Body Type and the golf swing

[Marcus0418]

I have always wondered if there has been a correlation between body type and the golf swing and if there have been any honest-to-God studies on it. I own a book called "The LAWs of the Golf Swing: Body-Type Your Golf Swing and Master Your Game " by Mike Adams and it does go into detail about body type and associated swing models but I dont feel it's correct. I have a feeling that more than just body type should go into it, like arm length, flexibility, relationship in torso length to leg length and so forth.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this or know if there is any more information out there? Or does body type even really matter in relation to the type of swing? (excluding extremes...I mean, obviously JB Holmes isnt going to be able to swing like Ricky Fowler)

 

[Lindsey Newman]

The club could care less. The trick is not getting fooled into where the club is in relation to the body. Where is it in relationship to the ball? If you just visualize the club moving, in time and space, without anything else, how would it be correctly applied to the ball? Then do whatever it takes with the body to do that with speed and precision.

I think it is a big mistake to relate where the club is to the body for positioning instead of the ball. Line drawing in a 2D world can be very misleading. Just think how much better it would be if you just removed everything from the camera view, but the target line the ball and the club. Just my opinion of course.

Oh and I have read that book and Dr. Suttie's books on body type thoroughly.

 

[DCgolf]

Books and Tapes are the curse of many instructors. I have seen and worked with many good teachers; guys who could really fix swings. But they felt they had to "publish or perish"; so they come up with some one size fits all theory, wrote a book about it, and that was the end of that. Couldn't even work with them anymore. Now they are typecast into a theory, a method, and they paint themselves in a corner that they can't get out of. They know damn well that everything in the book cannot possibly apply to everybody. But they put it out there anyway, and the results are disastrous. No two swings or golfers are alike. So no two lessons should be either.

 

[MikeD2]

The club could care less. The trick is not getting fooled into where the club is in relation to the body. Where is it in relationship to the ball? If you just visualize the club moving, in time and space, without anything else, how would it be correctly applied to the ball? Then do whatever it takes with the body to do that with speed and precision.

I think this is a great image. It recalls John Jacobs writings on the importance of simply swinging the club.