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Myth of Maintaining Your Address Flex in the Rear Knee


mvmac
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On 10/6/2015 at 0:03 AM, mvmac said:

If Boy Wonder Jordan Spieth can't convince people this myth is wrong than no one can. ;)

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Longest hitter on the LPGA tour. Watch the right knee during the backswing.


 

 

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  • 1 year later...
  • 1 month later...

Very nice. I've noticed my right knee wanting to point inward, probably need to flare my right foot a bit more?

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1 hour ago, zero said:

Very nice. I've noticed my right knee wanting to point inward, probably need to flare my right foot a bit more?

Could help. I don't know if I've ever seen a trail knee pointing inward much during the backswing.

Erik J. Barzeski —  I knock a ball. It goes in a gopher hole. 🏌🏼‍♂️
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  • 1 month later...
5 hours ago, mvmac said:

 

This wasn't the best demonstration. On his 'flexed knee' rotation, he didn't allow his lead knee to flex with the rotation. Yeah that will stop the hips.

I'm not against straightening the trail leg on the b/s, it's likely a natural movement. Not sure that doing so allows either a deeper or more rotated trail hip. When I actually try with both styles I get more hip rotation and depth relative to the target line by holding more flex.

That does not mean I think holding trail leg flex is a better way to swing. Trail leg extension on the b/s may be very useful for other reasons, but I don't think it's because of what jgilmer was saying. It seems to me that Hogan's trail leg extension was more about driving to his lead side off the inside of his trail foot before the club reached the top to initiate a fluid transition.

Edited by natureboy

Kevin

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34 minutes ago, natureboy said:

When I actually try with both styles I get more hip rotation and depth relative to the target line by holding more flex.

I'm confused by this. If you were to stand with my tailbone a few inches away from a wall and make a pivot allowing some freedom vs retaining the original flex, you'd be able to push into the wall with straightening the knee. Remember the trail also goes "up", on it's slant. Only way I can push into the wall would be to increase flex in the knee and that's not really a functional position.

And getting more rotation maintaining the address flex doesn't make any sense.

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Mike McLoughlin

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What Mike said.  It doesn't make any biomechanical sense that you can turn more with the same the flex versus extending the trail knee.

Your right ankle is essentially a fixed point. 

2 hours ago, natureboy said:

It seems to me that Hogan's trail leg extension was more about driving to his lead side off the inside of his trail foot before the club reached the top to initiate a fluid transition.

That also doesn't make biomechanical sense: you can't push forward off an extended knee. You could "lean" but that's it. (In truth the trail leg does little on the downswing in good golf swings - it regains a little flex passively and then gets pulled into extension again by the core and right hip rotating around and sliding a bit forward).

Erik J. Barzeski —  I knock a ball. It goes in a gopher hole. 🏌🏼‍♂️
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On 1/27/2017 at 10:48 PM, mvmac said:

I'm confused by this. If you were to stand with my tailbone a few inches away from a wall and make a pivot allowing some freedom vs retaining the original flex, you'd be able to push into the wall with straightening the knee. Remember the trail also goes "up", on it's slant. Only way I can push into the wall would be to increase flex in the knee and that's not really a functional position.

And getting more rotation maintaining the address flex doesn't make any sense.

I'm not understanding your scenario. Diagrams?

Now I wasn't looking at shoulder turn which may be inter-related to amount of flexion between torso and legs. My trial was to see how much my trail hip rotated away from the target line with ~ retained flex vs. a mostly (not completely unflexed knee). Looked only at hip rotation and with the flex maintained the trail hip moved farther away ('deeper') from the target line, which makes sense if you think about the geometry.

On 1/28/2017 at 0:06 AM, iacas said:

Your right ankle is essentially a fixed point. 

That also doesn't make biomechanical sense: you can't push forward off an extended knee. You could "lean" but that's it. (In truth the trail leg does little on the downswing in good golf swings - it regains a little flex passively and then gets pulled into extension again by the core and right hip rotating around and sliding a bit forward).

The right ankle does have degrees of freedom - not a ton, but some.

I didn't say Hogan's trail leg / knee was 'extended' as in straight. It straightens a bit during transition which is consistent with a gentle 'push off' the  inside of the trail foot a bit like Nicklaus' 'sprinter in the blocks' image / analogy. Jack's move was probably more 'sprinter like than Hogan. With Hogan, I agree there was also likely some 'tipping' / 'leaning' / 'falling' onto the lead leg as well that he termed 'enough lateral movement to get to the lead side' and others call a 'bump'.

Kevin

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4 minutes ago, natureboy said:

I'm not understanding your scenario. Diagrams?

It was pretty well explained IMO. You don't get more rotation by maintaining the flex in your trail knee.

4 minutes ago, natureboy said:

Now I wasn't looking at shoulder turn which may be inter-related to amount of flexion between torso and legs. My trial was to see how much my trail hip rotated away from the target line with ~ retained flex vs. a mostly (not completely unflexed knee). Looked only at hip rotation and with the flex maintained the trail hip moved farther away ('deeper') from the target line, which makes sense if you think about the geometry.

