Face To Path Explained with a Plane Board

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This concept video is exploring the face-to-path relationship in the golf

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swing. So I've got a little target here that we use for wedge practice, but we

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're

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gonna use it like a plane board. So you can see if I were to set my foreiron on

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the ground. It's not quite a flush to it, but it's going to give us a decent

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representation of a swing plane. Now what we're going to look at is the club

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face orientation compared to this plane at different points during the swing.

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There's a philosophy out there that you want to try to keep the club face

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square to this plane of movement as long as possible. And what I'm going to

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show

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you is that that's a challenging to do and b) I don't think it's the most

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athletic way or most natural way for the club to swing, and we'll look at a

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bunch of examples of tour pros to kind of see what they've figured out as far

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as

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the amount of rotation. So what we're going to do is let's pretend that instead

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of

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making a swing way up here where the club's following kind of a somewhat

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planar or circular path, we're going to shrink it down so that I'm standing

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right

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here in this H and the club is going to work around me as I make my

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swing. So in order for the club face to be square to the path, most people

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would

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define that as perpendicular. So the leading edge, perpendicular, kind of like

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that. Now what we'll see is let's say it's perpendicular when the shaft is

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vertical, if I lean the shaft forward I can still keep the leading edge

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perpendicular, but that would actually take a little bit of rotation in order

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to

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do so. So if I kept the face square to the path of the grip, it would be open

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and

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then if I rotated it, that makes it square. So down at the bottom when I'm

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making contact, we're going to have a little bit of shaft lean and then the

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club face will be rotated just a touch compared to the plane of the club in

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order to square the face. Now the theory of keeping the club face square to the

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path, you'll see, really doesn't show up when we look at it in the backswing,

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because there's a couple key points where it's easy to see the face-to-path

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relationship. One is when the shaft is parallel on either side of the ball and

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then two is looking at the top of the swing. So if we're looking at when the

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shaft is parallel, if it was to be square, that means that during the takeaway

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and

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during the downswing, you would want the face to be roughly at that angle there

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.

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Or if I had my six iron, that's roughly a 60 degree vertical swing plane with

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the

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six iron, that means that the club face would be square or perpendicular to

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that

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60 degree angle, it would look very much like that and most people would say

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that

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that's pretty closed. So if we fast forward to the downswing, that means that

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if

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we're saying this is pretty close to square or even vertical is square, I don't

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care too much, that means that I've still got to rotate it a good 40 degrees or

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so

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from here down to the bottom of the swing in order to get the club face pointed

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at the target or get it square to the path. So if I've got some rotation

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happening

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between here and contact, it doesn't make sense if you look at a lot of other

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sports that I would want to then change the path or change the movement of my

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arms right there in impact. It would make a lot more sense that I would want to

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gradually close it and continue it closing so that when it's in this

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follow-through position, square to the path would actually point close to like

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that. That would look like a very open club face by most standards. Square

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would

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be something like that but now you can see that that's more close than it was

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at

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the at impact. So I tend to look for more of a gradual rotation and gradual

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closing compared to the path. The place where it's the most apparent is if you

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look at the top of the swing. If I was to try to keep this square to the path

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at

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the top of the swing, you can see that that would look extremely closed by most

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standards. Most golfers are going to be closer to parallel to the plane, not

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perpendicular to it. So the club face has to rotate a good 70, 80, 90 degrees

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between the top of the swing and impact. So you could either, we'll do it there

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,

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so here's the top of the swing, there's impact. You could either wait, wait,

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wait,

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wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, and then try to snap it closed or you could

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gradually close it the whole time or you could close it early and then try to

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hold it on. I tend to prefer more of the gradual closing the entire downswing

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and

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even into the follow because I think it has the most fluidity and kind of, I

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like

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what it does to the path of the club in terms of helping to build the flat spot

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.

