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In this analysis video we take a look at the swing of Ricky Fowler. Now Ricky

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Fowler has made

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some pretty big swing changes under the tutelage of Bush Harman. He's played

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really well the last

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couple years and so it's no wonder that a lot of students have some questions

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about what swing

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changes he's made and why they've been so helpful. So in this video we're going

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to take a look at

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the one major swing change that he has made with the help of Bush Harman as

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well as his fitness

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trainer but then we'll highlight a couple of the other things such as how his

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swing is typically

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compared to both Sergio Garcia for this lay down move as well as Rory McElroy

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for his right leg

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straightening and almost reverse tip thrust. I'm going to help you understand

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that what he does is

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very different from those two golfers as well as helping you understand how

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sequencing has played

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a big role in his improvement under Bush Harman. Now sequencing is one of those

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kind of catch all

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buzz words that we like to use to relate to how one body segment is interacting

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with another. So

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the big area where Ricky tended to struggle was in using the muscles between

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his rib cage and

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pelvis. So over here on the left is a close-up video from 2010 and then over

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here on the right is

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a close-up video from last fall. Now we can see that the takeaway positions are

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very different the

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form relationships are very different. We can also see that he's over on the

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right Ricky has a

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little bit more muscle mass. He he worked out pretty hard when he started

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working with Bush

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Harman and that can be contributing to what he's able to do with his core

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because here's what we

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want to see in transition and this is the movement that I think a lot of golf

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ers amateur as well as

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some professionals miss out on and that is connecting the pelvis to the rib

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cage. So as we look through

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and as we scrub through back and forth in transition what you'll see is that

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his pelvis is leaving

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behind his upper body. So if you look at kind of this area right in here that's

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close to the bottom

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of his rib cage even down there that's close to the bottom of his rib cage and

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close to his

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lap muscle. So what you'll see is his pelvis rotates away from that part and

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you'll see that

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there's not a ton of rotation happening. It's a little bit more of a side bend

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movement. So there

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is some rotation but you'll see that the dominant movement is going to be more

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with that side bend

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and it's not until he gets down to right around here that his rib cage really

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starts rotating.

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Where in his new version what you'll see is his pelvis is still going to start

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a little bit

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before his lower body which it's good for it to start before the upper body for

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the lower body

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to start before the upper body but you want to make sure that that rotational

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movement of the lower

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body is transferred or connected to the rib cage. So what you'll see in the

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more recent

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swings is you'll see that this part of his rib cage is rotating much sooner

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than where

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he was back here six years ago. Again back six years ago he had a little bit

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more of a side bend

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movement where now he's having more of that rotational sling activated. Now

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that rotational

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sling is going to help steepen the path of the club. So yes his arms were in a

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better position

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at the top of the swing but the relationship between the arms and the upper

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body looks even

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better during the downswing because he has included more of this upper body

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rotation. If he didn't

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rotate his body then the side bend movement that you would tend to see is going

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to rely on more of

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an arm pull as a power source where over here on the right he's going to be

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using a little bit more

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of his total body to speed up the club head. As a result of having that body

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power that downswing

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now we're going to see that his arms are able to work a little bit more left

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and he's able to have

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more body rotation through the shot. Where over here on the on the left he's

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got less of the body

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rotation so his hands work a little bit more out to the right through the

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release. One key takeaway

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for you is if you look at a down the line video looking at where your upper

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body is and looking at

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where your arms are those are the two factors that are going to relate to where

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your hands are going

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to move through the ball. Are they going to move out towards the target line or

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are they going to

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move left following your body. If they move left and and the arms are straight

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ening then the only

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thing that's going to be pulling them left will be body rotation of the rib

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cage.

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Golfers are always compared to each other and one of the golfers who Ricky is

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frequently compared

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to is Sergio especially in transition. Now probably less so with more with his

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more modern move that

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doesn't have quite as much of the arm drop but what you'll see is that his

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movement in transition

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is actually quite different from Sergio's. If we look at the body movement of

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Sergio you'll see that

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if we had a kind of imaginary wall right here you'll see that his upper body

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and his head are

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working down this way and then he's having a lot of shallowing movement with

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the lead form.

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So as we go through transition you'll see that his upper body works down his

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rib cage works down

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and he creates all of his shallowing movement with what he's doing with his

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lead form and trail

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shoulder. Now if we look at Ricky what if we draw that same line up against his

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forehead what you'll

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see is that during transition his shallowing movement is going to happen more

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from his upper body

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working away and from hand drop and creating depth not so much from the arms

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shallowing.

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So while there is a significant plane shift I think comparing him to Sergio is

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actually comparing

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drastically different movements but similar flat shaft position. Since their

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transitions are

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different you'll see that through the release they have very different looking

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movements as well.

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You can see differences in the arm extension direction you can see differences

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in the amount

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of rotation and side bend and you can see pretty dramatic differences in the

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overall hand path.

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Now the other golfer who Ricky is frequently compared to is Roy McRoy and the

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place where

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their comparison typically exists is in the straightening of that right leg in

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the little

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reverse hip movement during the release. So you will see that both have a

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pronounced straightening

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of the legs and Roy does have the reverse hip movement and so does Ricky but I

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want to show you

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that there is a drastic difference in how they use their pelvis during the down

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swing. So as we go

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up to the top of the swing I want you to key in on the amount of slide of the

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pelvis and more

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importantly the rate of slide of the pelvis. What we'll see with Rory over here

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on the left is that

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he's going to shift over onto that left side relatively early in the downswing.

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Roughly by the

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time the hands are at about between shaft parallel and arm parallel. And then

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what you'll see is

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because of the orientation of his pelvis being behind his foot when he goes to

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push through his

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legs it's going to cause his pelvis to brace and it's going to cause his pelvis

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to elevate.

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Lovely looking pelvis movement when we look over here. Now when we look at

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Ricky he does

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create a lot of speeds we know he's using his legs but you'll see that his sway

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slide pattern

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is going to be very different from more of the classic looking swing of say an

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Adam Scott or a

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Rory McRoy. What we'll see with Ricky is he's going to have some early hip

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slide but then what

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you'll see is his hips continue to slide the rest of the downswing. So he doesn

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't move as far as

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early as someone like Rory McRoy. And so because this pelvis is working more

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across his body or in

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the direction of the target you'll see that as he approaches impact his pelvis

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is more on top of

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his foot than say a Rory McRoy. So as a result he's going to have all of the br

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acing be vertical

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with his lower body and then he's going to have to brace more with his ribcage

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and shoulders.

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He's not going to be able to brace with this whole sling the way that Rory McR

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oy is demonstrating.

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So while it's tempting to compare similar looking shaft positions and group

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golfers that way

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I like to look at the different movements of transition and release and build

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the

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categories of swings more around power sources and how you're controlling the

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path and face-to-path

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relationship. When you do it that way what you'll see is that Ricky has a

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unique move that works

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great for him and he has some really good pieces. You can see that he's done a

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lot of work both

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with his swing technique as well as in the gym in strengthening the connection

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between his pelvis

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and his ribcage and that's resulted in some better play. So if you like the way

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we break these

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swings down and you'd like to have your swing broken down or you'd like to have

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a certain golfer

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analyzed please don't hesitate to contact us at golfsmartacademy.com