Tyler Ferrell is the only person in the world named to Golf Digest's list of Best
Young Teachers in
America AND its list of Best Golf Fitness Professionals in America.
Diagnose Your Rate of Closure for Better Ball Flight
After this video, you'll be able to:
- Identify the differences in rate of closure between golfers like Phil Mickelson and Matt Kuchar.
- Analyze how contact location affects your follow-through and club face angle.
- Understand how delaying the closure of your club face can impact your shot trajectory.
In this video, you'll learn how to analyze your rate of closure using video analysis techniques. Understanding this aspect of your swing can help you identify issues with your ball flight and improve your performance on the course.
Video Transcript
WEBVTT
1
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In this analysis video, we're going to discuss the look of rate of closure.
2
00:00:04.880 --> 00:00:09.860
So I've had a couple of questions about Sasha Mackenzie, Johnson-Claire
3
00:00:09.860 --> 00:00:11.600
presentation regarding
4
00:00:11.600 --> 00:00:13.680
the look of rate of closure.
5
00:00:13.680 --> 00:00:19.930
So I wanted to just do a quick video to kind of put in a couple of thoughts and
6
00:00:19.930 --> 00:00:20.800
give you
7
00:00:20.800 --> 00:00:27.480
a way that you can have a better way of looking at rate of closure on video.
8
00:00:27.480 --> 00:00:31.670
So historically, what a lot of guys have done is looked at two different points
9
00:00:31.670 --> 00:00:31.960
.
10
00:00:31.960 --> 00:00:36.030
So when the club's about parallel and the follow through and when the club is
11
00:00:36.030 --> 00:00:36.440
about
12
00:00:36.440 --> 00:00:40.680
parallel and the downswing, then basically advocating a certain look here in
13
00:00:40.680 --> 00:00:41.320
the follow
14
00:00:41.320 --> 00:00:42.320
through.
15
00:00:42.320 --> 00:00:47.090
Now, this is Phil Mickelson, flipped to a right hand golfer over here as Matt K
16
00:00:47.090 --> 00:00:47.600
uchar.
17
00:00:47.600 --> 00:00:51.610
You can see that they've got the club face pointed roughly in the same
18
00:00:51.610 --> 00:00:52.920
direction compared
19
00:00:52.920 --> 00:00:58.200
to the camera, golf balls started right of their target, so they were both kind
20
00:00:58.200 --> 00:00:58.720
of starting
21
00:00:58.720 --> 00:01:00.440
on a push trajectory.
22
00:01:00.440 --> 00:01:04.200
That means the club face is turned about the same amount between these two
23
00:01:04.200 --> 00:01:04.840
frames.
24
00:01:04.840 --> 00:01:10.320
Well, coming into impact, we're looking at their 3D's of Matt Kuchar as one of
25
00:01:10.320 --> 00:01:11.080
the lower
26
00:01:11.080 --> 00:01:15.640
rate of closures, and Phil Mickelson has one of the higher rate of closure.
27
00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:20.680
So this frame by itself doesn't give you enough to go off of.
28
00:01:20.680 --> 00:01:23.400
And there's a couple reasons that that might happen.
29
00:01:23.400 --> 00:01:29.820
One would be looking at contact location, so when you're looking at where the
30
00:01:29.820 --> 00:01:30.800
golf balls
31
00:01:30.800 --> 00:01:35.660
hit on the face compared to the COG, that can cause some funky twisting looks
32
00:01:35.660 --> 00:01:36.360
in the follow
33
00:01:36.360 --> 00:01:37.680
through.
34
00:01:37.680 --> 00:01:46.160
One other piece that might be relevant is in order to have a lower rate of
35
00:01:46.160 --> 00:01:47.440
closure at
36
00:01:47.440 --> 00:01:52.510
impact oftentimes golfers then are holding off or delaying the things that
37
00:01:52.510 --> 00:01:54.160
close the face.
38
00:01:54.160 --> 00:01:59.110
And so as a result, after impact, they have a rapid spike or a speed up in rate
39
00:01:59.110 --> 00:02:00.080
of closure,
40
00:02:00.080 --> 00:02:05.330
where oftentimes golfers who have a faster rate of closure at impact may have a
41
00:02:05.330 --> 00:02:05.920
look of
42
00:02:05.920 --> 00:02:09.280
a slower rate of closure after impact.
43
00:02:09.280 --> 00:02:14.140
And then lastly, the piece that we can't really tell from here is this is a 3D
44
00:02:14.140 --> 00:02:15.120
image.
45
00:02:15.120 --> 00:02:20.080
So we can look at the distance the club is away from where that T was.
46
00:02:20.080 --> 00:02:24.480
And often golfers who have the lower rate of closure have the later arc width.
47
00:02:24.480 --> 00:02:30.780
And so because their arms are extending more through the shot and the club is
48
00:02:30.780 --> 00:02:31.960
essentially
49
00:02:31.960 --> 00:02:37.770
working away from their body, the club may be further away, even though it's at
50
00:02:37.770 --> 00:02:38.320
the same
51
00:02:38.320 --> 00:02:42.200
angle, therefore it traveled a greater distance and therefore it moved a little
52
00:02:42.200 --> 00:02:42.960
bit slower.
53
00:02:42.960 --> 00:02:48.630
But one of the keys is, okay, this is a hard position right here in order to
54
00:02:48.630 --> 00:02:49.680
really look
55
00:02:49.680 --> 00:02:50.680
at rate of closure.
56
00:02:50.680 --> 00:02:55.240
So where do we want to look?
57
00:02:55.240 --> 00:03:00.110
The classic other position that I've heard discussed is looking pretty much at
58
00:03:00.110 --> 00:03:00.480
when the
59
00:03:00.480 --> 00:03:07.600
club is parallel to the ground or shaft parallel right around here.
60
00:03:07.600 --> 00:03:12.240
And you will see that if we look back at that position.
61
00:03:12.240 --> 00:03:17.840
So probably closest to this frame here, you will see that there's enough of a
62
00:03:17.840 --> 00:03:18.840
difference
63
00:03:18.840 --> 00:03:19.840
here right?
64
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Phil Mickelson's club is pointing above the horizon.
65
00:03:22.360 --> 00:03:24.240
Matt Cooches is already pointing down.
66
00:03:24.240 --> 00:03:28.710
So in order to get the club face to rotate a certain amount around the shaft,
67
00:03:28.710 --> 00:03:29.440
it's going
68
00:03:29.440 --> 00:03:35.260
to have to rotate less covering about the same distance so it's going to move
69
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slower.
70
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But I would challenge you to look even closer.
71
00:03:39.680 --> 00:03:46.880
So whether it's a foot before impact or basically it's close to impact as you
72
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can, seeing how
73
00:03:48.160 --> 00:03:52.520
early they get the face pointed roughly at the golf ball.
74
00:03:52.520 --> 00:03:59.060
So you'll see with Phil through this phase right through here, there's not a
75
00:03:59.060 --> 00:03:59.900
lot of club
76
00:03:59.900 --> 00:04:02.560
face rotation right through here.
77
00:04:02.560 --> 00:04:06.280
There's not a lot of club face rotation, so the club is still pointing well out
78
00:04:06.280 --> 00:04:06.600
to the
79
00:04:06.600 --> 00:04:11.640
right and then it's not until well down here that it starts to straighten and
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it's straightening
81
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more from a result of straightening that right arm rather than twisting the
82
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club with
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the wrist.
84
00:04:20.720 --> 00:04:24.070
And when you're doing it more from straightening that arm, you're going to tend
85
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to reach that
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low or widest point sooner, which is going to decrease the resistance to
87
00:04:29.060 --> 00:04:29.920
twisting and
88
00:04:29.920 --> 00:04:34.240
therefore it's going to twist much higher.
89
00:04:34.240 --> 00:04:40.780
So looking before impact, you can see that roughly when I've used when the club
90
00:04:40.780 --> 00:04:41.200
is in
91
00:04:41.200 --> 00:04:45.470
front of the right foot, if it's still pointing well out to the right, you're
92
00:04:45.470 --> 00:04:46.280
going to have
93
00:04:46.280 --> 00:04:48.800
a higher rate of closure.
