Monday, August 30, 2010

FEELING Wrist Cock Release - Can You?

Most all golfers watching the slo-mos of swings like Tiger's and other pros see that they typically have a very late wrist cock release. They hold their wrist cock until just about the 6 o'clock position and then release the club. This is one of the keys to achieving maximum distance for a player especially in driving.


I would contrast the TV pictures to the videos of most players who I have seen swing in fittings. For most of these folks - and I am included here - their wrist cock release is more like at the 9 o'clock position or higher. I can also say for myself that sometimes I can feel a later release and almost always it is a time when I hit the ball a lot farther.


The true way to learn how to effectively produce "lag" is to find a good teacher who can teach you the proper swing sequence to create this lag and delayed wrist cock release. However, there are some pretty good tools out there to at least help players to get a "feel' for what this late release is like.


One of them, my favorite, is the Swingrite training club. You can set different levels of tension with this club so that the club "clicks" and you know you have produced a late release. The audible feature of this is great as is the fact that you can change the tension so that you can train yourself to feel what a stronger release is like.


Another tool to let you feel a later release is the "Gotcha Ready" weight device that you can attach to your club. If you put this up near the grip, it helps you to feel the sensation of a later release of wrist cock. I recently purchased this to see if it works, and I believe the added weight in my hands helps me to sense a later release.


After using the Gotcha Ready, I realized that the of the reasons counter weighting of clubs can help some folks get greater distance on their drives is this feeling of more weight on your hands. Counterweighting can, I believe, help you keep that feel of holding your wrist cock until later in your swing.


All of these can help players to get a feel for one of the things the pros do that many of us do not - release the club late in their swings.


Tony

Monday, August 23, 2010

Expanding Test Clubs - Easy to Justify!

With one week end to go until the boss (!) gets home, I have made lots of progress in improving my overall group of test clubs for fitting.


This week I am about to finish seven new driver test shafts..............two at 45 inch length (about the max length that I usually fit some one in) and five at 44 inches - varied weights from 55 grams up to a steel wood shaft weighing 105 grams. Now I will able to truly test for the influence of shaft weight on club path - remembering how weight affects path due to the "nine ball flight laws."


And later this week I will finish building a set of six 85 gram graphite shafts (range of butt flexes) so will now have iron shaft weights from about 60 grams (graphite) all the way up to over 120 to 130 grams raw shaft weight (steel). SK Fiber, Aerotech, FST, Wishon, and KBS shafts.


A really neat new addition (I love to add new shafts to my test club set!) are some SK Fiber lightweight graphite test shafts in a range of flexes, with overall 6 iron test club length of a little over 40 inches. These were built to be able to fit a 6 foot 9 inch golfer. We did an initial fitting this past weekend, and we found that he needs his shafts to be just a bit softer than the test clubs I had. So I am building two additional test shafts this weekend, and am sure that these will lead to the right fit and better iron distance for this player.


Bottom line - having a full range of test shafts and test heads is the only way to really do fittings that lead to improved ball striking, distance, and confidence.


Tony

Monday, August 16, 2010

Back At It - Adding New Iron Fitting Shafts

After an enjoyable but VERY hot weekend playing in our annual Member Guest tournament, I have a few iron fittings coming up in the next few weeks.


I presently have graphite and steel iron fitting shafts, in raw weights of about 60 and 70 grams in graphite, and 90 - 100 and 120 - 130 grams in steel. There is a hole between the graphite and steel shafts that I am starting to fill in this week.


I ordered six Aerotech i80 Steelfiber shafts - these combine steel and graphite fibers into one shaft - raw weights of about 85 grams. I will build these to different butt frequencies - 5 cpm apart. The Steelfiber shafts are a high quality shaft presently being used on the PGA tour by at least one prominent player. Many of my clubfitting friends strongly endorse this shaft, and I look forward to having these as a option for future club fittings.


What has pushed me to add this group of shafts is the fact that it is hard to predict what shaft weight and shaft feel will produce the best results for players. So it is important to test a number of options to be sure that all reasonable possibilities are covered to find the best fit for players. I never thought, for example, that 70 gram graphite SK Fiber shafts would be a good fit for me because I still swing the club pretty agressively - but I love the feel of these shafts and all I have to do is swing smoothly to get good results.


It is pretty difficult to have "too many" iron test fitting shafts - which is good news for customers!


Tony

Monday, August 9, 2010

Back In The SWing Of Things!

My "higher power" is out of town for a few days, which is going to give me the opportunity to get quite a lot of clubbuilding done the next week or so. Some of my tasks to complete in the evenings this week and part of next include....

- Finishing two iron builds

- Rebuilding two hybrid clubs

- Building some flex test clubs for a tall golfer

- Putting some extenders into two wedges

- Building a new set of driver fitting test shafts - varied shaft weights

- Rebuilding some of my driver test heads so that I can reduce the weight in the heads


I am starting to get very excited about improving my driver fitting test clubs. I am in the process of doing two major improvements to my driver fitting clubs.

First, installing some new FAZ FIT connectors into my test driver heads to reduce the total weight of the heads and connectors. It is easy to add weight in testing - as Dana Upshaw told me "lead tape is your friend."

Second, and I think most importantly, I am building four new test shafts using 55, 65, 75, and 85 gram Aldila NVS driver shafts. This difference of about 30 grams in shaft weight will allow me to test more effectively for the influence of shaft weight on ball flight - shaft weight has a major influence on the driver swing path for a player. I will probably also build at least one steel driver test shaft so that can go up to about 100 grams or so of shaft weight for players who might benefit from this.


While shaft flex is important for drivers, if you cannot hit the ball in the middle of the clubface you will not have the opportunity to maximize the distance of your drives. Driver shaft weight and its influence on club path is important to test for.


Tony

Monday, August 2, 2010

More Next Week.....

I have been out of town getting to play golf at Oakmont Country Club in Pittsburgh, PA for 3 days. What an Experience.....the most fun and interesting course I have ever played. Thanks LJ and CJ!


But in terms of blog post tonight.....my "higher power" is about to go out of town for 3 weeks and so I think I will let it rest for this week..............back next!


Tony