shift or center of gravity

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Brian,
I play collegiate golf in Atlanta Ga and I am slowly adapting a swing that is close to David Toms. I have read the controversial article by Jim Hardy and listened to your audio response with the pics of David Toms. My question is, for the one plane swing, as you describe it, is it better to keep a more center of gravity or to shift more weight to the right side. Jim Hardy describes it to shift your weight but it does not seem to work for me. Any thoughts? I would appreciate it.
 

Brian Manzella

Administrator
In the "up-the-wall-down-the-wall-left-of-the-wall" -type swing of David Toms (as in "Never Hook Again"), the feel is that the weight stays put.

It is a right forearm PICKUP, and any weight shifting should be only in response to the hands.
 

jeffy

Banned
quote:Originally posted by mc4jc2003

Brian,
I play collegiate golf in Atlanta Ga and I am slowly adapting a swing that is close to David Toms. I have read the controversial article by Jim Hardy and listened to your audio response with the pics of David Toms. My question is, for the one plane swing, as you describe it, is it better to keep a more center of gravity or to shift more weight to the right side. Jim Hardy describes it to shift your weight but it does not seem to work for me. Any thoughts? I would appreciate it.

Remember that Hardy is only looking for a 60-40 weight distribution at the top for a David Toms-style swing, which may not require any conscious weight shift in your case. Your set-up (spine tilted away from target) and pivot can easily accomplish that "automatically".

BTW, Brian's audio was NOT a response to the Hardy article. Though Brian has promised to post one, it hasn't happened yet. Brian's audio was responding to a bogus web site by a Hardy wannabe who had never met Hardy and whose only direct exposure to Jim was through a Golf Academy Live segment. That site is not a valid representation of Hardy's theories or thinking.
 
I appreciate the quick response. I found though today taking the club at the angle Toms takes the club it is hard to control the spin. on full shots i was spinning them off the green. the steeper descent onto the ball is causing more spin than i need. it seems my arms are starting my downswing and I believe its not the best way to start my downswing with this type of arc. its gonna take work to get my body to sync up. I need help.:(
 

jeffy

Banned
quote:Originally posted by mc4jc2003

I appreciate the quick response. I found though today taking the club at the angle Toms takes the club it is hard to control the spin. on full shots i was spinning them off the green. the steeper descent onto the ball is causing more spin than i need. it seems my arms are starting my downswing and I believe its not the best way to start my downswing with this type of arc. its gonna take work to get my body to sync up. I need help.:(

Brian is obviously better qualified to respond, but here is my crack at it. Since I've been taught by a Jim Hardy disciple (his ex-wife, LPGA Hall of Famer Carol Mann), I'll use Jim Hardy terms.

What you have found is very interesting as well as very consistent with what Jim as well as what notable two-plane teachers such as Manuel de la Torre, Laird Small and Jim Flick teach: in a two-plane swing, the downswing is driven by the arms and the body responds. de la Torre's book Understanding the Golf Swing is a generally excellent manual for a two-plane swinger (although his advice of starting the downswing with a pull of the upper arms arguably steepens the downswing, which two-planers don't need). Also, investing in Hardy's book The Plane Truth is probably worthwhile as it has a lot more detail than the GD article.

If you find you are too steep, you need to add width to your downswing. My particular favorite when I was a two-planer is to extend my right arm AWAY from my right side on the downswing. Tom Watson (very much a two-planer) has a visible casting motion on his downswing. Starting with the body or moving hard to the left side will steepen the downswing, what you don't want. Staying back a little on the right side (as is apparent in the Toms sequence when compared to Vijay's), or at least keeping the feeling that weight is centered on the downswing (as de la Torre teaches) also adds width. By the way, Hardy believes that the challenge of "synching" the arms and the body is a major disadvantage of a two-plane swing, something Tiger seems to be discovering as he moves from a one-plane to a two-plane action. However, a two-plane swing arguably puts less stress on the left knee, so Tiger is likely to persist with the two-plane in order to prolong his career.
 

Lisa Manzella

Manzella Golf Academy BrianManzella.com Administra
Yikes!!!!!

Tom Watson is a Swinger and only is using a seqenced release....

mc...

Why are you copying DT and what kinds of problems are you havig with your swing otherwise that makes you want to make a change?
 

EdZ

New
I read Hardy's book last week, and I think the title is very misleading.

He does a great job of discussing the differences between an address with a lot of forward lean vs. one with less (one plane/two plane) and the resulting effects and compensations/adjustments throughout the rest of the motion related to them. A 'general' relation to hitting (so called one plane) and swinging (so called two plane) and the differences between them.

I would not consider the book a discussion of 'plane' at all however.

Worth a read, as there is good detail there about the two setups and their resulting motion.
 
imanzella.. as a shorter player i have to use more of an upright swing plane. I have always had a two plane set up at the top of my swing and right now I am trying to fix getting from set up at address to the top. When I first started I came inside real bad and and this is something that I have always struggled with. I have admired DT swing and his is something I am just trying to invision to make my swing look like.
 

jeffy

Banned
quote:Originally posted by mc4jc2003

imanzella.. as a shorter player i have to use more of an upright swing plane. I have always had a two plane set up at the top of my swing and right now I am trying to fix getting from set up at address to the top. When I first started I came inside real bad and and this is something that I have always struggled with. I have admired DT swing and his is something I am just trying to invision to make my swing look like.