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00:04:48.800 --> 00:04:53.870
Alright, so one of the better places to look at rate of closure is looking at
95
00:04:53.870 --> 00:04:54.520
the face
96
00:04:54.520 --> 00:04:55.520
on view.
97
00:04:55.520 --> 00:04:58.960
Actually one of the best is the overhead view, but that one's really hard to
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00:04:58.960 --> 00:05:00.480
come by unless
99
00:05:00.480 --> 00:05:03.480
you have your own studio and have a fair amount of pros.
100
00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:07.620
So from the face on view, you can basically look at about how much of the club
101
00:05:07.620 --> 00:05:08.160
face you
102
00:05:08.160 --> 00:05:09.160
can see.
103
00:05:09.160 --> 00:05:15.020
And you'll see over here with Phil, the club face really is apparent well into
104
00:05:15.020 --> 00:05:15.880
the downswing.
105
00:05:15.880 --> 00:05:19.520
So roughly when it's even with his trail foot, you can still see a fair amount
106
00:05:19.520 --> 00:05:20.480
of it.
107
00:05:20.480 --> 00:05:25.440
So now over here on the right, we've got Matt Coocher and you'll see that by
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00:05:25.440 --> 00:05:26.200
that right
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00:05:26.200 --> 00:05:31.320
foot, it's really rotating and pointing more at the golf ball.
110
00:05:31.320 --> 00:05:35.240
So right about here where it's even with the right foot, you can see pretty
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00:05:35.240 --> 00:05:35.920
much the whole
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00:05:35.920 --> 00:05:36.920
face.
113
00:05:36.920 --> 00:05:39.840
We're here, you can see a lot less of it.
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So he's already got it rotated towards the face or towards the golf ball, so
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then it's
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00:05:44.640 --> 00:05:47.840
not going to have to rotate quite as much going into it.
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Phil on the other hand still has a fair amount of closing that he's going to
118
00:05:51.670 --> 00:05:53.120
have to do and
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00:05:53.120 --> 00:05:56.840
he does it really in those last few frames.
120
00:05:56.840 --> 00:06:01.840
So even though they get to a similar look of club face rotation at that follow
121
00:06:01.840 --> 00:06:02.440
through
122
00:06:02.440 --> 00:06:06.120
position, they got there in very different ways.
123
00:06:06.120 --> 00:06:11.880
You can also see from this view, you can see more of that width aspect where he
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00:06:11.880 --> 00:06:12.440
's reaching
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00:06:12.440 --> 00:06:15.960
the widest point of his swing sooner.
126
00:06:15.960 --> 00:06:21.620
So when the down the line camera we're looking from this view here, the club is
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00:06:21.620 --> 00:06:22.280
going to
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00:06:22.280 --> 00:06:27.960
reach about the same height as Matt Coocher's would a little bit later and that
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00:06:27.960 --> 00:06:28.720
can also
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00:06:28.720 --> 00:06:33.240
kind of skew the look of how much the club face is actually rotated.
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00:06:33.240 --> 00:06:37.790
So when you're trying to analyze club face rate of closure, you want to look at
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it just
133
00:06:38.240 --> 00:06:43.840
before impact, not after and sometimes down the line is a harder camera view to
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00:06:43.840 --> 00:06:44.680
see rather
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00:06:44.680 --> 00:06:47.120
than face on or overhead.
136
00:06:47.120 --> 00:06:51.390
Now here's a quick image to help with that idea of looking at the club after
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00:06:51.390 --> 00:06:52.160
impact.
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00:06:52.160 --> 00:06:56.520
Now these are amateurs hit on the swing vision and you'll see that when it's
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00:06:56.520 --> 00:06:57.600
hit outside
140
00:06:57.600 --> 00:07:03.800
of the center of mass, it's going to cause a fair amount of club face rotation.
141
00:07:03.800 --> 00:07:07.820
So if you were to take a look at the image right about there, you might say
142
00:07:07.820 --> 00:07:08.520
that that
143
00:07:08.520 --> 00:07:13.030
was held open and therefore be slower, but if you were to look at this image
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00:07:13.030 --> 00:07:13.680
here, it's
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00:07:13.680 --> 00:07:15.200
still pointed fairly to the right.
146
00:07:15.200 --> 00:07:20.060
So my guess is that it's higher and unfortunately a lot of the golf swings that
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00:07:20.060 --> 00:07:20.920
have a higher
148
00:07:20.920 --> 00:07:27.070
rate of closure tend to have more of a toe miss and therefore it's going to
149
00:07:27.070 --> 00:07:27.920
skew the
150
00:07:27.920 --> 00:07:30.280
look of it after impact.
151
00:07:30.280 --> 00:07:36.160
This would be more of the vertical gear effect from hitting it really low on
152
00:07:36.160 --> 00:07:37.200
the face.
153
00:07:37.200 --> 00:07:43.340
So now here we have Jim Furek, another lower rate of closure golfer and you'll
154
00:07:43.340 --> 00:07:44.120
see that
155
00:07:44.120 --> 00:07:48.390
he gets to a very different look here in the follow through than Matt Coocher
156
00:07:48.390 --> 00:07:49.080
did, but
157
00:07:49.080 --> 00:07:52.440
the rate of closure numbers are very similar.
158
00:07:52.440 --> 00:07:57.060
Now you can see that he gets the club through that key zone here pointing at
159
00:07:57.060 --> 00:07:57.960
the golf ball
160
00:07:57.960 --> 00:08:02.740
or closer to the target pretty early, it's not pointed out to the right quite
161
00:08:02.740 --> 00:08:03.440
as much.
162
00:08:03.440 --> 00:08:07.550
From this face on view, again by the time he gets even with that right foot,
163
00:08:07.550 --> 00:08:08.080
you'll
164
00:08:08.080 --> 00:08:12.090
see that the club is pointing more at the golf ball or more at the target so it
165
00:08:12.090 --> 00:08:12.480
's not
166
00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:15.600
going to have to rotate a ton through there.
167
00:08:15.600 --> 00:08:20.550
So I hope this helps you clarify the rate of closure discussion and how you can
168
00:08:20.550 --> 00:08:22.240
use video
169
00:08:22.240 --> 00:08:23.680
to identify.
170
00:08:23.680 --> 00:08:26.930
You're definitely not going to be able to get a numeric range as far as how
171
00:08:26.930 --> 00:08:27.400
fast you're
172
00:08:27.400 --> 00:08:32.600
actually closing, but you may be able to categorize yourself as more of a high
173
00:08:32.600 --> 00:08:33.800
rate, low rate,
174
00:08:33.800 --> 00:08:34.800
medium rate.
175
00:08:34.800 --> 00:08:36.640
So here's one last example.
176
00:08:36.640 --> 00:08:41.010
By looking at rate of closure in this way, you'll be able to understand why
177
00:08:41.010 --> 00:08:41.680
Jordan's
178
00:08:41.680 --> 00:08:47.710
beef has more of a medium rate of closure, he's not even really on the super
179
00:08:47.710 --> 00:08:48.800
low side,
180
00:08:48.800 --> 00:08:53.390
even though he has that kind of hold off look in the follow through that often
181
00:08:53.390 --> 00:08:54.440
gets attributed
182
00:08:54.440 --> 00:08:56.320
to a lower rate of closure.
183
00:08:56.320 --> 00:08:59.420
You can see that the club face is pointing a bit out to the right, not as much
184
00:08:59.420 --> 00:09:00.080
as Phil's,
185
00:09:00.080 --> 00:09:05.840
not as low as Furex or Kuchar, he's kind of more in the middle of the pack.
186
00:09:05.840 --> 00:09:09.700
From that face on view, you can still see a bit of the club face as it
187
00:09:09.700 --> 00:09:10.840
approaches more
188
00:09:10.840 --> 00:09:14.840
that right foot and then it closes there on the way through.
189
00:09:14.840 --> 00:09:18.860
So by using a more of a scientific or critical eye, hopefully you can
190
00:09:18.860 --> 00:09:20.160
understand a little
191
00:09:20.160 --> 00:09:22.400
bit better the rate of closure discussion.
1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.880
In this analysis video, we're going to discuss the look of rate of closure.
