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.

Understanding Power Sources in Your Golf Swing

After this video, you'll be able to:

  • Identify how your lower body initiates power during the swing.
  • Understand the sequencing of body segments for optimal speed transfer.
  • Learn to analyze your swing through the examples of Adam Scott and Rory McIlroy.

Explore how different segments of your body contribute to power in your golf swing. This video breaks down the roles of your lower body, core, and arms to help you improve your transition and speed.

Video Transcript
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In this analysis video, we're going to take a look at power sources and how

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they affect the golf swing.

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If you remember from the concept video, we're going to essentially break the

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body down into three different segments.

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So we're going to look at the lower body, the core, and then the shoulders and

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the arms.

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These are the three major segments that can create speed, and we're going to

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see how they work during transition.

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So first, we have two examples. We have Adam Scott and Rory McElroy.

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So we're going to go up to the top of the swing and look at their transition.

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Now, if you remember from the concept video, or if you've looked at a lot of k

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inematic sequence,

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you can see that the maximum acceleration for the lower body is going to

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typically happen right about there.

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Followed by the chest, right about there, followed by the lead arm, right about

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there.

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So what you'll see is that the majority of the speed creation is occurring in

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the early part of the downswing,

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and then the second half of the downswing, the release, is going to be more

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continuing to build that power,

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but more effectively transferring that power as efficiently as you can to the

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club head.

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So if we take a look at Adam Scott from the top of the swing, you'll see his

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lower body begin to rotate first,

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followed by his chest rotating kind of right in that area.

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And that brings his arms into the delivery position so that they're ready to

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fire.

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So he's primarily getting his speed through the big muscles in his hips and the

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big muscles in his trunk and shoulder blades.

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He's then using his arms down during the release to transfer that speed to the

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golf ball.

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Over here on the right, we're going to have a face-on view of Rory Macquarie so

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we can see the same thing.

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You can see as the club is still going backwards, his lower body is starting to

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translate and rotate,

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and then you'll see his trunk starting to unwind kind of right in there.

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So he gets into that similar delivery position that Adam Scott was in with some

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minor style differences,

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but a similar way of getting there using the lower body in the trunk.

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Those tend to be the biggest sources of power, but we'll get into some others

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as we go through other examples of how to create power.

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And one of the things that I stress is that the most consistent and the most

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powerful golfers tend to use their entire body.

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Now one of the ways that I like to look at power is doing this little kind of

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scrubbing the clip back and forth.

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Kind of like so, or almost like a little pump drill.

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And looking for where the majority of the movement is happening and then

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imagining if it was part of an exercise, what muscles would they be using.

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So over here on the left we can see Graham McDowell and you can see that there

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's a lot of movement from his hips and legs.

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There's not a lot of movement from his trunk, and there's actually a fair

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amount of movement in the trail elbow.

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If you were to, I should say, trail shoulder.

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If you were to look at this little window right here, you'll see that that

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right arm is kind of getting in position behind the shaft so that he'll have

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something that he can then push with.

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And so what you'll see is during this early part of the downswing, it's largely

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driven by the lower body, but with kind of a secondary accomplice of the

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shoulder.

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Now if we go over here and we look at Jason Day, we're going to pump through

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kind of that same window.

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Now what we'll see with Jason Day is you'll see a similar movement of the lower

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body because it's very hard to be a good driver of the golf ball without having

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your lower body initiate the downswing.

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And he's doing it in a little bit of translation which we can't see from this

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view, but he's also doing it in rotation.

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Now what we can see with his is one of his big secondary movements is that

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upper body is starting to back up.

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So if I were to draw this box just to give us a line of where his head is, you

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'll see that as he starts down, he's going into a little bit more of a back

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extension.

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So if we were to look at this area right in here, you'll see that yes, the

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lower body is rotating, but his back is going into more of a reverse thrust or

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an extension movement.

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Compare that with Graham McDowell over here on the left where his lower body is

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rotating and his trunk is actually flexing a little bit more down.

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So this is just going to lead towards different consistency patterns and path

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issues.

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Typically, the more that we go into extension early, I'll add Jason Day on the

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right, the more that the path is going to come from the inside, at least from

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the body's perspective.

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He could easily make adjustments with the arms to change the path, but if

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everything stayed the same, that simple extension is going to cause the path to

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be a little bit more shallow.

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Over here on the left, that simple flexing down would be a little bit of a

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steepening move, which unless he did something else would cause the path to be

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a little bit more steep and a little bit more left.

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You'll see that in Graham's case, he then uses a fair amount of side bend and

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translation to accompany that movement, which is great for driving the ball,

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and part of the reason why he is one of the more consistent drivers of the golf

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ball.

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Over here on Jason Day's side, you will see that he has a little bit less of

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that, but still gets into very good impact alignments and uses his arms in a

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little bit more vertical fashion than what Graham McDowell is doing.

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So we'll just simply adjust his ball flight and cause him to be a little bit

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more erratic off the tee.

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Now let's take a look at Jason Duffner, and we'll start to do some comparisons

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more with different power sources reflected in different parts of the game.

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So on the left, we have Jason with a driver, and you'll see that lower body

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during this little pump move has a fair amount of translation to where average

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is somewhere around four to five inches.

