Golfers Are Consistent - A Golfer's Good and Bad Swings Look the Same and Are Repeatable

[saevel25]

Sorry, I still don't get it. So if the differences between good and bad swings are immeasurable, what do you measure to verify that you're making a better swing?

A person can have a very repeatable bad swing, which produces a wide variety of results. The reason being that the path and face angle at impact vary greatly with each strike. Basically very similar movements, such that you can not tell the difference on slow motion video can produce highly volatile impact conditions.

PGA Tour players are very consistent with a very good swing that produces a very consistent impact condition that they want.

If you want a measurable, look at the end result. How often does the ball land with accuracy and precision. Accuracy being how tightly the balls land in the same area, with precision being how well you aim. Basically how well can you control swing path and face angle at impact to produce the shot you want. The better the swing you have the more control you have over the results, the more control you have of the club at impact.

[iacas]

Sorry, I still don't get it. So if the differences between good and bad swings are immeasurable, what do you measure to verify that you're making a better swing?

The 5SK are all verifiable, measurable, and achievable.

Let's skip achievable. It means what it says - everyone can achieve them. Let's also skip "verifiable" - we have data which verifies that each of the Keys are real.

By "measurable" we simply mean that there are ways to measure whether you've achieved the Key or not.

Key #1: How much does your head move around? What's your shoulder tilt at the top of the backswing? How much have you rotated your shoulders? All things we can measure.

Key #2: How much weight and/or force and/or pressure is there and where is it at various parts of the golf swing (specifically at impact)? All things we can measure.

Key #3: How much forward shaft lean do you have? Is it lining up with your lead shoulder, roughly? What's the delivered loft of the clubface at impact? All things we can measure.

Key #4: What's the path of the club? Where does the ball strike the clubface? What's the AoA? All things we can measure.

Key #5: What's the clubface angle at impact? Again, where does the ball strike the clubface? All things we can measure.

In this swing the guy's swing varied subtly in Keys #4 and #5. Everything else would be basically identical. And the differences in #4/#5 were incredibly small.

Golf is hard.

[Torres9]

This is an excellent post. It's not a perfect game and it's not about making perfect swings. Even when your technique is solid the execution will not be perfect every time and the factors of "why" can be extremely subtle.

[mvmac]

Sorry, I still don't get it. So if the differences between good and bad swings are immeasurable, what do you measure to verify that you're making a better swing?

[RFKFREAK]

BTW, I suck.

No argument here. :-) Great post, Erik. When I read that in LSW, it really made sense and completely changed how I thought. It was the anomaly which made me think I could be a decent golfer if I could just learn to hit the ball that way consistently. Thank you.

[colin007]

Yup, it's that we manage to hit some good shots in spite of the bad swings we possess.

[mvmac]

Ian Poulter shanked one today so I figured it be a good opportunity to compare against another swing I could find. Camera angles aren't exact but close.

[TheMadness]

Would this explain why I often see large foot imprints on soft tees when I flush a drive?  Is that extra GRF from driving the foot vertically into the ground what makes the marginal difference between a great drive and a good drive?

[mvmac]

Would this explain why I often see large foot imprints on soft tees when I flush a drive?  Is that extra GRF from driving the foot vertically into the ground what makes the marginal difference between a great drive and a good drive?

Probably not. Your good and bad swings are going to be pretty similar.

[TheMadness]

Good point.  However, I'm not sure that's necessarily the case if you're getting stuck and not moving to the front side consistently.  I may have a number of swings where I take the club back properly and hit it well, but I'll inevitably push the handle out occasionally and then get stuck on the downswing so that I'm not able to bring the club from the inside and transfer my weight.  When that happens, I never feel as if I'm getting that torque from the front foot.  When I hit a really flush drive, particularly when the tees are soft, I often look down and see a big shoe imprint where my front foot was.  That doesn't happen on the stuck swings.

[GaryH]

I once overheard an instructor say this to a pupil of his who looked, being generous, a 24 handicapper: "Your technique is better than Jim Furyk.  The difference is, his swing repeats.  That's the only difference."

My heart sank and i was actually quite appalled.  Why patronise someone?  Why give them false information, false hope?