2
00:00:04.880 --> 00:00:09.860
So I've had a couple of questions about Sasha Mackenzie, Johnson-Claire
3
00:00:09.860 --> 00:00:11.600
presentation regarding
4
00:00:11.600 --> 00:00:13.680
the look of rate of closure.
5
00:00:13.680 --> 00:00:19.930
So I wanted to just do a quick video to kind of put in a couple of thoughts and
6
00:00:19.930 --> 00:00:20.800
give you
7
00:00:20.800 --> 00:00:27.480
a way that you can have a better way of looking at rate of closure on video.
8
00:00:27.480 --> 00:00:31.670
So historically, what a lot of guys have done is looked at two different points
9
00:00:31.670 --> 00:00:31.960
.
10
00:00:31.960 --> 00:00:36.030
So when the club's about parallel and the follow through and when the club is
11
00:00:36.030 --> 00:00:36.440
about
12
00:00:36.440 --> 00:00:40.680
parallel and the downswing, then basically advocating a certain look here in
13
00:00:40.680 --> 00:00:41.320
the follow
14
00:00:41.320 --> 00:00:42.320
through.
15
00:00:42.320 --> 00:00:47.090
Now, this is Phil Mickelson, flipped to a right hand golfer over here as Matt K
16
00:00:47.090 --> 00:00:47.600
uchar.
17
00:00:47.600 --> 00:00:51.610
You can see that they've got the club face pointed roughly in the same
18
00:00:51.610 --> 00:00:52.920
direction compared
19
00:00:52.920 --> 00:00:58.200
to the camera, golf balls started right of their target, so they were both kind
20
00:00:58.200 --> 00:00:58.720
of starting
21
00:00:58.720 --> 00:01:00.440
on a push trajectory.
22
00:01:00.440 --> 00:01:04.200
That means the club face is turned about the same amount between these two
23
00:01:04.200 --> 00:01:04.840
frames.
24
00:01:04.840 --> 00:01:10.320
Well, coming into impact, we're looking at their 3D's of Matt Kuchar as one of
25
00:01:10.320 --> 00:01:11.080
the lower
26
00:01:11.080 --> 00:01:15.640
rate of closures, and Phil Mickelson has one of the higher rate of closure.
27
00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:20.680
So this frame by itself doesn't give you enough to go off of.
28
00:01:20.680 --> 00:01:23.400
And there's a couple reasons that that might happen.
29
00:01:23.400 --> 00:01:29.820
One would be looking at contact location, so when you're looking at where the
30
00:01:29.820 --> 00:01:30.800
golf balls
31
00:01:30.800 --> 00:01:35.660
hit on the face compared to the COG, that can cause some funky twisting looks
32
00:01:35.660 --> 00:01:36.360
in the follow
33
00:01:36.360 --> 00:01:37.680
through.
34
00:01:37.680 --> 00:01:46.160
One other piece that might be relevant is in order to have a lower rate of
35
00:01:46.160 --> 00:01:47.440
closure at
36
00:01:47.440 --> 00:01:52.510
impact oftentimes golfers then are holding off or delaying the things that
37
00:01:52.510 --> 00:01:54.160
close the face.
38
00:01:54.160 --> 00:01:59.110
And so as a result, after impact, they have a rapid spike or a speed up in rate
39
00:01:59.110 --> 00:02:00.080
of closure,
40
00:02:00.080 --> 00:02:05.330
where oftentimes golfers who have a faster rate of closure at impact may have a
41
00:02:05.330 --> 00:02:05.920
look of
42
00:02:05.920 --> 00:02:09.280
a slower rate of closure after impact.
43
00:02:09.280 --> 00:02:14.140
And then lastly, the piece that we can't really tell from here is this is a 3D
44
00:02:14.140 --> 00:02:15.120
image.
45
00:02:15.120 --> 00:02:20.080
So we can look at the distance the club is away from where that T was.
46
00:02:20.080 --> 00:02:24.480
And often golfers who have the lower rate of closure have the later arc width.
47
00:02:24.480 --> 00:02:30.780
And so because their arms are extending more through the shot and the club is
48
00:02:30.780 --> 00:02:31.960
essentially
49
00:02:31.960 --> 00:02:37.770
working away from their body, the club may be further away, even though it's at
50
00:02:37.770 --> 00:02:38.320
the same
51
00:02:38.320 --> 00:02:42.200
angle, therefore it traveled a greater distance and therefore it moved a little
52
00:02:42.200 --> 00:02:42.960
bit slower.
53
00:02:42.960 --> 00:02:48.630
But one of the keys is, okay, this is a hard position right here in order to
54
00:02:48.630 --> 00:02:49.680
really look
55
00:02:49.680 --> 00:02:50.680
at rate of closure.
56
00:02:50.680 --> 00:02:55.240
So where do we want to look?
57
00:02:55.240 --> 00:03:00.110
The classic other position that I've heard discussed is looking pretty much at
58
00:03:00.110 --> 00:03:00.480
when the
59
00:03:00.480 --> 00:03:07.600
club is parallel to the ground or shaft parallel right around here.
60
00:03:07.600 --> 00:03:12.240
And you will see that if we look back at that position.
61
00:03:12.240 --> 00:03:17.840
So probably closest to this frame here, you will see that there's enough of a
62
00:03:17.840 --> 00:03:18.840
difference
63
00:03:18.840 --> 00:03:19.840
here right?
64
00:03:19.840 --> 00:03:22.360
Phil Mickelson's club is pointing above the horizon.
65
00:03:22.360 --> 00:03:24.240
Matt Cooches is already pointing down.
66
00:03:24.240 --> 00:03:28.710
So in order to get the club face to rotate a certain amount around the shaft,
67
00:03:28.710 --> 00:03:29.440
it's going
68
00:03:29.440 --> 00:03:35.260
to have to rotate less covering about the same distance so it's going to move
69
00:03:35.260 --> 00:03:36.200
slower.
70
00:03:36.200 --> 00:03:39.680
But I would challenge you to look even closer.
71
00:03:39.680 --> 00:03:46.880
So whether it's a foot before impact or basically it's close to impact as you
72
00:03:46.880 --> 00:03:48.160
can, seeing how
73
00:03:48.160 --> 00:03:52.520
early they get the face pointed roughly at the golf ball.
74
00:03:52.520 --> 00:03:59.060
So you'll see with Phil through this phase right through here, there's not a
75
00:03:59.060 --> 00:03:59.900
lot of club
76
00:03:59.900 --> 00:04:02.560
face rotation right through here.
77
00:04:02.560 --> 00:04:06.280
There's not a lot of club face rotation, so the club is still pointing well out
78
00:04:06.280 --> 00:04:06.600
to the
79
00:04:06.600 --> 00:04:11.640
right and then it's not until well down here that it starts to straighten and
80
00:04:11.640 --> 00:04:12.520
it's straightening
81
00:04:12.520 --> 00:04:18.480
more from a result of straightening that right arm rather than twisting the
82
00:04:18.480 --> 00:04:19.320
club with
83
00:04:19.320 --> 00:04:20.720
the wrist.
84
00:04:20.720 --> 00:04:24.070
And when you're doing it more from straightening that arm, you're going to tend
85
00:04:24.070 --> 00:04:24.640
to reach that
86
00:04:24.640 --> 00:04:29.060
low or widest point sooner, which is going to decrease the resistance to
87
00:04:29.060 --> 00:04:29.920
twisting and
88
00:04:29.920 --> 00:04:34.240
therefore it's going to twist much higher.
89
00:04:34.240 --> 00:04:40.780
So looking before impact, you can see that roughly when I've used when the club
90
00:04:40.780 --> 00:04:41.200
is in
91
00:04:41.200 --> 00:04:45.470
front of the right foot, if it's still pointing well out to the right, you're
92
00:04:45.470 --> 00:04:46.280
going to have
93
00:04:46.280 --> 00:04:48.800
a higher rate of closure.
94
00:04:48.800 --> 00:04:53.870
Alright, so one of the better places to look at rate of closure is looking at
95
00:04:53.870 --> 00:04:54.520
the face
96
00:04:54.520 --> 00:04:55.520
on view.
97
00:04:55.520 --> 00:04:58.960
Actually one of the best is the overhead view, but that one's really hard to
98
00:04:58.960 --> 00:05:00.480
come by unless
99
00:05:00.480 --> 00:05:03.480
you have your own studio and have a fair amount of pros.
