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@JEFF
38 inches from end of grip straight down shaft to heel of club

darryl tateishi wrote:


Offset brings the shaft in ahead of the face (face will be open) and visually to me it feels like I have to flick my hands or roll them over to square the face up....or it feels like I have to come over the top to get the face on the ball......again...I think that is a designed feature by manufacturers (Karsten prob started this??)...to help fix a slice but again doing this deteriorates the action long term...... if people would get their clubs set up properly and avoid the use of band aids and crutches to try help them through they will be all the better in the long haul....and not be making these compensations that end up hurting them even more as time goes by.

Upright clubs and offset.- two wrongs that don't make a right

Upright clubs by their very disposition discourage the pivot from getting fully engaged. By using upright clubs the shaft will no longer be at right angles to the torso on the downswing, and any OTT move starts the ball much more left, quicker... than from a flatter lie angle.
The arms then don't have room to work correctly on the downswing, and we keep hearing the "stuck" term which is exactly what happens.
The offset is just that... an attempt to delay the shutting of the clubface so that OTT has a better chance of starting the ball online.. with more of a glancing blow. Two negatives rarely make things right.
A correct golf swing is going to be based upon forearm rotation in sync with a proper pivot rotation. This upright/offset kind of equipment set up will inhibit that, and leave golfers scratching their heads wondering why they don't get better.
The companies sure do sell us though on these concepts of their clubmaking....but when you are armed with true knowledge and aren't just patching your swing up with ill designed tools the yellow brick road becomes a heck of a lot clearer through the maze.
I have seen plenty of the latest and greatest stuff head straight to e-bay after a few rounds when improvement wasn't imminent.
It's not the club that will save you ...it's the correct setup of a club that can and will enhance our games over time....if you give yourself a chance and start thinking outside the box of what we have been told and follow and watch what the great players actually did with the club in their hands when they swung it efficiently you can then start to reap some rewards.

Offset brings the shaft in ahead of the face (face will be open) and visually to me it feels like I have to flick my hands or roll them over to square the face up....or it feels like I have to come over the top to get the face on the ball......again...I think that is a designed feature by manufacturers (Karsten prob started this??)...to help fix a slice but again doing this deteriorates the action long term.

Bradley,
Thank you. Your explanation of deficiency in club design should help a lot of dirters

Ping irons were game changers when introduced and you may be right that they started the offset trend. What I don’t understand is why the best, most expensive forged players irons still have offset.

As little as 1 to 3mm, is just enough to be a distraction when addressing the ball, IMO and how much can 1mm offset compensate for a less than perfect swing?

Bending to remove offset changes the loft angle, as well as angle of the sole/bounce.

We wouldn’t think of having offset in a hammer or an axe, so why in a golf club? Doesn’t make sense to me.

Jacob McElwee wrote:
Jacob ,Bradleys right,Grady would know best,but what Ive experienced,im 6.3 is if you go flatter you need to keep the length,I would start at 2 degrees flat then work my way to optimal,the thing about standard length for tall guy trying to hit flat lies,have to bend over alot ,and that makes backswing more vertical,wich is kinda oppisite of what you are trying to do,now Grady has overcome this,but I think it was helluva alot work,if he had his clubs a little longer,with the flat lies,could have stood a little taller,which i think would have helped with swinging around and staying connected,but,Grady is way more informed than I,just what ive been experiancing in,

So Bradley, could you please tell us more about your advised drills.
Thanks.

Azmat Lodhi wrote:


You pay for that info, fella.

Azmat Lodhi wrote:


The beauty about the drill series is that is evolves the swing. We all know there is no one magic move to making a repeatable golf swing, so the drill series teaches us in stages. It really teaches a golfer to learn the notes and then learn to play them in a sequence. the work teaches the body and our visual aspect what is meant to happen. Anyone can build a great swing and improve their game if given the right information. The drills are training and eventually the body works towards those ideals. The body can only do what it knows how to do.

