WEBVTT

1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.560
Hi, in this GolfSmart Insight, I'm going to help you understand the forces as

2
00:00:04.560 --> 00:00:05.080
they apply

3
00:00:05.080 --> 00:00:06.280
in the golf swing.

4
00:00:06.280 --> 00:00:11.410
I know that there's a lot of confusion out there about what the forces are, how

5
00:00:11.410 --> 00:00:11.920
you can

6
00:00:11.920 --> 00:00:15.240
see them or if you can see them, and the general patterns.

7
00:00:15.240 --> 00:00:18.390
So in this video, I'm going to hopefully clarify some of those forces,

8
00:00:18.390 --> 00:00:19.880
especially as they relate

9
00:00:19.880 --> 00:00:24.160
to the in-plane movement, sometimes referred to as alpha.

10
00:00:24.160 --> 00:00:28.110
All right, before we look at how it relates to the golf swing, I've got this

11
00:00:28.110 --> 00:00:28.880
simple little

12
00:00:28.880 --> 00:00:34.150
drawing to help you understand the net force, because I think it's often

13
00:00:34.150 --> 00:00:35.400
confused for what

14
00:00:35.400 --> 00:00:38.760
a golfer is trying to do versus what is actually happening.

15
00:00:38.760 --> 00:00:43.910
Okay, so in this scenario, I've got a cliff, right, and then there's a weight

16
00:00:43.910 --> 00:00:44.600
hanging

17
00:00:44.600 --> 00:00:48.720
around a pulley being held by this gentleman here.

18
00:00:48.720 --> 00:00:53.730
Now that pulley is not a string, it's a cable, and that's going to be important

19
00:00:53.730 --> 00:00:54.560
for this third

20
00:00:54.560 --> 00:00:55.560
situation.

21
00:00:55.560 --> 00:00:59.960
Okay, now I've got the weight on a cable attached to the guy.

22
00:00:59.960 --> 00:01:02.480
There's a couple of different things that could happen.

23
00:01:02.480 --> 00:01:06.840
Scenario one, he's kind of lowering it down slowly.

24
00:01:06.840 --> 00:01:10.890
Scenario two, he's backing up and he's actually pulling it upward, and then

25
00:01:10.890 --> 00:01:12.240
scenario three,

26
00:01:12.240 --> 00:01:15.920
because it's a cable, he's actually pushing it down.

27
00:01:15.920 --> 00:01:18.920
So he's having it fall faster than gravity.

28
00:01:18.920 --> 00:01:23.970
Okay, in the first scenario, actually the second scenario is probably the

29
00:01:23.970 --> 00:01:24.760
easiest, so

30
00:01:24.760 --> 00:01:25.760
let's start with that.

31
00:01:25.760 --> 00:01:30.520
So in the second scenario, right here, he's got the cable moving up this way.

32
00:01:30.520 --> 00:01:36.880
He is clearly pulling on the cable back towards him like this.

33
00:01:36.880 --> 00:01:39.670
That's where the net force would be going, and it would be greater than

34
00:01:39.670 --> 00:01:40.360
whatever the

35
00:01:40.360 --> 00:01:43.400
weight is with gravity.

36
00:01:43.400 --> 00:01:48.960
On this second example, we've got the weight going down, so he's slowly letting

37
00:01:48.960 --> 00:01:49.720
it down,

38
00:01:49.720 --> 00:01:54.110
so his hands and everything would be moving this way, but because the weight is

39
00:01:54.110 --> 00:01:54.520
going

40
00:01:54.520 --> 00:02:00.560
down slower than gravity, the net force is back towards him.

41
00:02:00.560 --> 00:02:04.510
It's going to be in the same direction as him pulling up just to a lesser

42
00:02:04.510 --> 00:02:05.560
degree or a lesser

43
00:02:05.560 --> 00:02:07.160
magnitude.

44
00:02:07.160 --> 00:02:12.170
It's only an example three where if he was to accelerate this down greater than

45
00:02:12.170 --> 00:02:12.760
just what

46
00:02:12.760 --> 00:02:17.980
gravity would be doing, that he would actually have the force and his hand

47
00:02:17.980 --> 00:02:19.240
direction going

48
00:02:19.240 --> 00:02:21.880
out towards the pulley like so.

