Andrew Rice Golf

Posts Tagged ‘swing catalyst’

The Travis Mathew Booth

I have just returned from the annual PGA Show in Orlando, Florida and I am pleased to share that the economic side of the game appears to be in fine shape. In previous years I have left the show feeling somewhat dejected, yet after this year’s experience I am really excited for what 2012 holds.

Every year I look around for ideas that might be game changers – something fresh, new and different. I also keep an eye out for what I call “headscratchers” – something so far out it makes me wonder how it could ever help a golfer get better. Here are a few things that piqued my interest:

Swingbyte

This tiny, lightweight device attaches to the shaft of your club from where it captures your swing and transmits it to your smartphone (Apple or Android) or tablet. It offers relatively accurate data on swing path, speed and lie angle amongst others, but the developer did stress to me that once swing speeds exceeded 90mph the accuracy got a little “sloppy”. It also allows you to share the information with your coach or golf buddies. This product comes highly recommended for the vast majority of golfers out there ($149; swingbyte.com).

Snag Golf

Face it - kids absolutely love to hit balls at a moving target and they love it even more if that moving target happens to be you. If you’re looking to give your kids or grandkids a reason to play golf and have a ball while doing it – all you have to do is suit up in the sticky suit and let the fun begin. It’s a velcro suit that, when used with Snag’s sticky balls and plastic golf clubs, turns you into a moving target thats far more appealing than even the guy in the range picker. Big time fun factor ($230, snaggolf.com).

SuperFlex Bands

Iliac Leather Head Covers

These leather headcovers have been around for a while, but there is nothing that makes a statement quite like a customized set of these protecting your big sticks.  I have some (that I paid for!) and every round I play somebody asks about them. I love old school and these have old school written all over them. For the golfer who has almost everything (from $58 ea; iliacgolf.com)

A Curved Face Putter?

How about these two items? I have a hard enough time making putts with a flat face – how does anybody suppose I’m going to make more putts with a putter that has a curved face?

The Putting Guillotine...

This second “headscratcher” I simply called the Putting Guillotine! Is this device really going to help me on a downhill left to right slider on the final green for the win….? I rest my case. While I selected these two items to show you, there were many more instances where ideas, products and teaching aids caused me to simply turn and walk away.

The best booth at the show had to go to TaylorMade – again. Here’s an interesting stat for you: TaylorMade currently controls a 55% share of the metalwood market. If you compare to when Titleist golf balls where at their peak – they only controlled a 48% share of the ball market! And remember – golf clubs cost a lot more than golf balls.

Inside the TaylorMade booth...

....and the TaylorMade UFO?

Best Clothing Booth - Travis Mathew – the old convertible was a great touch.

Best Hosiery (socks!) – Kentwool – they claim to be the world’s best golf sock and I have no reason to dispute that. These socks rock!

Best Teaching Technology – Swing Catalyst – I may be biased here, as I own one, but this technology is ahead of it’s time.

As per usual there were many golf personalities there and I happened to see Scotty Cameron, Michael Breed, Lee Trevino, Paula Creamer, Wally Uihlein, Gary Gilchrist and Erik Barzeski amongst others, but I’m still trying to figure out what Flava Flav was doing there? If that’s not a “headscratcher” then I don’t know what is?

If you have not had an opportunity to visit the PGA Show then this video might give you an idea of what the experience is like. Thanks for reading and enjoy!

Having the use of the Swing Catalyst system has almost been like being able to look behind the curtain to see what truly happens to a golfers’ weight when they swing the club. Guesswork and perception are taken out of the equation and the information you read in the following post is based purely on fact. 

 An FYI regarding the Swing Catalyst system – I have taken advantage of the Loaner Program they recently instituted. Whatever you spend in the Loaner Program is taken off the cost of a new unit – a nice way to shop!

