Don't forget this Sunday at 6:00PM PST we go live to help YOU diagnose your cause and effect. Submit your golf swing face on and down the line videos, email them to me directly tony@liongolfacademy.com
What's important to understand here is that a lot of people have the cart before the horse. The number one thing in the golf swing is how you leverage the CLUB. In order to leverage the clubshaft properly you need to have some sense of where the club is going at the very moment you reach the top. All good golfers cock (or set ) the club according to where they know that the club is going in the downswing, how much down, how much around, based on how wide or how narrow the swing base is, how the legs will work and yes where the shaft started, although really good golfers are not limited to working around where the shaft started. The set of the club is much more important for delivery of the clubhead accurately. The trail arm is released based on the trajectory of the lead arm, much like a two-handed backhand in tennis, so the trail arm must work within a confined set pattern of motion, depending on how the golfer swung back and how they intend to come down, which is essentially dictated by the lead arm and it's intended arc of motion. Apart from this, the golfer will struggle to build power and/or square the clubface. The two arms together must work in the described fashion in relation to where the chest is moving. The trail arm must straighten in conjunction with the opening of the chest as the weight moves targetward but the most important factor is that the skilled golfer is aligning the clubhead to fall behind the elbows AS THEY ALIGN approaching impact. All golfers throw the club but these guys know where they are throwing it to from the moment they start down. In fact, really before they even start the backswing because the exact throwing pattern dictates the shot type and trajectory. So the story here is not that they all increase their tilts and have different arm motions which indeed should be pretty obvious if you understand what's really happening in the golf swing. Since a different pivot point is created by the motion of the lead hip, combined with the widening of the hand path around the body in the downswing, creating extension and hitting through the ball, it is obvious that the tilts will need to increase since the trail shoulder must keep up with the motion of the lead side and trail shoulder/arm combo must arrive at a position far enough out towards the ball and low enough to square the club on the intended line in conjunction with the retreating and rising lead shoulder Therefore all of these rapidly changing patterns of motion REQUIRE that any great ball striker know where the club is going, and it's exact pattern of motion by, at the latest, the top of the swing. This will be accomplished by a set of the club that takes into account every nuance of all the combined motions that they will produce in getting to the ball. This implies strongly that golf is about knowing accurately how the club is moving in 3D space. Most golfers are just haphazardly setting the club in the backswing based on something that they think looks standard or like the tour pros but the motions approaching the top are not achieving a club set that permits them to start down with any authority and build accurate power. They are shooting blindfolded because they don't know where the target is, because the target is an accurate awareness of how the trail arm and club must move from that position. An accurate set, allows the golfer to KNOW given all of the motions that they will make coming down and exactly how they will release the trail arm and clubshaft relative to the lead arm/lead side motion combo. If a golfer knows that starting down, they can play really good tee to green golf. If they don't know that, all of the awareness of tilts, and rotational aspects, and setup in the world will still leave them somewhat in the dark. Just a simple example of what I am talking about would involve golfers that lift the club very high such as Wolff and Watson. Both of them are lifting the trail side of the body in the backswing. You can swing high without doing this but it requires more flexibility (think Champ) and is really not neccessary since you can actually gain extra leverage through reversing the motion in the downswing. This means that both of them are driving the trail side of the body down and throwing the trail shoulder region downward as well while their weight is moving to the lead side during the downswing. The set of the club must accomodate this move which means it happens more around the vertical rising lead arm which is pushing up. This is the reason that they both are able to drop the club so vertically in the early downswing and still hit the ball so well. Wolff also really crosses the line so he must compress his spine and snap his hips back and knees straight in order to fire the trail arm through accurately. However, his set of the club is what allows him to be prepared for all of these motions for accurate delivery of the club, as is the case with all of these golfers and if they didn't understand the set of the club, you wouldn't know anything about any of them. Cheers.
The dog wags the tail, not the other way around. All athletic motions especially the peak level athlete (top .01%) that are on tour are flukes of nature. To analyze them is purely for coincidence and not to be taken at an amateur level. You must teach the average golfer who fits in a mold of their own. The best in the world are working with two static variable, earth and club lie angles. The best in the world have figured out to use those two static object and work around them based on their body limitations. It just so happens the best in the world share few things in common with each other. The rest needs to stay at bay, and golf instructors trying to teach these moves reserved for the elite to average Joe’s are doing a huge disservice to them. My opinion of course. Thanks for the comment!