I don't know what you're talking about. Your ankle is in a relatively fixed place. For your right hip to move away from that point in space, the right leg has to lengthen. It does so with the knee extending.

3 minutes ago, natureboy said:

The right ankle does have degrees of freedom - not a ton, but some.

Kevin, do you realize how dumb things like this sound? No shit your right ankle can move. The point is that your right foot, your right ankle, is effectively fixed in space. It doesn't move away from the target line an appreciable amount, etc.

The rest of your post is not particularly relevant.

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 2/3/2017 at 10:17 PM, iacas said:

It was pretty well explained IMO. You don't get more rotation by maintaining the flex in your trail knee.

I don't know what you're talking about. Your ankle is in a relatively fixed place. For your right hip to move away from that point in space, the right leg has to lengthen. It does so with the knee extending.

With the ankle relatively fixed in place and a point of rotation (if you load rightward anyway), the thigh is essentially the radius of the circle. Think about it. The closer to horizontal the trail thigh is, the larger the effective radius around the trail ankle. It's very basic geometry. Pushing the trail hip back with a more extended trail leg will definitely raise it higher than rotating with a flexed knee, but not necessarily more angular rotation.

Trail leg extension may help you make a 'better' turn or a better swing, but not due to more degrees of hip rotation around the relatively fixed point of the ankle...unless maybe you let the pressure in the trail foot shift way back behind the heel. That sounds imbalanced.

On 1/27/2017 at 10:48 PM, mvmac said:

I'm confused by this. If you were to stand with my tailbone a few inches away from a wall and make a pivot allowing some freedom vs retaining the original flex, you'd be able to push into the wall with straightening the knee. Remember the trail also goes "up", on it's slant. Only way I can push into the wall would be to increase flex in the knee and that's not really a functional position.

Why would you need to push into the wall in this scenario? Does being able to apply backwards pressure help a golf swing if you can just make a big turn with your hips rotating past a point on that wall? I haven't encountered the need to hip check anyone in my backswing, yet so I don't see the benefit of your scenario vs. just being able to rotate the hips past that point on the wall on which you would be pushing.

Edited by natureboy

Kevin

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@natureboy, you can do whatever you want, I don't care. If you can turn your hips fully and not change the address flex in the knee, good for you. Film it because I think it's extremely difficult.

I can come up with a long list of HOF players and major winners that lose some flex in the trail leg during the backswing.

Maintaining address flex has zero advantages over losing a few degrees of flex.

2 hours ago, natureboy said:

I haven't encountered the need to hip check anyone in my backswing

You're exaggerating what I'm saying. I said push not "thrust" back.

2 hours ago, natureboy said:

Why would you need to push into the wall in this scenario?

The pressure loads into your trail heel. You don't "need" to do it, it just happens (when you turn your hips properly).

From pics 1-2 is their right glute getting closer or staying the same distance from the "wall" (I didn't draw the lines btw). It's clearly getting closer, it would be "pushing" into the wall, like I said. 

NicklausPelvicRotation.jpgPalmerPelvicRotation.jpg

 

What do you think is happening here? Is Rory maintaining his address knee flex? Heck no. 

Screen Shot 2017-02-20 at 9.55.02 PM.png

 

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Mike McLoughlin

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13 hours ago, natureboy said:

With the ankle relatively fixed in place and a point of rotation (if you load rightward anyway), the thigh is essentially the radius of the circle.

That doesn't make any sense. Nobody's rotating around their knee. The lateral (horizontal) distance from any part of the foot (fixed position) to the right hip is effectively zero. There's no rotation of the right hip around the ankle. That's not the dimension in which the hips rotate.

13 hours ago, natureboy said:

The closer to horizontal the trail thigh is, the larger the effective radius around the trail ankle.

Most people set up with their hip pretty close to "over" their knee. There's not really a "radius" there.

The simple geometry that you're seemingly not understanding is that the distance from the ankle to the hip increases in the backswing as you rotate your hips, and that extra distance comes from extending the trail knee. The trail hip not only goes up, but it goes around a little, too. That's extra distance. With your trail foot on the ground, its position is fixed, and the extra distance the hip moves (up, back) comes largely from the extension of the trail knee.

13 hours ago, natureboy said:

It's very basic geometry.

I'm a smart guy. I don't know why on earth you're talking about the trail thigh creating a radius.

What I've described is not only also simple geometry, it's anatomically correct and how the body works.

You said you can create more rotation with the trail knee maintaining its address flex. Post a video. Prove it.

13 hours ago, natureboy said:

Pushing the trail hip back with a more extended trail leg will definitely raise it higher than rotating with a flexed knee, but not necessarily more angular rotation.

The trail hip rotating also moves it farther away from the trail ankle (and closer to the front ankle). That's how a circle works…

Tiger.jpg

If the red dot is his right hip at A1, and the blue dot at A4, even if he rotated his hips level (he doesn't), the blue dot has moved farther away from the red dot. That increased length has to come from something.

I suppose Tiger could increase the flex in his trail knee to lower his right hip during the backswing… to counter-act the rotation he's going to get, but that would just be goofy.

