RandallT

I bet they meant $29.41 and not $2941.00. Seller has a good rep, and when you sort all their stuff, this is an outlier (not sure if this link works, but for me, it's sorted by price for this seller): https://www.ebay.com/sch/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from=&_ssn=apollogolfshop702&_sop=16 The next most expensive thing is $1500, and it is a vintage club. They have other single clubs in the $20-$30 range too. Just a guess.

Interesting thread. As golf tends to reflect real life, this seems like another way it does so. Politicians fade from the scene as they make way for a younger generation to take over. Star athletes’ prospects dim as the television cameras and sports pages focus on the newest phenoms. My old neighborhood where I grew up was bustling with kids and teens back in the day, but now is a staid older community of quiet empty-nesters. Tons of individual stories of aging that add up to new dynamics. Can be sad if we want things to never age, but life (like golf) doesn’t seem to work that way, damn it.

Happy Birthday, @dennyjones !! Plus @golfdu , @BrandiJoGolf , @mikemorford, & @Tact. Edit: Belated to @Slowcelica !

Yes, but only because the master plan is to f*** you at some later point.

This seems like a followup to this thread: It sounds like you could be just shaking the cobwebs off and getting back to a level of golf you used to play at. You’ve been at a lower handicap before, as you just now wrote. In any case, we typically like to discuss specifics here on the site. Like what your issues were, what the instruction was exactly, and how you practiced to overcome it. Frankly, pushing a specific product with a vague sense of your recent improvement isn’t much to discuss. Also lends to suspicions of you pushing an agenda to promote something. If you want to tell us about the specifics of what you’ve learned and implemented, great. If you want to recommend a commercial product without any of that, not sure you’ll find a welcoming place here for that discussion. Just not the kind of site here where that fits in.

Just curious what you think your priority is. What is it you work on? Things are looking pretty good from what I see, and I usually will only chime in on the 20+ handicappers who have a glaring weakness with keeping their head steady or an improper backswing turn. The only thing that I will mention is that you might take a look at some of the centered hip turn threads: I could be wrong but I feel like in your face on video that your hips move slightly differently than I see in these threads. Unless I'm mistaken, your hips are moving back away from the target. Anyway, welcome to swing threads. Welcome to TST. See you around.

That worked, so I’ve kinda resaved the main post so you’ll see those links now show up as embedded videos now. At the instructional content link I posted, you’ll see a couple good links at the top: 1. Filming the swing. We like to see down the line and face on angles, in particular. That helps the instructors (I’m not one) with a standard perspective and the angles mean more for analysis. 2. So you joined TST and have a swing thread. That’s helpful to see how to get folks to join in and contribute here. Anyway, good luck. Your swing looks nice and controlled to me. Your head motion looks good, centered turn, weight gets forward. Those are the basics I look for. But without the standard angles, I’m also just guessing. A couple questions for you: 1. Do you have an instructor? 2. What specifically are you working on right now when you practice? Also at the link above is a thread about the 5 S’s of practice (slow, short, specific, simple, etc). It’s a good resource on how to practice your priority when it is identified. So I was wondering if you have an instructor who has identified your priority, or if you’re hoping someone here will help identify it. Good luck!

I thought the point was to see if many of us had similar “aha” moments when we experienced a big breakthrough. Also interesting to see that we are all so different. For me the breakthrough is finally understanding and internalizing how to get the club come down less steeply and why that’s important. In my case it took a lot of backswing work and then patiently working on my transition. When I get it right, I almost feel like a real golfer.

Welcome to TST! The video links don’t seem to work- can you make sure they are public? Once that’s settled, I can assist with getting the main topic videos embedded correctly. In the meantime, here is is a great resource to find some good reading that you’ll find relevant for how swing threads work around here.

I can’t get over 70+ rounds per year being a light year. Don’t think I’ve played 70 rounds in this century. Congrats to your son!

I look forward to hearing more. Anytime a golf blog mentions USSR/Stalin, I’m in it for the long haul. Any thoughts on using video in your practice regimen? Would love to see your swing thread updated if you are gonna be incorporating video analysis. Definitely helped me when I was looking to “change the picture.” Definitely interested in seeing you get eligible for Newport Cup 2019! Edit: I could’ve sworn you had said before in another thread you weren’t eligible yet but I notice now your handicap is actually low enough already!

I’d caution against buying a stack and tilt book as I think I saw suggested above. I bet you’d find better resources here below, for starters: But there are many threads here about S&T, with great info on that methodology, so make sure you find those before investing in it. But let’s also not turn this thread into a debate of S&T, of course. Another suggestion is to practice at the edge of your abilities. Go only as fast as you can swing while you can still do the move you are attempting. Only speed up when you confirm on video that you’re doing what you are intending to do. Rather than do hundreds of practice swings, do it WITH a ball and on video- right at the speed where things break down. Speed up gradually, confirming along the way. This is guidance from a thread at the link above on practice. Look for that discussion thread: 5 S’s of practice- one of which is slow. Good luck and welcome to swing threads here.

