Golfer2223's Swing Theories

[iacas]

21 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

How much forearm rotation is happening relative to upper arm rotation.

I already told you. About 25° at the top of the backswing, going up to about 32° late in the transition (early downswing). It's a pretty simple chart to read.

32° just from the forearm rotation is a heck of a lot more than "no forearm rotation."

21 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

My theory is very little at all, maybe ten degrees in real life, more than this would be flat imo.

Are we in the Twilight Zone? 25-32°.

21 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Not sure what this person's swing looks like. What would Rory's green line tell us. I think the green line you provide is the number one problem for the average golfer.

What? The green vertical line is where the numbers - one of which shows 29.6° of forearm rotation relative to the upper arm - were taken. The top of the backswing and impact are labeled with vertical black lines.

Rory would be well above "ten degrees in real life." So would Hunter Mahan.

21 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Again I see the forearm rotation beyond the upper arm angle to either make the club flatter or steeper from the neutral plane. Maybe 5-10 degrees of addl forearm rotation to be totally neutral.

Nope. Dude, look at the chart.

21 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

My hypothesis is that 75% of pro golfers will have less than 15° addl forearm rotation, while amateurs will show as much as 30 or more degrees, in either direction, and maybe even in both directions.

In both directions? On what planet have you ever seen a golfer supinate on the backswing, let alone > 30°?

I showed you a pro above. 32° max. 25° or so at the top of the backswing. Well above 15°.

This is all knowable and known information.

You started this thread stating that you "knew" something - you called it "information" - and now it's a hypothesis? The thing has been tested already.

---

Let me make it simple for you: what's your response to this video:

If Mike's clubface rotates 80-90° to the plane, how much of that do you think comes from the forearm? How much from the shoulder socket/upper arm rotation? Given the graphs, I'd say 25-35° from the forearm and 45-55° from the upper arm/shoulder.

[Golfer2223]

Look I will just explain on video what I am talking about and post it this week. Then you can analyze what I mean and break it down.

Edited February 13, 2016 by Golfer2223

[Phil McGleno]

I for one am looking forward to this video-How on earth is someone going to show a good golf swing with no forearm rotation? Or only 5 Degrees of it?

@Golfer2223 if you are not saying something clearly then my suggestion is to say things more clearly.-First you say there is no forearm rotation one way or the other and now it is there but way less for a good player and way more for a poor player-What is it?

This site has a high bar here-You really get tested and grilled and in the end everyone gets better and knows more. Everyone means the best and you will grow more if you stick around and bat ideas around. If you think someone is wrong then come at what have to say-But have your ducks in a row first.

[Golfer2223]

Agree with you on many points Phil. I'm very glad people look forward to my explanation. I'm all for grilling and breaking down 100%. I'm not looking for arguing but I can move on if it happens. Absolutely everyone will be better off if we discuss it all out. I would very much like to do this. If I am too "wrong" or unclear here and some don't want me to, I will not force myself into a community as I can share my ideas in other forums and places. That is what I'm doing after all, finding a way to share my ideas. I've decided it would be selfish for me to not share (some of) what has helped me, as the average golfer can really use it. Obviously I have to get better at explaining them here. Maybe the best way is just post a youtube video

and be done with it.  I will try to not post my opinion as fact from now on, but instead as an idea or as a work in progress. I was always taught in golf and writing to be assertive

and not wishy washy. I do not

take anyone's words to be fact, especially online, so I expect others to hold me to the same standard.

I have never really written about the swing before. As far as having "ducks in a row," I will do my best. I will be lacking in technical explanation as I have never studied the positions in terms of A2 etc. I only have playing experience and in person teaching experience. 

Before I make this video I will link a youtube video here and get some opinions on the rotation.

[Golfer2223]

Okay here is video example 1 (not me). This man in the beginning explains how forearm rotation causes problems. It is a bit confusing as he then says you must rotate the forearms to square the face. 

Now here is video 2, someone teaching forearm rotation, and teaching to much of it imo.

 

i am trying to resolve the misunderstanding golfers have about this. How much forearm rotation is correct. My theory is the answer is nearly zero, but by zero i mean zero against the natural rotation the arms take when following the shoulder plane, involving little or no manipulations. I will be interested to hear what iacas and others think about this swing dynamic, explained differently

in the two videos I have linked. 

[boogielicious]

8 hours ago, Golfer2223 said:

Okay here is video example 1 (not me). This man in the beginning explains how forearm rotation causes problems. It is a bit confusing as he then says you must rotate the forearms to square the face. 

Now here is video 2, someone teaching forearm rotation, and teaching to much of it imo.

