more like A, and Phil and Tiger are more like B.

Your hips can still start first. Ben Hogan's hips started almost as early as anyone - but he still got his darn arms down across his chest with good speed to get the handle forward by the time his body reached his impact position. You do not. Perhaps you're confused in how active or passive the arms are in the golf swing. You keep saying they "fall." They don't fall - you have muscles and you actually need to SWING (left arm pulling across chest) or HIT (right arm straightening, to really over-simplify both) at the ball. You need to use the muscles in your arms and chest. "Falling" implies that they're passive. Your timing is probably fine. But from just after transition when everything is going forward/down, you need to MOVE YOUR ARMS (because they're attached to your hands and those are attached to the handle of the club) down faster. P.S. Since the impact position is the relative timing mechanism used, you can also slow down the body (mainly the hips) to let the arms get down "faster" (since it's relative to the body), but I'm not a big fan of telling someone to do something "slower." Still, slower hips can sometimes result in more speed because the timing of the "whip crack" is better. But, given a choice, I prefer to have people try to do something faster than to do another thing more slowly (on the downswing - a whole other set of rules applies to backswing rates).

[majorchamp]

You're completely right, actually.

Thanks Erik,

I need to process all that information and do example swings to get what your saying. Whenever I "try" to do a test swing where I get my hands down sooner and create that impact position with the shaft leaning forward, ...lets say I am hitting a 9 iron and the ball position is slightly forward of center...to move my hips out of the way, move my weight forward, and get my hands near my left inner thigh ends up creating a "VERY" forward angled shaft then what I see watching videos on youtube. The caddy view is kind of a strange angle..because if you watch Hunter Mahan from DTL, and the same swing caddy view, the DTL view almost seems like he is hitting off his right hip, whereas the front view sure enough shows his hands near his left thigh. quite a mind f*ck to this guy :) I can definitely see if I focus more on PULLING my hands down versus letting them "fall" would result in more lag. I might even do a video where I am talking into it, via caddy view, and explaining my thought process on this particular problem (hands at impact). thanks

[majorchamp]

Think a good drill I could work on is trying to swing OVER the ball while keeping my hands forward like so...the dotted line referencing my clubhead going over the ball.

I feel like once I start making contact, I kind of lose the momentum to continue drills sometimes. Anyways, just a random thought.

[SuperSonic]

Nice swing man. I wish I have swing like you :)

[majorchamp]

It feels like the quicker I try to get my left arm ACROSS my body, the more "across" my swing path feels (outside to in) on the downswing...this is just doing swings in my house with no ball.

[Zeph]

I'm working on the same thing (might have mentioned this already). Using the aiming point technique, meaning you look in front of the ball, trying to get the hands as far forward as possible is something you can try.

The two things that really works best for me is: a) Trying to get the hands to cover the left foot at impact, or even outside the left foot from my point of view. I don't look at my left foot, I just have a swing thought where I imagine the hands over the left foot. b) Trying to hit the ball as low as possible. This require de-lofting and the only way to do this is by having the hands in front of the ball at impact. Almost like a punch shot.

It feels like the quicker I try to get my left arm ACROSS my body, the more "across" my swing path feels (outside to in) on the downswing...this is just doing swings in my house with no ball.

As long as you don't flatten the shoulder plane or throw the right shoulder or hands out, that won't happen. Just try hitting balls on the range when doing this, you'll see that it doesn't mean you'll come over the top. For me, I've got more trouble with clubface alignment when I swing my arms faster. Open and shut clubface occuring more often, but it's something I'll have to adjust to when I'm speeding up the hands.

Your swing plane is pretty good, as long as you stay on it, you won't come OTT. You'd notice it soon enough on the range if the ball started slicing. If it does go right, see if it starts right or straight. I'm sure you know the ball flight laws, and my point is that the more probable issue is to have the clubface open at impact than coming OTT.

[iacas]

It feels like the quicker I try to get my left arm ACROSS my body, the more "across" my swing path feels (outside to in) on the downswing...this is just doing swings in my house with no ball.

If you feel like you're coming across the ball, it's again because you're likely using the wrong muscles. That sounds like you're trying to get your arms down by rotating your shoulders, which is the opposite of what you need to do.

Technically, if you did nothing but get your arms down faster, you'd be more closed because your shoulders, relative to your hands getting into impact, will have rotated less. If you were able to get your arms down, say, from the top of your backswing you'd swing something like 60 degrees inside-out at the ball (it'd be 90 if your hands were in line with the shoulders, but they're not).