SuperSpeed Golf training system

[FourTops]

Tried Swing Fan today...again. Swing Fan (to me) seems more efficient because it forces a certain movement due to wind resistance that SSG does not....and it seems to promote correct rotation without thinking about it. All IMO....try everything to see what works!

[trumb1mj1]

Tried Swing Fan today...again. Swing Fan (to me) seems more efficient because it forces a certain movement due to wind resistance that SSG does not....and it seems to promote correct rotation without thinking about it. All IMO....try everything to see what works!

 

I don't really understand the comparison. I feel like they are trying to achieve completely different things. I use my swing fan to warm up and during every SSG session. I also "burn out" with it at the end of my session.

[jah7838]

Has anyone had to take a month or so off in the middle of training because of an injury? I've had to take a month off because I strained my back at the end of August working out. It was a dumb early in the morning thing where it tightened up on me in the middle of some squat jumps.

 

I've only swung clubs a couple of times to rest it, and I'm probably going to be ready to start hitting and resuming my protocols in the next week or two. When I got hurt, I was at week 12 of Level 2 protocols.

 

When I resume, should I just pick up where I left off, or start from the beginning for a couple of weeks, and then jump back into where I was? Thanks for the help.

 

On another note, the extra distance gained during the year, made golf so much easier! Handicap dropped a couple of strokes from last year, and my GIR has also improved since last year.

[flushem]

Has anyone had to take a month or so off in the middle of training because of an injury? I've had to take a month off because I strained my back at the end of August working out. It was a dumb early in the morning thing where it tightened up on me in the middle of some squat jumps.

 

I've only swung clubs a couple of times to rest it, and I'm probably going to be ready to start hitting and resuming my protocols in the next week or two. When I got hurt, I was at week 12 of Level 2 protocols.

 

When I resume, should I just pick up where I left off, or start from the beginning for a couple of weeks, and then jump back into where I was? Thanks for the help.

 

On another note, the extra distance gained during the year, made golf so much easier! Handicap dropped a couple of strokes from last year, and my GIR has also improved since last year.

 

I have started L2 protocol all over again. I was out for months. Rather than focusing on hcp, I focus on average score as I resume SSG but still struggling with GIR. I wanna beat 90 consistently.

[flushem]

Guys, can you kindly take a look at these two video and give your feedback? I have been very successful with these drills.

 

For accuracy,

 

For better tempo,

[PorscheFan]

Has anyone had to take a month or so off in the middle of training because of an injury? I've had to take a month off because I strained my back at the end of August working out. It was a dumb early in the morning thing where it tightened up on me in the middle of some squat jumps.

 

I've only swung clubs a couple of times to rest it, and I'm probably going to be ready to start hitting and resuming my protocols in the next week or two. When I got hurt, I was at week 12 of Level 2 protocols.

 

When I resume, should I just pick up where I left off, or start from the beginning for a couple of weeks, and then jump back into where I was? Thanks for the help.

 

On another note, the extra distance gained during the year, made golf so much easier! Handicap dropped a couple of strokes from last year, and my GIR has also improved since last year.

 

I took 5 weeks of a couple of months in. I had already hit a new speed plateau before I stopped, and not that I'm back I seem to have zero loss in speed.

[David69]

Guys, can you kindly take a look at these two video and give your feedback? I have been very successful with these drills.

 

For accuracy,

 

For better tempo,

 

The videos are great - but what the hell do they have to do with swing speed? Swing Speed training is for SWING SPEED. That's it. Everything else is everything else.

 

Great videos and I love Clement as a teacher - but they have nothing to do with swing speed training. Just think of speed training as its own separate thing. Like doing sprints or suicides or whatever you did when your coach was mad at you at the end of practice. Do it a couple times a week as part of a normal core workout and forget that it has anything to do with golf.

 

Then go play golf and forget your swing speed training. You'll swing faster - eventually - by osmosis - and it will feel the same as your old swing. Your crappy swings will still be crappy but fly farther out. You'll still have to fix your fundamentals or whatever - but that has NOTHING to do with how fast you CAN swing. Seriously - it seems like people are overthinking this.