 

i am trying to resolve the misunderstanding golfers have about this. How much forearm rotation is correct. My theory is the answer is nearly zero, but by zero i mean zero against the natural rotation the arms take when following the shoulder plane, involving little or no manipulations. I will be interested to hear what iacus and others think about this swing dynamic, explained differently

in the two videos I have linked. 

This has sometimes been referring to as "releasing the club" as well. There has been a lot of discussion on this site about that. We are all in agreement on this one. We also agree that there is a ton of bad information given at driving ranges by players and even instructors. No instructor on this site would recommend a player roll over there forearms through impact.

[iacas]

7 hours ago, boogielicious said:

This has sometimes been referring to as "releasing the club" as well. There has been a lot of discussion on this site about that. We are all in agreement on this one. We also agree that there is a ton of bad information given at driving ranges by players and even instructors. No instructor on this site would recommend a player roll over there forearms through impact.

Correct. For example:

15 hours ago, Golfer2223 said:

Okay here is video example 1 (not me). This man in the beginning explains how forearm rotation causes problems. It is a bit confusing as he then says you must rotate the forearms to square the face. 

 

He also says that the forearms rotate during the backswing. Which we know that they do, and quite a bit.

15 hours ago, Golfer2223 said:

Now here is video 2, someone teaching forearm rotation, and teaching to much of it imo.

How much is too much?

On the left, below in both images, is his depiction of zero rotation:

On the right, in both images, he demonstrates nearly 90° of turning at the wrist. based on what I know, little of this comes from the upper arm - the majority of it comes from the forearm.

Do you disagree with any of that, @Golfer2223?

Notice one thing, then, too please. On the left, the plane of the left wrist is pretty much parallel to the sagittal plane. On the right images, it's perpendicular to it.

What do we find at the top of the backswing of the game's best players?

15 hours ago, Golfer2223 said:

i am trying to resolve the misunderstanding golfers have about this. How much forearm rotation is correct. My theory is the answer is nearly zero, but by zero i mean zero against the natural rotation the arms take when following the shoulder plane, involving little or no manipulations. I will be interested to hear what incas and others think about this swing dynamic, explained differently in the two videos I have linked. 

The issue now appears to be simply trying to determine what in the world you mean by the bold above, particularly because there's really nothing "natural" about the golf swing. What feels natural to you, or seems natural to you, is definitely not natural to all or possibly even the majority of golfers.

in my experience I've learned that you can't really talk about the golf swing in terms of what's "natural" or not. The truth of the matter is that for golfers who do this the right amount "naturally" then it simply isn't something we talk about in a lesson. For golfers who do it an improper amount, it may or may not be their priority.

Here's a wrist graph from AMM for a very, very good golfer. Note that the wrist (blue line, top left) starts with 50° of supination. It pronates, relative to the upper arm, to a position of 16° pronation at the top. That's a pronation from 50° on one side of the zero mark to 16° on the other side - a pronation of 66°. This doesn't even account for how much the upper arm rotates - the forearm has rotated 66° from the setup position.

(Note that above when I said 25° or 32°, that was relative to totally neutral, not to the setup position. The forearms rotated quite a bit more than the 25-32° cited, because they started somewhat supinated.)

This graph and these numbers are not unusual.

---

Look, @Golfer2223, it's somewhat incumbent upon you to be clear in what you're saying. It's far from ideal to say things like how you expect to see "zero forearm rotation" (or whatever) but then to claim that it's "relative to the natural shoulder motion" (obviously both paraphrased). Nobody has a clue what you mean by the "natural shoulder" whatever, and many would disagree that anything in this topic area is "natural" to begin with.

So, please clarify what you're saying, and be precise and use specific words, or at least define them, provide examples, or both.

[Phil McGleno]

15 hours ago, Golfer2223 said:

i am trying to resolve the misunderstanding golfers have about this. How much forearm rotation is correct. My theory is the answer is nearly zero, but by zero i mean zero against the natural rotation the arms take when following the shoulder plane, involving little or no manipulations. I will be interested to hear what iacas and others think about this swing dynamic, explained differently

@Golfer2223 what does forearm rotation have to do with the shoulders?-They are not connected. Forearms can rotate regardless of what the shoulders are doing.

[Golfer2223]

You're right. I didn't explain in depth enough what I'm saying, but I will continue to go into it more and more. I apologize for any confusion anyone has, and hope to resolve it. I think we're really uncovering a lot of things in this discussion in new ways, even though these things may have been discussed before. To be quite honest I'm a little worried about stating some of my ideas, as they are a very new way of thinking of the swing. I think I should probably publish these things first. Again not new ideas, just new ways of thinking.