100
00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:07.620
So from the face on view, you can basically look at about how much of the club
101
00:05:07.620 --> 00:05:08.160
face you
102
00:05:08.160 --> 00:05:09.160
can see.
103
00:05:09.160 --> 00:05:15.020
And you'll see over here with Phil, the club face really is apparent well into
104
00:05:15.020 --> 00:05:15.880
the downswing.
105
00:05:15.880 --> 00:05:19.520
So roughly when it's even with his trail foot, you can still see a fair amount
106
00:05:19.520 --> 00:05:20.480
of it.
107
00:05:20.480 --> 00:05:25.440
So now over here on the right, we've got Matt Coocher and you'll see that by
108
00:05:25.440 --> 00:05:26.200
that right
109
00:05:26.200 --> 00:05:31.320
foot, it's really rotating and pointing more at the golf ball.
110
00:05:31.320 --> 00:05:35.240
So right about here where it's even with the right foot, you can see pretty
111
00:05:35.240 --> 00:05:35.920
much the whole
112
00:05:35.920 --> 00:05:36.920
face.
113
00:05:36.920 --> 00:05:39.840
We're here, you can see a lot less of it.
114
00:05:39.840 --> 00:05:44.030
So he's already got it rotated towards the face or towards the golf ball, so
115
00:05:44.030 --> 00:05:44.640
then it's
116
00:05:44.640 --> 00:05:47.840
not going to have to rotate quite as much going into it.
117
00:05:47.840 --> 00:05:51.670
Phil on the other hand still has a fair amount of closing that he's going to
118
00:05:51.670 --> 00:05:53.120
have to do and
119
00:05:53.120 --> 00:05:56.840
he does it really in those last few frames.
120
00:05:56.840 --> 00:06:01.840
So even though they get to a similar look of club face rotation at that follow
121
00:06:01.840 --> 00:06:02.440
through
122
00:06:02.440 --> 00:06:06.120
position, they got there in very different ways.
123
00:06:06.120 --> 00:06:11.880
You can also see from this view, you can see more of that width aspect where he
124
00:06:11.880 --> 00:06:12.440
's reaching
125
00:06:12.440 --> 00:06:15.960
the widest point of his swing sooner.
126
00:06:15.960 --> 00:06:21.620
So when the down the line camera we're looking from this view here, the club is
127
00:06:21.620 --> 00:06:22.280
going to
128
00:06:22.280 --> 00:06:27.960
reach about the same height as Matt Coocher's would a little bit later and that
129
00:06:27.960 --> 00:06:28.720
can also
130
00:06:28.720 --> 00:06:33.240
kind of skew the look of how much the club face is actually rotated.
131
00:06:33.240 --> 00:06:37.790
So when you're trying to analyze club face rate of closure, you want to look at
132
00:06:37.790 --> 00:06:38.240
it just
133
00:06:38.240 --> 00:06:43.840
before impact, not after and sometimes down the line is a harder camera view to
134
00:06:43.840 --> 00:06:44.680
see rather
135
00:06:44.680 --> 00:06:47.120
than face on or overhead.
136
00:06:47.120 --> 00:06:51.390
Now here's a quick image to help with that idea of looking at the club after
137
00:06:51.390 --> 00:06:52.160
impact.
138
00:06:52.160 --> 00:06:56.520
Now these are amateurs hit on the swing vision and you'll see that when it's
139
00:06:56.520 --> 00:06:57.600
hit outside
140
00:06:57.600 --> 00:07:03.800
of the center of mass, it's going to cause a fair amount of club face rotation.
141
00:07:03.800 --> 00:07:07.820
So if you were to take a look at the image right about there, you might say
142
00:07:07.820 --> 00:07:08.520
that that
143
00:07:08.520 --> 00:07:13.030
was held open and therefore be slower, but if you were to look at this image
144
00:07:13.030 --> 00:07:13.680
here, it's
145
00:07:13.680 --> 00:07:15.200
still pointed fairly to the right.
146
00:07:15.200 --> 00:07:20.060
So my guess is that it's higher and unfortunately a lot of the golf swings that
147
00:07:20.060 --> 00:07:20.920
have a higher
148
00:07:20.920 --> 00:07:27.070
rate of closure tend to have more of a toe miss and therefore it's going to
149
00:07:27.070 --> 00:07:27.920
skew the
150
00:07:27.920 --> 00:07:30.280
look of it after impact.
151
00:07:30.280 --> 00:07:36.160
This would be more of the vertical gear effect from hitting it really low on
152
00:07:36.160 --> 00:07:37.200
the face.
153
00:07:37.200 --> 00:07:43.340
So now here we have Jim Furek, another lower rate of closure golfer and you'll
154
00:07:43.340 --> 00:07:44.120
see that
155
00:07:44.120 --> 00:07:48.390
he gets to a very different look here in the follow through than Matt Coocher
156
00:07:48.390 --> 00:07:49.080
did, but
157
00:07:49.080 --> 00:07:52.440
the rate of closure numbers are very similar.
158
00:07:52.440 --> 00:07:57.060
Now you can see that he gets the club through that key zone here pointing at
159
00:07:57.060 --> 00:07:57.960
the golf ball
160
00:07:57.960 --> 00:08:02.740
or closer to the target pretty early, it's not pointed out to the right quite
161
00:08:02.740 --> 00:08:03.440
as much.
162
00:08:03.440 --> 00:08:07.550
From this face on view, again by the time he gets even with that right foot,
163
00:08:07.550 --> 00:08:08.080
you'll
164
00:08:08.080 --> 00:08:12.090
see that the club is pointing more at the golf ball or more at the target so it
165
00:08:12.090 --> 00:08:12.480
's not
166
00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:15.600
going to have to rotate a ton through there.
167
00:08:15.600 --> 00:08:20.550
So I hope this helps you clarify the rate of closure discussion and how you can
168
00:08:20.550 --> 00:08:22.240
use video
169
00:08:22.240 --> 00:08:23.680
to identify.
170
00:08:23.680 --> 00:08:26.930
You're definitely not going to be able to get a numeric range as far as how
171
00:08:26.930 --> 00:08:27.400
fast you're
172
00:08:27.400 --> 00:08:32.600
actually closing, but you may be able to categorize yourself as more of a high
173
00:08:32.600 --> 00:08:33.800
rate, low rate,
174
00:08:33.800 --> 00:08:34.800
medium rate.
175
00:08:34.800 --> 00:08:36.640
So here's one last example.
176
00:08:36.640 --> 00:08:41.010
By looking at rate of closure in this way, you'll be able to understand why
177
00:08:41.010 --> 00:08:41.680
Jordan's
178
00:08:41.680 --> 00:08:47.710
beef has more of a medium rate of closure, he's not even really on the super
179
00:08:47.710 --> 00:08:48.800
low side,
180
00:08:48.800 --> 00:08:53.390
even though he has that kind of hold off look in the follow through that often
181
00:08:53.390 --> 00:08:54.440
gets attributed
182
00:08:54.440 --> 00:08:56.320
to a lower rate of closure.
183
00:08:56.320 --> 00:08:59.420
You can see that the club face is pointing a bit out to the right, not as much
184
00:08:59.420 --> 00:09:00.080
as Phil's,
185
00:09:00.080 --> 00:09:05.840
not as low as Furex or Kuchar, he's kind of more in the middle of the pack.
186
00:09:05.840 --> 00:09:09.700
From that face on view, you can still see a bit of the club face as it
187
00:09:09.700 --> 00:09:10.840
approaches more
188
00:09:10.840 --> 00:09:14.840
that right foot and then it closes there on the way through.
189
00:09:14.840 --> 00:09:18.860
So by using a more of a scientific or critical eye, hopefully you can
190
00:09:18.860 --> 00:09:20.160
understand a little
191
00:09:20.160 --> 00:09:22.400
bit better the rate of closure discussion.
Tyler Ferrell is the only person in the world named to Golf Digest's list of
Best Young Teachers in America AND its list of Best Golf Fitness Professionals in America.
Diagnose Your Rate of Closure for Better Ball Flight
After this video, you'll be able to:
- Identify the differences in rate of closure between golfers like Phil Mickelson and Matt Kuchar.
