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Member Question - Taking Hips Out Of The Swing

There have been a few Youtube videos within the last 6 months discussing the role of the hips in power/speed production. In these videos, several instructors have stated that you can "remove" the hips from the swing and only experience a 10-15% reduction in clubhead speed. While the amount of speed loss does appear to be accurate, a kneeling posture does not completely remove your hips from the equation. Therefore, we would have to make a few modification to truly test this theory. Nonetheless, the hips play a big role in power production/sequencing and a lot of great golfers (and athletes in general) tend to work "from the ground up" when it comes to performance. 

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Tags: Not Enough Distance, Concept

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This concept video is discussing the member question about taking your hips out of the

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galswing.

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So this member asked a question about a couple of different videos that have popped up

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over the last, let's say, six months about the clubbed speed you get from your legs

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and from your hips and a couple different other YouTube instructors have demonstrated

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that you can hit shots off your knees and not lose a ton of speed.

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So let's say normal clubbed speed is somewhere around 1-10-1-15 and then swinging off

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their knees, they might still be able to get, let's say, low 100.

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So basically concluding that the hips are only responsible for, let's say, you know,

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that last 10 miles per hour.

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Well, here's a simple concept of movement where I tried to demonstrate it.

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In order, so the problem with that is when I'm kneeling, my hips are still free.

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So while I've lost the, while I've lost the, you know, 30 degrees of ankle or knee rotation

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each direction, my hips still have pretty much their full capability.

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My pelvis is going to be limited and how rotated it can get because I've lost the

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the movement below my knees.

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Basically, in order to fix the joint and take it out of the equation, I have to fix the joint above it.

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So the joint above my hips is my pelvis.

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If I'm not fixing my pelvis, then my hips are still very much in the equation of how your contributing

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speed.

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So I get the, I get the purpose of the exercise, the purpose of the exercise of the show

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that just rotating your hips isn't going to necessarily create a whole lot of speed.

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The speed comes from using your body as a whole and transferring all that speed with the arms.

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And the, the hips to play a large role in that, but only as good as your arms and your hands

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are able to communicate it.

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So my challenge would be if, if someone wants to demonstrate that your hips don't contribute

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to speed, then what they should do is they should sit on their, sit bones.

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That's your pelvis and if you sit there, then you've taken your hips out of play.

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Especially if you did it with a chair and with your feet off the ground.

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The other option, you could do it in a seated position just like this.

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Now my hips are, are barely in the equation at all.

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It will be really hard.

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I would be very impressed to see someone get someone who has 115 mile an hour club heads

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speed.

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I would be very impressed if they were able to get over 100 miles per hour by actually

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not using their hips.

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I, I love, I've played around with the drill in college.

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I had a six hole challenge against another kid on the team where we played six holes

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off of our knees to try to, you know, just kind of mix it up.

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I believe that there's value in the drill.

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I believe that there's value in the idea, but it's a little bit misrepresented.

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So I wanted to do a little video to try to clarify it.

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Okay, so based on the greens here, that just flew somewhere in the 220 to 30 range.

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So I'm guessing that that was probably, you know, pretty close to 95 miles an hour or so,

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which where I'm currently swinging in the mid, you know, the low 108, 109, not quite crack in 110.

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That seems pretty reasonable based on what everyone was describing.

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