@iacus You've brought up some of the most crucial positions of the swing here that amateurs don't understand, and have an even harder time getting into. Would you say that the correct amount of arm rotation is the amount needed to get the club and wrist perpendicular to the sagittal plane created by the shoulders (granted proper shoulder rotation and a square clubface)? I think this is correct. So if something becomes perpendicular, it implies equal and opposite angles, which is why I think it CAN be explained in terms of natural motion. The only reason these angles can not always be acheived, is because the lengths of clubs vary, and more importantly, the length of clubs and heights of players, do not allow players to keep the exact angle of the shaft from setup and impact (with forward lean), throughout the swing. However if you were to design the golf swing in a robot, you would have to take the height of the robot and the length of the club into account. You would try to get the angle of the rotation of the robot arm to match the club angle, and have it take the most efficient path away from and back to the ball. Of course there are the older versions of robots that simply have the club travel in a perfect circle, but this is too much of a deviation from the actual swing because it discludes weight transfer. If the robot had similar makeup to a human, and could input weight transfer, it would want to swing the club into a position where it is most supported and able to use weight transfer into the swing, while still retaining the most efficient path away from and back to the ball. 

The supination and pronation of the right hand wrist you graphed is helpful for golfers who can understand it. The right wrist starts about 50 degrees supinated, very important to note this is close to a natural wrist position resting at one's side, as the wrists do not naturally fall at a 90 degree angle in real life. The right wrist will end up about 20 degrees pronated. This is the 20 degrees I was trying to get at earlier. The BIG question is why does the right wrist pronate 20 degrees, why is this getting the club on an efficient path? Why is 40 degrees too flat, and 5 degrees to steep? 20 degrees keeps the club (mid iron) on plane. With a longer club the angle increases, but the shoulder turn flattens as well. The rotation of the shoulders dictates how much pronation there will be in a standard swing. The flatter the shoulder plane, the more pronation you need to have the more efficient swing, the steeper the shoulder plane, the less pronation required. The pronation of the wrists are connected to the rotation of the upper arms, which is connected to the arm socket, which are connected to the shoulders, which move indelendently from the hips. Sergio Garcia takes the club back at first with a fairly steep shoulder rotation, and a ton of pronation, getting the club very flat, and nowhere near perpendicular to the sagittal plane. Eventually he will get the club near perpendicular, and the pronation will end up almost perpendicular to the shoulder rotation. Most golfers do Sergio Garcia type moves, getting the club supinated and pronated away from what the shoulders dictate the pronation needs to be to be efficient. Perhaps Sergio Garcia would win majors, if he was more efficient on the backswing, and did not have this over pronation on the way back. Despite his world class impact position with his hands very low, he does mostly play a fade that can trail to the right on him often. The over pronation going back causes the opposite action on the way down, i.e. not being pronated enough, and the club is less inside the ball at impact, steepening impact and promoting a fade. I think this is caused as well by the arm rotation not being purely a response to the shoulder rotation going back.

I'm sure this feels natural for Sergio but that is because he made it natural. He should have corrected this habit early on. He is taking the club completely off of it's intended plane. I'll go even further. Tiger Woods pronated the club to get in on the proper club plane, but his shoulder turn is steeper than it needs to be. The angles don't match, and this is why his swing failed him over time despite his phenomenal short game. Tiger compensated for the steep shoulder plane by making more of an up and down swing then a round one, since of course the shoulders are going less around and more up and down. This required his lower body to also go up and down, the hips and front leg need to pop upward aggressively after impact, causing all sorts of back problems. You see there is almost no one that can't* benefit from getting the efficient shoulder and arm plane. The exception as always is in case of injury where golfers can't rotate either the shoulders or the arms into the best angles. I do think everyone should first be taught to get these angles to be related and efficient. I definitely think it should be the priority for all golfers before moving on to any other moves. The reason I say this is when you don't get the most efficient shoulder rotation and arm rotation for the club in hand, you are further deviating the plane given by the designed shape of the club. If people want to swing this way, they should get someone to reshape their clubs so they don't have to manipulate the body to compensate. The club should dictate the swing. 

To say it is not essential to get the best shoulder and arm plane to meet the shape of the club, given the shape of the golfer, is to say the golf club was not designed for the body. Golfers need to stop thinking as if the club was designed by Satan himself to make the game as hard as possible, when the opposite is true. The club was designed to make the swing as easy as possible while being efficient and powerful. The designers of the golf club shape are trying to help us, so why would we manipulate the swing and make things harder for ourselves?

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 14, 2016 by Golfer2223

[SavvySwede]

32 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

You're right. I didn't explain in depth enough what I'm saying, but I will continue to go into it more and more. I apologize for any confusion anyone has, and hope to resolve it. I think we're really uncovering a lot of things in this discussion in new ways, even though these things may have been discussed before. To be quite honest I'm a little worried about stating some of my ideas, as they are a very new way of thinking of the swing. I think I should probably publish these things first. Again not new ideas, just new ways of thinking.