- Analyze how contact location affects your follow-through and club face angle.
- Understand how delaying the closure of your club face can impact your shot trajectory.
In this video, you'll learn how to analyze your rate of closure using video analysis techniques. Understanding this aspect of your swing can help you identify issues with your ball flight and improve your performance on the course.
Video Transcript
WEBVTT
1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.880
In this analysis video, we're going to discuss the look of rate of closure.
2
00:00:04.880 --> 00:00:09.860
So I've had a couple of questions about Sasha Mackenzie, Johnson-Claire
3
00:00:09.860 --> 00:00:11.600
presentation regarding
4
00:00:11.600 --> 00:00:13.680
the look of rate of closure.
5
00:00:13.680 --> 00:00:19.930
So I wanted to just do a quick video to kind of put in a couple of thoughts and
6
00:00:19.930 --> 00:00:20.800
give you
7
00:00:20.800 --> 00:00:27.480
a way that you can have a better way of looking at rate of closure on video.
8
00:00:27.480 --> 00:00:31.670
So historically, what a lot of guys have done is looked at two different points
9
00:00:31.670 --> 00:00:31.960
.
10
00:00:31.960 --> 00:00:36.030
So when the club's about parallel and the follow through and when the club is
11
00:00:36.030 --> 00:00:36.440
about
12
00:00:36.440 --> 00:00:40.680
parallel and the downswing, then basically advocating a certain look here in
13
00:00:40.680 --> 00:00:41.320
the follow
14
00:00:41.320 --> 00:00:42.320
through.
15
00:00:42.320 --> 00:00:47.090
Now, this is Phil Mickelson, flipped to a right hand golfer over here as Matt K
16
00:00:47.090 --> 00:00:47.600
uchar.
17
00:00:47.600 --> 00:00:51.610
You can see that they've got the club face pointed roughly in the same
18
00:00:51.610 --> 00:00:52.920
direction compared
19
00:00:52.920 --> 00:00:58.200
to the camera, golf balls started right of their target, so they were both kind
20
00:00:58.200 --> 00:00:58.720
of starting
21
00:00:58.720 --> 00:01:00.440
on a push trajectory.
22
00:01:00.440 --> 00:01:04.200
That means the club face is turned about the same amount between these two
23
00:01:04.200 --> 00:01:04.840
frames.
24
00:01:04.840 --> 00:01:10.320
Well, coming into impact, we're looking at their 3D's of Matt Kuchar as one of
25
00:01:10.320 --> 00:01:11.080
the lower
26
00:01:11.080 --> 00:01:15.640
rate of closures, and Phil Mickelson has one of the higher rate of closure.
27
00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:20.680
So this frame by itself doesn't give you enough to go off of.
28
00:01:20.680 --> 00:01:23.400
And there's a couple reasons that that might happen.
29
00:01:23.400 --> 00:01:29.820
One would be looking at contact location, so when you're looking at where the
30
00:01:29.820 --> 00:01:30.800
golf balls
31
00:01:30.800 --> 00:01:35.660
hit on the face compared to the COG, that can cause some funky twisting looks
32
00:01:35.660 --> 00:01:36.360
in the follow
33
00:01:36.360 --> 00:01:37.680
through.
34
00:01:37.680 --> 00:01:46.160
One other piece that might be relevant is in order to have a lower rate of
35
00:01:46.160 --> 00:01:47.440
closure at
36
00:01:47.440 --> 00:01:52.510
impact oftentimes golfers then are holding off or delaying the things that
37
00:01:52.510 --> 00:01:54.160
close the face.
38
00:01:54.160 --> 00:01:59.110
And so as a result, after impact, they have a rapid spike or a speed up in rate
39
00:01:59.110 --> 00:02:00.080
of closure,
40
00:02:00.080 --> 00:02:05.330
where oftentimes golfers who have a faster rate of closure at impact may have a
41
00:02:05.330 --> 00:02:05.920
look of
42
00:02:05.920 --> 00:02:09.280
a slower rate of closure after impact.
43
00:02:09.280 --> 00:02:14.140
And then lastly, the piece that we can't really tell from here is this is a 3D
44
00:02:14.140 --> 00:02:15.120
image.
45
00:02:15.120 --> 00:02:20.080
So we can look at the distance the club is away from where that T was.
46
00:02:20.080 --> 00:02:24.480
And often golfers who have the lower rate of closure have the later arc width.
47
00:02:24.480 --> 00:02:30.780
And so because their arms are extending more through the shot and the club is
48
00:02:30.780 --> 00:02:31.960
essentially
49
00:02:31.960 --> 00:02:37.770
working away from their body, the club may be further away, even though it's at
50
00:02:37.770 --> 00:02:38.320
the same
51
00:02:38.320 --> 00:02:42.200
angle, therefore it traveled a greater distance and therefore it moved a little
52
00:02:42.200 --> 00:02:42.960
bit slower.
53
00:02:42.960 --> 00:02:48.630
But one of the keys is, okay, this is a hard position right here in order to
54
00:02:48.630 --> 00:02:49.680
really look
55
00:02:49.680 --> 00:02:50.680
at rate of closure.
56
00:02:50.680 --> 00:02:55.240
So where do we want to look?
57
00:02:55.240 --> 00:03:00.110
The classic other position that I've heard discussed is looking pretty much at
58
00:03:00.110 --> 00:03:00.480
when the
59
00:03:00.480 --> 00:03:07.600
club is parallel to the ground or shaft parallel right around here.
60
00:03:07.600 --> 00:03:12.240
And you will see that if we look back at that position.
61
00:03:12.240 --> 00:03:17.840
So probably closest to this frame here, you will see that there's enough of a
62
00:03:17.840 --> 00:03:18.840
difference
63
00:03:18.840 --> 00:03:19.840
here right?
64
00:03:19.840 --> 00:03:22.360
Phil Mickelson's club is pointing above the horizon.
65
00:03:22.360 --> 00:03:24.240
Matt Cooches is already pointing down.
66
00:03:24.240 --> 00:03:28.710
So in order to get the club face to rotate a certain amount around the shaft,
67
00:03:28.710 --> 00:03:29.440
it's going
68
00:03:29.440 --> 00:03:35.260
to have to rotate less covering about the same distance so it's going to move
69
00:03:35.260 --> 00:03:36.200
slower.
70
00:03:36.200 --> 00:03:39.680
But I would challenge you to look even closer.
71
00:03:39.680 --> 00:03:46.880
So whether it's a foot before impact or basically it's close to impact as you
72
00:03:46.880 --> 00:03:48.160
can, seeing how
73
00:03:48.160 --> 00:03:52.520
early they get the face pointed roughly at the golf ball.
74
00:03:52.520 --> 00:03:59.060
So you'll see with Phil through this phase right through here, there's not a
75
00:03:59.060 --> 00:03:59.900
lot of club
76
00:03:59.900 --> 00:04:02.560
face rotation right through here.
77
00:04:02.560 --> 00:04:06.280
There's not a lot of club face rotation, so the club is still pointing well out
78
00:04:06.280 --> 00:04:06.600
to the
79
00:04:06.600 --> 00:04:11.640
right and then it's not until well down here that it starts to straighten and
80
00:04:11.640 --> 00:04:12.520
it's straightening
81
00:04:12.520 --> 00:04:18.480
more from a result of straightening that right arm rather than twisting the
82
00:04:18.480 --> 00:04:19.320
club with
83
00:04:19.320 --> 00:04:20.720
the wrist.
84
00:04:20.720 --> 00:04:24.070
And when you're doing it more from straightening that arm, you're going to tend
85
00:04:24.070 --> 00:04:24.640
to reach that
86
00:04:24.640 --> 00:04:29.060
low or widest point sooner, which is going to decrease the resistance to
87
00:04:29.060 --> 00:04:29.920
twisting and
88
00:04:29.920 --> 00:04:34.240
therefore it's going to twist much higher.
89
00:04:34.240 --> 00:04:40.780
So looking before impact, you can see that roughly when I've used when the club
90
00:04:40.780 --> 00:04:41.200
is in
91
00:04:41.200 --> 00:04:45.470
front of the right foot, if it's still pointing well out to the right, you're
92
00:04:45.470 --> 00:04:46.280
going to have
93
00:04:46.280 --> 00:04:48.800
a higher rate of closure.
