Does Swing plane matter anymore?

[Tball88]

Ok, with everything we've learned about D Plane does Swing plane and the line golf instructors love to draw really matter anymore.

I mean clubface controls 85% of direction, so if you control the clubface pretty well, you're plane can be off, a little over or a little under, but who cares if your clubface is open at impact and square at seperation, relative to your unique individual plane, whatever it may be.

I'm just thinking out loud, but when working at the range, as opposed to thinking about swing mechanics and do I have an on plane takeaway, etc. etc. Should we just be focusing on ball flight, and clubface control. If the ball went left, more than likely my face was shut at seperation if it went right it was probably open at seperation, or at least open relative to my path.

Just my thought for the day.

 

[Richie3Jack]

I think it depends. If you struggle with OTT, then swing plane matters to me because it more or less makes D-Plane a secondary issue in the sense I have to get my downswing plane squared away.

If you're underplane or swinging out to the right too much, I think understanding D-Plane can help tremendously because now you can just aim left and swing left and greatly increase your accuracy.

Still think a FLW at impact is key. Too difficult to consistently control the clubface with a flip, plus the AoA shallows out so much that you have a more miniscule amount to swing left.




3JACK

 

[westy]

Educated Clubhead

Maybe all you need to do is educate your CLUBHEAD.
And the good news is now we know how...
Could just be that simple?
Maybe its easy, but we never understood how.
Kinematics and all the mental stuff etc isnt worth nearly as much if you understand and can effectively deliver the face and head in 3D...
You come OTT for a reason. A misguided attempt to do something such as alter your path to make up for your bad face..
Calvin Peete, John Daly and Tiger Woods.

Then again...

 

[Jim Kobylinski]

yes swing plane matters but not in the general sense that we have all come to know but the "horizontal swing plane" as Trackman calls it or as Brian says (which i really like) the direction of the swing.

If the HSP is too far from neutral you will never have great clubface control because you will be constantly trying to mess with the face to get the ball to do what you want. Clubface control becomes much easier once your path, both the in/out and the down/up, is under control.

 

[dannyc]

Ok, with everything we've learned about D Plane does Swing plane and the line golf instructors love to draw really matter anymore.

in short, no.
you are always on "a plane"
make "the plane" be in the direction you want
the "line drawing" is meaningless

 

[Tball88]

Jim, correct me if I'm wrong, but for every plane/path/direction of swing, is there not one club face position at impact that will create a straight ball flight, then the other club face positions will either create a right or a left ball flight relative to the path.

I see your point that it's probably easier for various reasons to get the face correct, if the path is neutral, but if you have a "generally" neutral path, nothing to obscene in either direction, shouldn't you focus more on clubface control as opposed to trying to develop a perfectly neutral swing path?

I'm beginning to wonder if this is why golfers have not generally gotten better with all of our technology. A lot of trying to get golfers to swing on a certain line and not enough focus on clubface.

I believe Hogan came slightly over the top and swung left, but he figured out how to match the clubface to his particular path to hit a straight shot.

 

[Richie3Jack]

I believe Hogan came slightly over the top and swung left, but he figured out how to match the clubface to his particular path to hit a straight shot.

No way in the world did he come OTT.

He came down right on the elbow plane and swung left.




3JACK

 

[Tball88]

Richie, when I say OTT, it's really a matter of degrees. I've seen video that showed his driver at setup at around 43 degrees and at impact he was at 45 degrees, an extremely minor difference.

My real point though is does it matter, even if he was over the top by 7-8 degrees, do you really need to work on path, or should the focus be on clubface.

Let's say you have a guy who swings on a flat swing, angle of attack is relatively shallow, and is a few degrees underplane coming into impact.

Do you try to get him to swing on plane, or just say, hey he's flat and underplane, let's weaken the grip and get him a little more open at impact and he'll be fine?

Which is the easier fix?

 

[softconsult]

I'm confused. How does a slight increase in angle at impact have anything to do with over the top? Don't most good players do this?

 

[dbl]

From 43 to 45 degrees at impact?

So if he had just lifted his hands slightly at adress, then people couldn't complain about this "change"?

Noo, I don't this qualifies for OTT. I'd say the address plane and backswing plane having nothing to do definitionally with any downswing plane or whether a golf was over or under or throwing his shoulders and body parts to do OTT.

I think DannyC has it right. Should add, if you swing a rock on a string, there is plane that the orbit is on.

 

[Tball88]

Whether or not he was ott, is not what I'm trying to argue.

In the old way of thinking if the clubshaft came in above the orginal address plane, many would call that "over the top" or at the very least above the setup plane. Depending on how above setup plane you came into impact, the first thing a lot of teachers would try to do is to you get back on the setup path. A lot of teachers would even say that on Hogan's takeway he got under the plane line and then got back on plane on the downswing. Many would try to fix the take away plane, and the more I understand D-plane the less I think your takeaway matters, and what does matter is the clubface at impact.