[FourTops]

Tried Swing Fan today...again. Swing Fan (to me) seems more efficient because it forces a certain movement due to wind resistance that SSG does not....and it seems to promote correct rotation without thinking about it. All IMO....try everything to see what works!

 

I don't really understand the comparison. I feel like they are trying to achieve completely different things. I use my swing fan to warm up and during every SSG session. I also "burn out" with it at the end of my session.

 

It's individual. Swinging a weighted shaft builds muscle like lifting weights...at least that's how I see it. The swing fan is like swimming...the resistance of water (or in this case air) also builds muscle. It's a matter of which approach works, or is more comfortable and less stressful for each person.

 

Also, why do you use the fan to burn-out and not SSG?

[flushem]

Guys, can you kindly take a look at these two video and give your feedback? I have been very successful with these drills.

 

For accuracy,

 

For better tempo,

 

The videos are great - but what the hell do they have to do with swing speed? Swing Speed training is for SWING SPEED. That's it. Everything else is everything else.

 

Great videos and I love Clement as a teacher - but they have nothing to do with swing speed training. Just think of speed training as its own separate thing. Like doing sprints or suicides or whatever you did when your coach was mad at you at the end of practice. Do it a couple times a week as part of a normal core workout and forget that it has anything to do with golf.

 

Then go play golf and forget your swing speed training. You'll swing faster - eventually - by osmosis - and it will feel the same as your old swing. Your crappy swings will still be crappy but fly farther out. You'll still have to fix your fundamentals or whatever - but that has NOTHING to do with how fast you CAN swing. Seriously - it seems like people are overthinking this.

 

For me, the second video truly helps me increase ss and improve tempo at the same time. 120 mph ss was generated with the same drill. full swing but easy first then steadily faster.

[trumb1mj1]

Tried Swing Fan today...again. Swing Fan (to me) seems more efficient because it forces a certain movement due to wind resistance that SSG does not....and it seems to promote correct rotation without thinking about it. All IMO....try everything to see what works!

 

I don't really understand the comparison. I feel like they are trying to achieve completely different things. I use my swing fan to warm up and during every SSG session. I also "burn out" with it at the end of my session.

 

It's individual. Swinging a weighted shaft builds muscle like lifting weights...at least that's how I see it. The swing fan is like swimming...the resistance of water (or in this case air) also builds muscle. It's a matter of which approach works, or is more comfortable and less stressful for each person.

 

Also, why do you use the fan to burn-out and not SSG?

 

Good question. I guess during SSG I feel like I’m training my small muscles (fast twitch) and the swing fan is training my big muscles. At the end I’m spent and want to finish off those big muscles but not sure of science or effectiveness of this.

[jah7838]

Has anyone had to take a month or so off in the middle of training because of an injury? I've had to take a month off because I strained my back at the end of August working out. It was a dumb early in the morning thing where it tightened up on me in the middle of some squat jumps.

 

I've only swung clubs a couple of times to rest it, and I'm probably going to be ready to start hitting and resuming my protocols in the next week or two. When I got hurt, I was at week 12 of Level 2 protocols.

 

When I resume, should I just pick up where I left off, or start from the beginning for a couple of weeks, and then jump back into where I was? Thanks for the help.

 

On another note, the extra distance gained during the year, made golf so much easier! Handicap dropped a couple of strokes from last year, and my GIR has also improved since last year.

 

I took 5 weeks of a couple of months in. I had already hit a new speed plateau before I stopped, and not that I'm back I seem to have zero loss in speed.

 

I'll see how my next range sessions goes. With a tight back, I was only 1/2-1 club shorter than normal. Back feels a lot better now. If I'm close to my normal distance, I'll pick up where I left off. I'm probably still going to wait another week before I start up again. I know with a back, it's a slow process to get back to normal.

[David69]

Guys, can you kindly take a look at these two video and give your feedback? I have been very successful with these drills.

 

For accuracy,

 

For better tempo,

 

The videos are great - but what the hell do they have to do with swing speed? Swing Speed training is for SWING SPEED. That's it. Everything else is everything else.

 

Great videos and I love Clement as a teacher - but they have nothing to do with swing speed training. Just think of speed training as its own separate thing. Like doing sprints or suicides or whatever you did when your coach was mad at you at the end of practice. Do it a couple times a week as part of a normal core workout and forget that it has anything to do with golf.

