Feel Ain't Real

[JetFan1983]

1 hour ago, billchao said:

That's not really "making feel real" to me. It's just using a feel. If your feel is that your head moves towards the target during the backswing and away from it during the downswing, and that produces a steady head, what's real is the steady head, not the movement you feel in producing it. You wouldn't want to make that feel real.

From what you're describing, it seems like you're just talking about learning a motion, which I call "learning a motion" 

Yea I described this badly . Yes, you and Erik are correct in the literal sense. Feel is rarely if ever real. So when I say "making feel real," I mean that "the feel I'm using now is making the better golf swing, and I can prove it." That's what is real: the improvement itself, which is documentable in before-and-after videos, Trackman data and/or one's scores. 

I'm separating this kind of situation from the common one we see on this forum and on the range where someone says, "hey, I know how you can fix your slice. I fixed mine when I felt like I was doing this, etc. etc." Then we see the guy's swing on video, he's not actually doing it, his swing still looks awful, and he's lying to himself about his improvement. 

In the situation where "feel becomes real," the student is more self-aware and knowledgable, working with a good instructor, and actually making a better swing by using some crazy counter-intuitive feel.

So the feel itself isn't real, yes. You guys got me there. But the improvement is real. One is not lying to himself about it, as we see so often. 

But yea... "making feel real" is probably a bad way to say this haha, I didn't realize you would interpret it this way, but now that you both have, I realize this is a poor phrasing. What's real is the improvement itself, and that improvement is done using the correct feel, which is often given to you buy a savvy instructor who understands that students often need to feel crazy, counter-intuitive things -- that aren't actually real -- to achieve improvement, which is. 

 

[Jack Watson]

You can make your swing and change focal points internally and it will feel like you are making a different swing.

Feel is not real because of angular momentum.  That's everyone's 1/2 bs feel where the club is at the top far beyond a mere half swing.

Also the fact of torso rotation in golf screws up our proprioception as well as our understanding of the movement.

To me ultimately what matters when playing golf not swing is does your feel/intent correlate to where the ball ends up.

One thing I love about Ernest Jones concept is that you can't really overdo it.  

People think a hands feel intent will mean a weak hand slap flip at the ball but they are not realizing that our body will self organize around a task.  Grasping this is one of the reasons I enjoy golf so much more now than I did when I approached making a shot like Mac Ogrady.

It's not an instant fix but over time you would be surprised what happens to the motion if you stick to the intent of swinging the clubhead through the ball towards the target with the hands or even better concentrate it into one hand specifically.

I kind of use intent/feel interchangeably here.  I think it's amazing what the body will do if you only actively use the relevant portions of it.  

[billchao]

59 minutes ago, JetFan1983 said:

Yea I described this badly . Yes, you and Erik are correct in the literal sense. Feel is rarely if ever real. So when I say "making feel real," I mean that "the feel I'm using now is making the better golf swing, and I can prove it." That's what is real: the improvement itself, which is documentable in before-and-after videos, Trackman data and/or one's scores. 

I'm separating this kind of situation from the common one we see on this forum and on the range where someone says, "hey, I know how you can fix your slice. I fixed mine when I felt like I was doing this, etc. etc." Then we see the guy's swing on video, he's not actually doing it, his swing still looks awful, and he's lying to himself about his improvement. 

In the situation where "feel becomes real," the student is more self-aware and knowledgable, working with a good instructor, and actually making a better swing by using some crazy counter-intuitive feel.

So the feel itself isn't real, yes. You guys got me there. But the improvement is real. One is not lying to himself about it, as we see so often. 

But yea... "making feel real" is probably a bad way to say this haha, I didn't realize you would interpret it this way, but now that you both have, I realize this is a poor phrasing. What's real is the improvement itself, and that improvement is done using the correct feel, which is often given to you buy a savvy instructor who understands that students often need to feel crazy, counter-intuitive things -- that aren't actually real -- to achieve improvement, which is. 

 

What you're describing seems more like just learning a motion. You use feel X to achieve Y and keep working at it until Y becomes permanent, or "real" as you put it.

That's not really what "feel ain't real" means to me, though. A feel being real is a player feeling X and achieving X. "Feel ain't real" is more like when people describe how they do something when in actuality they're doing something else.

This is the kind of thing I'm talking about: https://www.golfdigest.com/story/flick-nicklaus-rotate?intcid=inline_amp

Quote

I always wanted a stable base for my swing, and my hips did not move sideways. They turned, as if in a barrel.

Yet, Jack didn't turn his hips as if they were in a barrel. His hips tilted slightly, they slid, and they rotated. It's a far more complex motion than simply rotating as described, but people latch onto these simplified concepts as if that is what is actually happening because thats what the pros feel.