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You'll see that basically it's about, if you imagine that a pelvis is roughly

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12 inches wide, then typically it's going to be about a third to a half of a

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pelvis width that he's going to shift.

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So you can see that his lower body is initiating the downswing, but you can

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also see if you look at his trunk that in terms of what looks like it's moving

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a greater amount of movement or moving faster, you would tend to see that his

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shoulders and his left

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are flat, so where I would be looking would be kind of in this zone right in

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here, and as he shifts onto his left side, you'll see that that tends to unwind

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almost faster than his lower body.

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So if you come over here to the one on the right, we'll see even less a drive

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from the lower body, and you can see right through here, right in this phase,

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you can see a fair amount of movement in the lead shoulder and arm.

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If you look at how much is going on right in here, during this little phase,

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you'll see that the lead arm is getting pulled a little bit away from the upper

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body and the upper body is rotating fairly aggressively.

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Not so much that he's driving with his lower body, so when looking at this, I

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would say that he's using more of his core and his shoulders to create the hit,

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especially with the iron, and he's using a little bit more lower body, but as a

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whole he tends to have more of a core or shoulder dominant pattern.

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Now let's take a look at Lee Westwood, because he does something that's a

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little bit different than the typical Tour Pro, so we're going to look at his

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power sources through the transition, and you'll see that his lower body is

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going to initiate, but you can see that that lead arm is getting pulled off the

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upper body fairly quickly.

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So he's another kind of Jason Duffer shoulder dominant player, but instead of

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having his dominant core movement be rotation, you'll see that he's doing more

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of a flex, or almost a crunch.

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Now it gets exaggerated as he gets towards impact, but you can see him really

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starting the movement right about here.

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That's where he's doing more of a crunch with his core, as opposed to a

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rotation, or a back extension in the Jason Day case.

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So here we'll see the lower body pushing fairly aggressively, but it doesn't

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rotate a ton because he's turning that push into more of this crunch motion

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through the core.

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It's one of the reasons why the hips are kind of a bridge joint, as they can

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either work to support the core, or to support the lower body.

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You'll clearly see that arm getting pulled right through here, so he's more of

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that lead shoulder kind of chop mechanic, and you can see him going into that

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fairly aggressive crunch, which gets his chest very close to the golf ball.

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This pattern would tend to be better with the short irons and have a little bit

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more trouble off the tee, but Lee Westwood has been a pretty good ball striker

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for the last decade, so he shows that regardless of what the tendencies are,

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you can make virtually anything work.

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Now, well, most golfers will have a dominant power source, or a cluster of

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dominant power sources.

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What you'll see is that the best players in the world are able to adjust their

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power sources depending on the requirements for that particular shot.

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So here we have former number one Luke Donald, and over on the right we have a

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driver swing and over on the left he's hitting a wedge.

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What you'll see is with his driver swing, his natural dominant power source is

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going to be very much a lower body jump, or a vertical movement of a lower body

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, combined with a side crunch, or right side bend from his upper body.

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So as we get him to delivery position kind of right in here, you can see that

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his left shoulder has already gotten high, and he's had a ton of vertical

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thrust through his legs.

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Now over here with the wedge, what you'll see is that he doesn't use his lower

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body in quite the same vertical fashion, in fact he uses it in more of a

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rotation.

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So when we get the hands at the same point, you can see that his right shoulder

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is actually still higher than his left, because he hasn't really used his core

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in a right side bend fashion, he's used it more in a rotational fashion.

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You'll also see that even though the lower body is moving, it's not really

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driving the movement.

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As we continue down, you'll see that it's more his extension of his right arm,

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combined with that rotation of his chest, that is really his engine for this

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wedge shot.

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Where, over here on the right, you can clearly see that it's his lower body and

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his side bend from the core that is driving this movement, and then the arms

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extend much later as a method of transferring the speed.

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So while it's important to recognize your dominant power source and what its

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strengths are, it's also important to be able to shift power sources if you

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want to reach your ultimate potential.

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And I'm sure some of you are wondering about special populations, so let's take

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a look at some golfers from the senior tour, and then a few golfers from the L

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PEA tour.

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You'll see that the tendency that we're looking for is to use your entire body.

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So here we have Bernhard Longer, who's done very well on the senior tour, and

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you'll see that it's that lower body driving, combined with his core rotation,

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and a little bit of side bend because he's hitting it off the tee.

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But it's primarily that lower body and core that's driving the initial part of

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his downswing.

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Over here on the right, we have Gary Holberg, who's another great ball striker

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on the senior PGA Tour.

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As we take him up to the top of the swing, you'll see that lower body and core,

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again controlling and driving the majority of the swing, or at least the early

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part where he's creating speed, and then his arms are going to transfer that

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speed much later down in the swing.

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And a couple more from the senior PGA Tour, so here we have Tom Watson, who's

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kind of the ageless one who's still able to compete on the regular tour, at

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least at the British Opens.

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You'll see that even though he has a very vertical arm height, you'll see that

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he tends to get that early movement from his lower body, followed by that

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rotation of his trunk and his core.

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So he has that early lateral movement and rotational movement from the pelvis,

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and then rotation from the core, and then he transfers that speed and energy

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through his arms and hands during the hit.