@@liongolfacademy Tour golfers are not athletes ini the sense that pro football, soccer or basketball players are. Their physical attributes are not above the average decent athlete IMO on average. Many male golfers for example have the physical capabilities to achieve 165-175 mph driver ball speeds which is in the tour average range, In fact, many better than average athletes can easily reach above 175 mph but all of this is dependant on good technique, of which they are fully capable. I am not guessing at this because I have been on both sides of this issue. I won a provincial college tournament at 18 and am a fairly above average athlete in many respects. I have never been able to play huge amounts of golf in my life so keeping up my game was not easy even though I reaached a + handicap for stretches. With body changes, layoffs, etc., I have "lost" and "regained" my swing many times.and have come to know how important technique is to the game of golf. I was reaching 175-180 mph ball speeds with accuracy in my mid-fifties but it was very dependant on my technique, i.e. being able to feel how to leverage the club. In periods where I had difficulty with that, speeds might drop to the 150s with much poorer accuracy and consistency. Once in a while, I would leverage the club so well (and sometimes it was a particular club or range of clubs) that I would gain massive amounts of distance and the purity of the strikes became unreal, such as a perfectly struck 7-iron that carried 210 yds.still in my fifities. I have had experiences of this kind throughout pretty much the entire T-G bag. Over the years, I have come to understand what makes the difference in these contrasting periods and without a doubt it is understanding (and feeling obviously, but the understanding helps A LOT) how to move the club. What was changing in these episodes of bad to very exceptional ball striking was not my ablility to tilt, turn, rotate, stand, etc. which weren't changing. It was my ability to feel and understand how to synchonize those elements with the proper relative motion of my arms, hands, and the club which is the secret sauce of the golf swing. I also know from experience that this is what pros are better at, strive for, and have learned to achieve consistency with. Golfers that are not working towards this are wasting their time with regard to playing their best golf. This is obvious from a logical standpoint, the club is a moving pendulum in an inclined plane, The motion of this variable-length pendulum is being synchronized with the motions of many other moving systems in the golf swing but the pendulum's arrival at a certain point in the arc and it's orientation at the point must be extremely precise for good striking. Clearly, ALL variations in how the system(s) move including tempo will necessitate a very accurate ablility to determine (feel) the proper leverage dynamics of that pendulum for that particular combination of elements, This more than anything else is what differentiates tour pros from people of average physical abliity that struggle to play high quality golf. However, many of them are not even trying to learn to do this because they are being taught so many ideas, concepts and myths that by comparison are relatively useless. This is in contrast to golfers such as tour pros for whom this ability is the bread and butter of their exceptional skill. A further substantiation of this, is a simple survey of youtube golf videos which will reveal a plethora of golfers that have changed 1 or two things in their swings and suddenly achieved something much closer to a tour type distance with one or a range of their club(s) with vastly superior striking. I know that I have seen this many, many times. Cheers.
I’m not sure if you are an instructor or make a living instructing but I can tell you if you are you would know it’s never this cut and dry when dealing with average golfers, if you aren’t an instructor then let me tell you it’s never this cut and dry when teaching average golfers 😂. Trust me when I tell you that average golfers may have the capabilities to get into positions on occasion but the work ethic and lifestyle requirements are usually the crutch in development. I would respectfully disagree on your claim that golf professionals are not athletes such as others in their fields. These your golfers bodies are built and designed around a high level repetitive motion, much like other athletes in their craft. You would not pit an MMA fighter with a rock climber and vice versa. Thanks for the comment! Best of luck in your teaching.
@@liongolfacademy I never said that golfers are not athletes but to compare them to athletes whose livelihood depends largely on some combination of their power, speed, or agility is not really appropos in many cases. Their average liabilities in this regard don't need to supercede the average by very much in order for them to be successful in the sport. In that regard, comparing golfers to either rock climbers or MMA fighters seems lopsided. Again, leveraging the club properly is what leads to positions, not the other way around. So whatever positions amateur golfers get into are likely to be fairly useless unless they have been taught how to leverage the club. Top golfers arrived at their somewhat dissimilar "positions" because they learned slightly differently how to leverage the club well. Such an approach would I believe revolutionize golf instruction but of course, it has to be understood first which I am not sure is easy to convey in writing, potentially explaining the current impasse. I am happy to leave it at that while retaining no less conviction in what I have said. Cheers.
