Why Understanding the Ball Flight Laws is Important

[JetFan1983]

Originally Posted by sean_miller

it's not like a player needs to think about them on every shot. They just don't.

They definitely don't. Like you said, now you know them, you've made whatever adjustments you needed to make, if any, and you've moved on from it. That's what everyone else should do too. But they don't. For whatever reason they fight it or don't care to listen in the first place.

I just feel bad for the people who find themselves behind a tree, with the green directly behind that tree, some distance away. They aim their face directly at the tree and try to use their swing path to determine the starting line. Most people don't deserve to have a golf ball come screaming back at their head at 100 MPH

[Harmonious]

Originally Posted by JetFan1983

Harmonious is still being a hater over the correct information. Why?

Not hating at all.  Seems the only hating is of Brandel Chamblee, who along with Frank Nobilo is one of my favorite people on the Golf Channel these days (post-Kessler).

To me, it doesn't matter whether someone knows the holy grail of ball flight laws or not. If they can get their students to hit the ball better, that's what counts.  Yes, I saw Rodger's duck hook.  I have to wonder whether Chamblee/Rodgers then adjusted the grip, etc. and hit some nice draws later on.  Maybe so, maybe not, but who cares?

I guess my question is why ball flight law knowledge, or lack or same, is the litmus test for anyone who discusses golf? I'm guessing there are lots of tour players who don't know them, just as there are lots of 20 handicappers who know them by heart.

[JetFan1983]

I like Nobilo a lot too. And Brandel does give solid tips in that lesson with Rodgers. I would like Brandel a lot more though if he lived up to his "well read" image and actually listened to this opposing viewpoint and gave it a legitimate chance. He hasn't.

I don't think they're the "Holy Grail" of tips at all, but I do think they're incredibly important to a lot of players (and to some people out there, knowing them might very well be their personal holy grail tip). You're right, most tour pros don't know them and they still play great golf. But we can't say for sure how many shots not knowing them has cost them over the course of their careers.

We all know a tournament comes down to one shot most of the time. Everyone wants to get better, so if it can save them just one, I would think they'd be thankful for the info.

Originally Posted by JetFan1983

They aim their face directly at the tree and try to use their swing path to determine the starting line.

Assuming their club face alignment at address would be the same at impact. Certainly not the case all the time.

[sean_miller]

Originally Posted by iacas

Nobody's saying they do, my man.

What's I'm hinting at is player struggling with working the ball or hitting the ball straight (ish - not including one-off swing and/or alignment errors - even the pros make mistakes) should re-evaluate the information they're receiving.

[uttexas]

I guess my question is why ball flight law knowledge, or lack or same, is the litmus test for anyone who discusses golf? I'm guessing there are lots of tour players who don't know them, just as there are lots of 20 handicappers who know them by heart.

For one, knowing the ball flight laws empowers people with a framework to correctly solve golf swing/ball flight problems. Let's say beginner right handed golfer x has problems slicing the ball. Golfer X's ball flight starts just left of target and fades a lot so the ball ends up well right of the target. Using Brandel's law of ball ends up where the clubface is pointing at impact. Brandel's solution would be to strengthen the grip. Golfer X will now hit mostly straight, low pulls that end up left of the target. The solution under Brandel's laws makes the problem worse. High speed camera recordings prove that most slicers have a square clubface at impact and knowing the correct laws that swing path, not face determines ball flight curve, the correct solution to the problem is to swing more in to out with a slightly more open clubface at impact. With Brandel's laws, the first step in solving the problem is wrong and the problems exponentially get worse. Thus, instead of using trial and error and voodoo fixes, knowledge of the correct laws gives a fundamental equation to solve.

[Harmonious]

Originally Posted by uttexas

For one, knowing the ball flight laws empowers people with a framework to correctly solve golf swing/ball flight problems. Let's say beginner right handed golfer x has problems slicing the ball. Golfer X's ball flight starts just left of target and fades a lot so the ball ends up well right of the target. Using Brandel's law of ball ends up where the clubface is pointing at impact. Brandel's solution would be to strengthen the grip. Golfer X will now hit mostly straight, low pulls that end up left of the target. The solution under Brandel's laws makes the problem worse.

High speed camera recordings prove that most slicers have a square clubface at impact and knowing the correct laws that swing path, not face determines ball flight curve, the correct solution to the problem is to swing more in to out with a slightly more open clubface at impact. With Brandel's laws, the first step in solving the problem is wrong and the problems exponentially get worse.

Thus, instead of using trial and error and voodoo fixes, knowledge of the correct laws gives a fundamental equation to solve.

I understand your passion about the ball flight laws and your concern for the beginner slicers.  But I think you are a little misguided if you think that merely incorporating those laws will turn a slicer into a straight ball hitter in one swing, without some trial and error.