94
00:04:48.800 --> 00:04:53.870
Alright, so one of the better places to look at rate of closure is looking at
95
00:04:53.870 --> 00:04:54.520
the face
96
00:04:54.520 --> 00:04:55.520
on view.
97
00:04:55.520 --> 00:04:58.960
Actually one of the best is the overhead view, but that one's really hard to
98
00:04:58.960 --> 00:05:00.480
come by unless
99
00:05:00.480 --> 00:05:03.480
you have your own studio and have a fair amount of pros.
100
00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:07.620
So from the face on view, you can basically look at about how much of the club
101
00:05:07.620 --> 00:05:08.160
face you
102
00:05:08.160 --> 00:05:09.160
can see.
103
00:05:09.160 --> 00:05:15.020
And you'll see over here with Phil, the club face really is apparent well into
104
00:05:15.020 --> 00:05:15.880
the downswing.
105
00:05:15.880 --> 00:05:19.520
So roughly when it's even with his trail foot, you can still see a fair amount
106
00:05:19.520 --> 00:05:20.480
of it.
107
00:05:20.480 --> 00:05:25.440
So now over here on the right, we've got Matt Coocher and you'll see that by
108
00:05:25.440 --> 00:05:26.200
that right
109
00:05:26.200 --> 00:05:31.320
foot, it's really rotating and pointing more at the golf ball.
110
00:05:31.320 --> 00:05:35.240
So right about here where it's even with the right foot, you can see pretty
111
00:05:35.240 --> 00:05:35.920
much the whole
112
00:05:35.920 --> 00:05:36.920
face.
113
00:05:36.920 --> 00:05:39.840
We're here, you can see a lot less of it.
114
00:05:39.840 --> 00:05:44.030
So he's already got it rotated towards the face or towards the golf ball, so
115
00:05:44.030 --> 00:05:44.640
then it's
116
00:05:44.640 --> 00:05:47.840
not going to have to rotate quite as much going into it.
117
00:05:47.840 --> 00:05:51.670
Phil on the other hand still has a fair amount of closing that he's going to
118
00:05:51.670 --> 00:05:53.120
have to do and
119
00:05:53.120 --> 00:05:56.840
he does it really in those last few frames.
120
00:05:56.840 --> 00:06:01.840
So even though they get to a similar look of club face rotation at that follow
121
00:06:01.840 --> 00:06:02.440
through
122
00:06:02.440 --> 00:06:06.120
position, they got there in very different ways.
123
00:06:06.120 --> 00:06:11.880
You can also see from this view, you can see more of that width aspect where he
124
00:06:11.880 --> 00:06:12.440
's reaching
125
00:06:12.440 --> 00:06:15.960
the widest point of his swing sooner.
126
00:06:15.960 --> 00:06:21.620
So when the down the line camera we're looking from this view here, the club is
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00:06:21.620 --> 00:06:22.280
going to
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00:06:22.280 --> 00:06:27.960
reach about the same height as Matt Coocher's would a little bit later and that
129
00:06:27.960 --> 00:06:28.720
can also
130
00:06:28.720 --> 00:06:33.240
kind of skew the look of how much the club face is actually rotated.
131
00:06:33.240 --> 00:06:37.790
So when you're trying to analyze club face rate of closure, you want to look at
132
00:06:37.790 --> 00:06:38.240
it just
133
00:06:38.240 --> 00:06:43.840
before impact, not after and sometimes down the line is a harder camera view to
134
00:06:43.840 --> 00:06:44.680
see rather
135
00:06:44.680 --> 00:06:47.120
than face on or overhead.
136
00:06:47.120 --> 00:06:51.390
Now here's a quick image to help with that idea of looking at the club after
137
00:06:51.390 --> 00:06:52.160
impact.
138
00:06:52.160 --> 00:06:56.520
Now these are amateurs hit on the swing vision and you'll see that when it's
139
00:06:56.520 --> 00:06:57.600
hit outside
140
00:06:57.600 --> 00:07:03.800
of the center of mass, it's going to cause a fair amount of club face rotation.
141
00:07:03.800 --> 00:07:07.820
So if you were to take a look at the image right about there, you might say
142
00:07:07.820 --> 00:07:08.520
that that
143
00:07:08.520 --> 00:07:13.030
was held open and therefore be slower, but if you were to look at this image
144
00:07:13.030 --> 00:07:13.680
here, it's
145
00:07:13.680 --> 00:07:15.200
still pointed fairly to the right.
146
00:07:15.200 --> 00:07:20.060
So my guess is that it's higher and unfortunately a lot of the golf swings that
147
00:07:20.060 --> 00:07:20.920
have a higher
148
00:07:20.920 --> 00:07:27.070
rate of closure tend to have more of a toe miss and therefore it's going to
149
00:07:27.070 --> 00:07:27.920
skew the
150
00:07:27.920 --> 00:07:30.280
look of it after impact.
151
00:07:30.280 --> 00:07:36.160
This would be more of the vertical gear effect from hitting it really low on
152
00:07:36.160 --> 00:07:37.200
the face.
153
00:07:37.200 --> 00:07:43.340
So now here we have Jim Furek, another lower rate of closure golfer and you'll
154
00:07:43.340 --> 00:07:44.120
see that
155
00:07:44.120 --> 00:07:48.390
he gets to a very different look here in the follow through than Matt Coocher
156
00:07:48.390 --> 00:07:49.080
did, but
157
00:07:49.080 --> 00:07:52.440
the rate of closure numbers are very similar.
158
00:07:52.440 --> 00:07:57.060
Now you can see that he gets the club through that key zone here pointing at
159
00:07:57.060 --> 00:07:57.960
the golf ball
160
00:07:57.960 --> 00:08:02.740
or closer to the target pretty early, it's not pointed out to the right quite
161
00:08:02.740 --> 00:08:03.440
as much.
162
00:08:03.440 --> 00:08:07.550
From this face on view, again by the time he gets even with that right foot,
163
00:08:07.550 --> 00:08:08.080
you'll
164
00:08:08.080 --> 00:08:12.090
see that the club is pointing more at the golf ball or more at the target so it
165
00:08:12.090 --> 00:08:12.480
's not
166
00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:15.600
going to have to rotate a ton through there.
167
00:08:15.600 --> 00:08:20.550
So I hope this helps you clarify the rate of closure discussion and how you can
168
00:08:20.550 --> 00:08:22.240
use video
169
00:08:22.240 --> 00:08:23.680
to identify.
170
00:08:23.680 --> 00:08:26.930
You're definitely not going to be able to get a numeric range as far as how
171
00:08:26.930 --> 00:08:27.400
fast you're
172
00:08:27.400 --> 00:08:32.600
actually closing, but you may be able to categorize yourself as more of a high
173
00:08:32.600 --> 00:08:33.800
rate, low rate,
174
00:08:33.800 --> 00:08:34.800
medium rate.
175
00:08:34.800 --> 00:08:36.640
So here's one last example.
176
00:08:36.640 --> 00:08:41.010
By looking at rate of closure in this way, you'll be able to understand why
177
00:08:41.010 --> 00:08:41.680
Jordan's
178
00:08:41.680 --> 00:08:47.710
beef has more of a medium rate of closure, he's not even really on the super
179
00:08:47.710 --> 00:08:48.800
low side,
180
00:08:48.800 --> 00:08:53.390
even though he has that kind of hold off look in the follow through that often
181
00:08:53.390 --> 00:08:54.440
gets attributed
182
00:08:54.440 --> 00:08:56.320
to a lower rate of closure.
183
00:08:56.320 --> 00:08:59.420
You can see that the club face is pointing a bit out to the right, not as much
184
00:08:59.420 --> 00:09:00.080
as Phil's,
185
00:09:00.080 --> 00:09:05.840
not as low as Furex or Kuchar, he's kind of more in the middle of the pack.
186
00:09:05.840 --> 00:09:09.700
From that face on view, you can still see a bit of the club face as it
187
00:09:09.700 --> 00:09:10.840
approaches more
188
00:09:10.840 --> 00:09:14.840
that right foot and then it closes there on the way through.