I hear you but what you speak of is nothing I have not heard before. Nothing in the golf instruction is new. People have dedicated their lives to figuring out the swing for past 200 years. There are no secrets to the swing, no quick way to fix it, no hidden move with leverages, it’s all been done and said multiple times. The best way to identify issues is all individually based, and each user is limited to their body they have at that time. It’s pretty simple and when utilized individually works wonders, which is why I can happily say it has kept me employed for 25 years as an instructor, and opened 5 academies based on this philosophy. I don’t doubt you think any less of your views, and you should not if you whole heartedly believe in them, stay with your passion. I can just tell you, from an instruction point nothing is new.
Six of the ugliest swings to ever play on the PGA Tour. Good point that the top of swing positions influence how the start down is different from more textbook swingers.
Wouldn’t this tilting be something that happens naturally ? Since we are swinging on a tilted plane . Why try and force something that happens that naturally should happen
You would be amazed, it only happens naturally if things fall in place. But most amateurs have issues with this due to aging, loss of rotation, flexion, etc. You will get there eventually! 😂
@@ayotollaofrockandrolla7219 its all relative I guess...I bet if an 81 year old read this, they would be dreaming of being 61 again! I guess the best way to say this, is a sedentary lifestyle will make this harder to increase your tilt, remain in the posture, and rotate. But that also depends on the grip placement, grip placement determines how much more you need to tilt, turn, or both. That also stems from setup, so its a huge domino effect.
You would think so! But what is a “correct grip”? There is no correct grip, every swing evolves around the grip and vice versa, every body has a different swing that evolves around the limitations of it. Every 10 years the structure of your body changes, so everything stemming from it changes. The bottom line is most of the stuff they have been teaching and writing for you to study and read has been false. Every swing is different.
Yes this is due to the lie angle of the club and earth. Their bodies have to form to those two limitations and they all do it so well. How they started vs how they get to impact are so different, even post impact is different. This is what happens when you give highly skilled people who are gifted athletes a tool that has limits to use. They all find a way.
Don't forget this Sunday at 6:00PM PST we go live to help YOU diagnose your cause and effect. Submit your golf swing face on and down the line videos, email them to me directly tony@liongolfacademy.com
Another great video! Keep them coming!
🙏 appreciate it!
😅great video love the comparisons it makes it so easy to see your point
Glad you enjoyed!
Nice analysis.
Thank you Frank! Happy Holidays
What's important to understand here is that a lot of people have the cart before the horse. The number one thing in the golf swing is how you leverage the CLUB. In order to leverage the clubshaft properly you need to have some sense of where the club is going at the very moment you reach the top. All good golfers cock (or set ) the club according to where they know that the club is going in the downswing, how much down, how much around, based on how wide or how narrow the swing base is, how the legs will work and yes where the shaft started, although really good golfers are not limited to working around where the shaft started. The set of the club is much more important for delivery of the clubhead accurately.
The trail arm is released based on the trajectory of the lead arm, much like a two-handed backhand in tennis, so the trail arm must work within a confined set pattern of motion, depending on how the golfer swung back and how they intend to come down, which is essentially dictated by the lead arm and it's intended arc of motion. Apart from this, the golfer will struggle to build power and/or square the clubface. The two arms together must work in the described fashion in relation to where the chest is moving. The trail arm must straighten in conjunction with the opening of the chest as the weight moves targetward but the most important factor is that the skilled golfer is aligning the clubhead to fall behind the elbows AS THEY ALIGN approaching impact. All golfers throw the club but these guys know where they are throwing it to from the moment they start down. In fact, really before they even start the backswing because the exact throwing pattern dictates the shot type and trajectory.
So the story here is not that they all increase their tilts and have different arm motions which indeed should be pretty obvious if you understand what's really happening in the golf swing. Since a different pivot point is created by the motion of the lead hip, combined with the widening of the hand path around the body in the downswing, creating extension and hitting through the ball, it is obvious that the tilts will need to increase since the trail shoulder must keep up with the motion of the lead side and trail shoulder/arm combo must arrive at a position far enough out towards the ball and low enough to square the club on the intended line in conjunction with the retreating and rising lead shoulder
Therefore all of these rapidly changing patterns of motion REQUIRE that any great ball striker know where the club is going, and it's exact pattern of motion by, at the latest, the top of the swing. This will be accomplished by a set of the club that takes into account every nuance of all the combined motions that they will produce in getting to the ball. This implies strongly that golf is about knowing accurately how the club is moving in 3D space. Most golfers are just haphazardly setting the club in the backswing based on something that they think looks standard or like the tour pros but the motions approaching the top are not achieving a club set that permits them to start down with any authority and build accurate power. They are shooting blindfolded because they don't know where the target is, because the target is an accurate awareness of how the trail arm and club must move from that position. An accurate set, allows the golfer to KNOW given all of the motions that they will make coming down and exactly how they will release the trail arm and clubshaft relative to the lead arm/lead side motion combo. If a golfer knows that starting down, they can play really good tee to green golf. If they don't know that, all of the awareness of tilts, and rotational aspects, and setup in the world will still leave them somewhat in the dark.