I've been down this road with Erik a time or two, and  I'm not discounting what you are saying.  I am just stating my opinion that there is more than one way to teach someone to hit the golf ball, it has been so since the game was invented.

BTW, everything else being equal, strengthening your grip will help to promote a draw.

[michaeljames92]

I've been reading John's and Brandel's twitter responses. Brandel went as far as discrediting Trackman?

chambleebrandel brandel chamblee

@

@James Ridyard then the opposite would be true, that a fade can be hit with a closed clubface.It can't. Trackman never was much of a player.

6 hours ago

[mdl]

Quote:

I understand your passion about the ball flight laws and your concern for the beginner slicers.  But I think you are a little misguided if you think that merely incorporating those laws will turn a slicer into a straight ball hitter in one swing, without some trial and error.

I've been down this road with Erik a time or two, and  I'm not discounting what you are saying.  I am just stating my opinion that there is more than one way to teach someone to hit the golf ball, it has been so since the game was invented.

BTW, everything else being equal, strengthening your grip will help to promote a draw.

This is not just something only beginner slicers need to worry about.  And having the wrong information on the ball flight laws can absolutely prevent someone from fixing a problem.

My best golf buddy is a solid player, HC bounces in the 9-10 range, but he's a self-taught feel guy.  He's been in a terrible driver slump which is really frustrating him as he's still having excellent days with the irons, but almost every round the driver (and 3w off the tee for that matter) is just terrible.  His misses are generally pulls or straight-slices.  On a day recently when his misses were straight slices, he was talking about how he thinks he's not "committing" and getting the face closed, but with that swing thought he either dead pulled it or hit an even worse slice.  I told him that the straight slice is a square face but OTT swing path.  He's been slowly pulling out of the driver slump and it's definitely helped him to not be trying to fix something that wasn't actually his problem.

Oh, and a note on your last sentence.  If literally all else remains equal, just strengthening your grip will promote a pull, pull-draw, or snap-hook, depending on swing plane, but will never promote a "good" draw unless your shots are mostly straight pushes.

[Zeph]

But I think you are a little misguided if you think that merely incorporating those laws will turn a slicer into a straight ball hitter in one swing, without some trial and error.

Nobody is saying that. The point is that if you believe what Brandel says, you'll never get rid of that slice, even with trial and error for decades. You might get lucky at some point and figure it out, but it definitely won't be by doing it the way he suggests. So the only way to get rid of a slice by following the advice of Brandel (and many others), will be to [b]not[/b] do what he says. Which makes the whole ordeal a lot tougher than necessary. You can go out on the range and work on closing the clubface for 10 hours, but with a path going out-in, you will never be able to hit a push-draw.

[The_Pharaoh]

Guys, Harmonious is just winding us up. There can be no other logical explanation for his line of thinking.

[sean_miller]

Is the bottom line is that Chamblee is about 40 years behind the times? I could help fix a new playing partner's slice (if they cared to listen) with Practical Golf. Yeah, that listening part is tough. I helped a couple guys get started in the 90s and don't recall either of them having a slice. They might now though, since that was pre-Golf Channel.

[TN94z]

I personally think it is important to get the best information out there.  Too many guys have an opinion on what is what and yet they just don't seem to get it.  For me, I want to know the correct ball flight laws with evidence to back them up.  I don't want to know them so I can think about them on every swing.  I want to know them so when I have something go wrong within my swing, it makes it easier to diagnose and correct the issue.

So my reply is, good job Iacas and anyone else who questions bad teachings.  There is enough confusion out there as it is....we don't need someone adding to it.

And I love this:

Quote:

@chambleebrandel If we assume that iron shots r hit on the way down (ie path going down) why doesn't the ball go into the ground?

[iacas]

Originally Posted by Harmonious

I understand your passion about the ball flight laws and your concern for the beginner slicers.  But I think you are a little misguided if you think that merely incorporating those laws will turn a slicer into a straight ball hitter in one swing, without some trial and error.

Nobody's saying anything like that. C'mon, dude. You can't put words like that in people's mouths. It's disingenuous.

Originally Posted by Harmonious

I've been down this road with Erik a time or two, and  I'm not discounting what you are saying.  I am just stating my opinion that there is more than one way to teach someone to hit the golf ball, it has been so since the game was invented.

I suppose there is. You can teach someone with bad information and they can struggle mightily until they've hit enough golf balls that their body does on its own differently than their the knowledge in their brains tells them to do.

Or you can teach them with the proper understanding from the get-go.

The latter makes golf easier. And there may be more than one way to teach golf, but there's only one set of physics which actually governs ball flight. Choosing the "wrong" one impairs your ability to learn and teach, regardless of the way you go about it.

Originally Posted by Harmonious

BTW, everything else being equal, strengthening your grip will help to promote a draw.

