Trackman session

[Simbo]

Iv been struggling with my driver distance for quite a bit a through just watching the ball flight I knew it was spinning far to much. So Sunday I went along to the Glasgow golf centre. I hit 10 balls, range ones, driver, 3 wood, hybrid and 6 iron,
Having never been here before and used the equipment I thought it would have measured everything I needed, but it never measured AOA, club swing path. But the driver was spinning way to much, average over 10 balls was about 3500, 3 wood was ok, but hybrid and 6 irons had very low spin rates.
How important is the angle of attack for my figures??
And can I work out how best to reduce my driver spin rate without it??
I really don't want to buy new equipment but I will if I need to, I'm using a titleist 910, 10.5 with a project x 8db stiff shaft that weighs 83g. I also thought my swing speed was quite slow at an average of 95mph.
My average carry was 226 yards

 

[garyinderry]

Very important. if you AOA is excessively down then it will push up your spin rate. where you are striking the face will also have a big effect.

 

[Khamelion]

Not sure about the spin rates, but I was told from when I was having lessons, that with a steep angle of attack, you will send the ball up high, so perhaps with your driver, look to make the swing path into the ball more shallow.

 

[MendieGK]

check this out and look at the difference between -5 AOA and +5 for your swing speed. the carry distance changes massively

http://wishongolf.com/etech/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/TrackMan-Driver-Optimization_2010.pdf

 

[Simbo]

I see 2 charts for my swing speed, what's the difference with them??
So basically without the AOA, I can't work out why I'm actually getting to much backspin??

 

[stevek1969]

I had a negative angle of attack and club path which would produce a big slice, worked on hitting the ball on the up and trying to get a much better positive club path has helped my driving dramatically, longer and straighter, the lad i see for lessons uses Trackman all the time.

 

[Deleted Member 1156]

Experiment with your ball position to see what effect that has :thup:

 

[ruff-driver]

Experiment with your ball position to see what effect that has :thup:

 

[garyinderry]

Hitting down imparts more spin and also low on the face. Check where you are impacting on the face.


Watch any number of videos on this topic on youtube.

 

[Paul77]

I used to think I was lining up the ball with the inside of my left heel. During lessons the pro measured it and it was more like 6" inside my heel. After I changed it, to what looked like I was lining it up with my big toe on my left foot, everything changed.

 

[the_coach]

am guessing you bought an amount of time on Trackman without a PGA Pro.

as you can see from this trackman screen, it measures 26 individual parameters of both ball flight & swing. among the 26 are AoA & path numbers.

but it totally depends what parameters have been selected to be viewed on screen, you can change them to show different groups of #'s to all.

[IMG

[/IMG]

would likely be that the swing path is coming in a ways steep, most likely on an out to in path which would mean ball contact a ways too high on the face if the 'low point' of the swing is target side of the ball, but also could be if you flip the hands some coming into impact so 'low point' has been before the ball you could also strike from low face, whichever or what exactly you could begin to tell by the ball flight - starting direction, height, in flight curvature.

would think maybes both set-up, upper body to lower body angles + ball position would play into the issues as well as swing motion technique.

but also the prime factor is where on the face along the horizontal axis the ball strikes (heel to toe) & how far that contact is aways from center.

easy ways to see this is to buy either a can of foot spray or dry shampoo spray - spray light coating to face - & you can see exactly where the strikes are from.

if you go again, ask them to set up the screen view with the numbers you want. a ways better if you can to get time with a Pro so you can begin to see how the numbers relate to the motion & strike, then you know better what to look out for in other sessions.

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[Simbo]

Yep, it was time without a PGA pro, the pro I use for lessons does have a trackman and I will schedule a lesson with my driver with him. I just had the opportunity to use this one and thought I'd try it then discuss with my pro about it.
Iv been trying to post up the driver chart without much success, but basically without knowing the AOA, and strike point everything from there is just guesswork???
To be honest my strike on the ball isn't that great IMO, but I don't really know how it relates to anyone else's of my level.

 

[the_coach]

AoA & path would have been recorded, just it wasn't selected to be part of the screen view.

major key though to spin is contact point on the face. (along with AoA, dynamic loft etc.)

angle of attack through the ball is mostly initially governed by a good set up with the driver.

so a forwards ball position but head remaining some good inches behind the ball position (many folks undo the forwards ball position by taking their upper body, chest & head to be back overtop of the ball before they start the swing or at some time during the swing motion)
plus with driver as the ball ideally is a good 4" off the ground the secondary spine position tilts away from target, trail shoulder lower than the lead.

then through the swing motion technique feeling the spine angles stay intact with the head remaining behind the ball.
important on first move downwards from the top that the upper body & head must not move towards target or towards the ball.
that ways the low point of the swing arc is before the club arrives at impact so your swinging up through impact - picture an inclined hoop - but remember if the ball position is up & forwards & the lowpoint of the clubhead is before the ball that the swing direction of the clubhead will also be a little ways left & up through the ball. so you gotta take that into consideration with aim to target.

would get a can of spray (foot or dry shampoo), spray driver face then get set up good & just take some easy swing motions at 50% effort with the focus on striking the ball a fraction above the geometric center of the driver face.

once you can do that good a bunch of times at 50% swing speed - do same at 55% - once you get repeatable good contact then up to 60% repeat all the ways up to 80% - if at any speed you can't find that 'sweet spot' consistently good enough drop back down to the speed you could & start over.

 

[the_coach]

looking at the numbers club head speed to ball speed. would really consider getting some spray & looking at the driver contact practice. you could get some more distance from improving strike alone before you look to swing any quicker. as that's going to improve the efficiency of CHS to ball speed, plus looking at AoA, dynamic loft at strike will lower the spin loft number so the spin rate - so you could gain a bunch of distance from the same swing speed.

 

[Sweep]

When reading this thread I really thought the OP's numbers were going to be poor, but when you see the results they seem OK. An average 138.7 ball speed from a 95mph club speed is after all a smash factor of 1.46. These figures are not too dissimilar to my own, so I am buoyed by the fact that it seems I can get more from the same swing speed. I am off to Tesco to buy some foot spray!

 

[the_coach]

To be honest my strike on the ball isn't that great IMO, but I don't really know how it relates to anyone else's of my level.

would say it's not as bad as maybes you think. looking at improving, a consistent strike pattern just a little ways higher than center with an AoA that's around 3º to 5º should get you little higher ball speed with less spin. so a bunch yards more distance, given a reasonable swing path to face angle relationship.