Just a simple example of what I am talking about would involve golfers that lift the club very high such as Wolff and Watson. Both of them are lifting the trail side of the body in the backswing. You can swing high without doing this but it requires more flexibility (think Champ) and is really not neccessary since you can actually gain extra leverage through reversing the motion in the downswing. This means that both of them are driving the trail side of the body down and throwing the trail shoulder region downward as well while their weight is moving to the lead side during the downswing. The set of the club must accomodate this move which means it happens more around the vertical rising lead arm which is pushing up. This is the reason that they both are able to drop the club so vertically in the early downswing and still hit the ball so well. Wolff also really crosses the line so he must compress his spine and snap his hips back and knees straight in order to fire the trail arm through accurately. However, his set of the club is what allows him to be prepared for all of these motions for accurate delivery of the club, as is the case with all of these golfers and if they didn't understand the set of the club, you wouldn't know anything about any of them. Cheers.
The dog wags the tail, not the other way around. All athletic motions especially the peak level athlete (top .01%) that are on tour are flukes of nature. To analyze them is purely for coincidence and not to be taken at an amateur level. You must teach the average golfer who fits in a mold of their own. The best in the world are working with two static variable, earth and club lie angles. The best in the world have figured out to use those two static object and work around them based on their body limitations. It just so happens the best in the world share few things in common with each other. The rest needs to stay at bay, and golf instructors trying to teach these moves reserved for the elite to average Joe’s are doing a huge disservice to them. My opinion of course. Thanks for the comment!
@@liongolfacademy Tour golfers are not athletes ini the sense that pro football, soccer or basketball players are. Their physical attributes are not above the average decent athlete IMO on average. Many male golfers for example have the physical capabilities to achieve 165-175 mph driver ball speeds which is in the tour average range, In fact, many better than average athletes can easily reach above 175 mph but all of this is dependant on good technique, of which they are fully capable.
I am not guessing at this because I have been on both sides of this issue. I won a provincial college tournament at 18 and am a fairly above average athlete in many respects. I have never been able to play huge amounts of golf in my life so keeping up my game was not easy even though I reaached a + handicap for stretches. With body changes, layoffs, etc., I have "lost" and "regained" my swing many times.and have come to know how important technique is to the game of golf. I was reaching 175-180 mph ball speeds with accuracy in my mid-fifties but it was very dependant on my technique, i.e. being able to feel how to leverage the club. In periods where I had difficulty with that, speeds might drop to the 150s with much poorer accuracy and consistency. Once in a while, I would leverage the club so well (and sometimes it was a particular club or range of clubs) that I would gain massive amounts of distance and the purity of the strikes became unreal, such as a perfectly struck 7-iron that carried 210 yds.still in my fifities. I have had experiences of this kind throughout pretty much the entire T-G bag.
Over the years, I have come to understand what makes the difference in these contrasting periods and without a doubt it is understanding (and feeling obviously, but the understanding helps A LOT) how to move the club. What was changing in these episodes of bad to very exceptional ball striking was not my ablility to tilt, turn, rotate, stand, etc. which weren't changing. It was my ability to feel and understand how to synchonize those elements with the proper relative motion of my arms, hands, and the club which is the secret sauce of the golf swing. I also know from experience that this is what pros are better at, strive for, and have learned to achieve consistency with. Golfers that are not working towards this are wasting their time with regard to playing their best golf. This is obvious from a logical standpoint, the club is a moving pendulum in an inclined plane, The motion of this variable-length pendulum is being synchronized with the motions of many other moving systems in the golf swing but the pendulum's arrival at a certain point in the arc and it's orientation at the point must be extremely precise for good striking. Clearly, ALL variations in how the system(s) move including tempo will necessitate a very accurate ablility to determine (feel) the proper leverage dynamics of that pendulum for that particular combination of elements,
This more than anything else is what differentiates tour pros from people of average physical abliity that struggle to play high quality golf. However, many of them are not even trying to learn to do this because they are being taught so many ideas, concepts and myths that by comparison are relatively useless. This is in contrast to golfers such as tour pros for whom this ability is the bread and butter of their exceptional skill. A further substantiation of this, is a simple survey of youtube golf videos which will reveal a plethora of golfers that have changed 1 or two things in their swings and suddenly achieved something much closer to a tour type distance with one or a range of their club(s) with vastly superior striking. I know that I have seen this many, many times. Cheers.