 

Then go play golf and forget your swing speed training. You'll swing faster - eventually - by osmosis - and it will feel the same as your old swing. Your crappy swings will still be crappy but fly farther out. You'll still have to fix your fundamentals or whatever - but that has NOTHING to do with how fast you CAN swing. Seriously - it seems like people are overthinking this.

 

For me, the second video truly helps me increase ss and improve tempo at the same time. 120 mph ss was generated with the same drill. full swing but easy first then steadily faster.

 

While I like the tempo video very much - that guy only swings at 120 with a slower controlled tempo because he has that as a baseline swing. SS training is geared to get you to raise your baseline swing. If all you can swing at is 100 - then no amount of tempo tricks are going to get you swinging faster. You'll swing better - sure - but not faster. If you want faster - you do SS training on your off/workout days and do tempo training on your practice days.

[BackNineCollapse]

Golf is not a strength sport, it's a speed and technique sport. There is actually a pretty good NEGATIVE relationship between peak forces generated and swing speed. Tension and effort are the enemy of speed. SSG (and similar overspeed training systems, across multiple sports) helps train the brain to swing faster. There are small skinny guys on tour that have ridiculous swing speed. Even more poignant are competitive 12-14 year old golfers. A lot of these kids are 5'6"-5'8", weight 120-130# and still swing their drivers 110+. You don't need to be 'strong' to swing fast, you just need to swing correctly.

 

I would never confuse the brain by adding a motion that trains the brain to swing harder. They actually did this study in baseball. Batters were put in two groups, one did just overspeed training, the other did overspeed followed by weighted bat swings to failure afterwards. The first group significantly increased bat speed, the second had no change. Someone above mentioned the best approach, consider overspeed training as a separate endeavor. Don't do it right before golf, don't do any other golf related training (i.e. swingfan, orange whip, etc.) before or after. Fully dedicate to swinging as fast as possible during the overspeed training, and then don't think about it at all when you play golf.

[David69]

Golf is not a strength sport, it's a speed and technique sport. There is actually a pretty good NEGATIVE relationship between peak forces generated and swing speed. Tension and effort are the enemy of speed. SSG (and similar overspeed training systems, across multiple sports) helps train the brain to swing faster. There are small skinny guys on tour that have ridiculous swing speed. Even more poignant are competitive 12-14 year old golfers. A lot of these kids are 5'6"-5'8", weight 120-130# and still swing their drivers 110+. You don't need to be 'strong' to swing fast, you just need to swing correctly.

 

I would never confuse the brain by adding a motion that trains the brain to swing harder. They actually did this study in baseball. Batters were put in two groups, one did just overspeed training, the other did overspeed followed by weighted bat swings to failure afterwards. The first group significantly increased bat speed, the second had no change. Someone above mentioned the best approach, consider overspeed training as a separate endeavor. Don't do it right before golf, don't do any other golf related training (i.e. swingfan, orange whip, etc.) before or after. Fully dedicate to swinging as fast as possible during the overspeed training, and then don't think about it at all when you play golf.

 

This.

[surefire]

Golf is not a strength sport, it's a speed and technique sport. There is actually a pretty good NEGATIVE relationship between peak forces generated and swing speed. Tension and effort are the enemy of speed. SSG (and similar overspeed training systems, across multiple sports) helps train the brain to swing faster. There are small skinny guys on tour that have ridiculous swing speed. Even more poignant are competitive 12-14 year old golfers. A lot of these kids are 5'6"-5'8", weight 120-130# and still swing their drivers 110+. You don't need to be 'strong' to swing fast, you just need to swing correctly.

 

I would never confuse the brain by adding a motion that trains the brain to swing harder. They actually did this study in baseball. Batters were put in two groups, one did just overspeed training, the other did overspeed followed by weighted bat swings to failure afterwards. The first group significantly increased bat speed, the second had no change. Someone above mentioned the best approach, consider overspeed training as a separate endeavor. Don't do it right before golf, don't do any other golf related training (i.e. swingfan, orange whip, etc.) before or after. Fully dedicate to swinging as fast as possible during the overspeed training, and then don't think about it at all when you play golf.

 

Do you have any studies or research that back up the bolded line?

