What Release Style Do You Use?

[Go Low]

Posts by Go Low in this thread have been deleted.

Go Low

[rogue]

Re: What Release Style Do You Use?

i'm very much a closed face player and have a lee westwood style release. This is due to my lack of rotor cuff flexibility so i struggle to rotate much in follow through. As a result i am very accurate, not the longest (although i would put that down to my height and weight).

I still hit a draw even though I have no release

[bill reed]

Re: What Release Style Do You Use?

hi Go Low
one thing i find intresting in your pictures is where the righ elbow is in all the pictures. only Brian Gay seemed to have little hip turn and all the others still have some bend in there right arm. when both arms are extended the club head is well past impact and the ball well gone. watching a lot of the top pro's they seem to drop the right elbow just ahead of ther right hip on the downswing and there right hips helps push there elbow through the shot.
even starange swings like Trevino and M/Norman did this. when you do this with a short chips or pitch it had a free sweeping feel to it and you never seem to quit on the shot.
i think how you have your wrist when at full backswing have a bearing on how your wrists end up in the impact zone.
also the type of swing (draw or fade) if hitting a draw you need your wrists to turn over throught impct but with a fade you try and hold of the wrist turn and keep the club face open giving you the fade spin.
i think you have a strong/week grip depending on your swing type/shot.
you would not have a really strong grip if you used a swing like Brian who uses 3sk systen and has a lot of wrist turn through impact and to much of a week grip would give you to much wrist turn. again the amount of bowed wrist depends on having a strong grip, you can see this by looking at the index finger of there right hand at impact and if it point up the left arm or the inside of the arm. Brain Gay is the only one that point up his right arm.
by trying difrent grips and taking pictres of yourself you will see the diffrence it has through impact on how much bowe your left wrist has. also on how your left wrists sets at full backswing.
in all your pictures none had started to roll over there wrists and this maybe that there all hitting a fade. if playing a draw the picture might look diffrent.
cheers
Bill

[bill reed]

Re: What Release Style Do You Use?

This is what makes the golf swing so interesting - all the various styles and methods within just a small portion of the entire golf swing. Can you imagine if Padraig Harrington tried to swing like Dustin Johnson, or if Paul Casey tried to swing like John Daily? Chances are - if those players just tried to adopt teh other player's release style alone they'd be selling insurance for a living!

I find it very amusing how golf instructors teach to "hit down" on the ball or "take a divot"...yet Tom Watson and the great Byron Nelson rarely ever took a divot, but instead picked (nipped) the ball right off the turf. Was their clubhead descending? Yes, but you don't have to gouge-out a chunk of turf to impart massive backspin. Golfers are told to always have shaft lean (toward the target) at impact and never (ever) let the clubhead pass the hands until after impact...yet many tour pros don't do that - and two of this year's major tournaments were won by flippers. By the way, Ian Baker Finch was a flipper...until he decided he should change his swing (said to gain more distance) and never could adapt to another method and didn't understand his old swing well enough to ever recover.

It's funny - golfers are told that to produce massive backspin off wedges that the ball must be compressed and to hit down on the ball to "pinch" the ball between the clubface and turf. Ever wonder how the tour pros are able to spin the ball backward on a 50 yard half-swing wedge shot where the ball isn't fully compressed? Ever wonder how the tour pros are able to spin the ball backward when they pick the ball off the turf or use a tee where the ball cannot be pinched between clubface and turf? Compressing the ball is important for spin as well as the ball cover material, but it's not necessary to fully compress the ball...and it has nothing to do with pinching the ball. In fact, this so-called "pinching" doesn't happen at all. Beyond ball type, a receptive green surface and dry conditions the key to producing backspin is clubhead acceleration through the ball and proper clubface-to-ball contact. Regardless of release style or swing method the club must be swung so that it "feels like" the clubhead is passing through your hands at impact, not your hands trying to hold the face square at impact.

Here's a tip that might help a lot of people...and it's fun and simple to do. The next time you go to the practice range hit a full bucket of balls from 30-50 yards with a half or three-quarter swing using your wedge you normally hit 60-100 yard wedge. With the stripe on the range balls you should be able to see the ball spinning. Try different styles of hitting the ball off a tight turf lie - picking, hitting down, shaft lean, bowed, flat and cupped wrist, holding the clubface square and open, etc. Almost certainly you'll find a style that allows you to nip the ball off a tight lie that produces high backspin. You'll also find that, in comparison, some of the styles you'll try barely spins the ball like a knuckleball...and some styles produce fat or thin shots. I'll bet the style that nips the ball off a tight lie that produces high backspin, a pretty little trajectory and an extra second of hang time in the air is the one that "feels like" the clubhead is passing through your hands at impact, not your hands trying to hold the face square at impact. Chances are good what you learn hitting these 30-50 yards wedge shots will capture your attention for ideas to be incorporated with your full swing.