@iacus You've brought up some of the most crucial positions of the swing here that amateurs don't understand, and have an even harder time getting into. Would you say that the correct amount of arm rotation is the amount needed to get the club and wrist perpendicular to the sagittal plane created by the shoulders (granted proper shoulder rotation and a square clubface)? I think this is correct. So if something becomes perpendicular, it implies equal and opposite angles, which is why I think it CAN be explained in terms of natural motion. The only reason these angles can not always be acheived, is because the lengths of clubs vary, and more importantly, the length of clubs and heights of players, do not allow players to keep the exact angle of the shaft from setup and impact (with forward lean), throughout the swing. However if you were to design the golf swing in a robot, you would have to take the height of the robot and the length of the club into account. You would try to get the angle of the rotation of the robot arm to match the club angle, and have it take the most efficient path away from and back to the ball. Of course there are the older versions of robots that simply have the club travel in a perfect circle, but this is too much of a deviation from the actual swing because it discludes weight transfer. If the robot had similar makeup to a human, and could input weight transfer, it would want to swing the club into a position where it is most supported and able to use weight transfer into the swing, while still retaining the most efficient path away from and back to the ball. 

The supination and pronation of the right hand wrist you graphed is helpful for golfers who can understand it. The right wrist starts about 50 degrees supinated, very important to note this is close to a natural wrist position resting at one's side, as the wrists do not naturally fall at a 90 degree angle in real life. The right wrist will end up about 20 degrees pronated. This is the 20 degrees I was trying to get at earlier. The BIG question is why does the right wrist pronate 20 degrees, why is this getting the club on an efficient path? Why is 40 degrees too flat, and 5 degrees to steep? 20 degrees keeps the club (mid iron) on plane. With a longer club the angle increases, but the shoulder turn flattens as well. The rotation of the shoulders dictates how much pronation there will be in a standard swing. The flatter the shoulder plane, the more pronation you need to have the more efficient swing, the steeper the shoulder plane, the less pronation required. The pronation of the wrists are connected to the rotation of the upper arms, which is connected to the arm socket, which are connected to the shoulders, which move indelendently from the hips. Sergio Garcia takes the club back at first with a fairly steep shoulder rotation, and a ton of pronation, getting the club very flat, and nowhere near perpendicular to the sagittal plane. Eventually he will get the club near perpendicular, and the pronation will end up almost perpendicular to the shoulder rotation. Most golfers do Sergio Garcia type moves, getting the club supinated and pronated away from what the shoulders dictate the pronation needs to be to be efficient. Perhaps Sergio Garcia would win majors, if he was more efficient on the backswing, and did not have this over pronation on the way back. Despite his world class impact position with his hands very low, he does mostly play a fade that can trail to the right on him often. The over pronation going back causes the opposite action on the way down, i.e. not being pronated enough, and the club is less inside the ball at impact, steepening impact and promoting a fade. I think this is caused as well by the arm rotation not being purely a response to the shoulder rotation going back.

I'm sure this feels natural for Sergio but that is because he made it natural. He should have corrected this habit early on. He is taking the club completely off of it's intended plane. I'll go even further. Tiger Woods pronated the club to get in on the proper club plane, but his shoulder turn is steeper than it needs to be. The angles don't match, and this is why his swing failed him over time despite his phenomenal short game. Tiger compensated for the steep shoulder plane by making more of an up and down swing then a round one, since of course the shoulders are going less around and more up and down. This required his lower body to also go up and down, the hips and front leg need to pop upward aggressively after impact, causing all sorts of back problems. You see there is almost no one that can't* benefit from getting the efficient shoulder and arm plane. The exception as always is in case of injury where golfers can't rotate either the shoulders or the arms into the best angles. I do think everyone should first be taught to get these angles to be related and efficient. I definitely think it should be the priority for all golfers before moving on to any other moves. The reason I say this is when you don't get the most efficient shoulder rotation and arm rotation for the club in hand, you are further deviating the plane given by the designed shape of the club. If people want to swing this way, they should get someone to reshape their clubs so they don't have to manipulate the body to compensate. The club should dictate the swing. 

To say it is not essential to get the best shoulder and arm plane to meet the shape of the club, given the shape of the golfer, is to say the golf club was not designed for the body. Golfers need to stop thinking as if the club was designed by Satan himself to make the game as hard as possible, when the opposite is true. The club was designed to make the swing as easy as possible while being efficient and powerful. The designers of the golf club shape are trying to help us, so why would we manipulate the swing and make things harder for ourselves?

TL;DR The right amount of forearm rotation is the the right amount of forearm rotation.