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Over here on the right, we have the unorthodox swing of Jim Thorpe.

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So we will see that lower body initiate the movement, followed by kind of a

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crunch and big side bend from the upper body.

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So he tends to get a lot of his power from his hips and trunk, and I know that

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we're talking about power here, but it'd be hard to not mention the

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exaggeration of his motorcycle move during the downswing and through the hit.

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So it shows that a lot of these pieces can be seen and applied, even in the

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more unorthodox swings.

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And let's take a look at a few LPGA swings.

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Now one of the things that's worth noting is, if we look at muscle fiber

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composition, in general, ladies are going to have, compared to the average male

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, about 70% of the muscle fibers in their lower body, and about 50% of the

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number of muscle fibers in their upper body.

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So proportionately, their lower bodies are going to be stronger.

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As a result, you're going to see more lower body dominant swings, but as Susan

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Patterson demonstrates here, they're going to be blended with the core and the

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upper body.

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In fact, she has a little bit more upper body involvement, as you can see that

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shoulder and lap pulling kind of right in here than your average LPGA girl.

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Over here on the right, we have Lexi Thompson as one of the examples of someone

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who has a very lower body dominant swing.

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So you can see a ton of lower body rotation and a ton of that trunk side bend.

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Those two things create a lot of speed, and then she uses a little bit of that

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vertical thrust and lip as she transfers the energy into the golf ball.

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But just because a woman tends to have an advantage in the lower body does not

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mean that they will fall pervy and only use it.

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So over here on the right, we have an amateur relative beginner who's

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controlling more of the swing with the upper body rotation.

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You can see that lead shoulder rotating around and that trail arm kind of

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pushing against the club.

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While over here on the left, you would see a little bit more of the typically

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expected over use of the legs and the lower back as a way to create speed,

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which will tend to cause, in her case, too much of a shallow angle of attack.

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So here we have two older gentlemen who have more of an upper body dominant and

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more of a crunch dominant swing.

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So they would fall into the category of more of a Lee Westwood, except for the

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fact that they don't use their lower body quite as much as Lee Westwood, so it

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becomes very upper body dominant.

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You'll tend to see that people who stand up in their backswing are going to be

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loading this kind of chop movement, so you'll see that he's doing more of a

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lead arm pull and an upper body crunch to create the speed, and then he has to

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stand up and flip his hands late in order to get that speed that he's created

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somewhere around the golf ball.

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We can see a similar pattern here, so if we go into the backswing you can see a

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stand-up followed by that chop movement, and even though he gets the club on a

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decent path, because of the chop movement being his dominant power source, he's

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not going to be able to have the angle of attack to have the amount of side

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bend and the bottom of the swing out in front of the golf ball.

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So he tends to struggle with thin and top shots as he's demonstrating here.

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Now while power sources are very primal and tied to pressure and they're

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extremely important, I want you to use a little example to show you that they

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're not everything.

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So over here on the right we have a golfer who's using primarily a power source

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movement of back extension and side bend.

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So you can see that that back extension and side bend is going to cause a path

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that's going very into out and he hits some pretty big hooks.

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Now if we wanted to change his path, we would actually have to change some of

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his power sources because his power sources are creating a very shallow path,

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and his club is following along because he's doing a pretty good job with his

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arms and hands to work with that.

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Over here on the left we have a golfer who's using more of a stand up move and

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lower body rotation.

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So if we just knew those two pieces, we would say this person's probably going

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to have a very into out path, but you'll see that because of how he's using his

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arms to control the path of the club, he actually has a very out to end path.

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So in the person on the left, changing his power sources would not necessarily

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be required.

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We would have to work on how he's controlling the path with the movement and

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the arms that we teach and transition.

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Over here on the right, if we wanted to improve his path, the best long term

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results would be changing the power sources because when he gets under pressure

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, his dominant power sources are going to make his path worse.

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Where over here on the left, his dominant power sources are actually going to

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help with his path as he figures out what to do with the arms.

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Now here we have a couple examples of how power sources can cause major

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inconsistencies.

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And one of the most common is if we look at the center of your thorax, under 3D

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00:19:03.690 --> 00:19:07.000
this is going to move a relatively small amount.

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Half inch in the backswing, maybe 2 inches to its furthest point during the

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downswing, and then it actually comes back a little bit through the release.

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So it doesn't move a whole lot.

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You'll see in both these cases, the gentleman on the right is going to move his

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00:19:23.740 --> 00:19:28.000
thorax a good amount from the top of the swing.

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So his power source is causing major inconsistencies and changes in his path

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because he's using the power source of basically an upper body lunge, almost

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like he's holding on to a cable and then just falling away from it as he's

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pulling.

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Sir Charles over here on the left, you'll see he's using a very exaggeration of

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that chop move or crunch move, and you'll see that he's using a little bit of

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00:19:57.890 --> 00:20:01.000
trail arm external rotation, which also steepens the shaft.

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So his 2 power sources get the shaft extremely vertical in an basically unplay

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able path, and then he has to do this major adjustment during the release.

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So there are times when the power source is causing the consistency problem,

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there are times when the power source is not controlling the consistency

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problem.

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And the thing to look at is using the steep and shallow flowchart are your

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power sources related to your path issues.