189
00:09:14.840 --> 00:09:18.860
So by using a more of a scientific or critical eye, hopefully you can
190
00:09:18.860 --> 00:09:20.160
understand a little
191
00:09:20.160 --> 00:09:22.400
bit better the rate of closure discussion.
1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.880
In this analysis video, we're going to discuss the look of rate of closure.
2
00:00:04.880 --> 00:00:09.860
So I've had a couple of questions about Sasha Mackenzie, Johnson-Claire
3
00:00:09.860 --> 00:00:11.600
presentation regarding
4
00:00:11.600 --> 00:00:13.680
the look of rate of closure.
5
00:00:13.680 --> 00:00:19.930
So I wanted to just do a quick video to kind of put in a couple of thoughts and
6
00:00:19.930 --> 00:00:20.800
give you
7
00:00:20.800 --> 00:00:27.480
a way that you can have a better way of looking at rate of closure on video.
8
00:00:27.480 --> 00:00:31.670
So historically, what a lot of guys have done is looked at two different points
9
00:00:31.670 --> 00:00:31.960
.
10
00:00:31.960 --> 00:00:36.030
So when the club's about parallel and the follow through and when the club is
11
00:00:36.030 --> 00:00:36.440
about
12
00:00:36.440 --> 00:00:40.680
parallel and the downswing, then basically advocating a certain look here in
13
00:00:40.680 --> 00:00:41.320
the follow
14
00:00:41.320 --> 00:00:42.320
through.
15
00:00:42.320 --> 00:00:47.090
Now, this is Phil Mickelson, flipped to a right hand golfer over here as Matt K
16
00:00:47.090 --> 00:00:47.600
uchar.
17
00:00:47.600 --> 00:00:51.610
You can see that they've got the club face pointed roughly in the same
18
00:00:51.610 --> 00:00:52.920
direction compared
19
00:00:52.920 --> 00:00:58.200
to the camera, golf balls started right of their target, so they were both kind
20
00:00:58.200 --> 00:00:58.720
of starting
21
00:00:58.720 --> 00:01:00.440
on a push trajectory.
22
00:01:00.440 --> 00:01:04.200
That means the club face is turned about the same amount between these two
23
00:01:04.200 --> 00:01:04.840
frames.
24
00:01:04.840 --> 00:01:10.320
Well, coming into impact, we're looking at their 3D's of Matt Kuchar as one of
25
00:01:10.320 --> 00:01:11.080
the lower
26
00:01:11.080 --> 00:01:15.640
rate of closures, and Phil Mickelson has one of the higher rate of closure.
27
00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:20.680
So this frame by itself doesn't give you enough to go off of.
28
00:01:20.680 --> 00:01:23.400
And there's a couple reasons that that might happen.
29
00:01:23.400 --> 00:01:29.820
One would be looking at contact location, so when you're looking at where the
30
00:01:29.820 --> 00:01:30.800
golf balls
31
00:01:30.800 --> 00:01:35.660
hit on the face compared to the COG, that can cause some funky twisting looks
32
00:01:35.660 --> 00:01:36.360
in the follow
33
00:01:36.360 --> 00:01:37.680
through.
34
00:01:37.680 --> 00:01:46.160
One other piece that might be relevant is in order to have a lower rate of
35
00:01:46.160 --> 00:01:47.440
closure at
36
00:01:47.440 --> 00:01:52.510
impact oftentimes golfers then are holding off or delaying the things that
37
00:01:52.510 --> 00:01:54.160
close the face.
38
00:01:54.160 --> 00:01:59.110
And so as a result, after impact, they have a rapid spike or a speed up in rate
39
00:01:59.110 --> 00:02:00.080
of closure,
40
00:02:00.080 --> 00:02:05.330
where oftentimes golfers who have a faster rate of closure at impact may have a
41
00:02:05.330 --> 00:02:05.920
look of
42
00:02:05.920 --> 00:02:09.280
a slower rate of closure after impact.
43
00:02:09.280 --> 00:02:14.140
And then lastly, the piece that we can't really tell from here is this is a 3D
44
00:02:14.140 --> 00:02:15.120
image.
45
00:02:15.120 --> 00:02:20.080
So we can look at the distance the club is away from where that T was.
46
00:02:20.080 --> 00:02:24.480
And often golfers who have the lower rate of closure have the later arc width.
47
00:02:24.480 --> 00:02:30.780
And so because their arms are extending more through the shot and the club is
48
00:02:30.780 --> 00:02:31.960
essentially
49
00:02:31.960 --> 00:02:37.770
working away from their body, the club may be further away, even though it's at
50
00:02:37.770 --> 00:02:38.320
the same
51
00:02:38.320 --> 00:02:42.200
angle, therefore it traveled a greater distance and therefore it moved a little
52
00:02:42.200 --> 00:02:42.960
bit slower.
53
00:02:42.960 --> 00:02:48.630
But one of the keys is, okay, this is a hard position right here in order to
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00:02:48.630 --> 00:02:49.680
really look
55
00:02:49.680 --> 00:02:50.680
at rate of closure.
56
00:02:50.680 --> 00:02:55.240
So where do we want to look?
57
00:02:55.240 --> 00:03:00.110
The classic other position that I've heard discussed is looking pretty much at
58
00:03:00.110 --> 00:03:00.480
when the
59
00:03:00.480 --> 00:03:07.600
club is parallel to the ground or shaft parallel right around here.
60
00:03:07.600 --> 00:03:12.240
And you will see that if we look back at that position.
61
00:03:12.240 --> 00:03:17.840
So probably closest to this frame here, you will see that there's enough of a
62
00:03:17.840 --> 00:03:18.840
difference
63
00:03:18.840 --> 00:03:19.840
here right?
64
00:03:19.840 --> 00:03:22.360
Phil Mickelson's club is pointing above the horizon.
65
00:03:22.360 --> 00:03:24.240
Matt Cooches is already pointing down.
66
00:03:24.240 --> 00:03:28.710
So in order to get the club face to rotate a certain amount around the shaft,
67
00:03:28.710 --> 00:03:29.440
it's going
68
00:03:29.440 --> 00:03:35.260
to have to rotate less covering about the same distance so it's going to move
69
00:03:35.260 --> 00:03:36.200
slower.
70
00:03:36.200 --> 00:03:39.680
But I would challenge you to look even closer.
71
00:03:39.680 --> 00:03:46.880
So whether it's a foot before impact or basically it's close to impact as you
72
00:03:46.880 --> 00:03:48.160
can, seeing how
73
00:03:48.160 --> 00:03:52.520
early they get the face pointed roughly at the golf ball.
74
00:03:52.520 --> 00:03:59.060
So you'll see with Phil through this phase right through here, there's not a
75
00:03:59.060 --> 00:03:59.900
lot of club
76
00:03:59.900 --> 00:04:02.560
face rotation right through here.
77
00:04:02.560 --> 00:04:06.280
There's not a lot of club face rotation, so the club is still pointing well out
78
00:04:06.280 --> 00:04:06.600
to the
79
00:04:06.600 --> 00:04:11.640
right and then it's not until well down here that it starts to straighten and
80
00:04:11.640 --> 00:04:12.520
it's straightening
81
00:04:12.520 --> 00:04:18.480
more from a result of straightening that right arm rather than twisting the
82
00:04:18.480 --> 00:04:19.320
club with
83
00:04:19.320 --> 00:04:20.720
the wrist.
84
00:04:20.720 --> 00:04:24.070
And when you're doing it more from straightening that arm, you're going to tend
85
00:04:24.070 --> 00:04:24.640
to reach that
86
00:04:24.640 --> 00:04:29.060
low or widest point sooner, which is going to decrease the resistance to
87
00:04:29.060 --> 00:04:29.920
twisting and
88
00:04:29.920 --> 00:04:34.240
therefore it's going to twist much higher.
89
00:04:34.240 --> 00:04:40.780
So looking before impact, you can see that roughly when I've used when the club
90
00:04:40.780 --> 00:04:41.200
is in
91
00:04:41.200 --> 00:04:45.470
front of the right foot, if it's still pointing well out to the right, you're
92
00:04:45.470 --> 00:04:46.280
going to have
93
00:04:46.280 --> 00:04:48.800
a higher rate of closure.