[Golfer2223]

Quoting that whole thing just to say that? Lol. Good thing I love scrolling ha

Edited February 14, 2016 by Golfer2223

[iacas]

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

@iacus

That's not my username. Which is why it didn't tag me.

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

You've brought up some of the most crucial positions of the swing here that amateurs don't understand, and have an even harder time getting into.

I disagree that "forearm rotation" (of any kind, really) is the "biggest swing flaw." I think there are many things I'd rank as bigger flaws than this.

I don't find that I have to cover this a ton during my lessons. There are several things I cover more frequently.

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Would you say that the correct amount of arm rotation is the amount needed to get the club and wrist perpendicular to the sagittal plane created by the shoulders (granted proper shoulder rotation and a square clubface)? I think this is correct.

I would say that everyone has a different amount of what's "correct" for them. (And it's not actually perpendicular, and the amount that it's off from perpendicular depends as much on how high the lead arm is at the top of the backswing, which has nothing to do with forearm rotation or arm rotation of any kind, really.)

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

So if something becomes perpendicular, it implies equal and opposite angles, which is why I think it CAN be explained in terms of natural motion.

I have no idea what that actually means. There's nothing "natural" about something being perpendicular. We're talking about the human body, after all, and to get it to be perpendicular it takes 90° of rotation!

Also, as I said above, they're not actually perpendicular, and the degree by which they're off of perpendicular depends on how high the lead arm is, not any rotational amount. If your arm exactly matches your shoulder plane, they have a chance of being perpendicular, or very close, but few people swing at exactly on that plane.

You've yet to define "natural motion," nor do you in this post.

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

The only reason these angles can not always be acheived, is because the lengths of clubs vary, and more importantly, the length of clubs and height of players, do not allow players to keep the exact angle of the shaft from setup and impact (forward lean), throughout the swing. However if you were to design the golf swing in a robot, you would have to take the height of the robot and the length of the club into account. You would try to get the angle of the rotation of the robot arm to match the club angle, and have it take the most effecient path away from and back to the ball. Of course there are the older versions of robots that simply have the club travel in a perfect circle, but this is too much of a deviation from the actual swing because it discludes weight transfer. If the robot had similar makeup to a human, and could input weight transfer, it would want to swing the club into a position where it is most supported and able to use weight transfer into the swing, while still retaining the most efficient path away from and back to the ball.

Weight transfer does little to disrupt the center of the golf swing (not that there is truly a point that is the center of the golf swing - I'm speaking somewhat colloquially). A weight transfer primarily involves the hips going forward during the downswing, not the point between the shoulders that sort of acts as a "hub" in the center of the swing arc. Again, the "center" is more of a smallish region and not actually a specific point, but… it generally stays in the same place in good players, so the weight transfer has little to do with it.

In other words, robots can accurately reproduce the golf swing if they simply have a wrist, because the "center" of the golf swing is a pretty small region.

But, I don't want to spend much time talking about this as I have no idea how it relates to your idea that there should be zero forearm rotation during the swing.

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

The supination and pronation of the right hand wrist you graphed is helpful for golfers who can understand it. The right wrist starts about 50 degrees supinated, very important to note this is close to a natural wrist position resting at one's side, as the wrists do not naturally fall at a 90 degree angle in real life.

I don't know what graph you're looking at.

In the last one I posted, the right wrist starts at 54° pronated and supinates 83° to end up at 29° supinated.

In case you were referring to another graph, though it had to be one with the right wrist shown (only one other graph), also shows the lead wrist as about 50° pronated going into about 16° supinated thought the backswing.

I'm not sure you know how to read these graphs or where 0° truly exists. It's not got much to do with how your arms hang at your sides. The measurements are relative to the proximal segment.

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

The right wrist will end up about 20 degrees pronated. This is the 20 degrees I was trying to get at earlier.

You've said a lot of things earlier, including "the forearms should rotate zero degrees" (paraphrased).

And, again, the right wrist starts out 50° pronated, and supinates 66° (or more - it supinates 83° in the other graph) throughout the backswing. If you want to talk about the rotation, you can't just talk about the rotation after it passes a zero point. Imagine a golfer's wrist started at "80" and ended up at "0" (I don't care if it's supination or pronation for this particular question) - would you say that golfer didn't rotate his forearm because it was at 0 when you chose to take a measurement? Or would you say the golfer rotated it 80° throughout the backswing?

The latter is the only answer that makes any sense. The golfer rotated it 80°. Not 0°. Not 20°.

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

The BIG question is why does the right wrist pronate 20 degrees, why is this getting the club on an efficient path? Why is 40 degrees too flat, and 5 degrees to steep? 20 degrees keeps the club (mid iron) on plane. With a longer club the angle increases, but the shoulder turn flattens as well.