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If they are, then that's something that you'll have to work on from a power

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perspective.

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If they're not, then it's more something that you'll have to work on from a

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control of the path perspective.

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And lastly, let's strengthen this idea that different power sources work well

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for different shots. So over here, we're going to take a look at a couple

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different chip shots.

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So we have Ernie Ells on the left and Luke Donald on the right.

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And basically what you'll see is the majority of this strike is controlled by

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rotating his upper body and straightening his trail arm.

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So you can see that upper body rotation and that trail arm straightening tends

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to move a lot more than his lower body.

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00:21:14.000 --> 00:21:18.000
For these short game shots, such as the finesse wedge and the distance wedge,

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you'll see that the lower body is more of a balance and support for the upper

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00:21:22.870 --> 00:21:25.000
body to be the power source around.

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One of the biggest issues that I see with people who struggle around the greens

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is typically using that lower body or the hips as a power source instead of

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00:21:35.760 --> 00:21:40.500
just letting the upper body rotate or the arms control the shot the way that

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Luke Donald and Ernie Ells are demonstrating here.

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So if you're having issues with getting your path or your face under control,

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always take a look at the first half of the downswing and you can get a good

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idea as to how your power sources may be making the situation easier or harder

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for your specific issue.

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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.

Understanding Power Sources in Your Golf Swing

After this video, you'll be able to:

  • Identify how your lower body initiates power during the swing.
  • Understand the sequencing of body segments for optimal speed transfer.
  • Learn to analyze your swing through the examples of Adam Scott and Rory McIlroy.

Explore how different segments of your body contribute to power in your golf swing. This video breaks down the roles of your lower body, core, and arms to help you improve your transition and speed.

Video Transcript
WEBVTT

1
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In this analysis video, we're going to take a look at power sources and how

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00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:06.000
they affect the golf swing.

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If you remember from the concept video, we're going to essentially break the

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body down into three different segments.

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00:00:15.000 --> 00:00:22.050
So we're going to look at the lower body, the core, and then the shoulders and

6
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the arms.

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00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:27.660
These are the three major segments that can create speed, and we're going to

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see how they work during transition.

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So first, we have two examples. We have Adam Scott and Rory McElroy.

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00:00:35.000 --> 00:00:39.000
So we're going to go up to the top of the swing and look at their transition.

11
00:00:39.000 --> 00:00:43.670
Now, if you remember from the concept video, or if you've looked at a lot of k

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inematic sequence,

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00:00:45.000 --> 00:00:48.940
you can see that the maximum acceleration for the lower body is going to

14
00:00:48.940 --> 00:00:51.000
typically happen right about there.

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Followed by the chest, right about there, followed by the lead arm, right about

16
00:00:56.250 --> 00:00:57.000
there.

17
00:00:57.000 --> 00:01:02.140
So what you'll see is that the majority of the speed creation is occurring in

18
00:01:02.140 --> 00:01:04.000
the early part of the downswing,

19
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and then the second half of the downswing, the release, is going to be more

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continuing to build that power,

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00:01:11.000 --> 00:01:16.020
but more effectively transferring that power as efficiently as you can to the

22
00:01:16.020 --> 00:01:17.000
club head.

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00:01:17.000 --> 00:01:20.950
So if we take a look at Adam Scott from the top of the swing, you'll see his

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00:01:20.950 --> 00:01:23.000
lower body begin to rotate first,

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00:01:23.000 --> 00:01:28.000
followed by his chest rotating kind of right in that area.

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00:01:28.000 --> 00:01:33.710
And that brings his arms into the delivery position so that they're ready to

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fire.

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So he's primarily getting his speed through the big muscles in his hips and the

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00:01:40.360 --> 00:01:44.000
big muscles in his trunk and shoulder blades.

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He's then using his arms down during the release to transfer that speed to the

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golf ball.

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Over here on the right, we're going to have a face-on view of Rory Macquarie so

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00:01:56.080 --> 00:01:57.000
we can see the same thing.

34
00:01:57.000 --> 00:02:03.820
You can see as the club is still going backwards, his lower body is starting to

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00:02:03.820 --> 00:02:06.000
translate and rotate,

36
00:02:06.000 --> 00:02:11.000
and then you'll see his trunk starting to unwind kind of right in there.

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00:02:11.000 --> 00:02:16.220
So he gets into that similar delivery position that Adam Scott was in with some

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minor style differences,

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00:02:18.000 --> 00:02:23.000
but a similar way of getting there using the lower body in the trunk.

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00:02:23.000 --> 00:02:27.000
Those tend to be the biggest sources of power, but we'll get into some others

41
00:02:27.000 --> 00:02:31.000
as we go through other examples of how to create power.

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And one of the things that I stress is that the most consistent and the most

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00:02:35.830 --> 00:02:39.000
powerful golfers tend to use their entire body.

44
00:02:39.000 --> 00:02:44.400
Now one of the ways that I like to look at power is doing this little kind of

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00:02:44.400 --> 00:02:47.000
scrubbing the clip back and forth.

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00:02:47.000 --> 00:02:50.000
Kind of like so, or almost like a little pump drill.

