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Bubba is a long hitter who loves to shape the ball. While he appears to use a lot of hand action to shape the ball, see how most of the "hand action" is actually in the follow through. Through the downswing and release, he has a very classic swing. It's no suprise that he is a consistent ball elite ball striker given the quality of his release.
Tags: Not Enough Distance, Analysis, Intermediate
WEBVTT
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in this analysis video we're gonna take
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a look at Bubba Watson but Watson is a
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lefty and one of the longest hitters on
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tour I'm gonna show you that he's got
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some classic movements to his swing but
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a few things that are a little bit
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unorthodox that would give him some of
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his unique looks so Bubba Watson is
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known for shaping pretty much every shot
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and hitting the ball a long way kind of
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playing with reckless abandon I'm gonna
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show you how he has a lot of classic
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characteristics to his swing a lot of
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things that I like and that we see in
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the the stock tour swing model and we're
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gonna go over a few of the things that
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give him kind of some uniqueness to his
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swing especially in the bracing in the
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follow-through so if we if we look at
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his backswing you'll see a fairly
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classic kind of one-piece takeaway from
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the down line you'll just see that
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there's one of his kind of trademark
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moves is he'll you'll set up with a
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little bit more of an open stance but
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that doesn't take away from his
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one-piece takeaway so it's largely a big
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big body movement muscles of the core
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hips and trunk that are moving the club
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away but he does tend to use a little
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bit more of the arm lift which gives the
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club the appearance of going a little
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bit more outside the line not that that
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really matters what that does is that
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helps create a little bit more of this
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vertical arm movement which he's then
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going to shallow out very nicely in
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transition so at the top of the swing
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you'll see that since distance is a
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priority of his you'll see a big full
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turn so you'll see lots of movement
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happening at the the ankle they need the
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hip the ribcage the shoulders all the
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way up through the chain but you'll see
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that he did even he did a great job of
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keeping his arms someone out in front of
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him even though he's had a ton of lift
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you can see that the trail elbow hasn't
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worked its way behind his body into a
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stuck position you can see if his trail
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elbow had worked behind his body we'd be
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able to see it kind of in this position
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over here so because his arms are still
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in an okay position even though he has
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this long swing
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you'll see that his first movement with
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his arms during transition is to really
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shallow out the club and get the the
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back of the left wrist roughly parallel
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to his shoulders or perpendicular to his
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spine so he has a really good job of
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shallowing out from the arms you'll also
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see that he does a tremendous job of
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sequencing the lower body as his upper
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body drops down he's kind of compressing
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against the ground to give him something
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to really push with you can see that his
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lower body opens up very very nicely I
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use the the the barrier of kind of by
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about the time the lead arm is parallel
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to the ground if you're if you're going
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for power you want to have your hips
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relatively square that's showing that
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you've started this swing more with the
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lower body than with the upper body here
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you can see he's he gets his hips back
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to square when that left arm or when his
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right arm is still well above parallel
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so kind of in the same position with
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these two swings so it's a tremendous
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job of sequencing the body and he's got
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lots and lots of flexibility which
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allows him to then have this kind of
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exaggerated look but now as he
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approaches the livery position he's
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continuing to power it with his body
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he's continuing to shallow it with the
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arms and he's squaring the clubface very
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nicely so when he's in this delivery
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position you'll see a pretty good
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variety of where he likes to have the
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club the shaft plane well where the club
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is where the club head is in relation to
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his hands all those affect his face to
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path and he's really good at moving
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around the face that path to have larger
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amounts of curves so from the face on
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view you'll see that transition move he
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does a really good job of getting his
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lower body to start and then he does a
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great job of setting up for his bracing
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so this has been largely a body pull on
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his arms and then once he gets to right
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about here we're now gonna start the
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release and so what you'll what you'll
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see is he does a great job of pushing
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through that lead leg to kind of create
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this little chain reaction that's going
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to cause the
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arms in the club too then want to extend
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as he goes into a release but he's done
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such a beautiful job of positioning his
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body that his arms are able to extend
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freely and he gets in this really
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classic looking bracing position now one
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of the unique things that you'll tend to
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see is that movement of his lower body
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or his feet through the through impact
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you'll you'll tend to see this vertical
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movement with a lot of golfers who hit
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the ball a long way compared to their