[Rynrem]

Yesterday during the final round, Poulter and Reed blocked or pushed or faded a shot. On both swing replays, Miller made the comment that they both "drug their handle" a little through impact and that was the cause of the push/block/fade. What exactly does that mean? as it looked like they were just creating lag via the flying wedge to my uneducated eye.

[boogielicious]

I once overheard an instructor say this to a pupil of his who looked, being generous, a 24 handicapper:  "Your technique is better than Jim Furyk.  The difference is, his swing repeats.  That's the only difference."

My heart sank and i was actually quite appalled.  Why patronise someone?  Why give them false information, false hope?

Our swings are repeatable.  Very much so.  We just repeat the bad technique.  We need to change the picture so we repeat the good technique.

[GaryH]

I once overheard an instructor say this to a pupil of his who looked, being generous, a 24 handicapper:  "Your technique is better than Jim Furyk.  The difference is, his swing repeats.  That's the only difference."

My heart sank and i was actually quite appalled.  Why patronise someone?  Why give them false information, false hope?

Our swings are repeatable.  Very much so.  We just repeat the bad technique.  We need to change the picture so we repeat the good technique.

Exactly.  That's my point.  Both player's swing repeats.  The difference is, Furyk's swing dynamics are sensational (certainly in the downswing and through impact) whereas the "24-handicapper"'s swing is poor.

The teacher was giving his student false information and false hope, which is a hindrince to any hope of improvement.

[iacas]

Good point.  However, I'm not sure that's necessarily the case if you're getting stuck and not moving to the front side consistently.  I may have a number of swings where I take the club back properly and hit it well, but I'll inevitably push the handle out occasionally and then get stuck on the downswing so that I'm not able to bring the club from the inside and transfer my weight.  When that happens, I never feel as if I'm getting that torque from the front foot.  When I hit a really flush drive, particularly when the tees are soft, I often look down and see a big shoe imprint where my front foot was.  That doesn't happen on the stuck swings.

I would bet you that you'd have a hard time, if we could digitally scrub the clubhead and ball from the video, telling the "good" swings apart from the "bad" swings. You're probably mixing in a little confirmation bias or something as well.

As a 12, your swing is going to be virtually the same almost all the time, unless you're feeling oddly that day, have an unusual shot or lie, or are trying something quite different (and are successful at actually changing it, which many people aren't).

[TheMadness]

I understand confirmation bias, but what I'm talking about is something different.  I agree that most of us have repeatable swings.  But a repeatable swing is going to have some level of variation, and the type of variation may lead to a specific, recurring problem.  Isn't that the goal of improving the swing--to create something that is still repeatable but less likely to result in a miss than your current swing?  For me, I struggle with loading my right side in a way that allows me to consistently get back to the ball with my spine angle in the same position.  I've been working on making changes to my swing, mostly in the preset, so that I load properly and put myself in a position to come back at the ball from the inside.  But even with an improved swing, and one that's generally repeatable, I may have an instance or two a round where the arms take over a little, or my weight sways rather than pivots.  And when that happens, I may still save the shot with good timing, but more often than not, I'll either block it right or snap it left.  If I save it, however, I don't see the imprint because I generally have just managed to sweep my arms through the ball at just the right time.  But when I load properly and don't rely so much on timing, I notice that I have that imprint reflecting a solid weight transfer to the front foot.  It's the end product, not the means of getting there.  What I'm working on is making my swing more efficient and eliminating the reasons for the sways/excess arm action that keep from reaching that end product.

Is that the wrong way of approaching it from your perspective?

[mvmac]

Yesterday during the final round, Poulter and Reed blocked or pushed or faded a shot. On both swing replays, Miller made the comment that they both "drug their handle" a little through impact and that was the cause of the push/block/fade. What exactly does that mean? as it looked like they were just creating lag via the flying wedge to my uneducated eye.

Miller is "seeing" something that's not really there based on what the outcome was. Commentators say the same kind of thing when a player hooks it, "see how he released the toe too early", when the swing looked virtually the same when the player stiffed it two holes before.

[Rynrem]

Miller is "seeing" something that's not really there based on what the outcome was. Commentators say the same kind of thing when a player hooks it, "see how he released the toe too early", when the swing looked virtually the same when the player stiffed it two holes before.

Thanks. I kept rewinding to see what he was talking about and just couldn't see it...even in slow motion slow motion