47
00:02:50.000 --> 00:02:54.660
And looking for where the majority of the movement is happening and then

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00:02:54.660 --> 00:02:59.000
imagining if it was part of an exercise, what muscles would they be using.

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00:02:59.000 --> 00:03:02.720
So over here on the left we can see Graham McDowell and you can see that there

50
00:03:02.720 --> 00:03:05.000
's a lot of movement from his hips and legs.

51
00:03:05.000 --> 00:03:09.670
There's not a lot of movement from his trunk, and there's actually a fair

52
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amount of movement in the trail elbow.

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00:03:12.000 --> 00:03:16.000
If you were to, I should say, trail shoulder.

54
00:03:16.000 --> 00:03:20.370
If you were to look at this little window right here, you'll see that that

55
00:03:20.370 --> 00:03:25.440
right arm is kind of getting in position behind the shaft so that he'll have

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00:03:25.440 --> 00:03:27.000
something that he can then push with.

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And so what you'll see is during this early part of the downswing, it's largely

58
00:03:33.030 --> 00:03:38.070
driven by the lower body, but with kind of a secondary accomplice of the

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00:03:38.070 --> 00:03:39.000
shoulder.

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Now if we go over here and we look at Jason Day, we're going to pump through

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00:03:45.440 --> 00:03:48.000
kind of that same window.

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Now what we'll see with Jason Day is you'll see a similar movement of the lower

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body because it's very hard to be a good driver of the golf ball without having

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your lower body initiate the downswing.

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00:03:58.000 --> 00:04:01.720
And he's doing it in a little bit of translation which we can't see from this

66
00:04:01.720 --> 00:04:04.000
view, but he's also doing it in rotation.

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00:04:04.000 --> 00:04:09.190
Now what we can see with his is one of his big secondary movements is that

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upper body is starting to back up.

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00:04:12.000 --> 00:04:16.470
So if I were to draw this box just to give us a line of where his head is, you

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00:04:16.470 --> 00:04:20.970
'll see that as he starts down, he's going into a little bit more of a back

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extension.

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00:04:22.000 --> 00:04:27.800
So if we were to look at this area right in here, you'll see that yes, the

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00:04:27.800 --> 00:04:33.240
lower body is rotating, but his back is going into more of a reverse thrust or

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00:04:33.240 --> 00:04:35.000
an extension movement.

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00:04:35.000 --> 00:04:40.250
Compare that with Graham McDowell over here on the left where his lower body is

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00:04:40.250 --> 00:04:46.000
rotating and his trunk is actually flexing a little bit more down.

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So this is just going to lead towards different consistency patterns and path

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issues.

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Typically, the more that we go into extension early, I'll add Jason Day on the

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right, the more that the path is going to come from the inside, at least from

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the body's perspective.

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He could easily make adjustments with the arms to change the path, but if

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everything stayed the same, that simple extension is going to cause the path to

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be a little bit more shallow.

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00:05:13.000 --> 00:05:18.430
Over here on the left, that simple flexing down would be a little bit of a

86
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steepening move, which unless he did something else would cause the path to be

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a little bit more steep and a little bit more left.

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You'll see that in Graham's case, he then uses a fair amount of side bend and

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00:05:30.410 --> 00:05:35.130
translation to accompany that movement, which is great for driving the ball,

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00:05:35.130 --> 00:05:39.370
and part of the reason why he is one of the more consistent drivers of the golf

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00:05:39.370 --> 00:05:40.000
ball.

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Over here on Jason Day's side, you will see that he has a little bit less of

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00:05:45.630 --> 00:05:51.070
that, but still gets into very good impact alignments and uses his arms in a

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00:05:51.070 --> 00:05:55.000
little bit more vertical fashion than what Graham McDowell is doing.

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00:05:55.000 --> 00:06:02.150
So we'll just simply adjust his ball flight and cause him to be a little bit

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00:06:02.150 --> 00:06:05.000
more erratic off the tee.

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00:06:05.000 --> 00:06:09.370
Now let's take a look at Jason Duffner, and we'll start to do some comparisons

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00:06:09.370 --> 00:06:14.000
more with different power sources reflected in different parts of the game.

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00:06:14.000 --> 00:06:19.220
So on the left, we have Jason with a driver, and you'll see that lower body

100
00:06:19.220 --> 00:06:24.760
during this little pump move has a fair amount of translation to where average

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00:06:24.760 --> 00:06:28.000
is somewhere around four to five inches.

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00:06:28.000 --> 00:06:33.360
You'll see that basically it's about, if you imagine that a pelvis is roughly

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00:06:33.360 --> 00:06:37.850
12 inches wide, then typically it's going to be about a third to a half of a

104
00:06:37.850 --> 00:06:40.000
pelvis width that he's going to shift.

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00:06:40.000 --> 00:06:44.790
So you can see that his lower body is initiating the downswing, but you can

106
00:06:44.790 --> 00:06:49.560
also see if you look at his trunk that in terms of what looks like it's moving

107
00:06:49.560 --> 00:06:54.440
a greater amount of movement or moving faster, you would tend to see that his

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00:06:54.440 --> 00:06:56.000
shoulders and his left

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00:06:56.000 --> 00:07:02.540
are flat, so where I would be looking would be kind of in this zone right in

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00:07:02.540 --> 00:07:09.600
here, and as he shifts onto his left side, you'll see that that tends to unwind

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almost faster than his lower body.