Drill one is hand and forearm velocity from 4.30 inside delivery path
Drill two is footwork/leg and ground pressures
Drill three is post impact work
Drill four is hand attitudes and cocking/uncocking etc that enable us backswing and transition options
Drill five is transition and pressures

The series leads from impact as start point and then builds the swing around that. The better we ingrain things the better those aspects will work unannounced on their own as time goes by.
The pace you work at is entirely up to you. I say one month per drill but ideally longer is better as it gives more time to ingrain the work....and suggest one video per week as a goal......but not necessary. I think a video of each drill within the first few days of starting them is needed so I can make sure it is performed correctly so you can gain the maximum benefit from it.....
I do the series in a video format talking and explaining and giving examples which makes it easy to understand. The links and passwords are sent to you when each drill is started and they should be revisited throughout the series as the understanding really becomes easier to see, especially as the progression takes place.
I don't necessarily need to see a video of your swing as is....but would be a good idea to have one saved which you can then compare to later on.
The series has had some great success because it is muscular training of the proper golf action as shown by the greats, which like I said with work starts to become involved in your own swing. There are certain bodily tensions we explore and head toward but the swing is yours with your own style and flair....I never try get someone to swing like all the players spoken about on websites. But we can have similar dynamics and that is the goal. The other beauty of it is that we work on the swing and don't necessarily have to grind balls as we can do the drills on our time at home or at lunch break with items most everyone already has handy around the home , so there is no extra cost in that regard to buy crazy teaching aids..... hitting balls and playing is the monitoring work of the results
Hope that answers your questions.

@Dean Mitchell ....that's as comprehensive as I could be without showing what to do.... and even if I did show people what to do here....it is my weekly video monitoring of the drill work that gains the benefit.....
NO-ONE has performed drill 1 correctly first go....so if you aren't doing it properly you aren't getting the logic or benefit of the drill.... the drills are unique and very unlike any regular golf instruction people would have seen before...but when backed up with the evidence of pics and my answering of questions and the why and how it ends up being as normal as can be
I am sure some students can attest for that....they probably think what the heck am I doing here when they start and then after a week or so they 'get it' and then can't wait to jump onto the next one and start putting the building blocks in place....
People even on drill 4 or 5 now probably receive the new drill and all of a sudden a lightbulb goes off and they go..."Wow"....now I know why I was doing all that stuff previously....but we can't put the cart ahead of the horse so we do and train and learn and by the end it all makes perfect sense

Folks-
Where do I find the modules you are referring to?
Thanks
Mox

Mark wrote:


Mark....read post above.
You won't find them as they are only given out to students of the course

offset can also lower the launch/trajectory all things being equal and there were few designs, Hogan included, exploiting that. as to why even the best classic mb blades have some offset it is important to understand what offset really is and how it differs from face progression. offset is forward point of the hosel to front edge of the face and face progression is center line of the hosel and therefore center line of the shaft to leading edge of the face. the hosel has inside diameter and outside diameter with the later depending on how thick the wall of the hosel is and that depends on material and manufacturing process as it has to meet certain requirements under stress. if you have a zero or onset iron that center line of the shaft would actually be behind the leading edge of the face so again all things being equal you would be making contact before the shaft gets fully into impact position. if you want the center line of the shaft and the leading edge of the club to arrive there at the same time you gonna have some offset there no escaping it. however you might want the leading edge to get there a bit ahead and align the center line of the shaft say somewhere on the second groove but that would still give you a little bit of offset even if the hosel is extremely thin not by much but enough for you to notice it at address.

if you have a zero or onset iron that center line of the shaft would actually be behind the leading edge of the face so again all things being equal you would be making contact before the shaft gets fully into impact position.

Anton,

I am thinking of leading edge of club face and leading edge of shaft aligned.

All things about impact arent equal, IMO. If one aims to hit the back of the ball, I think offset will compensate for fact that club shaft (hands) will not lead as much, as they do for someone who aims at the inside of the ball, in which case hands lead and club face squares into back of the ball by the body turn.