I have worked with a couple guys on their strokes gained estimates here: https://thesandtrap.com/b/the_numbers_game The two most recent articles there show numbers for @Slowcelica and @Fairway_CY. Fair to say your results are a bit more extreme than theirs, but similar conclusion: majority of strokes for many of us tend to be with full swing. What method did you use? A tool on the market or just your own spreadsheet? I’ve found the whole thing isn’t an exact science and there’s lots of fudge in the numbers. Different tools can give varying results. Also, I toss out the “recovery” strokes and try to analyze the prior shot that made you even be in a position to make a recovery shot. I bet that some of the 1 stroke you lost in recovery could actually be improved by working on your full swing, rather than practicing different recovery shot scenarios

Good luck with the start of the season. Don’t overdo it too much as you get rolling! I’m in a similar boat as my body has been fighting my desire to golf regularly. Slow and steady will be my mantra for the first couple months of the season. Some golf at a bit less than full speed is better than no golf due to injury!

Good luck!!

Welcome @OMYKISS!! Always good when lurkers become posters. Dive right in.

Welcome, @Leif!!

Another side of the story emerges: The official disputes the idea that the player (Rhein Gibson) had gone back to the bag and selected another ball. As the official (Duncan) says, the player expresses some surprise that the caddie (Brandon Davis) had picked it up. If this is true, I'd say case closed, @Lihu. There was ample doubt as to the player's intention, if the official's account is correct. http://www.golfchannel.com/article/golf-central-blog/official-disputes-caddies-version-gibson-penalty

Thanks for the clarification. In the video, the caddie implied that there wasn’t any objection to the ruling at the time and that it dawned on him later that he might’ve been right. That was my first red flag. Then the caddie referred to an anonymous friend who knows the rules real well (just trust him!) but does not want to be quoted. Second red flag. The decision quoted above said that any doubt goes against the player, so your explanation makes sense. Yah if I wanted to persuade people about my argument, I generally like to wear clothing

First the links and quotes: http://golfweek.com/2018/01/24/web-com-tour-player-throws-headcover-at-caddie-over-costly-and-mysterious-penalty/ http://www.usga.org/rules/rules-and-decisions.html#!decision-26,d26-1-9 All of the above is the supporting documentation for my question. As I understand it, the caddie above picked up his player’s ball after the player appeared to want to take a drop from a hazard, without explicitly saying that. A rules official on the scene assessed the penalty. Was the caddie correct? Gray area depending on interpretations?

Whenever I see a thread like this, my reaction is to share my somewhat recent experiences in shopping for a driver. Once was about 5 years ago, when I was taking up the game again. By going to a club fitter, he took me through a large number of manufacturers and configurations. I hit maybe 10 balls with each, and the fitter was using Flight Scope technology to develop a pattern of which configurations worked the best for me that day. In the end, a combination of his magic with technology and the feedback I gave him about the feels of each club led to a final choice. Then a couple years later, I won a PING G30 in a TST contest (before I became staff, I'll have you all know!). Again, I went to the same fitter who walked me through all of the configurations just for a PING G30 driver. There were 3 different head types, different shafts to try, plus loft and weight adjustments. It was a TON of experimentation- and the differences were significant. Again with his help with the ball flight numbers and my feedback about the experience with each set of balls that I hit, we settled on a configuration. I'd have been LOST without it. TL;DR: I was very satisfied with the process of getting a new driver through the help of a fitter. Maybe that's a luxury or impossible for some, but from what I've seen, it just helps you know you've bought something that will likely work. At least you've gone through a somewhat scientific process. Other than that, good luck with your choice! I know I wouldn't have known what to pick without help. Problem is: I'm not sure how you could use any of this advice if you're getting a driver that is a model or two behind the current models. Fitters, by their nature, tend to have the most recent stuff in stock. So while you'll likely get a better deal without sacrificing much by being a few years old- without the fitting, I'd always wonder if the club was the best I could've done.

Another good one. Quick update on my situation, for those interested: neck injury has blocked a lot of my progress on this, but I've been doing some motions recently as my physical therapy gets me back to a point where I think I'll be able to get full range of motion in my neck and shoulders. As I look forward to the spring to get going on this, the main takeaway for me when I try to sum up this thread is to avoid yanking the arms and hands down at the top of the downswing. Each of us may have different keys in avoiding that, but for me, I can say that the process has led to a very different mental map of how a swing works. I'm not saying it is a ground-up total rebuild of my swing, but it has been a discovery in that I've always thought about the downswing "incorrectly."

Gonna add this one to the steepness thread I'd started a while back. Tons of videos in that thread, but what's one more?!

I remember this challenge a little while back: @Golfer gal- any context to your question? Is it a Sandtrap thing you saw or something you hear about at your course or maybe in magazines?

Caveat: I’m no doctor and this isn’t medical advice. I’m dealing with C5-C6 disc herniation here since April. MRI also showed mild herniation in other cervical vertebrae. Spine surgeon just wants to do simple procedure on me. He also sent me to physical therapy and they’re shocked I’d consider surgery since I can do most things (not golf) pain free. They see surgery typically for people in more pain than I am in. Speaking with my general practitioner, he suggested I speak with someone else who does injections, for my own peace of mind. Seems like surgeons wanna do surgery, physical therapists want to do PT. I’ll bet injectors recommend injections. And if I saw a chiropractor, they’d say they could get me back to working order! And the GP carefully avoids telling you what to do, so as not to contradict any specialist. Thats a summary of where I am anyway. Also for what it’s worth, my physical therapists have done some things after the MRI showed herniation in the discs that have helped: 1. Dry needling, with electrical stimulation of the muscles that have tightened up. 2. Traction on my spine for 10-15min each visit that feels like it alleviates any compression in my cervixal spine. Ive been doing physical therapy since the spring, but once I added those elements after an MRI in December, I finally feel like I’m starting to progress toward pain-free full range of motion in my neck and shoulders. Knock on wood. Good luck!!!