golfrewind.com

To be clear (if I wasn't before), I was not intending to endorse The Golfling Machine method. I am aware of TGM, but I have no intention to go anywhere near it myself (I won't tackle anything that complex unless I get paid for it). I thought the original poster might be interested in it though, hence the links.

One more thought and I have to close down due to lightning. Aclear mental concept of the anticipated action is prerequisite.

I like this analogy:

When you try to make it across the room with a really full cup of coffee you better not look at it: Sure recipe for a spill!

Back to the original question?

I just wonder in what context you ask. If it is used as a reference check after the fact, on video or something, ok,but other than that, what value is it? You already know you are on plane when the club feels featherweight and the ball launches dead straight at incredible velocity.

If the implication is that one should understand the plane then somehow manipulate the body in such a way that the club follow that plane, then no, don't go there if you want to learn how to swing the club. It won't happen. That's putting the cart before the horse.

If the object is to strike the ball with not just a clubhead which is square and traveling square, but one which is traveling at optimum acceleration for that individual, then there are certain principles of physics which must be applied in order to make that happen. The function of the brain then is to focus on manuevering the body in such a way as to apply those principles, which are not difficult to comprehend, but do take a measure of education. They are in my view: leverage, compression, and equilibrium. Those forces are universal; they apply to all of us regardless of body type or strength, age, it doesn't matter. And there are specific, very clear methods to apply those principles. If those principles are properly applied, all three criteria above are achieved, and the swing plane that is achieved and viewed later on video will be the purtiest you ever saw.

I hope that answers your question. If you are looking for the best swing plane for you, learn how to apply those principles and the plane will take care of itself.

I understood, ss, and I just wanted to properly caution steve that TGM is not for the feint of heart and I think that some of the other books -- Hogan's and Cochran and Stobbs' in particular -- might answer the questions about planes and whatnot first without trying to tackle the elephant that is TGM.

I don't see how a plane can point anywhere. You can draw lines on a plane; the lines can point. Are you drawing a line on the swingplane? How do you know when the downswing plane points at the target line? Will it determine the inclination of the downswing plane? In other words, how do I know if I am too upright or flat? I agree about setup being most important. And that the backswing has to be correct. The top of the backswing creates the starting point of the downswing plane. Where my downswing goes makes the actual plane. I can control my backswing in terms of upright or flat, so I need to know how to find the correct top position. Doesn't anyone have a way to find the right inclination, not too upright or too flat? Is it trial and error?

Crossgrain, I just read your last post after writing the above. Will have to think about it before responding.

In a strict mathematical sense, steve, you are right in that a plane doesn't "point" anywhere.

However, in common use in golf circle, a the plane cuts through the ground at a certain angle. I'm going to use Hogan's thought experiment, and imagine the plane as a pane of glass. Your swing at impact can be thought of as sliding right along a pane of glass. You are going to stick your head through a hole in that glass, and look down at the ball. In golf terms where the plane "points" is where the imaginary pane of glass intersects the ground.

Or, you can think of the golf club -- think of it as an extension of your hand. Your hand can point at something, and you can use the head of the golf club to point at something.

When you sole the club, the shaft makes a straight line, which is part of that plane. The club obviously points in a direction, and so, we also describe the plane as pointing in a direction.

There are lots of pictures online:

http://www.1irongolf.com/index_files...0%20pixels.jpg

http://progolferdigest.com/wp-conten...-bad-swing.jpg

https://thegolfdrillguru.sslpowered.com/planecheck.jpg

http://www.tutelman.com/golf/shafts/.../Nicklaus1.jpg

There are many more -- search Google images for "swing plane golf club"

The direction from the golfer's point of view looking down at the ball -- that's the direction the plane is "pointing". And, when that plane is pointing at the target line, that's when the best results occur.

]Originally Posted by crossgrain
The best downswing plane is the one that points at the target line.

For a clear record, this was not my quote.

I think I understand what you are saying now. Yes, there probably is a more preferred swing plane depending on how you set up to the ball. In general, I don't think a relatively flat swing plane works very well. I think one has a tendency to bring the club too far inside which causes a lot of problems coming back down to the ball. Think about it, you bring the club "down" to the ball. Doesn't is make sense to make your swing plane then more vertical than horizontal. I know that since I started thinking more about swing plane I find one consistent source of problems: Bringing the club too far inside which is the same thing I think as flattening out the swing plane.

It is kind of a fine line but do some experimenting if you are having some problems with your swing. "Hold the club off" a bit when you start your shoulder turn to keep it from going too far inside. We are told time and again in golf instruction that we must come back down to the ball from the inside on our downswing. I know for myself I took this way too literally and over did the idea by bringing the club too far inside.

Sorry. I wonder how that happened!

