My Swing (billchao)

[DeadMan]

6 minutes ago, billchao said:

I don’t go to the driving range. I could say that I’ll change that, but I’d be lying.

Legitimately, I think 30 minutes a month at the range would be enough for this stuff. You go and you just focus on hitting shots where you're aligned to the target and the ball is curving the right way. It seems like you do enough practice and other work where this probably doesn't need much time.

[billchao]

9 hours ago, saevel25 said:

I agree, the swing looked good at SV.

Well there’s certainly enough of you guys saying it, so I appreciate that. We are our own toughest critics, as they say.

It is entirely possible that my swing looked good at SV because I practiced a bunch leading up to the trip, but then I let things go afterwards as I usually end up doing mid-late summer as the weather gets hotter, I get busier at work, and the mosquitoes that are out on a rampage cause me to lose interest in practicing.

The driver swings I filmed on the course were awful and I’m dying on that hill.

9 hours ago, saevel25 said:

I agree with the losing focus on some minor details we take for granted sometimes. There are times I will find a line, start thinking about something and forget were I wanted to aim.

Lately I’ve been picking an intermediate target and setting the clubface to that, then getting into address with the face set. That coupled with the mechanical adjustment seemed to have worked well last weekend.

9 hours ago, saevel25 said:

If you are just hitting shots at the range to hit good shots, I doubt there is a difference. If you are focusing on making swing changes (exaggeration), then there will be a difference. Still, there is no difference unless you have video evidence. Schrodinger's Golf Swing 😛 

I think that’s part of it. When I’m practicing, I’m focused on making a particular movement in the swing. When I’m playing, I’m focused on hitting the ball. I’m not making swings with the same intent. The evidence is there in last week’s videos. The swing on the 12th is definitely not the same as the swing on the 15th, unless I changed the outcome by measuring it 😜

9 hours ago, DeadMan said:

Legitimately, I think 30 minutes a month at the range would be enough for this stuff. You go and you just focus on hitting shots where you're aligned to the target and the ball is curving the right way. It seems like you do enough practice and other work where this probably doesn't need much time.

I’m going to try it.

I honestly haven’t practiced much at all since SV. There are three days with swing videos in my camera roll since July 11, and I record videos every session. I’m not putting in the time and I know it.

[billchao]

I think I might have figured out the issue with my pitching. The old habit of rolling my hands while taking the club back crept back. I’m essentially exposing too much bounce and relying too much on timing to hit the ball. It’s something @david_wedzik showed me I was doing many years ago.

I’m playing tomorrow morning, so I’ll try to keep on top of it and see how it goes.

[billchao]

15 hours ago, billchao said:

I think I might have figured out the issue with my pitching. The old habit of rolling my hands while taking the club back crept back. I’m essentially exposing too much bounce and relying too much on timing to hit the ball. It’s something @david_wedzik showed me I was doing many years ago.

I’m playing tomorrow morning, so I’ll try to keep on top of it and see how it goes.

Yea this was it. Full swing is left wrist up, short game is right wrist back. There should be absolutely zero conscious forearm rotation feeling in any of it.

Need to work on bunker shots. Or play courses with better bunkers. Probably both.

[billchao]

I think I’m playing my wedges too far forward in my stance. That could explain the occasional fat shots and why I tend to hit the ball high off the face out of the rough.

[billchao]

Got a session in with the Mevo+ today. It was about 45°F out and I hurt my shoulder so I wasn’t swinging 100%, but it arrived on Thursday afternoon and I really wanted to try it out 😃

These are hit with Snell MTB-X with the sticker on it, so I’m not going to put much stock in the spin numbers. My Pro V1x RCT balls are on the way and I’ll be using them next time to compare.

7I

 

Pretty decent. I deleted two shots I absolutely fatted the crap out of. I usually play my 7i as my 170 club so I’m right in the ballpark here.

I called those three pulls as soon as I hit them, so it’s good to know that I have that awareness even hitting into my net.

Driver

Uh yea this is why I suck at this game. Did I say I had clubface awareness with my 7i? I have absolutely none of it with the driver.

One caveat is that I’m a little tentative with hitting my driver on my home setup because if I catch it even a little fat I’m going to break something. I’m planning on buying a new mat in the spring.

So the swing speed is a little lower, especially when you compare it to my 7i speeds proportionally, but that lateral dispersion looks spot on. I’m either going to hit my target pretty well or I’m not even in the same zip code.