I believe that people may feel applying more force is detrimental, but I find it hard to believe any science would back this up.

The amount of force needed to swing a golf club is not high, but the more force you can apply to the club before impact the faster it will be traveling. However, power is the critical part here, as that is the rate at which you can apply the force.

Power is literally force over time, so, yes, applying a lower peak force quicker can generate more power than slowly applying a huge peak force. However, if you can apply a large force quickly, the power generated will be greater and the club will travel faster.

 

Speed training definitely has its place (I'm a big advocate of it), but there will be a plateau to how fast an individual can move, usually this plateau is less changeable than strength, so it makes sense to work on the peak force part of the equation as well as reducing the time part.

 

What was the duration of the baseball study?

If you are taking one session, then yes, I agree.

If over a longer duration, gaining strength and then training so that strength to be applied quickly will help.

[BackNineCollapse]

Golf is not a strength sport, it's a speed and technique sport. There is actually a pretty good NEGATIVE relationship between peak forces generated and swing speed. Tension and effort are the enemy of speed. SSG (and similar overspeed training systems, across multiple sports) helps train the brain to swing faster. There are small skinny guys on tour that have ridiculous swing speed. Even more poignant are competitive 12-14 year old golfers. A lot of these kids are 5'6"-5'8", weight 120-130# and still swing their drivers 110+. You don't need to be 'strong' to swing fast, you just need to swing correctly.

 

I would never confuse the brain by adding a motion that trains the brain to swing harder. They actually did this study in baseball. Batters were put in two groups, one did just overspeed training, the other did overspeed followed by weighted bat swings to failure afterwards. The first group significantly increased bat speed, the second had no change. Someone above mentioned the best approach, consider overspeed training as a separate endeavor. Don't do it right before golf, don't do any other golf related training (i.e. swingfan, orange whip, etc.) before or after. Fully dedicate to swinging as fast as possible during the overspeed training, and then don't think about it at all when you play golf.

 

Do you have any studies or research that back up the bolded line?

I believe that people may feel applying more force is detrimental, but I find it hard to believe any science would back this up.

The amount of force needed to swing a golf club is not high, but the more force you can apply to the club before impact the faster it will be traveling. However, power is the critical part here, as that is the rate at which you can apply the force.

Power is literally force over time, so, yes, applying a lower peak force quicker can generate more power than slowly applying a huge peak force. However, if you can apply a large force quickly, the power generated will be greater and the club will travel faster.

 

Speed training definitely has its place (I'm a big advocate of it), but there will be a plateau to how fast an individual can move, usually this plateau is less changeable than strength, so it makes sense to work on the peak force part of the equation as well as reducing the time part.

 

What was the duration of the baseball study?

If you are taking one session, then yes, I agree.

If over a longer duration, gaining strength and then training so that strength to be applied quickly will help.

 

Not published yet for golf (student is doing it for masters thesis), but has been done for baseball. The negative relationship is for peak forces, not over all work done. Obviously faster requires more work to be done, but it's how the force is applied that matters. Most amatuer golfers have short, high peaks in their force generation. Better golfers have lower peaks (often dramatically), but considerably more area under the curve. At the extremes, you need both (i.e. long drive swings have high peak forces and smooth curves), but for a vast majority of golfers they already have the requisite strength, it's just training the brain to produce more speed that is necessary.

 

Baseball study was 4 weeks, 3x/week.

 

EDIT: Just for some perspective, among the pros in our database, Tony Finau has the highest peak forces (not surprising, he has one of the fastest CHSs with one of the shortest arcs). Almost 40% of golfers with CHS between 90-94mph produce higher peak forces during their swings. At the other end of the efficiency scale, we tested a regionally competitive 14 year old golfer with a CHS of 116. His peak force was ~2/3 that of Finau, despite being only 6mph slower. This kid weighs 127#.

 

EDIT2: Sorry for double edit. I should clarify that better golfers do more 'positive' work, accelerating the club. There is a significant group of amateurs that, despite having relatively low CHS, do similar work. This group produces high peak forces early, then actively deccelerate into impact (due to being out of sequence). So it is possible to have a large area under the curve (in the absolute, as much is negative) and still have slow CHS. The 'treatment' for this group is to decrease peak force. I suspect if you had these golfers use a swingfan, they would get worse (just a guess, but an informed one =).