49
00:02:21.880 --> 00:02:27.640
Now we'll talk about where this relates to the golf swing, but the common thing

50
00:02:27.640 --> 00:02:28.160
I hear

51
00:02:28.160 --> 00:02:32.780
is, okay, if we want the forces coming back in towards you, that you need to be

52
00:02:32.780 --> 00:02:33.280
really

53
00:02:33.280 --> 00:02:34.920
pulling up on the handle.

54
00:02:34.920 --> 00:02:39.050
We'll understand that if you create a ton of club at speed, and this weight is

55
00:02:39.050 --> 00:02:39.600
pulling

56
00:02:39.600 --> 00:02:43.040
away from you, or the golf club is swinging away from you, you're going to have

57
00:02:43.040 --> 00:02:43.440
a really

58
00:02:43.440 --> 00:02:48.640
high force pulling in towards you, even though your arms are extending and kind

59
00:02:48.640 --> 00:02:49.440
of letting

60
00:02:49.440 --> 00:02:53.390
that weight kind of pull your arms out, so that's an important thing to

61
00:02:53.390 --> 00:02:54.120
understand that

62
00:02:54.120 --> 00:03:00.540
the net force is a relationship of the physics happening to you or by you, not

63
00:03:00.540 --> 00:03:01.720
necessarily

64
00:03:01.720 --> 00:03:04.780
what you're trying to do and what you're feeling.

65
00:03:04.780 --> 00:03:08.640
Now let's take that rope on a string analogy and apply it to the golf swing.

66
00:03:08.640 --> 00:03:13.680
Now let's specifically look at going normal down to the bottom, so pulling up

67
00:03:13.680 --> 00:03:14.200
on the

68
00:03:14.200 --> 00:03:18.000
handle and having the force going more up towards you.

69
00:03:18.000 --> 00:03:22.740
The orange dots that I have drawn represent roughly where the center of mass

70
00:03:22.740 --> 00:03:23.520
would be,

71
00:03:23.520 --> 00:03:27.560
so just behind the shaft in the direction of a club head kind of like this.

72
00:03:27.560 --> 00:03:31.570
Again, this is incredibly rough, but we don't have to get too specific to be

73
00:03:31.570 --> 00:03:32.240
able to see

74
00:03:32.240 --> 00:03:34.280
this general pattern.

75
00:03:34.280 --> 00:03:40.690
If we take a look at these dots and if we imagine just the vertical change or

76
00:03:40.690 --> 00:03:42.040
just the change

77
00:03:42.040 --> 00:03:46.070
towards the ground kind of like this, you can see as you get down here towards

78
00:03:46.070 --> 00:03:47.240
the bottom,

79
00:03:47.240 --> 00:03:51.120
the vertical change between the dots gets smaller and smaller.

80
00:03:51.120 --> 00:03:56.590
That means that the center of mass is not accelerating down towards the ground

81
00:03:56.590 --> 00:03:57.240
because

82
00:03:57.240 --> 00:04:02.680
the, if it was, then the space between these dots would get bigger and bigger.

83
00:04:02.680 --> 00:04:08.040
So since the distance between the dots is getting slightly smaller, that means

84
00:04:08.040 --> 00:04:08.440
that

85
00:04:08.440 --> 00:04:13.480
the force would be working up away from the ground.

86
00:04:13.480 --> 00:04:18.220
So when we get down here where the swing, where the club has a flatish path, it

87
00:04:18.220 --> 00:04:18.920
was moving

88
00:04:18.920 --> 00:04:23.120
very vertically through here and then it has a flatish path.

89
00:04:23.120 --> 00:04:28.850
That means somewhere around here, which ends up being roughly when those hands

90
00:04:28.850 --> 00:04:29.680
are in front

91
00:04:29.680 --> 00:04:36.290
of the thigh, it starts to flatten out and therefore the force would be working

92
00:04:36.290 --> 00:04:36.780
away

93
00:04:36.780 --> 00:04:43.110
from the ground from, let's say, the frame just before this, all the way down

94
00:04:43.110 --> 00:04:43.600
through

95
00:04:43.600 --> 00:04:45.720
and past impact.

96
00:04:45.720 --> 00:04:52.050
So you can see that unless you had an angle of attack somewhere around 90

97
00:04:52.050 --> 00:04:52.800
degrees, you're

98
00:04:52.800 --> 00:04:58.610
probably going to have the net force working away from the ground or towards

99
00:04:58.610 --> 00:04:59.240
you.