That's why I said this:

On 2/3/2017 at 10:17 PM, iacas said:

Your ankle is in a relatively fixed place. For your right hip to move away from that point in space, the right leg has to lengthen. It does so with the knee extending.

Simple.

Another simple demonstration? Tie a string to your belt loop, and have someone tuck the other end under your right foot. To turn properly you're going to pull on that string.

13 hours ago, natureboy said:

Trail leg extension may help you make a 'better' turn or a better swing, but not due to more degrees of hip rotation around the relatively fixed point of the ankle...unless maybe you let the pressure in the trail foot shift way back behind the heel. That sounds imbalanced.

None of that is accurate.

Again…

You said you can create more rotation with the trail knee maintaining its address flex. Post a video. Let's see it. It should be in the context of a golf swing.

11 hours ago, mvmac said:

@natureboy, you can do whatever you want, I don't care. If you can turn your hips fully and not change the address flex in the knee, good for you. Film it because I think it's extremely difficult.

Yup.

11 hours ago, mvmac said:

@natureboyI can come up with a long list of HOF players and major winners that lose some flex in the trail leg during the backswing.

Maintaining address flex has zero advantages over losing a few degrees of flex.

Yup.

Erik J. Barzeski —  I knock a ball. It goes in a gopher hole. 🏌🏼‍♂️
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On 2/21/2017 at 0:34 PM, iacas said:

You said you can create more rotation with the trail knee maintaining its address flex. Post a video. Let's see it. It should be in the context of a golf swing.

@mvmac and I talked and we're going to require this of you as a condition of your membership. Too much talk, too little sense, not a single video, Member Swing thread, photo(s), or anything.

Post a video demonstrating this.

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Erik J. Barzeski —  I knock a ball. It goes in a gopher hole. 🏌🏼‍♂️
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As viewed from above, Hogan and Palmer have both made an effective rotation of the trail hip away from the target line. This is large effected by the knee / shin moving away from the toes to a more vertical position as the inside of the trail foot is pressured. Palmer may be extending somewhat, but based on the pic below still from his younger days, I doubt Jack is much.

To the extent that the trail leg retains flex for that amount of turn away from the ball-target line the trial hip will be further from the target line on an arc as viewed from directly above (more effective degrees of rotation), while more trial leg extension will elevate the hip relative to the ground. I don't have an opinion on which is better.

I don't disagree with the premise of the thread, but all else equal and with feet nearly perpendicular to the target line, the less you extend the deeper / further from the target line the trail hip will be. I'm not saying that's better, just more effective degrees of rotation as viewed from above.

Rory has a great swing, but so did the guys below. If he extended it was by a very small amount. Both approaches seem to have worked very well.

a34a15a3d88fec576aaa1a3cffafb0bf.jpg

One thing I thought about that might be different in our descriptions is that I expect you turn out your trail foot a lot more than me. Given the inherent limitation in how much one can turn around the ankle the more your trail foot is turned out the more that trail leg extension can work to push the trail hip toward the target as it also pushes it up away from the ankle. I turn my trail foot out similar to Nicklaus and Palmer in the pics above (significantly less than the lead foot).

But at your full turn position with the same angle in your shins, if you were to add flex in the leg your hip would be further away from the ankle. Not saying it's better. But the length of the thigh is what it is. It doesn't change length. Anyone who thinks about it a little bit can deduce that for a given orientation of the shin bone, more knee flex leads to a horizontal thigh, which means the hip that it's attached to is farther from the foot.

natureboy_legs.png

I'm not saying that it's a better position, but just in terms of rotation moving the trail hip further from the ankle isn't the same thing as moving it farther from the ball target line. As data / science oriented guys I would think you'd want to be precise about why your methods work or are better. Could a higher hip position be beneficial? Very possibly. It could be that going higher as well as around helps with balance or something else.

On 2/21/2017 at 1:17 AM, mvmac said:

Maintaining address flex has zero advantages over losing a few degrees of flex.

The above is an assertion, not a fact…even if no great golfer has exactly maintained their address position flex. The question is maintaining a lot of flex or allowing a lot of or actively seeking extension in the trail leg. I don't think there's a universal law on this.

I don't care about your arbitrary requirement to jump through hoops for your amusements. Enjoy deleting my last post :beer:.

Kevin

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@iacas-Tho it is nice to be able to take your time and type out what you mean to say this is one of the downsides to a forum too-You have to respond to a whole bunch of crap and a person can get all of their thoughts out uninterrupted.

If you were been sitting in a room with @natureboy and he started drawing that entirely stupid picture with the lines you could have cut him off and spared all of us the pain of having to watch him so badly miss the point.

I bet @natureboy is still going to look at the response-And I bet he is still not going to see where he went wrong. But that is because he is just that way and he is unable to see how stupid his own posts are and how little they actually deal with golf swings.

His stick drawing is exactly why you asked for a video-Even though he posted it after you asked. His errors and flaws and stupid thoughts would have been even more evident if he had actually tried to make a vid.

  • Upvote 1

"The expert golfer has maximum time to make minimal compensations. The poorer player has minimal time to make maximum compensations." - And no, I'm not Mac. Please do not PM me about it. I just think he is a crazy MFer and we could all use a little more crazy sometimes.

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