[flushem]

at range, I start with ssg and then practice. with body used to faster swing speed, it is quite a challenge to slow down my ss to 80s and 90s. But it has been successful to generate fast ss with slower tempo. The tempo video advocates to keep the same backswing speed but to speed up the follow-through.

 

some of you may not agree with me and I do respect that. But i wanna share my success of incorporating SSG and tempo training.

[clevited]

Golf is not a strength sport, it's a speed and technique sport. There is actually a pretty good NEGATIVE relationship between peak forces generated and swing speed. Tension and effort are the enemy of speed. SSG (and similar overspeed training systems, across multiple sports) helps train the brain to swing faster. There are small skinny guys on tour that have ridiculous swing speed. Even more poignant are competitive 12-14 year old golfers. A lot of these kids are 5'6"-5'8", weight 120-130# and still swing their drivers 110+. You don't need to be 'strong' to swing fast, you just need to swing correctly.

 

I would never confuse the brain by adding a motion that trains the brain to swing harder. They actually did this study in baseball. Batters were put in two groups, one did just overspeed training, the other did overspeed followed by weighted bat swings to failure afterwards. The first group significantly increased bat speed, the second had no change. Someone above mentioned the best approach, consider overspeed training as a separate endeavor. Don't do it right before golf, don't do any other golf related training (i.e. swingfan, orange whip, etc.) before or after. Fully dedicate to swinging as fast as possible during the overspeed training, and then don't think about it at all when you play golf.

 

Do you have any studies or research that back up the bolded line?

I believe that people may feel applying more force is detrimental, but I find it hard to believe any science would back this up.

The amount of force needed to swing a golf club is not high, but the more force you can apply to the club before impact the faster it will be traveling. However, power is the critical part here, as that is the rate at which you can apply the force.

Power is literally force over time, so, yes, applying a lower peak force quicker can generate more power than slowly applying a huge peak force. However, if you can apply a large force quickly, the power generated will be greater and the club will travel faster.

 

Speed training definitely has its place (I'm a big advocate of it), but there will be a plateau to how fast an individual can move, usually this plateau is less changeable than strength, so it makes sense to work on the peak force part of the equation as well as reducing the time part.

 

What was the duration of the baseball study?

If you are taking one session, then yes, I agree.

If over a longer duration, gaining strength and then training so that strength to be applied quickly will help.

 

Not published yet for golf (student is doing it for masters thesis), but has been done for baseball. The negative relationship is for peak forces, not over all work done. Obviously faster requires more work to be done, but it's how the force is applied that matters. Most amatuer golfers have short, high peaks in their force generation. Better golfers have lower peaks (often dramatically), but considerably more area under the curve. At the extremes, you need both (i.e. long drive swings have high peak forces and smooth curves), but for a vast majority of golfers they already have the requisite strength, it's just training the brain to produce more speed that is necessary.

 

Baseball study was 4 weeks, 3x/week.

 

EDIT: Just for some perspective, among the pros in our database, Tony Finau has the highest peak forces (not surprising, he has one of the fastest CHSs with one of the shortest arcs). Almost 40% of golfers with CHS between 90-94mph produce higher peak forces during their swings. At the other end of the efficiency scale, we tested a regionally competitive 14 year old golfer with a CHS of 116. His peak force was ~2/3 that of Finau, despite being only 6mph slower. This kid weighs 127#.

 

EDIT2: Sorry for double edit. I should clarify that better golfers do more 'positive' work, accelerating the club. There is a significant group of amateurs that, despite having relatively low CHS, do similar work. This group produces high peak forces early, then actively deccelerate into impact (due to being out of sequence). So it is possible to have a large area under the curve (in the absolute, as much is negative) and still have slow CHS. The 'treatment' for this group is to decrease peak force. I suspect if you had these golfers use a swingfan, they would get worse (just a guess, but an informed one =).

 

I like how you think. I always try to find a way to compare things very simply. This isn't a perfect example but I think of most of us amateurs as dragsters. We have good power naturally but we just spin out in first gear and don't apply the power to the road. We think we are slow but in reality, if we figure out how to properly apply the throttle, we can put up fast times.

