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Axial Velocity Explained with 3D

Rotating the shaft closed on the downswing is a trademark of any elite golf swing. It can be hard to see on video but 3D reveals a powerful pattern. In this video, see the theory behind the suggested motorcycle movement.

Tags: Not Enough Distance, Member Question, Concept, Advanced

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This video is explaining axial velocity.

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So you'll see that I'm a big proponent of the motorcycle move and kind of getting the face to close.

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So in this video we're going to take a look at the 3D graphs of the demonstrate axial velocity.

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So axial velocity is looking at how fast the club is rotating kind of like so.

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When it opens, you'll see the line go negative and when it closes, you'll see the line go positive.

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The club will be like this and then naturally in the back swing, I'll have a little bit of opening.

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You'll see it go negative and then you'll see very different patterns for how the club closes during the downswing.

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One of the trends that you will see with Torpros is that they tend to close it faster earlier, which is why I'm a big fan of this motorcycle movement.

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We're getting the club face to start closing either as I'm ending the backswing or as I'm starting the downswing.

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A common amateur issue is you'll see almost virtually no club face closing until it gets down to about here and then you'll have to close it very quickly.

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My background from other sports is taught me that having smooth movements tends to work better than having complex or rapid movements.

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So just like when I was learning tennis or when I was playing competitive tennis, you would want kind of this feeling of a smooth release where the ball got hit in the middle.

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For the same reason, I like to have this kind of smooth, gradual closing in the club face, the entire downswing.

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Instead of having it stay open for most of it and then close down to the bottom.

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So as you're looking through the graphs, try to imagine how the swing would look.

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But the graphs are going to show the actual rate of how fast that club face is closing during the golf swing.

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Okay, so now we have an example of an axial velocity graph.

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So the position I have right here is where they are in space at this green line.

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So roughly around when they start really pouring on the motorcycle movement.

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This graph is a timeline of a golf swing. So the first line represents a dress.

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This is top of the swing, this is impact and then finish.

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So further away from this horizontal black line, the faster it's moving.

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So if it's negative it down way down here, it'll be rotating open quickly.

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And the higher up it is the faster it's closing.

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So basically what you see is not a lot of rotation during the takeaway, pretty much one piece.

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Little openings in closing during the backswing, but mostly opening.

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And then you'll see right around here before the top of the swing, before the club changes direction.

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So going to start closing the club face, closes it more rapidly.

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And then right about here it really takes off and it starts closing the face.

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So that's right around this point in time in space is when that point in time on the graph happens to occur.

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It'll make more sense or it'll be easier to visualize when we take a look at a few others, both pros and amateurs.

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Okay, so here's another pro.

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You'll see he has a little bit more of the opening during the backswing and during early transition.

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But you'll see right around here. He starts closing it and then right about where I have it in time in space.

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So well up here soon after he started the downswing sequence he's now going to start ramping up.

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You'll see a bigger difference when we get to comparing the three amateurs.

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Okay, here's one more pro. You can see fairly flat during take away, opening during the backswing.

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Starts closing. There's in order to kind of hinge the wrists in transition.

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You'll see a little bit of this dip and then right around this point in time somewhere here.

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You can see that's well above where most of you may be thinking about closing the club face.

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This is when he's actually starting to rotate the club face closed.

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Now remember if you start closing the club face early and it causes the ball to hook,

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it means that there's other things going on and you holding the club face open is kind of a contribution to your overall pattern.

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So now we've got all three pros on screen. You can kind of take a look. You can pause the video and look for some of the details.

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But you can see in general that they are starting to close the club face while the club is still well up in the air

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or just after they've started to transition.

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Now this is the first of the three amateurs. So you'll see slightly different pattern.

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Not too dissimilar in the backswing maybe a little bit more opening during the take away.

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But then you'll see this flat line through transition where basically there's no rotation of the club.

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Then you'll actually see it open well into the downswing. You'll see he's now down to about belly button height

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where the others were up at kind of eye height or shoulder height or however you want to look at it.

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He still has not started to close yet. This is right about when he's going to start closing the club face.

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So you'll see that he doesn't have nearly as much time to rotate the club face closed.

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So he's going to have to do it very quickly in order to get it in the same orientation.

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Here's another amateur. So we can see opening and then that same little flat line during transition.

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You can see it's not until well down here that he starts to close the club face.

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So this is a common pattern that we're going to see with a lot of amateurs who struggle with their transition and release.

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This is kind of a one of those graphs that kind of tells a lot of the story as to why they're swing maybe being built the way that it is.

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And then lastly, this is a scratch golfer of very very good, very accomplished amateur.

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So you'll see a still a kind of flat line with a little bit of closing but then you'll see it opens.

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So he's a little bit higher up than those first two were who were more in the 10 to 20 handy cap range.

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This is a scratch golfer so he's closing it a little bit early but nowhere near as early as the three tour pros.

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So now if we're comparing all three of those amateurs, you can see that they are starting to close the club face around the same time and space.

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You can pause this to look for any of the little nuances and variances.

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But I just want you to see kind of the overall pattern where most golfers tend to not close the club face early enough or aggressively enough to get into the same impact positions that the tour pros get into.

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And lastly, this is all six of the graphs that you got to see so that you can compare.

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You've got the three tour pros up top and you can see the club position.

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And then we've got the three amateurs on the bottom and you can also see the club positions.

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You can see in general the pros are going to close it earlier and faster or more aggressively.

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Where the amateurs are going to close it later and then they have to close it very rapidly during the release as opposed to closing it a little bit.

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Earlier during transition.

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There's always variations in there some pros who close it later some pros who close it earlier.

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But in general the earliest amateurs are still usually later than the latest tour pros.

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So if you're struggling with getting into the impact position, hopefully this helps you understand what has to happen with the club.

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And then maybe it will make a little bit more sense why we're asking you to do some of the body movements during the transition and release some of the arm and club movements to help make this club face rotating or rotation.

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Actually create the ideal impact positions that tour pros tend to demonstrate with their stock tour swing.

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