 

[JetFan1983]

3 minutes ago, billchao said:

This is the kind of thing I'm talking about: https://www.golfdigest.com/story/flick-nicklaus-rotate?intcid=inline_amp

Yet, Jack didn't turn his hips as if they were in a barrel. His hips tilted slightly, they slid, and they rotated. It's a far more complex motion than simply rotating as described, but people latch onto these simplified concepts as if that is what is actually happening because thats what the pros feel.

 

Right. Yea, feel isn't real here. This is the John Daly situation in the OP. The instructor (in this case, Jack) isn't aware that he's not doing what he's telling us he's doing, and his lack of awareness over that fact makes him kind of a crappy instructor in this case. 

3 minutes ago, billchao said:

What you're describing seems more like just learning a motion. You use feel X to achieve Y and keep working at it until Y becomes permanent, or "real" as you put it.

That's not really what "feel ain't real" means to me, though. A feel being real is a player feeling X and achieving X. "Feel ain't real" is more like when people describe how they do something when in actuality they're doing something else.

Yes, I am 100% describing how to learn a motion... with feel... 

...Feel that is properly calibrated. It feels like you're doing something else, but you're not. It feels like this, but in fact, it is that. Therefore, you can re-map your brain to understand, "oh okay this feel is actually creating this motion." Feel is real now in the sense that, you are properly aware of what you are doing. You are properly aligning a feel with what reality actually is. You can properly interpret what you are doing through feel. You can understand your body better and how it responds to what your brain is telling it to do. 

 

[Jack Watson]

Maybe this is a bit analytical for some but a feel is a sensation,  a perception of what's happening.

Its very different from an action or intent.  Action produces the feel.

I think this also explains the player who is lights out one day and shoots 95 the next.

They say I didn't have my feel.

well that's another way of saying that you don't know what you're doing

[b101]

On 16/11/2017 at 4:30 PM, mvmac said:

Going to start this thread by sharing a funny example from John Daly. 

So much of this resonates. An example from my range work yesterday... (all at the end of my backswing)

That shorter 'real' swing was me feeling like it was a 3/4 shot at most. Really interesting how little actually changes... I do prefer the picture though!

[Buckeyebowman]

On 11/24/2017 at 9:49 PM, billchao said:

Umm what? This thread is all about how feel ain't real and what you think may be happening probably isn't, and your response to @klineka's post about how he feels a movement that isn't actually happening on video is a story of your own unsubstantiated feels that you think affected your swing...

Maybe your feel changed your swing or maybe you just got into a rhythm after a while and just started timing everything better, resulting in better shots. How would you know? Feel ain't real.

I'll add my own example: all of my swings feel like arm swings. I rotate naturally without thinking about it. If I had to describe my swing, my hands go up along the target line, then they come down.

Wow! It's almost like you were on the range with me, watching me hit those balls! Amazing what supposition can do!

"Feel ain't real" is an absolute, and other than physical constants such as the speed of light, the speed of sound, the Planck length, I do not trust absolutes! Feel ain't real means that no "feel" is ever right! How then do we play golf? How do we judge for wind, lie, and temps.  We should all shoot 150!

I'm self taught, so I've had to learn to trust my feels. It may take a while, but I'll usually figure things out since I don't have someone telling me what to do!

[iacas]

8 minutes ago, Buckeyebowman said:

I'm self taught, so I've had to learn to trust my feels. It may take a while, but I'll usually figure things out since I don't have someone telling me what to do!

Your feels aren't real either. Hell, I filmed your swing the other year, and you said you felt that you were making a much longer swing than that.

"Feel ain't real" is not an absolute. It is, however, accurate far more often than not.

[billchao]

22 minutes ago, Buckeyebowman said:

Wow! It's almost like you were on the range with me, watching me hit those balls! Amazing what supposition can do!

"Feel ain't real" is an absolute, and other than physical constants such as the speed of light, the speed of sound, the Planck length, I do not trust absolutes! Feel ain't real means that no "feel" is ever right! How then do we play golf? How do we judge for wind, lie, and temps.  We should all shoot 150!

You've missed the point. I'm not sure you understand the concept of the discussion at all.

What you feel you do in your swing may or may not actually be really happening. That's the "real" part we're talking about. I know what my feel is and what it produces in my swing, but my feel (arms-only swing) is not actually real (I rotate plenty). My swing is not arms-only, despite how it feels.

If anything, you've only reinforced my original comment you quoted with this:

22 minutes ago, Buckeyebowman said:

I'm self taught, so I've had to learn to trust my feels. It may take a while, but I'll usually figure things out since I don't have someone telling me what to do!

