Case study on release and lag: Help This Junior, Senor.

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Well, since i just drove my older one to her PSAT exam this morning, I thought this forum can also use a multiple choice question, keeping in mind some of the debatable issues of late.

The following is a multiple choice question. Choose your best answer. If you can explain your reasoning well, you may receive a bonus. If you leave it blank, you shall receive a penalty of astronomical size, like whiffing your driver on the first tee or something of that nature. (you can slow down the video to see clearly enough if you know how and where to look)

Here we go:

This junior (my younger one) has played golf for a few years under the blind tutelage of an obtuse father/coach, more often than not a lethal combo. Having survived that so far, she has been told that her major swing fault has always been early release of "cocking of the wrists". In fact, when this video was shown to some people, the consensus has been that she can use more lag. Upon hearing such, the father was more excited than ever and exclaimed: see,,i told you so. Besides working on her swing tempo, balance, and other unthinkable things that pop up on a daily basis, the holy grail slogan continues: hold your lag or no ice cream treat. Poor kid, but i digress.

Using your updated golf knowledge obtained directly, indirectly or even through 4th hand channels from "the best assembled team of golf scientists" on earth, choose the following best answer on future management plan:

1. pat the father on his back and raise your thumb up to his often irritatingly insistent emphasis on MORE LAG.

2. slap the father on his head and sternly caution him to stop more lag and introduce the concept of normalization of the force at impact and therefore more power, more ice cream.

3. have something to say on something else.

4. none of the above (with potential for big bonus).

5. all of the above (with potential for big penalty).

SwingAcademy.com
 
Well, Kevin, first thing first, i often show your youtube swings to her, whatever the implications may be:)

7 iron: about 130.

When she hits it well, it is usually high and straight. Yup, once in a while, she will hit it fat (so i jump up and down and remind her of the no brainer that she must have not lagged enough, although my other suspicion is that she has rushed her tempo on the downswing). She rarely thins shots.
 

Kevin Shields

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Ill have to update the youtubes of my swing, has changed dramatically!

I think the fat ones would be more likely the latter instead of not "lagging" enough.
 
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Two issues regarding my theory of her application of her previous instruction that's caused her problems (by the way it's not a perfect world so it's bound to happen that "good" instruction when not fully understood is going to cause problems):

1) The effort and idea to keep her right leg fixed, non-swaying, knee pointed in throughout the backswing ( and no doubt you can see that was a BIG focus for her), possibly combined with the concept of starting the downswing and also leading the downswing with her lower body, has created a condition at the top and shows up in the start down - where she essentially gets stuck and everything moves together on the downswing, she doesn't have the ability for the lower body to unlink from the upper body, let's just call it in a general way "coming over the top". It's one of a few underlying issues that don't allow her to have "lag".

Body positions and motions are the result of moving the club, they are not things you do to move the club. Likewise, in a similar way but a different context, Tempo is the result of the required timing of the mechanical and anatomical motions being made and not the cure for improper mechanical and anatomical sequencing.


2) As I've said before there are MANY different perspectives, definitions of the concept lag - it's important to know them all and then clearly define the one you are talking about - otherwise it's just mass confusion in communicating to another person if they are using a different definition than you, when that happens you get 160+ page threads. Does she have a "lag/release" problem - sure.

While I've stated the issues that I see - I wouldn't want to try to describe the fix on a forum by typing it out. Plus you're a smart guy and probably can figure it out. PM me if you need more help. Otherwise, tell your daughter she has a great swing - congratulations on what you've accomplished so far - alot of potential there!
 
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ej20

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Golfdad,in this day and age of cheap and affordable high speed cameras,there really is no excuse for blurry videos if you want to analyse a swing with any accuracy and certainty.The club is so blurry in the latter parts of the swing that it almost becomes invisible.Thirty frames per second videos are also inadequate.
 
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Great swing, in fact it looks so good she could probably go at it harder with that tempo and add some 'jump' to shallow out the bottom and be hitting those 7i's even further.

If I were you, I would...

Continue to encourage her development and love for the game. Don't be consumed with how the swing looks as much as how well it functions (repeats), because we ALL miss shots.

SHORT GAME. short game. SHORT game. short GAME.
 
Why is here swing that short???

(how do you guys answer multiple quotes in one post?)

That video was taken at the beginning of the past summer. She was preparing for a coming up tournament and realized that her length has increased which confused her. So she decided to shorten her swing to match some mental markers that she was used to. At her age, tournament length is quite short, so there is not much incentive to max out. She also felt that with shortened swings, dispersion got tighter. I have to send her into the battlefield with whatever she is comfortable with:)

Here is an even older video showing her "fuller" swing. SwingAcademy.com

Not sure if the older video provides additional clues for MikeO. Thank you Mike for being thoughtful on this matter. What you have raised, in one shade or another, have also crossed my feeble mind often,,,but honestly, so far there is not enough clarity! :) On a daily basis, I feel I am chasing a moving target.

ej20, guilty as charged. I really need to upgrade soon. In my household there is this unspoken rule that if it is not broken, don't get a new one. :)

magicmarker: Thank you for yet another reminder about short game. I have this mental block that every time we go practicing, putting is put off as the last item. Have to change that!
 
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