Please stop saying things as if they're fact.

1. Who is to say 40° is "too flat"? Who is to say 5° is "too steep"? Maybe for that particular player they're appropriate. Plus, again, in the examples above we saw supination of 66° and 83°. We saw pronation of (in the same two graphs) of 50° (32° to -18°) and 66° (50° to -16°).
2. The initial measurement has quite a bit to do with grip strength - how turned the hands are clockwise or counter-clockwise on the grip. It has quite a bit to do with the elbow location, too.
3. The right wrist supinates during the backswing. It doesn't pronate. You made this mistake frequently.
4. Again, it doesn't turn or rotate only 20°. More like 50, 66, 83°…
5. The shoulder turn doesn't flatten appreciably with a longer club.

Re: the fifth point… this is from another thread, but here's Tiger hitting a driver and a short iron.

The line is across his lead arm, but his shoulder pitch is nearly the same at this point, as you can see. Both of the numbers read "42°."

I imagine you'll find if you study good golfers that the shoulder plane does not change appreciably with different clubs.

I'll stop here, except to ask a simple question about the video at the end… honestly because I haven't got a clue what you're saying the rest of the way.

You seem to imply that Tiger and Sergio have bad full swings because they don't do whatever it is you're talking about. You implied, if I read it correctly, that Tiger won because of his short game and putting, and is injured because of his full swing. You implied, again if I read it correctly, that Sergio is has a poor full swing, and that his backswing sequencing is off…

Yet… Tiger gained more strokes with his full swing (even driving) than he did with his short game and putting. Tiger's full swing has been a HUGE factor in why he's been so dominant, and why he wins as often as he does (or did).

Look at that… he gained 1.64 strokes with his approach shots and less than half that with his short game and putting combined. That year was not an anomaly, either: Tiger dominated largely due to his ballstriking, not his short game and putting as you seem to want to contend.

Here's another look:

Sergio, too, btw is well regarded for his ball-striking. He's consistently been one of the top 20 golfers in the world for a long, long time now. He's currently 16th in the OWGR. Sergio is also pretty high up on the list of strokes gained for driving and approach shots (or tee-to-green).

47 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

What does that video have to do with anything?

It is curious, though, that the robot also rotates its mechanical "forearms" quite a bit in making its backswing.

[Golfer2223]

I confused supinated (wrist up) and pronated (wrist down), please reverse those in my statement. 

@iacas you missed that my statement about weight transfer being part of the golf swing is why the robot that swings in a vertical circle is not a realistic swing, nor is it possible for anyone unless you are 7 feet tall and take a half swing. You might disagree but without weight transfer you will lack a lot of power, even if you are still staying centered and getting the club where it needs to go.

Edited February 15, 2016 by Golfer2223

[iacas]

3 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

I confused supinated (wrist up) and pronated (wrist down), please reverse those in my statement.

IMO you confused more than just that.

3 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

@iacas you missed that my statement about weight transfer being part of the golf swing is why the robot that swings in a vertical circle is not a realistic swing, nor is it possible for anyone unless you are 7 feet tall and take a half swing. You might disagree but without weight transfer you will lack a lot of power, even if you are still staying centered and getting the club where it needs to go.

I didn't "miss" that at all. I specifically addressed how the robot can make a perfectly "realistic" swing as far as the impact conditions, the club shaft, clubhead, etc. are concerned. In fact, of course they make realistic swings - golf club manufacturers use them to accurately test their equipment. Their swings are quite accurate as - and again, I said this before - the center of the swing doesn't move very much in the golf swing.

Besides, this topic is not about the "weight transfer," but about rotation of the forearms. Which, again, ranges from 50 to 83° just in the few examples cited, and which you still fail to acknowledge is over 20°.

Spoiler

Totally off-topic, but "weight transfer" doesn't contribute much to clubhead speed. Very little, in fact, relatively speaking.

I'm sure you'll take that as blasphemous, but consider that this golfer didn't really transfer any weight (and, in fact, didn't turn much at all either, nor use much vertical GRF)…

Look, let's try to hit reset of sorts. In a sentence or two or three or even four, please clarify exactly what you mean re: "forearm rotation" during the backswing. Please make a short post not referencing previous posts, and make clear what you're trying to say (and the definitions of words you're using).