 

To me, that applying the throttle is swing efficiency and technique. SSG, general overspeed training to me is like improving the airflow to your engine, or improving the exhaust flow in order to "free up" more power and speed. Long drive specific weight training and other more explosive exercises are like adding a little extra boost and fuel to your engine.

 

Just my visuals of it. Not perfect, but makes some sense to me.

[Z1ggy16]

Welp I think it's working for me. It was a down hill drive by about 10-20 yards, clipped a tree branch ... but today on 500 yard par 5... had 160 left in.

 

Couldn't believe I did that, normally I'm hitting a 3w or hybrid on that hole. Tees were moved up about 10 yards in the box from normal, but I felt like I had more speed there than I ever have before.

 

I am working a fade into my swing now because my current mechanics involve a little bit of a hip stall.. so I have lost a bit of distance with my irons. I'm hoping that SSG will get my fade distances back up to where my draws were.

[300_Straight]

I've noticed that the SSG, at times, has me getting quick with my tempo and results in slightly slower swings. When I take a swing with my natural tempo and mechanics, the numbers shoot up. At the end of my training last night, I took a few extra all out swings with the Green. The first 3 or 4 resulted in ~124-128mph. The last swing where I took my natural tempo and concentrated on keeping my left shoulder back, resulted in 137mph. Same thing happened the previous session. I swung an extra ~4 times all around 131 - 132, then a 138 when I concentrated a bit more. I didn't reflect the 138 in my "Final Green" swings, maybe I should :) lol.

 

I think this system is definitely going to work. I've already seen pretty good gains and I've been doing it less than 2 weeks. My 1st 'Baseline' session took place AFTER a warm up of about ~30 swings, so I would imagine my numbers were down slightly. I also didn't realize the Step Swings were part of the Introductory Protocol, so I've only done them in 2 / 6 sessions. I am going to update this thread either weekly or bi-weekly with my results. Here are my numbers thus far:

[FourTops]

Tried Swing Fan today...again. Swing Fan (to me) seems more efficient because it forces a certain movement due to wind resistance that SSG does not....and it seems to promote correct rotation without thinking about it. All IMO....try everything to see what works!

 

I don't really understand the comparison. I feel like they are trying to achieve completely different things. I use my swing fan to warm up and during every SSG session. I also "burn out" with it at the end of my session.

 

It's individual. Swinging a weighted shaft builds muscle like lifting weights...at least that's how I see it. The swing fan is like swimming...the resistance of water (or in this case air) also builds muscle. It's a matter of which approach works, or is more comfortable and less stressful for each person.

 

Also, why do you use the fan to burn-out and not SSG?

 

Good question. I guess during SSG I feel like I’m training my small muscles (fast twitch) and the swing fan is training my big muscles. At the end I’m spent and want to finish off those big muscles but not sure of science or effectiveness of this.

 

Makes sense to me.

[FourTops]

No matter what system one uses it's better than no system. But as I've posted before, and another did above, why do skinny smaller guys, even 13 year old kids, have ridiculous swing speeds...speed that I personally know was not created by any of the above systems?

 

I'll go out on a limb and say many of us may be using weak / strong grips, certain stances, employing "moves", or other nuances we deem to be "correct"...some of which might have been recommended by a pro, or learned from a textbook, or how we started swinging a golf club, so in reality it could be possible that one or more of those "standards" might be sub-optimal to create desired speed.

 

Like I stated above...ANY use of any of the systems, or all, is better than nothing.

[surefire]

 

Not published yet for golf (student is doing it for masters thesis), but has been done for baseball. The negative relationship is for peak forces, not over all work done. Obviously faster requires more work to be done, but it's how the force is applied that matters. Most amatuer golfers have short, high peaks in their force generation. Better golfers have lower peaks (often dramatically), but considerably more area under the curve. At the extremes, you need both (i.e. long drive swings have high peak forces and smooth curves), but for a vast majority of golfers they already have the requisite strength, it's just training the brain to produce more speed that is necessary.

 

Baseball study was 4 weeks, 3x/week.

