# How your attack angle more manages your swing path direction.



## the_coach (Aug 7, 2014)

More folks of late have seemed interested in looking at swing path, AoA & what that means to someone's swing motion & how it affects getting the ball to target. So for the folks who are, thought you might be interested in this.

[video=youtube_share;G5JYjNsyDpk]http://youtu.be/G5JYjNsyDpk[/video]


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## Spuddy (Aug 7, 2014)

Is this because the club is travelling on an arc and the only time it's down the target line is at the bottom of the arc? With a negative angle of attack, the club is travelling in to out and on a positive angle of attack it's travelling out to in?


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## the_coach (Aug 7, 2014)

Spuddy said:



			Is this because the club is travelling on an arc and the only time it's down the target line is at the bottom of the arc? With a negative angle of attack, the club is travelling in to out and on a positive angle of attack it's travelling out to in?
		
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In this swing it's a more neutral path looking to hit a much straighter flighted shot (this helps to have a small curvature on the ball, so you get much closer dispersion to your shots so more shots nearer to target) so the path is still coming a little ways from the inside but the inclined swing arc & the ball position on the inclined plane plus as it's irons & importantly with the loft on the club so you want a hands leading forwards leaning shaft -AoA, means to start to target hitting a straighter shot flight, the inclined arc needs to be aimed a little left.
Hitting a shot with more draw or fade curvature, you would approach it slightly differently.

So club path is inside to square to inside, or just a degree or so inside to square to back inside. The more efficient the swing delivery is the more you need to pay attention to this when wanting to hit a straighter flighted shot.


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## DaveM (Aug 7, 2014)

Sorry but I've never seen the point in over complicating the golf swing. Always believed in KISS. All this goes over my head.


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## the_coach (Aug 7, 2014)

As it said on the tin ......... More folks of late have seemed interested in looking at swing path, AoA & what that means to someone's swing motion & how it affects getting the ball to target. So for the folks who are, thought you might be interested in this.


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## RGDave (Aug 7, 2014)

Does all this science explain the "old" idea (going back sometime, i.i.r.c.) of standing a little open for short irons and a little closed for driver?


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## the_coach (Aug 7, 2014)

RGDave said:



			Does all this science explain the "old" idea (going back sometime, i.i.r.c.) of standing a little open for short irons and a little closed for driver?
		
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If you were doing that with express purpose of having a straighter flight so tighter dispersion, so purposely swinging a little ways left with the irons, a little ways right with the driver to hit them straighter, then maybes. If that was to hit a fade with the irons or a draw with the driver, then no.


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## London mike 61 (Aug 7, 2014)

I think the thread is a great way to explain the AoA but I'm having trouble translating all the technical data into how I could make use of it in terms of adapting my swing so that I would achieve the optimum ball flight and dispersion.

Or maybe I'm just not 'getting it'.


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## the_coach (Aug 7, 2014)

London mike 61 said:



			I think the thread is a great way to explain the AoA but I'm having trouble translating all the technical data into how I could make use of it in terms of adapting my swing so that I would achieve the optimum ball flight and dispersion.

Or maybe I'm just not 'getting it'.
		
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You may well not need to, adapt your swing that is, at all. 
If anyone aims the say 6i square to target line aims there body as they should parallel left of this aim line with the intention to send the ball pretty ways straight to that target, but even with a good sound fairly neutral swing motion sequence & path pretty consistently misses that target a little ways right all the time, this explains why that is & it's not that they've flat pushed the shot a little ways right. Same is true of someone setting up correctly with the driver, square to target, expecting to hit it fairly straight to that target but is constantly missing target a little ways left.

This is not something I put up that anyone has to do in their own game, it was just a deeper explanation of why someone with a very sound neutral swing would be experiencing these 'misses' to target. There have been a lot of folks asking about swing path, dynamic loft & AoA of late, so if anyone wanted to understand a little more this explains it, though it may take a few watches to get just how & why with different lofted clubs AoA affects swing path, so the direction of ball to target.


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## RGDave (Aug 8, 2014)

the_coach said:



			If you were doing that with express purpose of having a straighter flight so tighter dispersion, so purposely swinging a little ways left with the irons, a little ways right with the driver to hit them straighter,
		
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Thank you.

Yes, of course... for the straight shot. 

Makes sense to me!


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## DaveM (Aug 8, 2014)

the_coach said:



			As it said on the tin ......... More folks of late have seemed interested in looking at swing path, AoA & what that means to someone's swing motion & how it affects getting the ball to target. So for the folks who are, thought you might be interested in this.
		