That's great but this isn't what "feel ain't real" is about. Of course your feels produce results. All of us are feel players because that's how we make our bodies produce actions. Even when you take lessons, you're taught a motion, but the feel to produce and reproduce it is up to the individual. I've seen lessons where two people will describe different feels for similar motions, and I've also seen people describe similar feels and produce different motions.

Do your feels produce exactly what they feel like? Jack Nicklaus has always referred to the feeling that someone is holding his head still during his swing and his head doesn't move. That's feel being real.

[Buckeyebowman]

You're absolutely right. I was horrified watching those vids you took at the outing! So, I resolved that if I was going to take a backswing, I might as well take one!

However, this in no way addresses the fact that I realized what I was doing wrong in that range session! I went through half a small bucket getting nothing more than 2 feet off the ground! I don't hit golf balls like that, and I knew something was very wrong. After one particular swing I realized what I was doing.

I then concentrated on keeping my head "back" until the ball was away, and started nailing everything on the button! Talk about a schizophrenic session. 

But, I noticed that you gave yourself some wiggle room. Saying that "feel ain't real" is accurate more often than not! So, this allows for the time when feel is right! As it was at the range that day.

[iacas]

2 minutes ago, Buckeyebowman said:

I then concentrated on keeping my head "back" until the ball was away, and started nailing everything on the button! Talk about a schizophrenic session. 

Point remains: you don't know that that's actually the change you made.

2 minutes ago, Buckeyebowman said:

But, I noticed that you gave yourself some wiggle room. Saying that "feel ain't real" is accurate more often than not! So, this allows for the time when feel is right! As it was at the range that day.

Highly doubtful.

[Buckeyebowman]

Like you were there!

[saevel25]

When it comes to the golf swing feels. If it isn't confirmed by video, then it isn't confirmed real.

Let's call it Golfs Uncertainty Principle 

Give yourself the benefit of the doubt is nothing more than rolling the dice. You may be right. If you are not then you might be doing more harm than good. 

[iacas]

26 minutes ago, Buckeyebowman said:

Like you were there!

Read what's written, dude.

At the outing you were completely unaware of the fact that your swing didn't even reach A3. Feels are almost never "real." I'm going with the odds on that one. Hence "highly doubtful."

[JonMA1]

In your experience @iacas, are some students closer between their feels and what's real than others? 

Personally, I'm horrible at feeling a change or reality. I actually recorded video recently where I say out loud "crap, my hips slid back on that one", only to look at the video and see they did not. Or more commonly the opposite, where I felt I really nailed something only to see I failed miserably. 

But I would think some students are better than average at making a small change with 100% feel... at least getting closer to what was asked. Or is that pretty rare?

[iacas]

1 minute ago, JonMA1 said:

In your experience @iacas, are some students closer between their feels and what's real than others?

Yes. Some players have better proprioception, better awareness, better body control, better timing… whatever.

[Buckeyebowman]

On 12/31/2017 at 8:52 PM, iacas said:

Read what's written, dude.

At the outing you were completely unaware of the fact that your swing didn't even reach A3. Feels are almost never "real." I'm going with the odds on that one. Hence "highly doubtful."

OK, that's fair. However, in this instance I didn't have a vid to fall back on, I had to depend on myself. At the start I began to wonder, "What the Hell is going on here?!" I just don't hit balls like that! I was lost for answers, and then in one swing I felt myself lunge toward the target. I resolved to keep my head "steady" until the ball was away.

If that was the "proper" feel or not, I have no way of knowing. All I know is that it fixed the problem! This was the most "schizophrenic" range session of my life! First half of the bucket, hideous! Last half of the bucket, just fine! And it fixed the problem for the rest of the season!

I once watched a video of Fred Couples hitting a driver. The shot was focused tightly on his head. During his back swing you could see his head move slightly away from the target. Then, in the transition and into the down swing, you could see his head return to where it was at the beginning, moving slightly toward the target.

Then, through impact, you could see Couples' head again moving backwards, away from the target, until he was completely "through" the shot when his head turned to look at the result of his shot, and on to the finish, moving again toward the target.

I've heard of golfers being described as a "double pendulum". That their head, which is not an insignificant amount of mass, should act in "opposition" to the swinging of the arms and hands.

I'm interested in your feelings about this.

 

[iacas]

1 minute ago, Buckeyebowman said:

I've heard of golfers being described as a "double pendulum". That their head, which is not an insignificant amount of mass, should act in "opposition" to the swinging of the arms and hands.

Off Topic, but that's not what the "double pendulum" is when talking about the golf swing. It's the arms and the club shaft.