I’m not sure if you are an instructor or make a living instructing but I can tell you if you are you would know it’s never this cut and dry when dealing with average golfers, if you aren’t an instructor then let me tell you it’s never this cut and dry when teaching average golfers 😂. Trust me when I tell you that average golfers may have the capabilities to get into positions on occasion but the work ethic and lifestyle requirements are usually the crutch in development. I would respectfully disagree on your claim that golf professionals are not athletes such as others in their fields. These your golfers bodies are built and designed around a high level repetitive motion, much like other athletes in their craft. You would not pit an MMA fighter with a rock climber and vice versa. Thanks for the comment! Best of luck in your teaching.
@@liongolfacademy I never said that golfers are not athletes but to compare them to athletes whose livelihood depends largely on some combination of their power, speed, or agility is not really appropos in many cases. Their average liabilities in this regard don't need to supercede the average by very much in order for them to be successful in the sport. In that regard, comparing golfers to either rock climbers or MMA fighters seems lopsided.
Again, leveraging the club properly is what leads to positions, not the other way around. So whatever positions amateur golfers get into are likely to be fairly useless unless they have been taught how to leverage the club. Top golfers arrived at their somewhat dissimilar "positions" because they learned slightly differently how to leverage the club well. Such an approach would I believe revolutionize golf instruction but of course, it has to be understood first which I am not sure is easy to convey in writing, potentially explaining the current impasse. I am happy to leave it at that while retaining no less conviction in what I have said. Cheers.
I hear you but what you speak of is nothing I have not heard before. Nothing in the golf instruction is new. People have dedicated their lives to figuring out the swing for past 200 years. There are no secrets to the swing, no quick way to fix it, no hidden move with leverages, it’s all been done and said multiple times. The best way to identify issues is all individually based, and each user is limited to their body they have at that time. It’s pretty simple and when utilized individually works wonders, which is why I can happily say it has kept me employed for 25 years as an instructor, and opened 5 academies based on this philosophy. I don’t doubt you think any less of your views, and you should not if you whole heartedly believe in them, stay with your passion. I can just tell you, from an instruction point nothing is new.
Tilt is one indicator that seperates good from bad players.
💯 ! Thanks for the watch and feedback manfred
Six of the ugliest swings to ever play on the PGA Tour. Good point that the top of swing positions influence how the start down is different from more textbook swingers.
Thanks for the comment! Appreciate the support
Wouldn’t this tilting be something that happens naturally ? Since we are swinging on a tilted plane .
Why try and force something that happens that naturally should happen
You would be amazed, it only happens naturally if things fall in place. But most amateurs have issues with this due to aging, loss of rotation, flexion, etc. You will get there eventually! 😂
@ I’m 61
@@ayotollaofrockandrolla7219 its all relative I guess...I bet if an 81 year old read this, they would be dreaming of being 61 again! I guess the best way to say this, is a sedentary lifestyle will make this harder to increase your tilt, remain in the posture, and rotate. But that also depends on the grip placement, grip placement determines how much more you need to tilt, turn, or both. That also stems from setup, so its a huge domino effect.
@ maybe I’m old school . But I also feel a correct grip takes care of 90% of all amateur swing issues
You would think so! But what is a “correct grip”? There is no correct grip, every swing evolves around the grip and vice versa, every body has a different swing that evolves around the limitations of it. Every 10 years the structure of your body changes, so everything stemming from it changes. The bottom line is most of the stuff they have been teaching and writing for you to study and read has been false. Every swing is different.
Pause those thumbnail pics at impact and the differences are marginal
Yes this is due to the lie angle of the club and earth. Their bodies have to form to those two limitations and they all do it so well. How they started vs how they get to impact are so different, even post impact is different. This is what happens when you give highly skilled people who are gifted athletes a tool that has limits to use. They all find a way.