100
00:04:59.240 --> 00:05:03.310
What really matters is how you apply that force away from the ground, whether

101
00:05:03.310 --> 00:05:03.720
you do

102
00:05:03.720 --> 00:05:09.590
it more from your body, whether you do it more by pulling and bending your arms

103
00:05:09.590 --> 00:05:09.960
.

104
00:05:09.960 --> 00:05:14.400
But as you've seen, you don't necessarily have to feel like you pull your hands

105
00:05:14.400 --> 00:05:15.240
in closer

106
00:05:15.240 --> 00:05:19.800
to your body in order to get the proper net force pattern.

107
00:05:19.800 --> 00:05:22.800
The other instruction that I commonly hear is down at the bottom, you want to

108
00:05:22.800 --> 00:05:23.320
be pulling

109
00:05:23.320 --> 00:05:26.000
not only up, but you want to be pulling in.

110
00:05:26.000 --> 00:05:29.950
So this is a little bit trickier to see the easiest way to see this is actually

111
00:05:29.950 --> 00:05:30.160
from an

112
00:05:30.160 --> 00:05:36.110
overhead cam, but think of it in the same light as what we did from the face-on

113
00:05:36.110 --> 00:05:36.480
.

114
00:05:36.480 --> 00:05:41.590
We can see that at this phase in the downswing, the center of mass is having

115
00:05:41.590 --> 00:05:43.120
some clear movement

116
00:05:43.120 --> 00:05:44.640
out towards the golf ball.

117
00:05:44.640 --> 00:05:49.380
Now remember, if it slows down its movement out towards the golf ball or it

118
00:05:49.380 --> 00:05:50.680
changes direction

119
00:05:50.680 --> 00:05:54.000
in the center of mass starts moving away from the golf ball, that means that

120
00:05:54.000 --> 00:05:54.520
there was

121
00:05:54.520 --> 00:05:57.920
a net force away from the golf ball.

122
00:05:57.920 --> 00:06:03.420
So down here at the bottom where you can see that the path of the club starts

123
00:06:03.420 --> 00:06:04.160
working

124
00:06:04.160 --> 00:06:09.530
back up and in, that means that well before then, there was a net force that is

125
00:06:09.530 --> 00:06:10.240
working

126
00:06:10.240 --> 00:06:11.680
away from the golf ball.

127
00:06:11.680 --> 00:06:16.320
So you can see that in order to make a swing where you didn't have the net

128
00:06:16.320 --> 00:06:17.400
forces working

129
00:06:17.400 --> 00:06:22.730
back up and in or away from the ground and away from the golf ball, it would be

130
00:06:22.730 --> 00:06:24.040
very challenging.

131
00:06:24.040 --> 00:06:27.960
In fact, it would not look very much like a golf swing at all.

132
00:06:27.960 --> 00:06:32.790
The most important part is how you create these forces, not necessarily what

133
00:06:32.790 --> 00:06:33.520
the forces

134
00:06:33.520 --> 00:06:35.400
actually are.

135
00:06:35.400 --> 00:06:39.390
There's still a lot of stuff that we can learn from investigating these net

136
00:06:39.390 --> 00:06:40.160
forces, but the

137
00:06:40.160 --> 00:06:44.280
overall patterns kind of make sense with the general movement patterns.

138
00:06:44.280 --> 00:06:48.240
If you're not sure what the general movement patterns are or therefore what the

139
00:06:48.240 --> 00:06:48.800
arm should

140
00:06:48.800 --> 00:06:53.120
be doing in the backswing or transition or the release, either subscribe to our

141
00:06:53.120 --> 00:06:53.640
YouTube

142
00:06:53.640 --> 00:06:57.900
channel, that way you can get updates as soon as we post them online, or if you

143
00:06:57.900 --> 00:06:58.440
want to

144
00:06:58.440 --> 00:07:03.180
get into the real nitty gritty, head over to golfsmartacademy.com, sign up for

145
00:07:03.180 --> 00:07:03.640
a free

146
00:07:03.640 --> 00:07:07.900
membership, and then you can take a look at the concept videos and the drill

147
00:07:07.900 --> 00:07:08.560
videos to

148
00:07:08.560 --> 00:07:12.600
help you understand all the details as far as what the body should be doing

149
00:07:12.600 --> 00:07:13.280
during the

150
00:07:13.280 --> 00:07:17.450
different phases of the swing and how to recognize the feedback as to if you're

151
00:07:17.450 --> 00:07:18.360
actually doing

152
00:07:18.360 --> 00:07:19.360
it or not.