Did Faldo use the twist away?

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WVSooner

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I was just wondering to myself...

I remember my brother having Faldo's book called "The Winning Formula." Faldo talked about setting his wrist early and keeping them that way to the top of the swing. At the top, his right hand would be in the position of a "waiter holding a serving tray."

Now, can you get to a right hand position like that without having a flat or bowed left wrist? And is what Faldo did identical or similar to the twist away?

If I remember correctly from the book, not only would he put his hands in this position in the backswing but he kept that right hand position all the way through on the downswing and through impact.

I was a big Faldo fan back in the day but, instead of buying his book I figured that I should try to learn from his teacher, so I bought a Leadbetter book. In 20 years my best round is an 81. :mad: I still don't know what I should try to forget or keep from that book.
 
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dbl

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Maybe K. Shields will weigh in, but I'd say the waiter holding a tray position is not meant to be the same as NSA; in fact you could argue that it is a pretty universal position across many swing methodologies. As well, you could have a bent right wrist with a cupped left, which is not very NSA compliant. Furthermore the NSA video explains many possible steps to stop slicing and is not just "one position." For example, as far as I can see, Faldo was not doing wedding ring up. When people refer to NSA, are they referring to the whole enchilada, or what? Well, Faldo was not doing twist towards, so there is that.
 
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SJO

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Faldo is just talking about setting the wrist back on itself as opposed to setting it upwards. It should result in a flat left wrist at the top.

I think twistaway refers more to the forearms which Faldo isn't addressing. That book could be a bit complicated for the layman.
 
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aaron_lohan

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Yes, early on in his career he was upright at the top with a cuppy left wrist, so he started to rotate the clubface as he took the club away from the ball which bent the right wrist back on itself.
 
birdie_man

birdie_man

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Faldo took a strong grip and was cupped at the top, I do believe.

Not really a "NSA twistaway" type clubface control, I think.
 
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btp

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I can't find my Faldo book, but I'm pretty sure Faldo says he rotated his left forearm ala O'Meara who heard it from Hogan. Opposite of twist away. He did want a full wrist set 1/2 way back. His book has some pretty good insight to his keys.
 
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WVSooner

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btp said:
I can't find my Faldo book, but I'm pretty sure Faldo says he rotated his left forearm ala O'Meara who heard it from Hogan. Opposite of twist away. He did want a full wrist set 1/2 way back. His book has some pretty good insight to his keys.
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Hogan rotated his forearm in a clockwise direction, the opposite direction of the twistaway? I didn't know that.
 
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birly-shirly

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WVSooner said:
I was just wondering to myself...

I remember my brother having Faldo's book called "The Winning Formula." Faldo talked about setting his wrist early and keeping them that way to the top of the swing. At the top, his right hand would be in the position of a "waiter holding a serving tray."

Now, can you get to a right hand position like that without having a flat or bowed left wrist? And is what Faldo did identical or similar to the twist away?

If I remember correctly from the book, not only would he put his hands in this position in the backswing but he kept that right hand position all the way through on the downswing and through impact.

I was a big Faldo fan back in the day but, instead of buying his book I figured that I should try to learn from his teacher, so I bought a Leadbetter book. In 20 years my best round is an 81. :mad: I still don't know what I should try to forget or keep from that book.
Click to expand...

I've got that Faldo book, and the wrist-setting he talks about in the backswing and downswing sounds very "twistaway" to me. He really emphasises that he had to learn to stress the right wrist bending back on itself and holding that postion through the top of the swing and then resisting any straightening out all the way to impact. Whether or not Faldo's left wrist was straight, or slightly cupped, at the top is neither here nor there to me - because his emphasis was definitely on creating the angle at the back of the right wrist - which to me is more or less the same thing as torquing the shaft around its own axis. Isn't that twistaway - rather than forearm rotation?

For what it's worth - I didn't see his grip as strong - just a classic two knuckles. At the top, the clubface looks maybe a little strong in relation to the back of this left hand and a little weak in relation to the back of this left forearm. I guess it depends on your reference points.

In addition to this torquing of the shaft - he also worked on rotating the arms clockwise on the way back. I think Faldo had grown up swinging the club quite straight-back and through, steep with not enough arm rotation. The first step that he took towards remodelling his swing was rotating the left arm in his takeaway and fanning the clubface open - a la Hogan and at O'Meara's suggestion.

I remember seeing photos of him as an amateur with a very shut face/arched left wrist at the top of his swing. Since he stressed both the arm rotation and wrist torque in his major swing overhaul, my guess would be that these two changes were complementary. He needed to rotate the left arm more to get the club on a shallower plane going back, and balanced this with a little twistaway to keep the clubface from getting too open.

I always thought that it was odd, given that I've never heard it disputed that Leadbetter was the brains behind Faldo's majors-winning swing, that Faldo put such emphasis on the wrist torque when I've never heard or seen Leadbetter talk about it at all.

I don't know what his bad shots were prior to getting together with Leadbetter. I think he'd led the money list in Europe so wasn't exactly a chop. I do remember an interview with him as his swing changes were starting to come together in which he justified the two years work and slump in form on the basis that he could now hit a ball and practically guarantee left to right spin. I still remember the journalist being somewhat speechless that someone might put in 2 years of hard labour to achieve a constant slice!

Hogan's secret (as printed in Life Magazine) is the complete opposite of twistaway. Left arm rotation and cupping the left wrist.
 
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birly-shirly

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Kevin Shields said:
Twistaway isnt only a backswing move. Hogan did his twistaway on the downswing
Click to expand...

Yes - but I think Hogan's twistaway in his downswing wasn't a conscious move, at least by the time he was a pro. OTOH, his roll and cup move was always a conscious manipulation. Not doing it deliberately was his draw technique.
 
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birly-shirly

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I hope you weren't referring to Power Golf!

Kevin - I'm loth to disagree with you on anything golfswing related. Obviously, Hogan squared his clubface pretty well and as Brian pointed out in his video short, that requires some torque around the shaft for just about anyone.

So, I don't know how much it really matters what Hogan said he did - but, FWIW, my reading of 5 Lessons was that, as regards the action of the left wrist on the way into and through impact, that this was more a reaction to a driving left upper body and arm than a manipulation of the club.

Doesn't he say somewhere that he had only 2 conscious thoughts for the downswing - starting with the hips, and then hitting through the ball with shoulders, arms and then hands?

Also, IIRC, supination was described by Hogan as anti-hook (and anti-flip) protection - it's what let him hit with his 3 right hands, and I'm sure he said that he was against any kind of conscious squaring of the clubface, which was to be taken care of with the grip and waggle.

I re-read his Life article before posting previously - and that was all anti-hook. Clockwise rotation and cupping on the way back and no conscious manipulation on the way down.

I don't suppose I'm the first person to wonder why there was so little overlap between 5 Lessons and the Life secret.
 
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