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Now, now. Not having a dig just expressing my opinion. If that's what rocks your boat, fine by me.


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## Foxholer (Aug 8, 2014)

Apart from being a bit of a techie nut - so interested from that point of view - the major benefit I see understanding what is really going on so I am able to make an adjustment that *will* correct a fault I may have (on any day).

So much of Golf is counter-intuitive - and the brain often adjusts unconsciously as it believes it needs to anyway - that knowing what really happens is quite important to getting a 'correction' to work properly quickly!

The numbers/pictures simply confirm the Physics for me! That still doesn't mean I'm not going to hit the tree that's in my way though - but probably less often!


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## London mike 61 (Aug 8, 2014)

the_coach said:



			You may well not need to, adapt your swing that is, at all. 
If anyone aims the say 6i square to target line aims there body as they should parallel left of this aim line with the intention to send the ball pretty ways straight to that target, but even with a good sound fairly neutral swing motion sequence & path pretty consistently misses that target a little ways right all the time, this explains why that is & it's not that they've flat pushed the shot a little ways right. Same is true of someone setting up correctly with the driver, square to target, expecting to hit it fairly straight to that target but is constantly missing target a little ways left.

This is not something I put up that anyone has to do in their own game, it was just a deeper explanation of why someone with a very sound neutral swing would be experiencing these 'misses' to target. There have been a lot of folks asking about swing path, dynamic loft & AoA of late, so if anyone wanted to understand a little more this explains it, though it may take a few watches to get just how & why with different lofted clubs AoA affects swing path, so the direction of ball to target.
		
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Thanks coach, I understand now what you are saying, it's great to have someone on here that can explain the technical side of things, I guess you must have put a lot of effort into understanding it yourself so you could explain it to others.


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## the_coach (Aug 8, 2014)

Not really understanding the 'now, now' reference.

But anyways wasn't thinking you were having a dig, was just replying to the opinion, by highlighting for folks that there was a 'disclaimer' in the first posts para, that if it was not the kinda thing they had an interest in it probably wouldn't be worth investing their time to view the vid.



DaveM said:



_*Sorry but I've never seen the point in over complicating the golf swing*._ Always believed in KISS. All this goes over my head.
		
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Just a view in relation to this. With my own circumstances as an elite am who is involved through the USGA in the coaching & development side of mainly low Cat 1 golfers I'm fortunate to get to go to a lot of PGA coaching seminars so get to talk with many Pro instructors & many Tour players.

Certainly over the last, say, couple of years, it's become noticeable that there are hardly any (if any, can't think of one off hand) of the top couple hundred Pro instructors that don't use a LM on a daily basis in their teaching with their Tour Pro's, both from the main Tour but also the smaller Tour circuits or their elite national or state representative elite ams. Also now too with the handicap golfers who are really looking into improving their games.

The Tour Pro's I've spoken to at these seminars all have said there are only really a very small handful of Pro's that don't, week in week out, either with their coaches or solo practice that don't now use a LM.

Their reasons for doing so, on talking with both the instructors & players, have exactly echoed my own reasons for using one both in my own practice & coaching sessions.

Every one I've ever spoken to about this, has said that the LM data has allowed them for the first time to have empirical evidence, through the numbers, to better understand their swing 'feels'.

By that they can now see that repeating a certain swing motion, swing feel, so that these 'numbers' keep coming up with very little variation, translates in exactly being able to produce a certain flight, shape, distance, to their shots to a level of consistency that is much more defined than it ever was before. Also actually 'knowing' this gives them the confidence to step up & hit the shots under the pressure of competition, to get better outcomes more often.

They all express my own findings that once you take a little time to understand this data, these parameters (lot of folks tend to think this is a lot more complicated than it actually really is or that it's just plain 'magic') far from making the game complicated it really does the exact opposite, it distills things down because you have in front of you real 'proof' that the 'feel' of x or y or x&y will always give you a particular result.

So then you know exactly what 'feel' is needed, it no longer becomes just a theory or experiment. There's now hard data, empirical proof, which perhaps counterintuitively for a lot of folks, makes you freer to concentrate on the 'right' feel through any swing motion. So not more complicated but simpler.

Someone concentrating on keeping something simple alone with no 'proof' might have the proof of a certain result with the ball but no real understanding of what actually produced that good result. So simple only works if their particular simplicity of their golf swing allows them to play the game really well most of the time to the highest level possible, looking at the fact that the handicap of the average golfer hasn't improved over much for the previous decades to where we are now, it would seem to point that just keeping it simple alone hasn't really worked for most.