If leading edge of club face and leading edge of the shaft create a straight line,
(hosel is only an connection/link between club face and shaft), the latter is easier to set up and control, IMO.

i really wouldnt know just tried to explain to you and others with similar kinda questions some reasons for offset from club design perspective. how you fit that to your swing and what you wanna do is up to you, you can almost always bend it to what you want. the axe and hammer tools you have mentioned do have offset if you think about it. the edge of the axe is aligned with the center line of the handle not in line with the outer line of the handle. for me personally i'd prefer that the center line of the shaft is aligned to a point on the face i ideally wanna make contact with eg second groove and that would result in a tiny bit of offset which is almost unnoticeable at address but its there if you look real good. if you want it differently thats your call and while i would agree that its more visually pleasing at address i dont want that at expense of desired point of contact moving away from the center line of the shaft in either direction.

he axe and hammer tools you have mentioned do have offset if you think about it. the edge of the axe is aligned with the center line of the handle not in line with the outer line of the handle.

Anton,

its all about perspective, isnt it.

When we make contact with a hammer or axe the head/leading edge is way ahead of the handle, unless your swinging vertically, up and down.which isnt how we swing a golf club.

Reasoning is that at impact to achieve what Steve Elkington called , non negotiable line of compression, hands are ahead of the ball, shaft is leaning toward target, club loft is reduced and the leading edge of the shaft is in effect making contact

From a club design perspective I would bet everything you said is spot on. While we are discussing how conventional wisdom can sometimes lead us away from the ideal, just wanted to throw this out there.

when you make contact with leading edge of the shaft it is called shank i believe. the shaft is your connection to the club head and ultimately that little white ball and it makes sense to me conventional wisdom or not that the center line of the shaft is connected to desired impact point in a good design. if its not you are compensating for something either way. if you want to have a neutral club that does not compensate and interfere with your feel and intentions that is how you would want it setup. very old blades had no offset at all. Hogan designs even very early ones had a little offset to bring the center line inline with desired impact point and while i dont believe he was the first with that he and people he worked with clearly understood what they were doing. that pretty much became the classic blade design since then, clubs like Hogan Precision back then to Miura blades of today. you are welcome to call it conventional wisdom and challenge it, after all thats how progress is made or regress in this case, but so far apart from perception i dont see any real meat in what you saying. i think you are making the same mistake modern club designs have succumbed to in their "if little offset is good more is better" while you seem to think that "any amount of offset is just bad". personally i cannot agree with either of these two i'm afraid.

So quickly jumping back onto the golf swing: Part 1 of some thoughts:

History has proven over and over time and time again that we do not have to have the club 'on plane' on the backswing. Why people instruct this and believe in it is beyond me. We see too many great players with the club crossing the line or laid off at the top for it to be a huge concern.



Even coming down the shaft/club does not have to be 'on plane' as we have been taught, because again the best ball strikers really did not adhere to this principal.



There are two things we can do bringing the club down....we can guide the shaft down trying to point the butt of the club at the ball....like walking along the edge of a cliff really.....trying to be very precise and not err in any direction, either too steep or too flat
OR
We can pressure the shaft from hip high entry point into and right through the impact strike...as shown by the top two golfers in photo below



Anybody believe they can pressure the club from a steep angle to an 'on plane' position? Nope....Nigh impossible, yet this is what everyone is being told to try do.

The only way to do it correctly is from flat or under plane back to square....laid off behind us and rotated into the back of the ball with hand speed, rotation speed and pressure....this is what all the greats did.
Hogan, Trevino, Snead, Nelson etc etc

Part 2

We often hear about players/instructors talking about trying to get the club on plane going back and on plane at the top of the swing which they believe will put them on plane coming down.
The problem with this belief is that if the shaft enters the impact area void of rotation pressures and torque the player then becomes prone to pulls and pushes......The swing has to be too careful and precise in an attempt to align the head onto the ball. The body tends to stop as the arms pull the club down and consistent striking with directional control becomes a lottery. Any slight deviation or change from the feel alters a players ability on a daily basis and what seemed easy one day becomes a total mystery the very next day.
And again the up/down on plane golf swing is just not supported by the truly great ballstrikers we admire and try to copy.When I look at the great strikers I see a club that is really never on plane much at all until the point where it really matters. This has to be done correctly as we can't just say anything off plane is good, but it certainly gives us a greater chance.
The great strikers learned or instinctively knew to bring the club into impact from somewhere else other than what today is deemed 'on plane'. They pressured the shaft from an off plane position where the pressures and forces could be applied where it was needed most- into and through impact. Once you learn to do this you feel the consistent pressure and sensations right into your hands day in and day out...and this is why the best ballstrikers could perform more consistently on a more regular basis.