I would tend to disagree with your presumption that you have to use a more upright plane...I don't know how short you are, but Player, Woosie, Trevino, Hogan, Sarazen, for example, all had what Hardy would call a one-plane swing. You just need much flatter clubs to play that way. For example, Hogan's were 2* flatter than standard and 1/4" short, effectively 2 1/2* flatter than standard. In my case, I've gone from 1* upright and half inch long as a two-planer to standard length and lie, and I may even flatten them some more. I'm 6' or so.
 
jeffy.. I agree with you.. its just my certain body type and natural swing seem to fit better with the more upright swing. like brian i have tried many different swings and methods and it seems that this works best for me. when i played for my state championship in highschool I was more free swinging with tendencies of upright and controling the flight of the golf ball with my hips. now as i take golf more serious a year and something later i realize that i need to nail down some things in my golf swing that i can go to later. just telling you that i do agree with you in what your talking about i was just saying in my case.:)
 

jeffy

Banned
quote:Originally posted by mc4jc2003

jeffy.. I agree with you.. its just my certain body type and natural swing seem to fit better with the more upright swing. like brian i have tried many different swings and methods and it seems that this works best for me. when i played for my state championship in highschool I was more free swinging with tendencies of upright and controling the flight of the golf ball with my hips. now as i take golf more serious a year and something later i realize that i need to nail down some things in my golf swing that i can go to later. just telling you that i do agree with you in what your talking about i was just saying in my case.:)

Hey, if a two-plane swing is good enough for Tiger (the direction he seems to be going), there can't be too much wrong with it. As EdZ notes above, getting the Hardy book and using it to make sure you don't mix one-plane elements (setup, posture, takeaway, etc.) with your two-plane swing is probably worthwhile. One thing I liked about the two-plane swing was how easy it seemed to be to add distance through simple upper body exercises (such as pullups, pushups and tricep dips). The distance Tiger has added is very impressive.
 
yeah. right now i am NOT looking for much distance. I am hoping to control that a little more cause right now I hit the ball about the furthest for my height. sorry if that sounds egotistical. I am about 5 '4 and I hit it over three hundred. and like my nine iron is almost 170. it gets kinda ridiculous so i am hoping just to get a repeatable swing. i used to be a personal trainer at Golds Gym so i think that helps.
 

jeffy

Banned
quote:Originally posted by mc4jc2003

yeah. right now i am NOT looking for much distance. I am hoping to control that a little more cause right now I hit the ball about the furthest for my height. sorry if that sounds egotistical. I am about 5 '4 and I hit it over three hundred. and like my nine iron is almost 170. it gets kinda ridiculous so i am hoping just to get a repeatable swing. i used to be a personal trainer at Golds Gym so i think that helps.

Well, well, well, you are a strong lad...Hogan would say you can't play good golf hitting a nine iron that far (see the somewhat amusing book "Afternoons with Mr. Hogan" by Jody Vasquez, page 49). You should really work on a one-plane, three-quarter punch shot like Phil Mickelson has developed. That's also what Carol Mann did when she was a two-planer.
 
sounds like you have read up on your golf well. Today i played pretty well.. i tried limiting my swing like you said and it helps. one under isn't to bad.. but i need to learn to putt. it's the one part of my game if i could get down would help the most. its mainly reading the greens.. my speed seemed pretty good today just couldnt make the birdies. oh well.. thanks again jeffy.
 

jeffy

Banned
quote:Originally posted by mc4jc2003

sounds like you have read up on your golf well. Today i played pretty well.. i tried limiting my swing like you said and it helps. one under isn't to bad.. but i need to learn to putt. it's the one part of my game if i could get down would help the most. its mainly reading the greens.. my speed seemed pretty good today just couldnt make the birdies. oh well.. thanks again jeffy.

Thank you for the compliment. I don't know if it will help you, but I thought Brian's article on putting is about the best I've seen. Also, I'll pass along one of Carol's putting practice regime: use four balls, chose a breaking putt and place the balls in a semi circle to give you a different line with each putt. When you putt the ball, forget about mechanics but after each strolke evaluate these three things: did you roll the putt, did you start it on the correct line, did you hit it the right speed? It doesn't matter what kind of stroke you use, you need to get these three things right to hole putts, so this drill focuses your concentration on those.

Something I've tried to a very limited degree but you might try is using one of those electronic green reading devices on the practice green or in practice rounds. When placed on the ground they give you the direction and degree of any slope at that spot on the green. Charting the slope along your putts and then comparing that information with what you "read" and how the ball breaks may accelerate your learning.
 
Hardy's SP and DP both require a plane shift from TGM perspective. If you desire to turn the shoulders on a "plane" perpendicular to the spine but do not want to start with the SP spine tilt suggested by Hardy, you may want to check the Tom Stickney article in the latest Golf Illustrated.

DRW
 
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