Weight shift is a poor term.  Similar to the term “takeaway” it does not convey the appropriate sensation.  My research has shown that the term “weight transfer” would be far better.  And here’s why: When I think of shifting my weight I make a conscious move to get my body over to my back foot for example.  Not good!  The weight transfers in the swing purely due to the motion in the arms hands and club as they travel away from the target.  Think of it this way – if I swing my arms, which each weigh 15 lbs, and a club  in my backswing you can be sure that I am transferring weight onto my back foot. There is however no conscious shifting or body move that gets the weight over there. This is exactly why the 84 degree  rule (as illustrated below) holds true.

Mickey Wright and the 84 Degree Line

There is no lateral body move, yet many players often wrote or spoke about a sense of weight transfer. The body stays centered while the weight is transferred by the motion in the arms and the club. Video HERE

I found that very good golfers (college and touring professionals) had a maximum percentage of 80% of their weight on their back foot slightly beyond halfway back.  This was achieved with almost no lateral movement in the upper body.

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In the screen shot above notice how the center of gravity indicator between my feet (top right) is almost as far to the right as it goes. This should be the furthest point to the right the weight moves and from here it starts moving back to the front foot.

I did find that a reverse weight shift (reverse pivot) was almost impossible for me to achieve. With the arms and club swinging to the right it made it very difficult to get the weight to favor the front foot in the backswing.

In the screen shot below I have positioned my weight 70/30 on the front foot (with the 84 line as a reference) at the top of my swing as advocated by some teachers. While the numbers may be difficult to achieve I did find that for many people the idea of keeping their body left and sensing the weight being 70/30 in favor of the front foot proved to be very helpful. This helped me to seperate the difference between what a student felt and what was real.  Many times it was better for a student to work towards a feeling than the actual reality.

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At the start of the downswing, when the left arm (for right handers) gets parallel to the ground the majority of top tour professionals displayed a weight distribution of 50/50.  Sam Snead illustrated this beautifully!

I did notice that with single figure handicap golfers there seemed to be a tendency to get their weight too far forward (75/25) at this point. This led to a situation where, when they got to the delivery point (shaft parallel to the ground), they very often had more than 90% of their weight on their front foot and had to back up through impact.  This seemed to be a contributing factor to hooks and blocks – the better golfers most common malady!

All the best ball strikers studied displayed a tendency to transfer the weight to the front foot in a smooth and continuous flow with no backing up or slowing of the transfer. The more straight and direct the CoG trace moved the better. This meant that they arrived at impact with an 80/20 split favoring the front foot and the weight continued to move smoothly over to the front side beyond impact.

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Notice the continuous and smooth CoG trace into the front foot here by Billy Hurley.  His weight was more than likely 85% on the front foot at impact.

The tendency with higher handicap golfers (above 18) was for the weight to get too far back and then remain there all the way through impact. It was not unusual to see one of these golfers have a split of 70/30 favoring the back foot at impact.

In summary:

• The weight should start at 50/50
• Somewhere between halfway back and the top of the backswing the player should max out weight on the back foot at 80/20
• At halfway down (arm parallel to the ground) the weight should once again be 50/50
• The weight should make a continuous tranfer to the front foot in the downswing with an 80/20 split occuring at impact. 

A few more screen shots:

Geoff Ogilvy passing through impact (shaft bend is due to camera lens)

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Peter Uihlein at impact

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Please keep two things in mind as you process the above information: due to the relative newness of this technology there is not a huge sample group of golfers to study and that all percentages are a mean or ”ballpark” number.

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The photo of Sam Snead above perfectly illustrates where the weight should be positioned at these three key points in the golf swing:

• Just prior to the top of the backswing the weight is almost always in the vicinity of 80/20 favoring the back side.
• At the half way down point top players always seem to position their weight equally here (50/50).
• At impact the weight is always in the vicinity of 20/80 favoring the front side.

The amazing technology from Swing Catalyst has been instrumental in educating me further on this important information. If you’d like to learn more about your weight shift please give me a call to book your session at some point within the next two weeks.

I will be posting at great detail on this topic later in the week so stand by. The evidence is clear!

