This might be the stupidest question ever posted on this forum (or any others, for that matter) but, nevertheless, I shall plough onwards...
With all the good stuff about the action of the arms on the downswing in the past few months, could ALL of it be undone by forearms that are too tense? I have a terrible problem of getting my left forearm to drop below my left upper arm coming into impact, so that I end up dragging the clubhead through and draining all the power.
Once again, sorry for disturbing you with my childish ramblings, but I'm just wondering if anyone else feels this is a problem area
Thanks in advance
Dear OLIVER1,
A clue from science, and a PLEA to those schooled in anatomy to help us all.
From science, so far, there is convincing evidence that the angular velocity of the left arm, as measured and displayed on various 'kinematic sequence' devices PEAKS about 900 to 1000 degrees per second, 2/3 into the .250-.300 second downswing, when for good golfers, the left arm is horizontalISH, and the golf club is verticalISH. This is, without doubt, the second most important 'quality swing affecting' event to ball impact, first for velocity, but due to the involvement with the 'release' activities, also high in determining club path and club face conditions.
At this point in time and space, IMO (and hopefully can be verified by real scientists like those at the Anti Summit), most of the body element 'motors/accumulators' start to rapidly reduce their output. Also, because of the possible early start of antagonistic muscle activities for whatever reasons ie 'tension, imbalance, etc., the CRUCIAL distal-to-proximal energy transfers accompanied by the more visible deceleration processes of the pelvis, torso shoulders and arms MAY be impaired.
SO WHAT !!!!
Well, if the forearms are tense, IMO (please anatomists weigh in here, because this is the meat of the problem), my understanding is that there is significant synergy between 'tight forearms' and tight wrists, and higher grip pressure etc. BUT from the last paragraph, this happens at the time a whole lot of energy is trying to get across the wrist joints and into the golf club; MAYBE even the new 'coupling point' is an area of interest here too.
So my admittedly, barely scientific contribution is that 'Popeye-like' tense forearms that get/stay this way thru the the downswing phase are very probably real good club head velocity REDUCERS.
Now for the right arm/hand and the role in affecting club head velocity. Fortunately, I can be a little more scientific here, and I apologize in advance if it gets a little hard to complicated. I will make a serious effort to keep it understandable, and more importantly, easy to implement.
For clarity, ( and fortunately with no significant impact on correctness), picture only the shoulders, arms and club rotating during the downswing. I think, looking at ANY of the thousands of videos available, its easy to picture a 'mini shoulder, swing plane, a slightly larger 'arm, or better combined arms' swing plane, and lastly the famous 'golf club' swing plane. Yes, a whole lot has been analyzed that these are NOT the same planes, bla bla bla.
True, BUT IMO, real physicists should be able to agree on one thing; that UNTIL IMPACT, the closer the shoulder plane is to the inclination of the golf club plane, the higher will be the club angular velocity. In real technical terms, 'the angular momentum vectors' need to be aligned for maximum energy to be transferred.
So, OLIVER1, just look at your video and see if your 'shoulder plane' is staying inclined, or if it is 'going horizontal' PREMATURELY BEFORE IMPACT. Very fortunately, even standard video at 30 frames a second is more than adequate to check this area.
Finally, lets combine all of the above to conclude that 'tight forearms', or too much 'right hand activity', or 'running out of right arm' ALL will affect the downswing plane of the shoulders, and IMO (remember, I am not scientifically sure and am asking for the BLOGS help here), reduce club head speed.
As Ripley said, " Believe it or not ???"
COMMENTS PLEASE !!!!!!!