Some relevant averages:

• V. Launch: 10.5°
• AoA: 5.3°
• Height: 74.1’

Does that mean I’m delofting the driver a bunch? I definitely hit the driver lower than I should. Even when I was getting fit for it, we had a hard time getting the launch up without seriously messing up something else.

Anyways, this thing is fun. I’ll be doing Mevo+ sessions with some regularity I think, probably going to do wedges and other things, too. Looking forward to the Pro upgrade in the future.

[woodzie264]

Cool toy! Thanks for pics - that’s helpful

 

i’d be interested to see how the simulator parts work, when you’re not able to visualize the distances. In other words it’s one thing for a machine to tell me I have a 50 yard pitch versus me on the course seeing my 50 yard pitch. I feel like a lot of my judgment with regards to short game, comes from being there and seeing it and getting a feel for how hard I should swing the club. I do have my clubs labeled for quarter swings, half swings, quarter pitches, and that sort of thing so I get that you can make adjustments there, but I’m not sure it  necessarily is the same as being on a course in seeing a flag 50 yards away versus a machine telling me that I have a 50 yds pitch. Does that make sense? What are your thoughts on that simulator mode?

[billchao]

15 minutes ago, woodzie264 said:

Cool toy!

It’s not a toy, it’s a serious piece of equipment for the purpose of improving at golf.

Being fun to use is a complete coincidence 😃

23 minutes ago, woodzie264 said:

Thanks for pics - that’s helpful

That’s just the app view, too. You get the full chart of your sessions on myflightscope.com, but that’s harder to read in a screenshot so I didn’t bother to share it.

[iacas]

55 minutes ago, billchao said:

Some relevant averages:

• V. Launch: 10.5°
• AoA: 5.3°
• Height: 74.1’

Does that mean I’m delofting the driver a bunch? I definitely hit the driver lower than I should. Even when I was getting fit for it, we had a hard time getting the launch up without seriously messing up something else.

Yes.

[billchao]

37 minutes ago, iacas said:

Yes.

That’s what I thought. We’ll look at it next year I guess 😃

[iacas]

1 minute ago, billchao said:

That’s what I thought. We’ll look at it next year I guess 😃

You always tend to shove your hands forward instead of letting the clubhead pass.

Just a bit. But it's there.

[woodzie264]

1 hour ago, billchao said:

It’s not a toy, it’s a serious piece of equipment for the purpose of improving at golf.

Being fun to use is a complete coincidence 😃

Oh, absolutely! 

[boogielicious]

14 hours ago, billchao said:

Some relevant averages:

• V. Launch: 10.5°
• AoA: 5.3°
• Height: 74.1’

One session I had with my 10 deg head

• V launch 16.4
• AoA 8.0
• Height 101’

I may be launching too high. This is what is so exciting about the MEVO Plus, we can work on optimizing our ball flight at home instead of at a simulator. I always feel rushed at a sim.

[billchao]

6 hours ago, boogielicious said:

This is what is so exciting about the MEVO Plus, we can work on optimizing our ball flight at home instead of at a simulator. I always feel rushed at a sim.

Yea. I feel like I can actually work on stuff with feedback. I used to get on Trackman once or twice a year just to get a snapshot of the state of my swing, check shotzones, etc. I would never go and rent the time to just work on one facet of my swing; it never seemed like good value for my money.

[billchao]

 

I think this is the first time I’ve swung a golf club since November. It wasn’t good. This is why so don’t take golf trips during winter 😅

I spent rest of the session just trying to find the center of the face with zero success.

[iacas]

Get the weight in the balls of your feet.

[billchao]

Tried to practice something today. Realized very quickly that I don’t really remember how to swing a club. It’s amazing how much I lose over winter and everything just kind of reverts back. Same story every year, it seems.

Except this year I’m smart and instead of spending the whole time blindly searching for a swing feel to find the mechanics I’m looking for, I decided to damn the mechanics and just make swings where I hit the center of the clubface.

It actually worked pretty well. I kind of just slowed things down a little and focused on making smooth swings and I found the sweet spot. That’s something.

 

I’d say they’re about 80%. I could probably play golf fairly well with those swings. I won’t, because the second I stand over a ball on a golf course, I’m going to swing as hard as possible for no particular reason.

[billchao]

 

Ok I think I’m remembering how to do this now. Got a good practice session in just focusing on going steep to shallow in transition. Noticed that my swing so far this year has been too shallow going back and steep in transition so I went in this direction.

Didn’t really focus on the mechanics. I just sort of let my body do whatever it needed to make the club work the way I wanted it to. The trail elbow is sliding behind me a bit but I’m just focusing on the contact right now.