I think a flatter swing would look a tiny bit more inside, both before and after the ball, but you probably couldn't see it, because the difference would be small at the beginning of the backswing. If you can see or feel the club going more inside, that is really far inside and could give you a big hook if you came back down on that line. But you could still be flat or upright with it too. It is a separate problem. I think the flatness or uprightness of the club's plane has to be considered separately from the clubhead going inside out or outside in. They are both important.

Perhaps there is a connection between them though, that caused you to link them. If you do go flat, there may be a tendency to come down inside, as the easiest way back to the ball.

With the flat swing, where the arms and club are lower at the top, the arms and club would tend by momentum to go through the hitting zone somewhat high, (or drop down inside as mentioned above) requiring tricky work to keep them down, so as to make solid contact. The opposite would happen with an upright swing. Having been too high at the top, the upright arms and club would tend to come through too low at the bottom, which if allowed to happen would cause a fatish toeish contact with the ball. The easy way out of this bad swing might be the outside in swing.

A simple look at the plane's of the arms and club at impact shows the club's plane to be a little flatter than the arm's plane, at impact anyway. I don't how this difference in planes works during the swing. The system is too complicated to deduce logically, at least for me. And I don't really care how it works if I can find a way to get the best effects. So I'm just looking for a method to obtain the best inclination, letting the complexities have their own secret existance. It would be nice at the same time to get the direction of the arc correct, so it's not too inside out or outside in.


Hbendillo, do you have a way to find the right line (arc actually) on the backswing, so as not to be inside or outside on the way back?

I think you have to look at someone's setup at the address position from a down the line view to determine what is too inside for a given swing. The shaft and spine angle at address will vary a bit from golfer to golfer. If you are talking about a classic swing and not one that has some crazy loop in it then I think you can tell by where the clubhead goes when taking it back. If you draw a plane line on the shaft I don't think you generally want to see the club head get inside or below that line, especially early in the backswing. Taking it inside that line an appreciable amount is too flat for that setup. Someone on one of the boards I visit, maybe it was this one, explained the over the top move using the shaft plane line as a reference. You bring the club too far inside that line and in an effort to get the club back to the ball you throw the club over that top of that line on the downwing. I mean I kind knew that but visualizing the club shaft coming over that plane line gave me a new visual perspective on what is going on.

I try to find the right arc buy doing a few slow motion practice swings actually looking back to see how the shaft of the club goes back. I have begun to recognize when my swing is getting too flat so I rehearse the backswing slowly then take the swing. Usually I get immediate feedback if I do it right after struggling with my swing. When I find I am chunking the ball and then get it right I hit a crisp shot. I realized, and maybe someone could verify this for me, that I had to hold the club off a bit with my right arm, not let that right elbow fold back and get behind me too far.

A full length mirror while practicing your swing can be really help understand the difference between what you think you feel and what is really going on. Video isn't bad, but the mirror is instantaneous.

The "old pro," my former teacher, told me that the right arm controls the backswing. Today I believe that both arms have to exercise control, but his advice made me concentrate on the right arm temporarily, until I forgot about it, and maybe that was his intention. If such a thing helps, it helps. Getting the right arc on the backswing could be solely a matter of checking and correcting, but it also could be a matter of changing something else that is causing the problem. For example, I was paralyzed to start the swing at address without some kind of pre-movement or akwardness, and I didn't want any pre-movement. Then by chance I remembered more advice from the old pro, that he had said to put my weight back on my heels. I had always wondered just how far back that meant, but I did it and it worked. For the last few years I had been clearly toward the balls of the feet, so I moved the weight back to the heels without paying too much attention to how much. Suddenly I could start my backswing at any speed without any pre-movement and balance was much better. The backswing seemed easier to do, smoother, on line, and more "circular." Shots improved. Then I thought about how to divide the weight between heel and balls (balls of the feet I would like to call "feetballs" ). After rocking forward and backward a lot to see what is available, I have at present decided to put a light force on the "feetballs" and the remaining weight on the heels. This position is quite close to the point where I have to lift all weight off the feetballs in order to not fall backward. I haven't found a way to measure this but there isn't much room for error forward or backward. And it helps my swing a lot. The original problem was the backswing; the solution was a seemingly unrelated setup change.

Regarding the right arm on the backswing, it is pretty clear that both arms have to lift at the same time as they move to the right, in relation to the shoulders, and the shoulders have to turn a certain amount, in order to create a usable top position.

How to avoid going back inside unexpectedly?

I recommend the following exercises:
1. Practice swinging and hitting with the club going back inside and staying inside coming down. See if you chunk (hit fat) with that swing. Is so, try to learn not to. You might discover a separate cause for the chunking. You may or may not discover why you take the club inside sometimes. You could also use this swing to push or hook the ball on purpose.
2. Practice swinging and hitting with the club going back inside but looping back to a square plane, meaning the arc is for a straight shot. Again you may or may not discover why you take the club inside sometimes, but you are likely to learn something.
3. Try going back square, but flat or upright, to see what happens. This is trial and error to find the best top position.

Bonus: Check your heel-feetballs weight distribution and experiment with that.