[Golfer2223]

Tiger Woods 2013? How about the Tiger Woods that owned the game of golf for a decade. That Tiger Woods was always number one in chipping and putting, whether you look at it on paper, or use your eyes. Yes he lead in nearly all categories, driving and approach shots included, but he really separated himself with the putter. This is the same case for Spieth, who with an entirely different swing, is able to dominate through short game. The swing only has to do so much, and by do so much I mean be near what I'm talking about. It doesn't have to be right on, but thisnis where beginners need to go. I'm proposing there is a simple, natural, mechanic, to the swing that if golfers know, can make them better golfers. Professional athletes understand athletic motions. This is why you have the swing being passed down from generation to generation. This is why the 17 year old Ryan Ruffels is shooting 6 under par on tour and having a lot of success and traction. Both of his parents were athletes, Davis Cup tennis players. The common person will say it's in the genes, but that is an ignorant statement, you do not pass on athleticism. What passes on is the knowledge I am passing on to you, that the best athletic move in any sport is the simplest one, it is the 0. 

I am trying my best to explain what I'm saying so you can understand @iacas and admittedly I'm not getting everything right. However you don't speak in my terms also. There is no one to say generally your way of explaining is better or more understandable than mine. I am making mistakes because I am trying to explain my concept in your technical speak. I do not teach technically but generally. You do not speak generally about the swing, so that is why I'm the one making the mistakes here. If you come out of your comfort zone, sometimes you make mistakes but you also learn things, which is why I'm learning from you, but not you from me...yet. I know you eventually will pick up something as you are certainly trying to understand my view. If you truly want to understand it, you're going to have to look at the swing in a different way, the general, averaged out way. I can assure you the game of golf is not passed down technically. Many athletes don't even know what a right angle is. General speak can be just as helpful to the golfer as graphs and numbers. Once you get the averaged out motion, then technicalities can help. Many golfers succeed without any technical knowledge. Sometimes the technical makes sense in the brain, but the muscles don't speak this language. In short, the numbers don't add up.

I don't think if someone cannot get to what I consider a standard position, they should go steeper or flatter to compensate, they should shorten the swing instead and keep the angles. I can hit a ball 80% as far with a quarter swing using hip separation and wrist lag. If someone doesn't have hip separation or wrist lag, and swing length is all they have, may then we can look at it, but that's a rare case. Even in that case, the person is simply dropping the club onto the ball, so they should still be trying to get as close to the swing I'm describing. If they can't get the shoulders to the swing I'm describing, fine, then they should put the club where it would be, if they could get the shoulders correct. For the life of me I cannot understand why instructors argue that steep and flat is okay for some people. It is not! 

I agree with the measurements you have, I just think they should compliment what I'm saying, and not seek to prove there is no perfect position. It seems that is where we dissent, I believe there is a perfect position for every golfer at every point in the golf swing. Like many you disagree and say every golfer is different. I think every golfer is only different because they don't have the knowledge. The ones that do have more in common with each other than they don't. This is why I used Sergio, because he does something extremely uncommon on the way back, but then he has to end up where I am saying everyone  should end up if they have the flexibility.  Again, if they don't, they should move towards this position in the most efficient way possible, the shortest distance between the positions with the smallest wasted motion, a perfectly curved line.

Edited February 15, 2016 by Golfer2223

[Golfer2223]

I'm finally realizing I will definitely need a video to describe the swing I'm talking about. There is no way for me to explain it in words, if I did it would take up about 100 pages. I have to show it, and I will get to that.

Weight transfer doesn't affect club head speed, but it does affect power, greatly. You do understand that someone who weighs more will hit the ball further than someone who weighs less with the same exact impact position right? Force and speed are two different things entirely.

Force is mass times acceleration. Acceleration is the speed part of the swing, but the golfer influences the mass of the club head with their own mass. Acceleration is also important as "swing speed" is a flawed concept. 100mph swing gaining speed will hit the ball farther than 100mph losing speed, because it will affect the force!

I'm not a physics expert but speed is a flawed measurement to find force. Speed doesn't account for the efficiency of the swing, it is just distance traveled over time. How far the golf ball goes depends on force, and momentum as well. Speed has nothing to do with anything, velocity, mass, momentum, acceleration, are what contribute to distance because the only speed that matters is ball speed.

Edited February 15, 2016 by Golfer2223

[iacas]

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Tiger Woods 2013? How about the Tiger Woods that owned the game of golf for a decade. That Tiger Woods was always number one in chipping and putting, whether you look at it on paper, or use your eyes.

Sorry, but that's plainly not true. Tiger Woods gained just over 2x as many strokes with his full swing than he did with his short game and putting. And this is calling everything inside 100 yards "short game."

You keep arguing things that are knowable, and known.

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Yes he lead in nearly all categories, driving and approach shots included, but he really separated himself with the putter.

Tiger gained over 2x as much with his approach shots as he did with his putting.

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

This is the same case for Spieth, who with an entirely different swing, is able to dominate through short game.

Spieth is good at all phases of the game. He doesn't "dominate" with his putting. He's good at all phases.