I have recently returned from the 2011 Orlando PGA Golf Show and I wanted to share a few of my impressions with you. Firstly, if you are an avid golfer, you simply must make a plan to attend this show – it is literally the Disney World of golf! Talk to your golf professional, a friend in the biz, beg, steal, but find a way to get there. Plan on two full days (preferably Thursday and Friday) to soak it all up.

This year there seemed to be a positive vibe at the Show. All the major club companies were represented with Taylormade commanding a huge portion of the floor. My four high points of the Show were:

Swing Catalyst

Once again I have nominated this product as one of my highlights. It might be costly, but this machine dispenses invaluable information for any golf coach. It shows where a golfers weight is positioned throughout the swing, how much rotational force is being generated, all while synchronizing with video and either Trackman or Flightscope. Talk about an all in one package! This is the G5 of golf instruction technology.

Flightscope

The new and improved Flightscope X2 portable launch monitors do not offer anything groundbreaking relative to what Trackman has always offered, but where they crush the competition is price point – $11,000 vs $30,000+! The accuracy of the Flightscope has always been brought into question, however after meeting with them and seeing the new X2 in action I am sold. Not new technology, but definitely a new price point at which to consider the technology.

Nuun Hydration Tablets

Nuun tablets are optimal hydration and I believe the future of hydration in sports. The taste is light and refreshing and I really like the “green” aspect of this product – you carry your own Nuun waterbottle, fill it with water and add a tablet without loading up the landfills with plastic bottles from everything you drink on the golf course. The speed of absorbtion, electrolyte content and lack of carbohydrates (sugar!) is what sets this product apart. It tastes really good too.

Speed Woosh from Momentus

In an almost unnoticed about face by Momentus (which has always promoted heavy clubs) they are now promoting the Speed Woosh to increase your clubhead speed. Well what about all those heavy clubs I bought that are lying in my garage? Sorry, no good – at least if you want more speed! This device is great fun to swing and as an added bonus it works. It gets the fast twitch muscle fibers to fire and that can only help you add distance to your tee balls. I like it!

In additon to these four highlights I saw a little bit of everything – from six different types of golf tee designs to a device to keep your head still in the swing (it actually worked!) There were also the usual cast of golf celebs from Greg Norman to Hank Haney (hi Hank!) to Natalie and Paula. I also attended a few excellent seminars  by AMF and noted golf instructor Jeff Ritter. Jeff gave an inspirational talk on marketing golf instruction in the modern society.

After leaving the show I felt excited and enthusiastic about the future of our game. We seem to be turning the corner and I am really looking forward to 2011.

Thanks for reading and feel free to post your questions and comments.

I have just returned from the PGA Golf Show and came back with a very positive vibe. While it is always good to catch up with friends, old and new I feel that the game of golf is doing just fine even without Tiger.

Here are a few notes on what I found to be the highlight of my trip:

• Even though this is their second year at the show I found Swing Catalyst Studio to be the most exciting and positive piece of technology involving golf instruction. Last year I reported on the Swingia Balance Plate, but the Swing Catalyst takes the same idea to a new level.

• The Swing Catalyst Force Plate seamlessly integrates with video analysis software and an optional launch monitor (TrackMan). The force plate is housed in a tee unit covered with artificial turf. 
• The Swing Catalyst Force Plate enables the teacher to view a student’s centre of gravity, stance and pressure distribution both live and recorded, in real time and in slow motion. Additional data on rotational force, tempo and rhythm are also available once the swing has been captured.
• The best feature shows what percentage of a golfers’ weight is on each foot. Many systems have this option, but none go so far as to indicate what part of the foot the weight is located on.

When integrated with a TrackMan system and 300 fps cameras, Swing Catalyst provides the optimal in instructional tools – an upper level viewing experience, all the numbers pertaining to the club and ball flight and now all the numbers pertaining to the body, force and weight positioning.

With integration this really is the Rolls Royce system available on the market today.