94
00:04:48.800 --> 00:04:53.870
Alright, so one of the better places to look at rate of closure is looking at
95
00:04:53.870 --> 00:04:54.520
the face
96
00:04:54.520 --> 00:04:55.520
on view.
97
00:04:55.520 --> 00:04:58.960
Actually one of the best is the overhead view, but that one's really hard to
98
00:04:58.960 --> 00:05:00.480
come by unless
99
00:05:00.480 --> 00:05:03.480
you have your own studio and have a fair amount of pros.
100
00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:07.620
So from the face on view, you can basically look at about how much of the club
101
00:05:07.620 --> 00:05:08.160
face you
102
00:05:08.160 --> 00:05:09.160
can see.
103
00:05:09.160 --> 00:05:15.020
And you'll see over here with Phil, the club face really is apparent well into
104
00:05:15.020 --> 00:05:15.880
the downswing.
105
00:05:15.880 --> 00:05:19.520
So roughly when it's even with his trail foot, you can still see a fair amount
106
00:05:19.520 --> 00:05:20.480
of it.
107
00:05:20.480 --> 00:05:25.440
So now over here on the right, we've got Matt Coocher and you'll see that by
108
00:05:25.440 --> 00:05:26.200
that right
109
00:05:26.200 --> 00:05:31.320
foot, it's really rotating and pointing more at the golf ball.
110
00:05:31.320 --> 00:05:35.240
So right about here where it's even with the right foot, you can see pretty
111
00:05:35.240 --> 00:05:35.920
much the whole
112
00:05:35.920 --> 00:05:36.920
face.
113
00:05:36.920 --> 00:05:39.840
We're here, you can see a lot less of it.
114
00:05:39.840 --> 00:05:44.030
So he's already got it rotated towards the face or towards the golf ball, so
115
00:05:44.030 --> 00:05:44.640
then it's
116
00:05:44.640 --> 00:05:47.840
not going to have to rotate quite as much going into it.
117
00:05:47.840 --> 00:05:51.670
Phil on the other hand still has a fair amount of closing that he's going to
118
00:05:51.670 --> 00:05:53.120
have to do and
119
00:05:53.120 --> 00:05:56.840
he does it really in those last few frames.
120
00:05:56.840 --> 00:06:01.840
So even though they get to a similar look of club face rotation at that follow
121
00:06:01.840 --> 00:06:02.440
through
122
00:06:02.440 --> 00:06:06.120
position, they got there in very different ways.
123
00:06:06.120 --> 00:06:11.880
You can also see from this view, you can see more of that width aspect where he
124
00:06:11.880 --> 00:06:12.440
's reaching
125
00:06:12.440 --> 00:06:15.960
the widest point of his swing sooner.
126
00:06:15.960 --> 00:06:21.620
So when the down the line camera we're looking from this view here, the club is
127
00:06:21.620 --> 00:06:22.280
going to
128
00:06:22.280 --> 00:06:27.960
reach about the same height as Matt Coocher's would a little bit later and that
129
00:06:27.960 --> 00:06:28.720
can also
130
00:06:28.720 --> 00:06:33.240
kind of skew the look of how much the club face is actually rotated.
131
00:06:33.240 --> 00:06:37.790
So when you're trying to analyze club face rate of closure, you want to look at
132
00:06:37.790 --> 00:06:38.240
it just
133
00:06:38.240 --> 00:06:43.840
before impact, not after and sometimes down the line is a harder camera view to
134
00:06:43.840 --> 00:06:44.680
see rather
135
00:06:44.680 --> 00:06:47.120
than face on or overhead.
136
00:06:47.120 --> 00:06:51.390
Now here's a quick image to help with that idea of looking at the club after
137
00:06:51.390 --> 00:06:52.160
impact.
138
00:06:52.160 --> 00:06:56.520
Now these are amateurs hit on the swing vision and you'll see that when it's
139
00:06:56.520 --> 00:06:57.600
hit outside
140
00:06:57.600 --> 00:07:03.800
of the center of mass, it's going to cause a fair amount of club face rotation.
141
00:07:03.800 --> 00:07:07.820
So if you were to take a look at the image right about there, you might say
142
00:07:07.820 --> 00:07:08.520
that that
143
00:07:08.520 --> 00:07:13.030
was held open and therefore be slower, but if you were to look at this image
144
00:07:13.030 --> 00:07:13.680
here, it's
145
00:07:13.680 --> 00:07:15.200
still pointed fairly to the right.
146
00:07:15.200 --> 00:07:20.060
So my guess is that it's higher and unfortunately a lot of the golf swings that
147
00:07:20.060 --> 00:07:20.920
have a higher
148
00:07:20.920 --> 00:07:27.070
rate of closure tend to have more of a toe miss and therefore it's going to
149
00:07:27.070 --> 00:07:27.920
skew the
150
00:07:27.920 --> 00:07:30.280
look of it after impact.
151
00:07:30.280 --> 00:07:36.160
This would be more of the vertical gear effect from hitting it really low on
152
00:07:36.160 --> 00:07:37.200
the face.
153
00:07:37.200 --> 00:07:43.340
So now here we have Jim Furek, another lower rate of closure golfer and you'll
154
00:07:43.340 --> 00:07:44.120
see that
155
00:07:44.120 --> 00:07:48.390
he gets to a very different look here in the follow through than Matt Coocher
156
00:07:48.390 --> 00:07:49.080
did, but
157
00:07:49.080 --> 00:07:52.440
the rate of closure numbers are very similar.
158
00:07:52.440 --> 00:07:57.060
Now you can see that he gets the club through that key zone here pointing at
159
00:07:57.060 --> 00:07:57.960
the golf ball
160
00:07:57.960 --> 00:08:02.740
or closer to the target pretty early, it's not pointed out to the right quite
161
00:08:02.740 --> 00:08:03.440
as much.
162
00:08:03.440 --> 00:08:07.550
From this face on view, again by the time he gets even with that right foot,
163
00:08:07.550 --> 00:08:08.080
you'll
164
00:08:08.080 --> 00:08:12.090
see that the club is pointing more at the golf ball or more at the target so it
165
00:08:12.090 --> 00:08:12.480
's not
166
00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:15.600
going to have to rotate a ton through there.
167
00:08:15.600 --> 00:08:20.550
So I hope this helps you clarify the rate of closure discussion and how you can
168
00:08:20.550 --> 00:08:22.240
use video
169
00:08:22.240 --> 00:08:23.680
to identify.
170
00:08:23.680 --> 00:08:26.930
You're definitely not going to be able to get a numeric range as far as how
171
00:08:26.930 --> 00:08:27.400
fast you're
172
00:08:27.400 --> 00:08:32.600
actually closing, but you may be able to categorize yourself as more of a high
173
00:08:32.600 --> 00:08:33.800
rate, low rate,
174
00:08:33.800 --> 00:08:34.800
medium rate.
175
00:08:34.800 --> 00:08:36.640
So here's one last example.
176
00:08:36.640 --> 00:08:41.010
By looking at rate of closure in this way, you'll be able to understand why
177
00:08:41.010 --> 00:08:41.680
Jordan's
178
00:08:41.680 --> 00:08:47.710
beef has more of a medium rate of closure, he's not even really on the super
179
00:08:47.710 --> 00:08:48.800
low side,
180
00:08:48.800 --> 00:08:53.390
even though he has that kind of hold off look in the follow through that often
181
00:08:53.390 --> 00:08:54.440
gets attributed
182
00:08:54.440 --> 00:08:56.320
to a lower rate of closure.
183
00:08:56.320 --> 00:08:59.420
You can see that the club face is pointing a bit out to the right, not as much
184
00:08:59.420 --> 00:09:00.080
as Phil's,
185
00:09:00.080 --> 00:09:05.840
not as low as Furex or Kuchar, he's kind of more in the middle of the pack.
186
00:09:05.840 --> 00:09:09.700
From that face on view, you can still see a bit of the club face as it
187
00:09:09.700 --> 00:09:10.840
approaches more
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that right foot and then it closes there on the way through.
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So by using a more of a scientific or critical eye, hopefully you can
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understand a little
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bit better the rate of closure discussion.
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