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Now you can see that from a practical standpoint, trying to create a swing

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where I keep that closed becomes really challenging as I start to get up

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towards the top of the swing. You can see that if I get my wrist in any sort of

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natural position, it's going to be closer to parallel to the plane instead of

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perpendicular to it. So if the downswing starts with it, not

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square to the plane, there's no way I could keep the club face square to the

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plane during the entire swing. So now the two major ways that the club face is

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going to rotate. One would be if I start to pull the grip back like this and

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kept the club face in the same orientation, you can see that it would

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be pointing way to the right. But because of how this arm tends to rotate when

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it straightens, what ends up happening is when I pull this in, that shoulder

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will

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tend to rotate this closed. So that many golfers who have a look of it open,

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open,

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open, open, and then snap and close do so by more bringing the grip back

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instead

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of twisting the face. The only way that I can keep the grip moving towards the

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target, or in the, it's moving a little bit up, but

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moving through there, the only way that I could then square it through that

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would

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be having pure shaft rotation. Maybe that will make a little bit more sense

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from the face on view. From the face on view, you'll frequently see the club

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face

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looking like this when it's wide open. Golfers who tend to have more of that

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earlier rotation will tend to have the club face looking more like this.

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If it's open through this phase here, then what will typically happen is the

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grip will end up moving backward like this and the club will rotate because of

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how the right arm works on it like that. As opposed to getting it closed a

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little bit earlier, and then I can continue the grip moving forward,

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which helps delay the low point and create some of that flat spot.

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I thought it would be helpful to take a quick look at a couple different

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examples in the video analyzer. So we've got a couple different golfers who

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are thought to have kind of quiet wrists, not a whole lot of club face rotation

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.

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So we got Dustin Johnson and Steve Stricker. Now it's a little tricky to see

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the club face

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because this camera angles a little bit low. But if we go just until he starts

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down,

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you can start to see the club face there is pointing pretty much that way.

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Now if it was perpendicular to the swing plane, which would be

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somewhere in that general category, we would expect to see it pointing

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kind of more parallel to that line or the club face would be along that line

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pointing out that way. So even Dustin with his close grip or strong grip,

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boogerist, doesn't get the club face square to the swing plane at the top of

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the swing. And then as he comes down, you can see at this point, the club face

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is

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pretty vertical. So if you were to, you know, imagine some type of swing plane,

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again, it's still got a good 20 30 degrees to rotate.

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The only swing plane that that would be square to would be one that was

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perpendicular or something

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about like that. Now you will see that he he gets it fairly closed here as

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as we're close to square to that path as anybody that I've seen.

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But you will see that on the way through through here, he gets it close to

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vertical,

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which again, that would be turned down compared to the swing plane.

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Now it's, I, we'll look at another view. We'll look at one of my swings from

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overhead.

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And just to show some of the challenges of being able to see the amount of

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rotation

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in through here, because the collision with the golf ball can definitely

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disrupt the way

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that the club face will look. But quickly, we can look at Steve Stricker

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over here on the right. You can see at the top, it's is club face would be

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considered

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square or even slightly open, maybe, but it's pretty close to parallel to the

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forearm.

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And we know if it was pretty, if it was in that same orientation down at the

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bottom,

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it would be pointing along the swing plane, not perpendicular to it.

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So the club face would actually be pointing basically out like that or probably

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60 degrees,

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70 degrees out to the right. But then as we get to those two checkpoints that

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are easy-ish

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to see the face to path relationship here, you can see again, the only swing

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plane that would

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be perpendicular to would be pretty horizontal. So it's still got a good 20, 30

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degrees to

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rotate there. And then you'll see at the point in the follow through when it's

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toe up,

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he's rotated it past perpendicular. So we know that it's rotating through that

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phase,

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and we know that it's rotating through that phase. To me, it wouldn't make a

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whole

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lot of sense to rotate it, hold on, and then rotate it again. It seems more

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repeatable or

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athletic to have slow, smooth, consistent rotation during the entire release

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pattern.

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I thought it'd be fun to look at two different perspectives of my own swing

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from a couple years

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ago. Here we've got camera, I've got down the line, and then here you can see

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that same alignment

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stick, but now we're looking from close to overhead. Now we're going to use

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those two references over

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here. You can see the club face close to vertical, and then on the way through

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close to vertical as

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well. So there's definitely, there's definitely some rotation through that

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phase, right, because

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the club face, if it stayed at the same orientation to the swing plane would be

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pointed out the right,

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so we know it's closing. And then to get back to, to get to vertical, it would

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have to close

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even past where it was at impact. Now from overhead, you'll see that I struck

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this ball a little bit

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on the toe. And so what you'll see is that slightly off center strike can

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disrupt some of the speed

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of how it looks like it's closing, which is part of the reason why I think it

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can be more helpful

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to look at the window, just prior to impact, and then a couple feet after where

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some of that noise

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has been somewhat zeroed out. But you can see that there's definitely some

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rotation of the club

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through this phase, even on a release that looks pretty close to square.