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00:07:13.000 --> 00:07:18.220
So if you come over here to the one on the right, we'll see even less a drive

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00:07:18.220 --> 00:07:23.890
from the lower body, and you can see right through here, right in this phase,

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00:07:23.890 --> 00:07:29.000
you can see a fair amount of movement in the lead shoulder and arm.

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00:07:29.000 --> 00:07:35.300
If you look at how much is going on right in here, during this little phase,

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you'll see that the lead arm is getting pulled a little bit away from the upper

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body and the upper body is rotating fairly aggressively.

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Not so much that he's driving with his lower body, so when looking at this, I

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would say that he's using more of his core and his shoulders to create the hit,

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00:07:56.110 --> 00:08:00.780
especially with the iron, and he's using a little bit more lower body, but as a

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whole he tends to have more of a core or shoulder dominant pattern.

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Now let's take a look at Lee Westwood, because he does something that's a

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little bit different than the typical Tour Pro, so we're going to look at his

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power sources through the transition, and you'll see that his lower body is

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going to initiate, but you can see that that lead arm is getting pulled off the

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upper body fairly quickly.

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So he's another kind of Jason Duffer shoulder dominant player, but instead of

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having his dominant core movement be rotation, you'll see that he's doing more

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of a flex, or almost a crunch.

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Now it gets exaggerated as he gets towards impact, but you can see him really

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starting the movement right about here.

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That's where he's doing more of a crunch with his core, as opposed to a

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rotation, or a back extension in the Jason Day case.

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So here we'll see the lower body pushing fairly aggressively, but it doesn't

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rotate a ton because he's turning that push into more of this crunch motion

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through the core.

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It's one of the reasons why the hips are kind of a bridge joint, as they can

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either work to support the core, or to support the lower body.

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You'll clearly see that arm getting pulled right through here, so he's more of

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that lead shoulder kind of chop mechanic, and you can see him going into that

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fairly aggressive crunch, which gets his chest very close to the golf ball.

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This pattern would tend to be better with the short irons and have a little bit

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more trouble off the tee, but Lee Westwood has been a pretty good ball striker

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for the last decade, so he shows that regardless of what the tendencies are,

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you can make virtually anything work.

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Now, well, most golfers will have a dominant power source, or a cluster of

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dominant power sources.

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What you'll see is that the best players in the world are able to adjust their

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power sources depending on the requirements for that particular shot.

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So here we have former number one Luke Donald, and over on the right we have a

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driver swing and over on the left he's hitting a wedge.

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What you'll see is with his driver swing, his natural dominant power source is

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going to be very much a lower body jump, or a vertical movement of a lower body

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00:10:16.000 --> 00:10:21.000
, combined with a side crunch, or right side bend from his upper body.

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So as we get him to delivery position kind of right in here, you can see that

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his left shoulder has already gotten high, and he's had a ton of vertical

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thrust through his legs.

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Now over here with the wedge, what you'll see is that he doesn't use his lower

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body in quite the same vertical fashion, in fact he uses it in more of a

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00:10:40.290 --> 00:10:41.000
rotation.

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So when we get the hands at the same point, you can see that his right shoulder

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is actually still higher than his left, because he hasn't really used his core

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in a right side bend fashion, he's used it more in a rotational fashion.

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You'll also see that even though the lower body is moving, it's not really

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driving the movement.

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As we continue down, you'll see that it's more his extension of his right arm,

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00:11:05.410 --> 00:11:10.780
combined with that rotation of his chest, that is really his engine for this

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wedge shot.

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Where, over here on the right, you can clearly see that it's his lower body and

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his side bend from the core that is driving this movement, and then the arms

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extend much later as a method of transferring the speed.

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So while it's important to recognize your dominant power source and what its

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strengths are, it's also important to be able to shift power sources if you

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want to reach your ultimate potential.

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And I'm sure some of you are wondering about special populations, so let's take

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a look at some golfers from the senior tour, and then a few golfers from the L

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PEA tour.

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You'll see that the tendency that we're looking for is to use your entire body.

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So here we have Bernhard Longer, who's done very well on the senior tour, and

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you'll see that it's that lower body driving, combined with his core rotation,

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and a little bit of side bend because he's hitting it off the tee.

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But it's primarily that lower body and core that's driving the initial part of

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his downswing.

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Over here on the right, we have Gary Holberg, who's another great ball striker

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on the senior PGA Tour.

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As we take him up to the top of the swing, you'll see that lower body and core,

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again controlling and driving the majority of the swing, or at least the early

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part where he's creating speed, and then his arms are going to transfer that

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speed much later down in the swing.

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And a couple more from the senior PGA Tour, so here we have Tom Watson, who's

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kind of the ageless one who's still able to compete on the regular tour, at

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least at the British Opens.

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You'll see that even though he has a very vertical arm height, you'll see that

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he tends to get that early movement from his lower body, followed by that

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rotation of his trunk and his core.

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So he has that early lateral movement and rotational movement from the pelvis,

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and then rotation from the core, and then he transfers that speed and energy

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00:13:19.000 --> 00:13:23.000
through his arms and hands during the hit.