Again, nobody's saying otherwise (except that such a change likely won't result in a usable draw). But as I said in the video, he's already got the face pointing left at impact.

A brief story... I know of a few tour players who say that the incorrect understanding of the ball flight laws resulted in their losing their tour status. They'd hit the ball at the target, it'd draw left of it, and in order to attempt to start the ball farther right they'd swing more to the right . Result: ball started at the target and hooked farther left than before.

So you can get all sanctimonious, Harmonious, but at the end of the day it's a simple fact: the incorrect ball flight laws has hurt people at every level of the game.

Originally Posted by The_Pharaoh

Guys, Harmonious is just winding us up. There can be no other logical explanation for his line of thinking.

So much for his "option 3."

Harmonious, I'd like nothing more than to stop talking about ball flight laws. But as long as idiots like Brandel Chamblee keep spewing garbage, I'm going to correct them and put the right information out there. I care about golfers and want them to get better, and everyone deserves to know what makes the ball fly the way it does.

[Harmonious]

OK, the tribe has spoken.  I have been voted off the island.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by Harmonious

OK, the tribe has spoken.  I have been voted off the island.

Harmonious, c'mon. You're free to not care or to ignore threads like this. But you pop into them anyway, and say things that aren't quite true or downplay the importance of the message.

The proper ball flight laws take about ten seconds to learn. They're not difficult to understand, but not knowing them makes learning to play more difficult. It's like trying to play basketball thinking that you're supposed to hit the center of the square in order to score points - sure, you'll make some baskets along the way, but the whole premise is wrong.

[Stretch]

Originally Posted by michaeljames92

I've been reading John's and Brandel's twitter responses. Brandel went as far as discrediting Trackman?

chambleebrandel brandel chamblee

@

@James Ridyard then the opposite would be true, that a fade can be hit with a closed clubface.It can't. Trackman never was much of a player.

6 hours ago

"Facts are meaningless! You could use facts to prove anything that's even remotely true." -- Homer Simpson.

[Harmonious]

Originally Posted by iacas

Harmonious, c'mon. You're free to not care or to ignore threads like this. But you pop into them anyway, and say things that aren't quite true or downplay the importance of the message.

The proper ball flight laws take about ten seconds to learn. They're not difficult to understand, but not knowing them makes learning to play more difficult. It's like trying to play basketball thinking that you're supposed to hit the center of the square in order to score points - sure, you'll make some baskets along the way, but the whole premise is wrong.

Believe me, I ignore a lot of threads, even though some of the swing advice given (usually by 20 cappers) is wrong, IMO. I feel sorry for the poor guy posting his swing, trying to decipher ten different suggestions, many of which contradict each other.  But I generally stay out of those because, who knows, maybe one kernel could help the poor guy.

That is why I originally posted on this "Bash Brandel" thread.  Yeah,  he says that "generally the ball starts on the swingpath line" instead of "generally the ball starts on the clubface line". And one swing from Rodgers hooked into the woods.  Was that an alignment problem? We don't know.  I just don't think he should be fired from the Golf Channel for it.

I agree that the ball flight laws are helpful (and, thanks to your charts and videos, I know them well), I just don't think they should be the litmus test against which any golf instructor or golf commentator should be measured.  That's all.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by Harmonious

Believe me, I ignore a lot of threads, even though some of the swing advice given (usually by 20 cappers) is wrong, IMO. I feel sorry for the poor guy posting his swing, trying to decipher ten different suggestions, many of which contradict each other.  But I generally stay out of those because, who knows, maybe one kernel could help the poor guy.

I agree, notice, and do as well.

Originally Posted by Harmonious

That is why I originally posted on this "Bash Brandel" thread.  Yeah,  he says that "generally the ball starts on the swingpath line" instead of "generally the ball starts on the clubface line". And one swing from Rodgers hooked into the woods.  Was that an alignment problem? We don't know.  I just don't think he should be fired from the Golf Channel for it.

Who's calling for him to be fired? I'd be happy as heck if he could just get the right information out there, and failing that, will strive to correct the bad information he puts out there. I do think someone who teaches should be doing the Playing Lessons show, but as I said in the video I made, I think he's one of the best at talking about non-instructional topics.

Nobody's getting anywhere near "he should be fired" and I think it undermines your point to take it to that extreme.

Originally Posted by Harmonious

I agree that the ball flight laws are helpful (and, thanks to your charts and videos, I know them well), I just don't think they should be the litmus test against which any golf instructor or golf commentator should be measured.  That's all.

It's not a litmus test, but I do think it is fundamental to understanding how to teach. I've given countless examples of the wrong diagnoses given because the wrong ball flight laws are believed to be true, so I won't rehash them again.

Have teachers and golfers done well believing the "wrong" information? Sure, but they've succeeded in spite of the bad information, not because of it.