Plain Plane Confusion

[6bee1dee]

I am convinced that 99 per cent of golfers including tour players and instructors know little or nothing about what they call a Swing Plane.

After thumbing through a few recent golf magazines and reading from Tiger Woods that he wants to keep his left arm and shaft on plane and he ‘justs’ wants to swing on the same plane as his address shaft plane- I’ll sheet myself.

Look here: (both pics from Golf Magazine and are for reference only)

"My goodness, that left arm and shaft are on plane for sure, Mr. Woods.”

Maybe ‘ol Tiger is referring to a vertical plane (like a wall) not a incline swing plane.

And here:

And ‘just’ wanting to swing on the address shaft plane is find- I’m all for it., but please understand or explain that the hands MUST shift or your backswing will look like a Monty Python routine for nerds.

While you are at it- explain it to Haney and Hardy, too.


Happy Thanksgiving to EVERYONE. Eat too much, and pass out on the couch watching football.

Peace, 6b

 

[Jim Kobylinski]

Good pictures, good post. Before people start asking questions about tiger's bowed wrist and shut face, this is how he hits his cut shots. Shut face with an angled hinge.

He did a PERFECT example of one today at the Grand Slam of golf on the par 3 11th tee. He "hit" (not sure of iron) with a bowed wrist and angle hinge to roughly 3 feet from 199 into the wind.

 

[MizunoJoe]

The left arm IS on plane up until throwout happens in a sequenced Swing. By using up all of of #3 as wrist uncocking, the left arm(and shoulder) can remain on plane through impact.

 

[swing-geek]

Wow, great pics with yet another crappy quote in the mainstream golf media. Guys, those mags are like Playboy - you don't buy em for the articles.

The first pic could be put straight into Hardy's book "The Plane Truth for Golfers" as a great example of his opinion of what a "one-plane" swing should look like at the top. Club is laid off (maybe a bit too much in that shot) and hands are above the heels (flat position) instead of the midfoot (upright). Perhaps some evidence that he is trying to become a "one plane" swinger as his "new move".

Impact shows some significant changes too. Spine is a ton more straight than before. No hunchback stress and energy loss in that shot. But his head is still diving down toward the ball and away from target. And his right shoulder is still a bit low (spine tilt away from target).

For a great athlete like Tiger, one plane swing + straighter back + graphite shaft would easily = 20 more yards (2005 increase in distance over 2003).

When trying to do Hardy's "one plane" swing, you might try to FEEL like you are swinging along the address shaft plane (you want to get very "flat"). Another reason not to take a mainstream mag literally.

 

[jeffy]

quote:Originally posted by swing-geek

Wow, great pics with yet another crappy quote in the mainstream golf media. Guys, those mags are like Playboy - you don't buy em for the articles.

The first pic could be put straight into Hardy's book "The Plane Truth for Golfers" as a great example of his opinion of what a "one-plane" swing should look like at the top. Club is laid off (maybe a bit too much in that shot) and hands are above the heels (flat position) instead of the midfoot (upright). Perhaps some evidence that he is trying to become a "one plane" swinger as his "new move".

Impact shows some significant changes too. Spine is a ton more straight than before. No hunchback stress and energy loss in that shot. But his head is still diving down toward the ball and away from target. And his right shoulder is still a bit low (spine tilt away from target).

For a great athlete like Tiger, one plane swing + straighter back + graphite shaft would easily = 20 more yards (2005 increase in distance over 2003).

When trying to do Hardy's "one plane" swing, you might try to FEEL like you are swinging along the address shaft plane (you want to get very "flat"). Another reason not to take a mainstream mag literally.

Tiger is actually in a Hardy "two-plane" position at the top: the left arm is steeper than a line drawn through the shoulders. Hardy has been saying that for awhile. That said, Tiger, like Daly, Couples and a few others, drops back into a "one-plane" position in the downswing. Despite his current top of the swing position, Tiger's swing has always been basically "one-plane", under Hardy's definition (which Jim has admitted is a simplified and imperfect label). That explains the laid-off shaft and slightly shut face typical of "one-plane" swings.

 

[6bee1dee]

Hardy should used the terms flat and steep instead of one plane and two plane. The golfdom would be better off.

 

[Jim Kobylinski]

quote:Originally posted by jeffy

That explains the laid-off shaft and slightly shut face typical of "one-plane" swings.

k...i don't have any info on the one/two plane thing so i'm not going to argue that BUT the above may be true about "one planers" (ugh i hate that term), however this is what Tiger does when he hits A CUT!

I can find many other pictures in similar positions where the face is "more square" and matching the left arm more.

AGAIN, like i said above, this is what HE DOES when he hits a cut.