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

What passes on is the knowledge I am passing on to you, that the best athletic move in any sport is the simplest one, it is the 0.

There hasn't been a "0" in this entire discussion unless it's come after the "5" in "50°".

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

You do not speak generally about the swing, so that is why I'm the one making the mistakes here.

You can't speak generally about the swing because we're trying to say specifically what happens. "Generally" doesn't do anyone any good. "Generally" is too close to "just make a good backswing and then make a good downswing."

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

If you truly want to understand it, you're going to have to look at the swing in a different way, the general, averaged out way. I can assure you the game of golf is not passed down technically. Many athletes don't even know what a right angle is.

I am not teaching anyone right now. I do not get "technical" with students. But this is a technical discussion. I know how to teach people, and I know when to use "technical" terms. This is one of those times. You're trying to discuss rotation of the forearms, and you can't discuss that by saying "players should not have any rotation, but if they do, it should just be a little bit, the right amount, the natural amount" because that doesn't really end up saying much of anything.

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Let's go back to the notion of the backswing angle. Essentially, the arms form a triangle with the shoulders right?

No. As soon as the trail arm bends the triangle is disrupted. Furthermore, since the lead arm rotates (as does the trail arm), the only somewhat consistent (assuming the left arm remains extended or "straight") side of the triangle (the shoulders often retract or move slightly, too, and the trail elbow bends quite a bit) is not even consistent itself - it's turning and twisting, and different amounts depending on whether you're considering the upper arm or the forearm.

30 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Then as the backswing progresses the arms slide across the chest towards the right side of the golfer. Then finally the club is slightly flattened off, about 20 degrees off the perpendicular line. This is my view of the standard golf swing. I don't think if someone cannot get to this position they should go steeper or flatter to compensate, they should shorten the swing instead and keep the angles. I can hit a ball 80% as far with a quarter swing using hip separation and wrist lag. If someone doesn't have hip separation or wrist lag, and swing length is all they have, may then we can look at it, but that's a rare case. Even in that case, the person is simply dropping the club onto the ball, so they should still be trying to get as close to the angle I'm describing. If they can't get the shoulders to the angle I'm describing, fine, then they should put the club where it would be, if they could get the shoulders correct. For the life of me I cannot understand why instructors argue that steep and flat is okay for some people. It is not! 

There you go with the 20° thing again. Also, we aren't talking about hip separation and wrist lag. This is a topic - your topic - about forearm rotation.

I've shown you how the forearms rotate anywhere from 50 to 83° during the backswing, and that's just relative to the upper arm, and yet you're still clinging to this 20° number you, what, made up?

PGA Tour players have had successful careers having steep and flat shoulder planes. They've had successful careers with steep and shallow left arms. They've had successful careers with a "toe down" position at the top, and a "shut" face at the top. There is no universal truth here.

7 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

I'm finally realizing I will definitely need a video to describe the swing I'm talking about. There is no way for me to explain it in words, if I did it would take up about 100 pages. I have to show it, and I will get to that.

Please do.

7 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

Weight transfer doesn't affect club head speed, but it does affect power, greatly.

Power is clubhead speed. They're the same thing.

7 minutes ago, Golfer2223 said:

You do understand that someone who weighs more will hit the ball further than someone who weighs less with the same exact impact position right? Force and speed are two different things entirely.

What?

Dude.

Seriously.

If Golfer A weighs 190 and hits the golf ball with certain impact conditions (whatever you want them to be - clubhead speed, contact location, AoA, VSP, the works) and golfer B who weighs 120 pounds hit the golf ball with the same equipment and the same exact impact conditions, the ball will fly exactly the same distance.

The weight of the golfer does not matter at all.

[Golfer2223]

Excuse me? Tiger gained as many strokes with putting as he did with full swings? Are those two things equal? You take a whole lot more putts than you do swings. Saving two putts is much more important than hitting the fairway or striking the iron well, if you're trying to win a tournament. Look at what just happened to Phil. You have to get the ball into the hole before you get a score. Being #10 in putting and #500 in ball striking will equal better scores than being #2 in ball striking and number #20 in putting. Tiger was #1 or #2 in putting all those years, that is why he dominated. Everyone who knows the game knows this.

Stop saying dude. Can you wait until I finish editing to respond. I deleted that information about the triangle and 20 degrees. You asked me not to bring up previous posts, but you keep going back to the zero rotation thing. We are passed that now, I will explain what I meant by zero in a video.  

Force impacts distance and force is mass times acceleration. A golfer who weighs more will contribute more mass to the club head. A 200 pound golfer with a 90mph swing will hit the ball further than a 140lb golfer with a 92 mph swing. This is a fact.