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body weight so skinnier golfers are
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gonna tend to have to rely on this
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pushing vertically against the ground in
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order to create enough friction to
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create enough rotational speed
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now he's shallowing his sequencing his
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release all that stuff looks very very
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classic one of the things that gives
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Bubba some of his trademark uniqueness
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and kind of flair is his follow-through
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movements and his his finished position
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so once he gets through this bracing
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into his follow-through position right
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about here what a lot of golfers would
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do is they would continue rotating their
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upper and lower body while the arms kind
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of were the speed of the club was being
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absorbed more by the body instead of the
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arms Bubba is a little bit unique in
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that he tends to freeze his body and
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absorb more of the speed in his arms and
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wrists through the movement there and
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then his body just kind of casually
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rides that momentum of the arms and the
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club up to the finish so instead of
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using more of his hips and his trunk to
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absorb the speed you can see him hinging
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this knee a little bit which is usually
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coming from that hip flexor and you can
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see his upper body kind of bracing and
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moving back that way so instead of
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absorbing it with bracing through the
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hips and the trunk he's absorbing it
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with more of his quads his knee and more
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of his shoulders so it gives a little
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bit of uniqueness to his the way the
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club exits because right around here
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everything is pretty classic if his body
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just can't
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rotating then it would look very much
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like a Jason day or an Adam Scott but
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what happens is because his body hasn't
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really continued rotating the wrist
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helped the club past the body very very
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quickly and then because the body hasn't
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continued rotating the arms now start
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moving in a much more vertical almost
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hold off look to his follow-through so
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as a fun comparison I flipped Adam Scott
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because normally when they're comparing
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Bubba or Phil for the rabies they flip
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Bubba or Phil to the radiation but I
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want you to take a look and see a lot of
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the similarities so we've got a fairly
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similar amount of body rotation you've
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got really good arm extension slightly
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different positions of the shaft and
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clubface but overall a lot of
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similarities there so now what you'll
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see is as the club passes his body he's
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now his primary goal is no longer
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controlling the path of the club it's
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now safely absorbing the speed of the
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swing and so what you'll see is it's
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largely the risks that are absorbing the
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speed of swing and then his body just
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kind of stays facing towards the fairway
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like so so if we take it to about the
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same position where the hands are about
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the same position what you'll see is
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that Adam Scott has turned his body a
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good twenty or thirty degrees and that's
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where he's absorbing the speed of the
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swing as opposed to Bubba doing it
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mostly in the arms of the club it'll
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look a little bit more exaggerated when
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we look from face on so now looking at
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Jason day we can compare some of the
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things from the face on so you'll see
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that even though they had very different
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looking back swing loads we're getting
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into a similar unloading pattern as we
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move Bubba through those similar
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positions
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you'll see that again compared to what
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we had with Adam Scott not a dramatic
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difference he's a little bit further
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behind so he's bracing slightly
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differently what we'll see now is as the
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club passes
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Jason's midline he's absorbing it more
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with body rotation and trunk rotation so
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you can see that it's mostly the hips
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and the shoulders there's not a lot
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going on there with the wrists so now if
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we take Bubba here he could be doing the
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same thing but what ends up happening is
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once he gets through the hands passing
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the midline now most of the absorption
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is gonna happen in the wrists and
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vertical movement of the knees as
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opposed to continuing rotating his trunk
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and core so this is one of the cases
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where the Flair and the uniqueness to
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his swing is kind of at a point where I
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think it's non-critical unless it was
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unless he was battling some type of
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injury either in that lead knee or
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potentially in the neck shoulder or
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elbow area I wouldn't see any reason
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that you'd have to change it because
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he's having great success with the face
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to path relationships he's having great
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success with sequencing and powering the
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swing and gets into a really good
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bracing strategy it's just that
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absorbing of the speed after all the key
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movements of the swing are done so if
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you want to understand which movements
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of your swing are critical and which
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movements are just your style head over
00:10:03.660 --> 00:10:05.339
to golf Smart Academy and check out our
00:10:05.339 --> 00:10:07.410
membership options in the membership
00:10:07.410 --> 00:10:09.120
program you could submit your swing and
00:10:09.120 --> 00:10:11.550
we'll do a video voice over just like
00:10:11.550 --> 00:10:13.680
this on your swing and show you where
00:10:13.680 --> 00:10:15.930
you could potentially stand to improve
00:10:15.930 --> 00:10:18.120
in terms of distance or consistency or
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whatever is ailing you