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Over here on the right, we have the unorthodox swing of Jim Thorpe.

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So we will see that lower body initiate the movement, followed by kind of a

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00:13:34.040 --> 00:13:38.000
crunch and big side bend from the upper body.

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So he tends to get a lot of his power from his hips and trunk, and I know that

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we're talking about power here, but it'd be hard to not mention the

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exaggeration of his motorcycle move during the downswing and through the hit.

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So it shows that a lot of these pieces can be seen and applied, even in the

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00:14:00.200 --> 00:14:03.000
more unorthodox swings.

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And let's take a look at a few LPGA swings.

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Now one of the things that's worth noting is, if we look at muscle fiber

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composition, in general, ladies are going to have, compared to the average male

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00:14:15.850 --> 00:14:20.030
, about 70% of the muscle fibers in their lower body, and about 50% of the

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00:14:20.030 --> 00:14:22.000
number of muscle fibers in their upper body.

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00:14:22.000 --> 00:14:26.000
So proportionately, their lower bodies are going to be stronger.

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00:14:26.000 --> 00:14:30.910
As a result, you're going to see more lower body dominant swings, but as Susan

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00:14:30.910 --> 00:14:36.030
Patterson demonstrates here, they're going to be blended with the core and the

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00:14:36.030 --> 00:14:37.000
upper body.

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00:14:37.000 --> 00:14:41.380
In fact, she has a little bit more upper body involvement, as you can see that

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00:14:41.380 --> 00:14:46.000
shoulder and lap pulling kind of right in here than your average LPGA girl.

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00:14:46.000 --> 00:14:51.660
Over here on the right, we have Lexi Thompson as one of the examples of someone

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who has a very lower body dominant swing.

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00:14:55.000 --> 00:15:01.000
So you can see a ton of lower body rotation and a ton of that trunk side bend.

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Those two things create a lot of speed, and then she uses a little bit of that

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00:15:07.040 --> 00:15:13.000
vertical thrust and lip as she transfers the energy into the golf ball.

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But just because a woman tends to have an advantage in the lower body does not

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00:15:17.200 --> 00:15:20.000
mean that they will fall pervy and only use it.

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So over here on the right, we have an amateur relative beginner who's

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00:15:24.670 --> 00:15:29.000
controlling more of the swing with the upper body rotation.

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00:15:29.000 --> 00:15:33.950
You can see that lead shoulder rotating around and that trail arm kind of

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00:15:33.950 --> 00:15:36.000
pushing against the club.

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00:15:36.000 --> 00:15:41.030
While over here on the left, you would see a little bit more of the typically

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00:15:41.030 --> 00:15:46.160
expected over use of the legs and the lower back as a way to create speed,

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00:15:46.160 --> 00:15:53.000
which will tend to cause, in her case, too much of a shallow angle of attack.

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So here we have two older gentlemen who have more of an upper body dominant and

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more of a crunch dominant swing.

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So they would fall into the category of more of a Lee Westwood, except for the

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00:16:06.770 --> 00:16:11.540
fact that they don't use their lower body quite as much as Lee Westwood, so it

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becomes very upper body dominant.

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You'll tend to see that people who stand up in their backswing are going to be

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loading this kind of chop movement, so you'll see that he's doing more of a

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lead arm pull and an upper body crunch to create the speed, and then he has to

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stand up and flip his hands late in order to get that speed that he's created

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somewhere around the golf ball.

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We can see a similar pattern here, so if we go into the backswing you can see a

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00:16:42.440 --> 00:16:49.090
stand-up followed by that chop movement, and even though he gets the club on a

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00:16:49.090 --> 00:16:56.180
decent path, because of the chop movement being his dominant power source, he's

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00:16:56.180 --> 00:16:59.740
not going to be able to have the angle of attack to have the amount of side

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00:16:59.740 --> 00:17:02.000
bend and the bottom of the swing out in front of the golf ball.

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So he tends to struggle with thin and top shots as he's demonstrating here.

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Now while power sources are very primal and tied to pressure and they're

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extremely important, I want you to use a little example to show you that they

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00:17:18.750 --> 00:17:20.000
're not everything.

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So over here on the right we have a golfer who's using primarily a power source

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00:17:25.550 --> 00:17:29.000
movement of back extension and side bend.

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00:17:29.000 --> 00:17:33.370
So you can see that that back extension and side bend is going to cause a path

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00:17:33.370 --> 00:17:37.000
that's going very into out and he hits some pretty big hooks.

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00:17:37.000 --> 00:17:41.860
Now if we wanted to change his path, we would actually have to change some of

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00:17:41.860 --> 00:17:47.100
his power sources because his power sources are creating a very shallow path,

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00:17:47.100 --> 00:17:50.380
and his club is following along because he's doing a pretty good job with his

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arms and hands to work with that.

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00:17:52.000 --> 00:17:59.430
Over here on the left we have a golfer who's using more of a stand up move and

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00:17:59.430 --> 00:18:02.000
lower body rotation.

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00:18:02.000 --> 00:18:07.020
So if we just knew those two pieces, we would say this person's probably going

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00:18:07.020 --> 00:18:11.850
to have a very into out path, but you'll see that because of how he's using his

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00:18:11.850 --> 00:18:16.000
arms to control the path of the club, he actually has a very out to end path.