Simple if it's working correctly naturally, is great, simple if it's not working so correctly then is not so great.

Of course all of the above only really refers to folks who are looking to improve their golf games, those who play the game happy at the fact they just get their fun & camaraderie on a more social level, the game or their competence is not really their goal are really completely separate not really part of what I've been speaking too here.


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## Karl102 (Aug 8, 2014)

Great vid thanks.... Ironically, I had a lesson on a flightscope yesterday and this was exactly what I was looking at.


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## DaveM (Aug 8, 2014)

the_coach said:



			Not really understanding the 'now, now' reference.

But anyways wasn't thinking you were having a dig, was just replying to the opinion, by highlighting for folks that there was a 'disclaimer' in the first posts para, that if it was not the kinda thing they had an interest in it probably wouldn't be worth investing their time to view the vid.



Just a view in relation to this. With my own circumstances as an elite am who is involved through the USGA in the coaching & development side of mainly low Cat 1 golfers I'm fortunate to get to go to a lot of PGA coaching seminars so get to talk with many Pro instructors & many Tour players.

Certainly over the last, say, couple of years, it's become noticeable that there are hardly any (if any, can't think of one off hand) of the top couple hundred Pro instructors that don't use a LM on a daily basis in their teaching with their Tour Pro's, both from the main Tour but also the smaller Tour circuits or their elite national or state representative elite ams. Also now too with the handicap golfers who are really looking into improving their games.

The Tour Pro's I've spoken to at these seminars all have said there are only really a very small handful of Pro's that don't, week in week out, either with their coaches or solo practice that don't now use a LM.

Their reasons for doing so, on talking with both the instructors & players, have exactly echoed my own reasons for using one both in my own practice & coaching sessions.

Every one I've ever spoken to about this, has said that the LM data has allowed them for the first time to have empirical evidence, through the numbers, to better understand their swing 'feels'.

By that they can now see that repeating a certain swing motion, swing feel, so that these 'numbers' keep coming up with very little variation, translates in exactly being able to produce a certain flight, shape, distance, to their shots to a level of consistency that is much more defined than it ever was before. Also actually 'knowing' this gives them the confidence to step up & hit the shots under the pressure of competition, to get better outcomes more often.

They all express my own findings that once you take a little time to understand this data, these parameters (lot of folks tend to think this is a lot more complicated than it actually really is or that it's just plain 'magic') far from making the game complicated it really does the exact opposite, it distills things down because you have in front of you real 'proof' that the 'feel' of x or y or x&y will always give you a particular result.

So then you know exactly what 'feel' is needed, it no longer becomes just a theory or experiment. There's now hard data, empirical proof, which perhaps counterintuitively for a lot of folks, makes you freer to concentrate on the 'right' feel through any swing motion. So not more complicated but simpler.

Someone concentrating on keeping something simple alone with no 'proof' might have the proof of a certain result with the ball but no real understanding of what actually produced that good result. So simple only works if their particular simplicity of their golf swing allows them to play the game really well most of the time to the highest level possible, looking at the fact that the handicap of the average golfer hasn't improved over much for the previous decades to where we are now, it would seem to point that just keeping it simple alone hasn't really worked for most.

Simple if it's working correctly naturally, is great, simple if it's not working so correctly then is not so great.

Of course all of the above only really refers to folks who are looking to improve their golf games, those who play the game happy at the fact they just get their fun & camaraderie on a more social level, the game or their competence is not really their goal are really completely separate not really part of what I've been speaking too here.
		
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Hi coach funny but I have looked at the video and fully understand it. In fact I look at most of the videos you have put up.
I think to a certain extent I've been lucky in being blessed with a good natural swing(or so I've been told). My cousin was a pro golfer so I've play many rounds with him and other pro's over the last 40yrs. My games not what it was. Lose of distance due to age and injury. But can still knock it round in single figures on my day, just about lol. Do enjoy your vid's even if I don't relate them to my game. Plus I understand there are many out there that benefit from them. I also appreciate the trouble you go to with your answers. Even if I do find some a tad long winded.

All the best Dave.


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## Foxholer (Aug 8, 2014)

DaveM said:



			Even if I do find some a *tad* long winded.
		
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And if you want/need a translation of 'tad' - simply replace it with (the predominantly West Coast expression apparently) 'ways'! 