Furyk and Sergio are prime examples of this in the modern game as we know it. Great consistent ballstrikers who pressure the club from under plane onto plane into the strike and the force and pressures holds the shaft on plane through impact also. Tremendous stuff.

And why are the great ballstrikers not concerned with backswing plane ,would it be there all making the same swing from hip high to hip high in the DS,The BS just being a momentunm builder to do that hip,to hip swing faster.The Key being hooking up,Connection

All this wonderful footage you have here of the greatest. Dont you think that all these guys came down on a much shallower plane?
And what is ur view about swinging and hitting?

Azmat,
Of course a shallower approach allows the club to be delivered and then turned through the strike
. See pics below of how beautifully Hogan, Trevino, Sergio & Furyk enter into impact with the shaft on or under the address plane (shown in red)....this allows range of motion for the body to continue turning and pressuring and holding the shaft right through the impact arena void of deviation.









When we look at Donald and Mickelson their hands are raising into the strike (coming from a steeper decent)...the shaft raises above the address alignment and the body cannot turn as it is rising and stopping to make room for this lift...so the hands and arms disconnect and the shaft flies off post impact.






Remember these guys are highly trained best in their profession athletes who can make this work with a lot of practice and timing but it is a more difficult task for most normal people on planet earth to stop the body, extend the arms away from the body and turn the head through the strike.....

If consistency is the name of the game then the upper group have it under control much better by stacking the cards in their favour.

And again it is not co-incidence that the guys in the top row here shallowed their shaft out with forearm rotation and ground leverage to point the shaft outside the ball coming down and not at or inside the ball.

Azmat.......As for hitting or swinging?
In my opinion we only need look at post impact pictures to be able to gauge what a person is doing.

A swinger would extend the arms straighten the rear leg and stop the shoulders into a more vertical position and try to align the club onto the ball and then we would see a disconnect of arms from torso on the way through and the club would extend/elongate away from the torso and the face would mainly shut down on the thru strike
A hitter would involve the entire torso and turn through the shot with a more level torso/shoulder turn and more gripping bent rear leg. The right elbow would be inclined to stay bent and closer and the hands would stay closer and tighter to the body and the club face would turn thru naturally with this rotation and stay more neutral through the strike being less prone to opening or closing.

A swinging action looks more beautiful to the eye as it is free and flowing and looks more effortless, however being able to do both releases I know my game is easier to manage and less scary by keeping things tighter and turning with connection than throwing my arms away and trying to align the face onto the ball.
Swinging releases the pressure from the hands and timing becomes critical. Hitting would keep more pressure in the hands and a much more tangible feeling of the club evolves on a more regular basis
.
No surprise that the most consistent ball strikers were more hitting orientated than swinging oriented.

Just a gif from the Byron images Bradley posted earlier ...

I posted one of these pics in another thread earlier.
Sam Snead
It is really worth viewing and using the screen and lines in the background to get a good look at the weight shift...the downward movement,,,,,the hip turn.....the way the clubhead falls back toward the screen at transition....how this gets the right elbow in and finds the slot.......the right shoulder position......the head......the turning of the club into the strike....where the body mass is in relation to the ball....the spine tilt......the way the left shoulder gets around in the final frame

It's all the same goodies in a different person's body than the one we normally discuss on the internet

For the guys doing my drill series these 2 pics should tell you a LOT....
Pic 5 of the Snead sequence is 100% what you are working on in drill 4 & 5....leading straight back to where we started with drill 1...... that should help answer a few questions why we do things in such an order when we work through the series and the importance of why we start from impact and work beyond before we can get to slotting
In other words it is pointless slotting if you don't know what do from the position in pic 6 below into and post impact to gain your face & ball control and your power control

Yep- they are all about the same. Only a few degress difference. NO MATTER HOW THEY TAKE THE SHAFT BACK !!!

Lane

I cant thank u enough. Some of the concepts would take some time to be ingrained in my system
But what you have told about hitting and driving so what you are saying is that Hogan was a hitter right?
I am trying to engrain this Hoganesque rotation while maintaining and not letting the wrist release (RHFWedge) but its not giving enough power and I am hitting them thin. Where do u think I am going wrong.
Thank u very much again.