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00:18:16.000 --> 00:18:22.610
So in the person on the left, changing his power sources would not necessarily

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00:18:22.610 --> 00:18:24.000
be required.

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00:18:24.000 --> 00:18:27.800
We would have to work on how he's controlling the path with the movement and

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00:18:27.800 --> 00:18:30.000
the arms that we teach and transition.

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00:18:30.000 --> 00:18:35.080
Over here on the right, if we wanted to improve his path, the best long term

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00:18:35.080 --> 00:18:40.000
results would be changing the power sources because when he gets under pressure

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00:18:40.000 --> 00:18:43.000
, his dominant power sources are going to make his path worse.

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00:18:43.000 --> 00:18:47.400
Where over here on the left, his dominant power sources are actually going to

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00:18:47.400 --> 00:18:51.000
help with his path as he figures out what to do with the arms.

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00:18:51.000 --> 00:18:55.660
Now here we have a couple examples of how power sources can cause major

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00:18:55.660 --> 00:18:57.000
inconsistencies.

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00:18:57.000 --> 00:19:03.690
And one of the most common is if we look at the center of your thorax, under 3D

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00:19:03.690 --> 00:19:07.000
this is going to move a relatively small amount.

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00:19:07.000 --> 00:19:11.190
Half inch in the backswing, maybe 2 inches to its furthest point during the

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00:19:11.190 --> 00:19:15.000
downswing, and then it actually comes back a little bit through the release.

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00:19:15.000 --> 00:19:17.000
So it doesn't move a whole lot.

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00:19:17.000 --> 00:19:23.740
You'll see in both these cases, the gentleman on the right is going to move his

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00:19:23.740 --> 00:19:28.000
thorax a good amount from the top of the swing.

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00:19:28.000 --> 00:19:35.000
So his power source is causing major inconsistencies and changes in his path

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00:19:35.000 --> 00:19:40.520
because he's using the power source of basically an upper body lunge, almost

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00:19:40.520 --> 00:19:45.630
like he's holding on to a cable and then just falling away from it as he's

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00:19:45.630 --> 00:19:46.000
pulling.

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00:19:46.000 --> 00:19:52.380
Sir Charles over here on the left, you'll see he's using a very exaggeration of

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00:19:52.380 --> 00:19:57.890
that chop move or crunch move, and you'll see that he's using a little bit of

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00:19:57.890 --> 00:20:01.000
trail arm external rotation, which also steepens the shaft.

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00:20:01.000 --> 00:20:06.540
So his 2 power sources get the shaft extremely vertical in an basically unplay

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00:20:06.540 --> 00:20:12.000
able path, and then he has to do this major adjustment during the release.

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00:20:12.000 --> 00:20:18.000
So there are times when the power source is causing the consistency problem,

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00:20:18.000 --> 00:20:21.360
there are times when the power source is not controlling the consistency

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00:20:21.360 --> 00:20:22.000
problem.

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And the thing to look at is using the steep and shallow flowchart are your

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00:20:28.040 --> 00:20:32.000
power sources related to your path issues.

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00:20:32.000 --> 00:20:35.200
If they are, then that's something that you'll have to work on from a power

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00:20:35.200 --> 00:20:36.000
perspective.

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00:20:36.000 --> 00:20:40.660
If they're not, then it's more something that you'll have to work on from a

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00:20:40.660 --> 00:20:43.000
control of the path perspective.

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00:20:43.000 --> 00:20:46.810
And lastly, let's strengthen this idea that different power sources work well

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00:20:46.810 --> 00:20:50.600
for different shots. So over here, we're going to take a look at a couple

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00:20:50.600 --> 00:20:52.000
different chip shots.

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00:20:52.000 --> 00:20:55.000
So we have Ernie Ells on the left and Luke Donald on the right.

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00:20:55.000 --> 00:20:59.950
And basically what you'll see is the majority of this strike is controlled by

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00:20:59.950 --> 00:21:04.000
rotating his upper body and straightening his trail arm.

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00:21:04.000 --> 00:21:10.550
So you can see that upper body rotation and that trail arm straightening tends

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00:21:10.550 --> 00:21:14.000
to move a lot more than his lower body.

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00:21:14.000 --> 00:21:18.000
For these short game shots, such as the finesse wedge and the distance wedge,

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00:21:18.000 --> 00:21:22.870
you'll see that the lower body is more of a balance and support for the upper

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00:21:22.870 --> 00:21:25.000
body to be the power source around.

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00:21:25.000 --> 00:21:30.470
One of the biggest issues that I see with people who struggle around the greens

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00:21:30.470 --> 00:21:35.760
is typically using that lower body or the hips as a power source instead of

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00:21:35.760 --> 00:21:40.500
just letting the upper body rotate or the arms control the shot the way that

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00:21:40.500 --> 00:21:44.000
Luke Donald and Ernie Ells are demonstrating here.

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00:21:44.000 --> 00:21:48.850
So if you're having issues with getting your path or your face under control,

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00:21:48.850 --> 00:21:53.300
always take a look at the first half of the downswing and you can get a good

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idea as to how your power sources may be making the situation easier or harder

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for your specific issue.

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