One last thing, he isn't laid off...he's right at the turned shoulder plane. Look at brian's thread.

 

[billmckinneygolf]

Can we stop calling FADES 'cuts'? You guys are too sharp for that. It's like saying sand trap or the pin for bunker and flagstick. Sorry, just hearing Ben in my head.

 

[birdie_man]

quote:Originally posted by 6bee1dee

And ‘just’ wanting to swing on the address shaft plane is find- I’m all for it., but please understand or explain that the hands MUST shift or your backswing will look like a Monty Python routine for nerds.

Ya man....I was trying to explain this to my dad the other night.

He was trying out one of those big "swing plane" circle things that you stand in (made out of plastic tubing).....

....I tried to get it set so it would be for a Zero Shift- straight up and down the TSPlane....he had it setup kinda for a Double Shift.....but not really, of course (you can't really do it on those things unless you make a bend in the tube about halfway back).

I explained to him that it would be ok until you were about halfway back....then it starts getting WAYYYY too flat if you continue to keep the club on the tubing- no shift up towards the TSPlane!.

Ya- I guess it has to be setup for a Zero Shift if you want to stay on the tubing the entire time....a Double Shift would be on it for all but the last part of the Back Stroke and first part of the Down Stroke...

I think those things are useless.

quote:Originally posted by 6bee1dee

Happy Thanksgiving to EVERYONE. Eat too much, and pass out on the couch watching football.

10-4!

quote:Originally posted by swing-geek

When trying to do Hardy's "one plane" swing, you might try to FEEL like you are swinging along the address shaft plane (you want to get very "flat"). Another reason not to take a mainstream mag literally.

Ya exactly man....my guess is most people (who use Double or Single Shift Backstrokes) don't feel the shift to the TSPlane at the top (and definately don't feel the shift back to the Elbow Plane- in Doub. Shift)....and 99% of people don't even know it's there.

-Paul

 

[birdie_man]

BTW.....how big of a change has Tiger really made? I mean- how tough of a change is this really to make? I don't see how this could take very long or be very difficult to sort out. He's just Swinging on a flatter plane.

 

[jeffy]

quote:Originally posted by 6bee1dee

Hardy should used the terms flat and steep instead of one plane and two plane. The golfdom would be better off.

Actually, he used to. I got the DVD of his presentation at the 1990 teaching summit and he refered to the two extremes as "flat" and "upright". I think he went to the "one-plane"/"two-plane" labels to emphasize the shoulder "plane" (defined as a line drawn through the shoulders at the top, not the TGM "turned shoulder plane"): in his one-plane swing, it isn't enough to have a flat arm swing, more important is that the player have a relatively steep shoulder plane. I also have come to hate those labels, but, for now, Hardyites are stuck with them.

 

[swing-geek]

It's actually a huge change to go to a "one plane" swing from a Butch Harmon type swing. And Tiger shows many of the changes in those two photos.

His swing if flatter (hands more behind himself) at the top, and his right forearm is more vertical than before. Club is laid off (at least I see it that way - camera angle is just slightly in front of Tiger's feet here - look at his feet), which is ok in Hardy's "one-plane" swing. Tiger's Club used to be straight at target or slightly over the line before. His right tricep is also close to his body, not raised far away from his body like before. This shows that he is more across his chest with his left arm than before.

The most significant fundamental you have to master in a "one plane" swing is keep your arm pull very passive. Not easy to do if you were a Harmon swinger. Looks like he is probably still using lots of right elbow (accumulator 1) as a power source (that's a good thing), but pulling the arms down from the top is to be avoided in the "one plane" swing.

Hardy's "one-plane" swing should be called "flat body spin" swing and the "two-plane" could be called "upright arm chop" swing. But then the title would be "The Spin Chop Truth For Golfers". Where's the fun in that?

The body rotation spin needs to be the focus for the power source in the "one plane" swing and the "arm chop axe pull" is the primary power source for Hardy's "two plane" swing. Simple concept, but Hardy's two swings are really polar opposites.

Hardy's genious was in realizing that there are two sets of fundamentals, quite different from each other, for each type of swing.

 

[6bee1dee]

Hardy's genius doesn't seem to rub off on me. First, the terms are way off base. It may make people think he really is talking about planes- he might be in his mind but he has yet to be accurate as to what a one plane is and a two plane is. Flat and upright make sense, the plane talk doesn't.

A good set-up will accommodate either a flat swing or an upright swing- that is why it is a good address.

As I posted before (somewhere), a double shift is a one plane swing in "Hardy terms" because in his words the club comes down the plane it went up on- but he doesn't speak of that nasty little shift. If he did, it would all fall apart. And a single shift is a two planer for him. And it is.