Btw. Better to be long-winded and complete than brief and incomplete imo!


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## CMAC (Aug 25, 2014)

missed this- vid looks interesting but no sound- will view later


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## turkish (Aug 27, 2014)

Re: coach- a bit off tangent but find it really interesting talking of the empirical evidence in golf swings. Makes me wonder where the game will be in 100 years (not that i'll know). Will players be like machines getting it within extremely small target distances?

Only fairly recently has the technology been advanced to record stuff like this and create large amounts of data. In terms of handicaps not changing obviously true but would you not agree that golf courses have generally become tougher? especially at elite level?

Also where does stuff like this leave guys like Bubba Watson (who i've been told has never had a lesson in his life?)


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## the_coach (Aug 27, 2014)

turkish said:



			Re: coach- a bit off tangent but find it really interesting talking of the empirical evidence in golf swings. Makes me wonder where the game will be in 100 years (not that i'll know). Will players be like machines getting it within extremely small target distances?

Only fairly recently has the technology been advanced to record stuff like this and create large amounts of data. In terms of handicaps not changing obviously true but would you not agree that golf courses have generally become tougher? especially at elite level?

Also where does stuff like this leave guys like Bubba Watson (who i've been told has never had a lesson in his life?)
		
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it's very likely tech will develop so there will be things that will continue to come out that will most likely help a golfer practice better (if they've a real mind too that is), maybes better ways show their swings against an ideal similar sized model I would guess. more tech swing path guides. 
better LM & some developed at a cheaper price point for the handicap golfer. 
the smart cells will be developed more with accelerometers gyro's etc so apps will be more & more sophisticated etc - but the person using them will still have to have a deal of knowledge re ball flight why, what produces what, what swing motions, technique produce what impact through the ball etc -
but in the end it's alway going to come back to the weakest link - the human involved.

the number of players taking lessons, & sticking with continuing to get reviews updates through the year from the Pro has really increased any. also most people going to the range, go their to hit balls, they don't really use the practice time efficiently or in the right way (in the majority from my experience) 

the number of folks you see just reach straight for the driver, & most practice what they are good at rather than weaknesses as a general observation - of course there are exceptions to this but they really are the minority.

over the last 50 or so years handicap on average haven't come down that much. 
the percentage of elite golfers (scratch to plus) haven't really gone up a lot given the rise in the worlds population & the number of folks playing the game now.

no Bubba never really had a lesson, learnt to play from a early age - but there's only one of him, one of Furyk, 
there have always been these exceptions back to big jim bruen - the bruen loop, Moe Norman, Trevino & Palmer, Ray Floyd, many of them over time but far more Pro golfers more adhere to the a 'norm'. 
game the will continue to throw out these kind of players. 
though most players now practice with LM, as I do. 

a lot of folks see this as being over complicating but in practice it's actually the complete opposite as getting the read out the 'numbers' gives you proof which then you can directly link in practice to the 'feel' to produce that partiular ball flight you're looking for. 
no longer to you have to just look at flight & guess or pace out distance or just guess how far it carried. 
& also you can see exactly what the club path is doing in 3 dimensions & what the face angle is doing through impact etc,. which frees you up a ways rather than anything else.

Bubba will win again but only when he feels right emotionally, only when his timing is bang on so he's in control of the face angle & not getting too steep with the attack angle. 

that's why he's usually bang on his game or a off by a real good ways. 
he could well win the masters a number of times as that course plays to his strengths when he's on. but doubt very much he'll win either of the opens, & depends which course the PGA is on as to whether he could win that.
not many handicap players have these players talent to be able to largely just play & develop there own game very few of these type of players that get lower than a 3 index in my experience.

don't think the courses I play comps on around the state/or nationally have got any harder, got a bit longer given the development of the ball & the drivers. 

think that's probably true of the Pro tour too, but just longer to try to keep the second shots somewhere in the ball park that they used to be so they are not all short irons in, some courses that's not possible as the land isn't there but then the pins get tucked more, greens a little faster, more bunkers or cut run offs or rough but that's just really about the distance the ball travels.
there still isn't too many PGA Pro's that can really out power any golf course only a rare few, that are Bubba, Rory, long & have the rest of their game in shape, think the percentage is still pretty much like it used to be when Nicklaus, Palmer etc used to overpower courses.

golf is both a hard and an easy game, it's totally counterintuitive, no-one is ever really fully in charge of if, if you think you are it comes back to bite you real hard, think that's why most of us keep coming back because it is challenging in a true sense.


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