I'm asking does it really matter. if you come in slightly above or below your original path, can't you just alter the face?

Just trying to get a better understanding of the D-plane as it relates to teaching, and building a somewhat predictable ballflight.

 

[Jim Kobylinski]

Jim, correct me if I'm wrong, but for every plane/path/direction of swing, is there not one club face position at impact that will create a straight ball flight, then the other club face positions will either create a right or a left ball flight relative to the path.

sure, the ball would go "straight" but not at your target. What if you swung 8* inside/out, 3* down? You'd need a hell of an open clubface to hit a straight push AND you'd be dangerously close to shanking the ball on EVERY SHOT.

I see your point that it's probably easier for various reasons to get the face correct, if the path is neutral, but if you have a "generally" neutral path, nothing to obscene in either direction, shouldn't you focus more on clubface control as opposed to trying to develop a perfectly neutral swing path?

Yes, that is what i said above. You don't have to end up perfectly neutral, but as long as you are farily close yes you just work on clubface control to get a consistent flight for the ballflight desired.

I'm beginning to wonder if this is why golfers have not generally gotten better with all of our technology. A lot of trying to get golfers to swing on a certain line and not enough focus on clubface.

Trackman is relatively new and it isn't readily affordable imo. A large % of teachers don't even understand the d-plane and there is still a big % that believe path influences flight more than face. Give it time for teachers to become more educated and learn how to teach better, hopefully the GTE will do that.

I believe Hogan came slightly over the top and swung left, but he figured out how to match the clubface to his particular path to hit a straight shot.

he didn't come OTT on all of his shots, BUT on trackman you'd better believe his HSP would be outside/in to counteract the down on those short iron shots he aimed left for

 

[savydan]

I feel that I can control the face relative the path better than I can control the path itself.

 

[vjsinger]

I feel that I can control the face relative the path better than I can control the path itself.

Huh..What's your Handi?

 

[savydan]

4.4

Maybe I didn't say it quite right.

My point is that do we "feel face" relative to the target, or do we really "feel face" relative to the path?

In other words, my misses tend to be slight pulls or pushes - I rarely double-cross.

If I want my face a little open to the path, I think that's "relatively" easy.

However, my path my be a coupla degrees off. And now we know that Angle of Attack also matters too.......

 

[dannyc]

I'm confused. How does a slight increase in angle at impact have anything to do with over the top?

it doesn't

 

[Tball88]

Jim, thanks for the response, that was exactly what I was trying to get at.

 

[Tball88]

sorry about the misuse of the term over the top. I should have said he came in on a higher plane than his original setup. Didn't mean to confuse the thread.

 

[Richie3Jack]

he didn't come OTT on all of his shots, BUT on trackman you'd better believe his HSP would be outside/in to counteract the down on those short iron shots he aimed left for

Exactly.

Hey, I got coming OTT and swinging left confused as well. But they are in reality two different things.

Basically swinging left is rotating the plane line left. OTT is flat out bending the plane line (I believe you can bend the plane line slightly and be fine, but OTT is IMO, a big time bend of the plane line).

Same with 'swinging right', just a rotation of the plane line to the right.

My guess is Hogan, who was known for mostly hitting a very slight, 'power fade' and had what appeared like moderate sized divots and had maximum trigger delay swung to the left quite a bit to counter the downward AoA and probably had a true path very close to 0 with a clubface very close to zero.

Somebody like Moe who could hit it dead straight and took slighter divots probably had a shallower AoA and swung left with irons, but probably only slightly since that's all he had to do to hit it straight and probably was surreal with his face angle consistently at or very near 0.0* as well as very consistent with true path very near 0.0*.





3JACK

 

[vjsinger]

Exactly.

Hey, I got coming OTT and swinging left confused as well. But they are in reality two different things.

Basically swinging left is rotating the plane line left. OTT is flat out bending the plane line (I believe you can bend the plane line slightly and be fine, but OTT is IMO, a big time bend of the plane line).

Same with 'swinging right', just a rotation of the plane line to the right.

My guess is Hogan, who was known for mostly hitting a very slight, 'power fade' and had what appeared like moderate sized divots and had maximum trigger delay swung to the left quite a bit to counter the downward AoA and probably had a true path very close to 0 with a clubface very close to zero.

Somebody like Moe who could hit it dead straight and took slighter divots probably had a shallower AoA and swung left with irons, but probably only slightly since that's all he had to do to hit it straight and probably was surreal with his face angle consistently at or very near 0.0* as well as very consistent with true path very near 0.0*.





3JACK

Good post.