 

EDIT: Just for some perspective, among the pros in our database, Tony Finau has the highest peak forces (not surprising, he has one of the fastest CHSs with one of the shortest arcs). Almost 40% of golfers with CHS between 90-94mph produce higher peak forces during their swings. At the other end of the efficiency scale, we tested a regionally competitive 14 year old golfer with a CHS of 116. His peak force was ~2/3 that of Finau, despite being only 6mph slower. This kid weighs 127#.

 

EDIT2: Sorry for double edit. I should clarify that better golfers do more 'positive' work, accelerating the club. There is a significant group of amateurs that, despite having relatively low CHS, do similar work. This group produces high peak forces early, then actively deccelerate into impact (due to being out of sequence). So it is possible to have a large area under the curve (in the absolute, as much is negative) and still have slow CHS. The 'treatment' for this group is to decrease peak force. I suspect if you had these golfers use a swingfan, they would get worse (just a guess, but an informed one =).

 

So if I am reading and understanding correctly, surely the real issue is when the peak force occurs, and the ability to maintain high force output throughout the downswing not the amount of the peak?

 

That is to say, there is nothing wrong with the amount of force amateurs generate, but they generate it too soon, and then reduce it before they get to impact?

Whereas a pro is constantly increasing or at least maintaining force applied until impact if not longer?

 

To me, this is not saying that having a high peak force is bad, just that it's bad if you don't apply it at the right times. Therefore if you peak too soon, but cannot sustain the force you will make big gains just by improving timing\sequencing\whatever moves that peak to impact or just after. Once you have this, increasing that peak will help you gain more distance, providing you don't lose the timing of the peak in doing it.

That said, it may be that absolute maximum force cannot be sustained long enough during the downswing, so you need to throttle back the max to increase the force application duration. Therefore if your maximum possible force output is higher, your sustainable threshold of x% of that force will also be higher, which would be beneficial.

 

I also think it's similar to when looking at clubhead speed, it's only useful if you are hitting the sweetspot, a high speed off the hosel is pointless, but it doesn't mean speed itself is bad, just not what should be focussed on until the mechanics are sound.

[thepinkbomber]

I noticed where I placed the radar I have different speeds. Question for those using the Swing Speed Radar...

 

For speed sticks...

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

For driver / ball..

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

We notice its different with driver / ball. For no ball we hold the lag longer for some reason not on purpose so the faster part of the swing is farther down the line.

 

Even if you have just the sticks would be helpful.

 

Thanks.

[PorscheFan]

Golf is not a strength sport, it's a speed and technique sport. There is actually a pretty good NEGATIVE relationship between peak forces generated and swing speed. Tension and effort are the enemy of speed. SSG (and similar overspeed training systems, across multiple sports) helps train the brain to swing faster. There are small skinny guys on tour that have ridiculous swing speed. Even more poignant are competitive 12-14 year old golfers. A lot of these kids are 5'6"-5'8", weight 120-130# and still swing their drivers 110+. You don't need to be 'strong' to swing fast, you just need to swing correctly.

 

I would never confuse the brain by adding a motion that trains the brain to swing harder. They actually did this study in baseball. Batters were put in two groups, one did just overspeed training, the other did overspeed followed by weighted bat swings to failure afterwards. The first group significantly increased bat speed, the second had no change. Someone above mentioned the best approach, consider overspeed training as a separate endeavor. Don't do it right before golf, don't do any other golf related training (i.e. swingfan, orange whip, etc.) before or after. Fully dedicate to swinging as fast as possible during the overspeed training, and then don't think about it at all when you play golf.

 

Do you have any studies or research that back up the bolded line?

I believe that people may feel applying more force is detrimental, but I find it hard to believe any science would back this up.

The amount of force needed to swing a golf club is not high, but the more force you can apply to the club before impact the faster it will be traveling. However, power is the critical part here, as that is the rate at which you can apply the force.

Power is literally force over time, so, yes, applying a lower peak force quicker can generate more power than slowly applying a huge peak force. However, if you can apply a large force quickly, the power generated will be greater and the club will travel faster.

 

Speed training definitely has its place (I'm a big advocate of it), but there will be a plateau to how fast an individual can move, usually this plateau is less changeable than strength, so it makes sense to work on the peak force part of the equation as well as reducing the time part.

 

What was the duration of the baseball study?

If you are taking one session, then yes, I agree.