The message here is to EXPERIMENT...and keep notes on the results. Experiment with all facets of the swing...and find "your" swing.

Hi
i agree with you on the hitting down and pinch the ball between the club and the turf. that can't happen due to the angle of the club face. the ball will always move up the wedge face of the club. and like you say pinching the bal clean will and can give you lots of backspin with a wedge.
i find rather than wanting more backspin! to get the ball to pull back when lands on the green, i just want enought for the ball to stop with very little backspining of the ball so i always know where it will end up and not have one shot stop dead a foot from the hole and another spin back 15 feet.
Lowpost put me onto some wedges a couple of years ago that were really great for backspin and it use to impress my friend when i could spin the ball back 10 to 15 feet but you could not control it and they did scuff up the balls a bit too.
one other thing, watching the pros spinning the ball back also has to do with the greens there playing the ball into. there always much softer and take spin much more than the greens we play at our clubs.
try playing a round after the open or a pro comp and the greens are so diffrent even i spin the ball back.
to get spin you need to hit the sweet spot to inpart max spin. if you do as i do and add fade spin the ball lands softer and with little back spin but you do know where the ball will end up.
i agree with most of what you have said and agree that playing with a bucket of ball helps but try and get a good green to land on and not just the pratic range where its harder to judge how mach backspin you get, as its not cut so short and well watered and sand based as real greens.
cheers
Bill

[bill reed]

Re: What Release Style Do You Use?

hi Go Low
i do disagree about the ball travling up the club face. if you use say a wedge and you make contact with the ball on say the 4th grove then by the time the ball leaves the face it at the 5th grove. i'm not saying the groves give you the spin. i'm saying the angle of the face does, but milled club faces do impart more spin and they grip the ball more. the club face traveling in a forward and downword motion make the ball spin on the face and with the wedge it will move as much as a grove width.
it has been discused on here before and someone posted a slow-mo of this happening.
your other point about a bucket of balls, i use to have about 20 balls half yellow and the other half white like the old Ping balls you use to get. there great for watching how they spin in the air as the sort of strob, there great for your putting with too. i find it hard to see a ball with just a line round it using a wedge but i'm getting old (57) but think it helps when putting.
i do agree that learning how to spin a ball helps your golf but being able to put lots of backsin on a ball often works out against you when it spins back twice as far as you wanted it to. hitting the ball with spin into a bank on the green to stop it and pull back is a good shot to have in your locker and i'm not saying it not worth learning.
but i would rather hit a soft landing ball knowing where it will stop than a show-off shot that spins back off the green.
there is a place for shots with spin but i think it is a shot that is very hard to control. with say a 7, 8 and 9 iron, backspin does help in keeping the ball on line and ovreriding any side spin.
i think one other things is checking where you hit the ball on the club face as missing the sweet spot varys the shot a lot. taking a ball 1/2 inch towards the toe could cost you 10 yards in distance, the newer cavaty clubs do reduce the extra side spin for of center hits but using a ball you can see how it spins and checking where on the face you hit it can help your game a lot.
cheers
Bill

[BrianW]

Re: What Release Style Do You Use?

Balls really do slide up the clubface, I have studied the ballistics of ball contact. They stick to it initially then start to slide, this all takes place in around 6 milliseconds, it is the ball sliding that creates the back spin, the more loft the more oblique the contact and the more spin is generated. Take a read of Cochran and Stubbs book 'Search for the perfect golf swing' there is a good section in the book showing the results of extensive tests.
This link gives some good explanation: http://www.leaderboard.com/GLOSSARY_LAUNCHANGLE

Regarding the generation of spin in a shot, this is something that IMO is part of my golfing repartee. In the right shot it is a useful tool, especially when hitting into a small green from 180 yards or so with a hybrid that will stop up on landing. In the shorter shot around the green, especially the lob shot that must clear high over a bunker and stop up dead on landing then I use my lob wedge and rely on a softly landing ball that will not spin back, this way I can attack the pin. I like to play pitch shots into a green from 50 to 80 yards using a pitching wedge so that the ball lands, breaks and rolls on a short distance. I believe the important skill is controlling spin rather than just creating it.

On the release I like to think of it as something that happens from a foot before impact to around three feet after. I work on creating a wide swing arc through this zone that is accelerating through it. Many golfers pull the club up across their chest as they strike the ball, robbing themselves of power and control.