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Understand Your Swing Plane/Path
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While positions are important, it's the movements that get you into those positions that rea matter. In this video, I highlight how two golfers with similar transition positions will have different results based on how they got there. Fred Couples and Phil Mickelson have very different driving abilities but a similar steep positon at the top of the swing. One shallows in transition, but is still steep. The other does not.
Playlists: Understand Your Swing Plane/Path
Tags: Poor Contact, Transition, Analysis, Concept, Intermediate
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In this analysis video, I'm going to answer a member question about shallowing versus
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being shallow.
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So he asked if you shallow your arms, you know, where will the club point?
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And I wanted to do this video to point out that the key to arm shallowing is that it's
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a movement, it's not really a position.
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So I've got two golfers here that I hope will help illustrate this point.
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Now, I'm over on the right.
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I've got Fred Couples, over on the left.
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I've got Phil Nicholson.
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You can see they're slightly different camera angles, but you can see that compared to
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some body landmarks, both of these club shafts would be considered more steep.
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They're pointing slightly inside the golf ball, fills maybe a little bit more so.
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So they're both kind of steep in this position.
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Now, I know from there 3Ds that Fred Couples is shallowed actually a little bit more than
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average.
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So he's shallow to get bit together this point and Phil Nicholson hasn't had very much
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arm shallowing if any at all.
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He actually does more of his arm shallowing later.
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So if I back it up to the top of the swing, we'll see how they get into that delivery position
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or that kind of downswing checkpoint.
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So from here at the top of the swing, you can see they're both in a slightly across the
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line position.
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The cross-thaline is steep if you were to look it across the line.
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It basically means the club shaft is bicecting the arms.
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So it would be closer to the left arm than to the right arm, which is how it looks when
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we look at steep in shallow later in the downswing.
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Now, as Fred Couples starts changing direction, you can see some forearm rotation if you
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really know what to look for.
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You're looking at the relationship of the back of the left hand compared to the point
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of the elbow.
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You'll be able to see that there's some left arm rotation through that phase there where
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the club is just kind of dropping or shallowing.
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Now it's easier to see the effects of it here because he's given the club some shallowing
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momentum as he's still rotating and you'll see that the club through there has a the effect
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of a little bit more of a shallow position.
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And he's done so while his body's continued to power the swing.
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That allows him to hit it more with his body than with his arms and you'll see that he
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has some good arm bend still at impact.
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All that is really useful for when hitting the longer clubs like the driver.
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Now fill from a similar-ish club arm position at the top of the swing.
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You can see that the back of the left hand compared to the elbow doesn't really rotate
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through there.
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It's pretty much going in the same direction.
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So the club is swinging in roughly the same direction that the hands are going instead
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of swinging more down and back.
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And so he doesn't really get any shallowing there so he has the shallow more by straightening
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that right arm and kind of stalling some of his rotation.
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Now that combination can be great for wedges and short irons but is usually problematic
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with a club that has a little bit higher moment of inertia and less loft.
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So having limited flat spot, limited body power tends to produce some more problematic patterns
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for the longer club like the driver.
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So even though they have a club both in a steeper position in transition, Fred Couples
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is able to hit about 70% of the fairways and Phil Nicholson will be below 60, oftentimes
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in the 50s or some tournaments even lower than that.
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So they both hit the ball a long way but Fred Couples is significantly more accurate
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from a similar position because he's doing a different movement to get into that position
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not just the absolute position.
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So as you watch videos, I think it's important to kind of challenge yourself and train
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yourself to be able to see the movements they get them into positions not just the isolated
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positions.
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That's why on the website we teach the movement combinations that work during each phase
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of the swing so that you can pick and choose and kind of match up your swing to hopefully
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move your swing in a good direction and continue to have a long-term plan and continue
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positive results.