If over a longer duration, gaining strength and then training so that strength to be applied quickly will help.

 

Not published yet for golf (student is doing it for masters thesis), but has been done for baseball. The negative relationship is for peak forces, not over all work done. Obviously faster requires more work to be done, but it's how the force is applied that matters. Most amatuer golfers have short, high peaks in their force generation. Better golfers have lower peaks (often dramatically), but considerably more area under the curve. At the extremes, you need both (i.e. long drive swings have high peak forces and smooth curves), but for a vast majority of golfers they already have the requisite strength, it's just training the brain to produce more speed that is necessary.

 

Baseball study was 4 weeks, 3x/week.

 

EDIT: Just for some perspective, among the pros in our database, Tony Finau has the highest peak forces (not surprising, he has one of the fastest CHSs with one of the shortest arcs). Almost 40% of golfers with CHS between 90-94mph produce higher peak forces during their swings. At the other end of the efficiency scale, we tested a regionally competitive 14 year old golfer with a CHS of 116. His peak force was ~2/3 that of Finau, despite being only 6mph slower. This kid weighs 127#.

 

EDIT2: Sorry for double edit. I should clarify that better golfers do more 'positive' work, accelerating the club. There is a significant group of amateurs that, despite having relatively low CHS, do similar work. This group produces high peak forces early, then actively deccelerate into impact (due to being out of sequence). So it is possible to have a large area under the curve (in the absolute, as much is negative) and still have slow CHS. The 'treatment' for this group is to decrease peak force. I suspect if you had these golfers use a swingfan, they would get worse (just a guess, but an informed one =).

 

Very interesting study.

 

Question: which forces are being measured? Is this the force applied to the handle / bat, somewhere else, or some sort of combination of forces?

[BackNineCollapse]

 

 

Very interesting study.

 

Question: which forces are being measured? Is this the force applied to the handle / bat, somewhere else, or some sort of combination of forces?

 

Always middle of the grip/handle.

[03SMURF]

I noticed where I placed the radar I have different speeds. Question for those using the Swing Speed Radar...

 

For speed sticks...

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

For driver / ball..

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

We notice its different with driver / ball. For no ball we hold the lag longer for some reason not on purpose so the faster part of the swing is farther down the line.

 

Even if you have just the sticks would be helpful.

 

Thanks.

 

For SSG training, I put the radar about where my driver ball position would be and have it facing straight at me. This has given me the most consistent results.

[thepinkbomber]

I noticed where I placed the radar I have different speeds. Question for those using the Swing Speed Radar...

 

For speed sticks...

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

For driver / ball..

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

We notice its different with driver / ball. For no ball we hold the lag longer for some reason not on purpose so the faster part of the swing is farther down the line.

 

Even if you have just the sticks would be helpful.

 

Thanks.

 

For SSG training, I put the radar about where my driver ball position would be and have it facing straight at me. This has given me the most consistent results.

I thought the directions said to place it at a 45 degree angle of the club head coming into impact?

[03SMURF]

I noticed where I placed the radar I have different speeds. Question for those using the Swing Speed Radar...

 

For speed sticks...

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

For driver / ball..

1. how far away vertically from sticks to you place the radar at 45 degrees

2. how far behind horizontally from speed stick head at setup do you place the edge or center of the radar?

 

We notice its different with driver / ball. For no ball we hold the lag longer for some reason not on purpose so the faster part of the swing is farther down the line.

 

Even if you have just the sticks would be helpful.

 

Thanks.

 

For SSG training, I put the radar about where my driver ball position would be and have it facing straight at me. This has given me the most consistent results.

I thought the directions said to place it at a 45 degree angle of the club head coming into impact?

 

I found that only to be important when hitting a ball. Many of the long drive guys I’ve seen do this training set it up this way, too.

[03SMURF]

Little update on me and my long term gains. I’ve been on FlightScope a couple times the last week for iron shaft fitting. Last SSG workout was in June. Trackman session in February (very near all of my SSG PR’s) had 6 iron speed at 101.5. My same 6 iron was around 103 today according to my fitter. Nice to see the speed has stayed and slightly increased from getting to play some. What’s scary is my new potential setup carried 15 more yards with an excellent improvement in dispersion.