 

[swing-geek]

Try thinking of it this way:

One plane: Swing along the flat "rotation plane", with the axis set by a more bent-over spine address position, and let the rotation of your body spin-fling the arms and club back into the ball.

Two plane: While rotating around your spine, lift the club into a second upright "lifted plane", and chop straight down into the ball.

Of course, those things don't actually happen when you swing, but it's kinda maybe sorta how you think of them when you do them.

Also, setups are different for "one plane" and "two plane" swings, as are many other fundamentals.

 

[6bee1dee]

quote:Originally posted by swing-geek



Of course, those things don't actually happen when you swing, but it's kinda maybe sorta how you think of them when you do them.

That is what separates TGM from the rest of the instructional world.

TGM doesn't mask illusions with false ideas and try to make students feel it out.

A good set up works for all strokes- period.

 

[DOCW3]

quote:Originally posted by 6bee1dee

I am convinced that 99 per cent of golfers including tour players and instructors know little or nothing about what they call a Swing Plane.

After thumbing through a few recent golf magazines and reading from Tiger Woods that he wants to keep his left arm and shaft on plane and he ‘justs’ wants to swing on the same plane as his address shaft plane- I’ll sheet myself.

Look here: (both pics from Golf Magazine and are for reference only)

"My goodness, that left arm and shaft are on plane for sure, Mr. Woods.”

Maybe ‘ol Tiger is referring to a vertical plane (like a wall) not a incline swing plane.

And here:

And ‘just’ wanting to swing on the address shaft plane is find- I’m all for it., but please understand or explain that the hands MUST shift or your backswing will look like a Monty Python routine for nerds.

While you are at it- explain it to Haney and Hardy, too.


Happy Thanksgiving to EVERYONE. Eat too much, and pass out on the couch watching football.

Peace, 6b

6b~

What Haney teaches is that the plane the club moves in is constantly "changing" but is always parallel to the angle of the clubshaft at address. This could be what Tiger means. Whether he is doing that or not in the photos may be another matter. It does appear to me that Tiger's setup in Skins has the hands positioned higher.

Hardy/Haney do not place emphasis on maintaining a relationship to the plane line as defined in TGM. I would think this would be a real barrier to discussions between the parties.

DRW

 

[jeffy]

quote:Originally posted by 6bee1dee

It may make people think he really is talking about planes- he might be in his mind but he has yet to be accurate as to what a one plane is and a two plane is. Flat and upright make sense, the plane talk doesn't.

I disagree: Hardy has been very precise on what he means, in his book and presentation at the 2004 PGA teaching summit...Since a one-plane swing has a flat</u> swingplane but a steep</u> shoulder plane, I think he has avoided the term flat, as some could mistakenly feel that a flat shoulder turn works in a one-plane swing.

As I posted before (somewhere), a double shift is a one plane swing in "Hardy terms" because in his words the club comes down the plane it went up on- but he doesn't speak of that nasty little shift. If he did, it would all fall apart.

Wrong again, he does talk about the shift, just doesn't dwell on it...

Hardy's not an idiot. There are some flaws in his published theory but you guys aren't even close to them.

 

[MizunoJoe]

No, Hardy's not an idiot - he's made a lot of money and is getting a lot of publicity with his book. I see that he's coming out with a more "in-depth" book, which will, no doubt, sell well, further proving that there are lots of idiots out there and he's not one of them.

 

[6bee1dee]

quote:Originally posted by jeffy

quote:Originally posted by 6bee1dee

It may make people think he really is talking about planes- he might be in his mind but he has yet to be accurate as to what a one plane is and a two plane is. Flat and upright make sense, the plane talk doesn't.

I disagree: Hardy has been very precise on what he means, in his book and presentation at the 2004 PGA teaching summit...Since a one-plane swing has a flat</u> swingplane but a steep</u> shoulder plane, I think he has avoided the term flat, as some could mistakenly feel that a flat shoulder turn works in a one-plane swing.

As I posted before (somewhere), a double shift is a one plane swing in "Hardy terms" because in his words the club comes down the plane it went up on- but he doesn't speak of that nasty little shift. If he did, it would all fall apart.

Wrong again, he does talk about the shift, just doesn't dwell on it...

Hardy's not an idiot. There are some flaws in his published theory but you guys aren't even close to them.

tsk tsk Jeffery. Hardy doesn't even know what he means. Everytime he is asked a question he has to re-spin an answer.

Let me tell you, he better dwell on the plane shift because that is where many go wrong in believing the the hands don't move up and off the plane.

Why would anyone publish a FLAWED piece of work?

I AM SO GLAD HARDY ISN"T CLOSE- phew ! Close one.

And sad because people now talk about 1p and 2p and aren't really talking planes at all. Sad.