How to flick your wrists for a better swing

[torbill]

Sure.

What is going on here? We are causing a towel to move along a straight line. When it gets just to the right point, near the end of its travel, we cause it to change directions as fast as we can. If we get the timing just right - snap!

Now, let’s take a closer look. What was it, primarily, that was causing the original motion and the change in motion? Was it the wrist? Or was it the entire arm? Where did the power come from? I won’t answer this, don’t take my word for it. Answer it for youself. Do the experiment I suggested for determining the role of the wrists in generating the power and speed to propel a golf ball. Take a towel to an opening in a door in your house. Place your right forearm firmly against the left wall of the opening. Now, with everything immobized but the wrist, give it your best snap. Now do the opposite. Standing in the open room, snap the towel as hard as you can while keeping your wrist as stiff as you can, which is to say, trying to take the wrist out of the motion. (By the principle of superposition) the total snap is the simple addition of the snap created by the wrist added to the snap of the arm with the wrist as immobilized as we can make it - no extraneous snapping magic is available, this is simple mechanics. Where did the loudest snap come from? Was it even close?

Now, of course, this isn’t to mean that the wrist does nothing when snapping the towel, but would you say it is the main contributor? Wrists arent superfulous in the world, they do important work, and they predominate for doing certain jobs, and they even do certain jobs in the overall golf swing. My comments have been exclusively directed at the link in the OP, where the instructor makes claims about improving clubhead speed through wrist manupulation. This is simply false, on physical grounds, from everything I can determine with analysis and from all of my golf experience - and I am a very good golfer.

I prefer to think about the wrists in my golf swing as an effect. Not a cause. The wrists naturally fold near the top as the effect of the deceleratiion of the intertia of the club. They naturally unfold as the effect of the applied forces that cause a centrifugal force. The cause is what the mind and the rest of the body have done. Start making the wrists be the cause of action and I think we are headed for a lot of frustration and swing methods that will not hold up over time.

[Nard_S]

Stand with your feet together take club to waist high with full wrist hinge and hit the ball. goes a lot further than you might think.

[TIM929]

Your video is the best part of the article- thank you Dan!

[torbill]

You have no basis of comparison, no baseline, no control. How can you possibly establish what the contribution of wrists is, when you have never looked at what would happen without wrist involvement? Try doing exactly what you are doing, but doing it without wrist action. I will guarantee that the ball will go a lot further than you think. Once you do this, and repeat it enough so that your data is good, you will actually have a measure of what the wrists do, and do not, contribute.

[glk]

 

From Nesbitt/Serrano Work and Power Analysis of the Golf Swing . Roughly 72% of the work is via the hips and back joints (hips, lumbar, thoracic in the graph) the shoulders/arms joints supply around 25% (with the trail elbow supplying about a third of this) with the knees and ankles bringing in the rest. The wrists, combined, account for about 6% of the work. Work and ultimately power generated is predominately through the body with the shoulders/arms secondary - how one efficiently (or not) generates/transfers this to the club head is the difference between a great swing and the myriad of "inefficent" swing.

For those who wish to read the entire paper. For those that wish to see the graph that sparked the alpha wars it is figure 11. Work and Power Analysis of the Golf SwingThe role of the wrist is not a power source. More importantly they act as a transfer agent for the power generated.

From mid-peak hands (delivery position) to impact the club accelerates very rapidly due in most part (this unhinging also enables the rapid supination of the lead forearm) to the unhinging of the lead wrist. Inefficient swings begin to unhinge much too early thus never attaining the speed potential. Example from Cheetham linear kinematic graph. From mid-peak hands to impact the club accelerates from a bit under 24 mph to 115 mph - this happens in about .04 secs. Good luck doing that without wrists or throwing away the angles long before delivery. For the interested, google will provide research on the wrists contribution to distance and accuracy.

[Nard_S]

Must be fishing season.

[farmer]

These guys make money by providing content. So, they have to invent new stuff to sell. Golfers who use this content would be far better served if they were shown how to take a proper stance, how to make a correct grip, that kind of boring anybody can do it instruction.

[torbill]

Actual data, how about that. Looking at the relative size of the muscles involved in the golf swing I would have guessed that the muscles that control the wrists to be well less than 10%, and that’s where it comes in - 6%.

A word about how the muscles that control the wrists work, in the kinematic sequence shown - and I am assuming here that the sequence represents a typical golfer who is letting the swing load his/her forearm muscles, passively. Toward the top of the backswing, the arms/hips/leg begin to decelerate. This causes the inertia of the club to begin to pull on the body and finish the windup. At this point energy is supplied to muscles that control the wrists, stretching them and storing energy. This energy remains stored in the wrist-related muscles as the body and arms begin to the downswing, even adding more stretch and energy to the forearm/wrist muscles as the body and arms accelerate toward the ball. Then, as the body slows its rotation when coming into the ball, centrifugal force and the slowing of the arms allows the muscles that are attached to the wrists to unstretch, releasing their energy into the ball.

Now, going back to the claim by the instructor in the OP link, let’s say that you start doing active things to flick the wrists. The question becomes, how much more than 6% of the total energy can you actively supply? Without data, other than my experiment with the door jamb, I would bet my next Social Security check that it is no more than 2% more. Tiny, at best. And at worst, by actively manipulating the wrists, how much are you distorting the geometry of an otherwise sound golf swing? It seems to me that any attempt to add distance through active wrist manipulation has little upside and a lot of potential downside.

I do think that wrists have a real role to play in the golf swing, just not in adding meaningful distance to a shot through artificial manipulation. I look at DJ and his wrist at the top. His wrist is somehow playing a part in the total geometry of his body and swing - not distance, but rather creating some sort of a positive contribution to his overall swing mechanics/positions that works for him. I don’t question that.

 

[Fuscinator]

Did I read correctly that the Nesbitt/Serrano study was only done on four amateur golfers? Aside from it seeming to be a rather small sample, unless you know you're comparing a wrist flicker to a body turner, it's hard to make definite statements about one method vs. the other, yes?

[wagolfer7]

You would have to match the position of the clubhead.

If he's doing full wrist hinge at waist high, the clubhead is much higher than waist high with no wrist hinge. Thus the wrist hinge would go farther. But if you match the height of the clubhead with no wrist hinge, then it would be very comparable in my opinion.

Not sure what all the debate is here. All good players use their wrists. The debate would be active vs passive wrists. And early hinge vs float loading.

As for the OP's article. I'm baffled. Picture #3 and #4.....that's not what I see in PGA players at those positions. You see extended arms and forearm rotation. Not collapsed wrists.

 

[glk]

I don't understand what a wrist flicker or body turner are? Nor what methods you are talking about. Yes 4 is a pretty small sample set. Two models were created into which data gathered was fed. Jacobs and company may have done further stuff with Nesbit as they came up with their Alpha Man stuff. You'd have to contact them to get further into the weeds. Jacobs did publish a book based on Nesbit/Serrano work in particular with Nesbit. The Science of the Golf Swing - understand it is not light reading, lol.

 

Here is a bit easier to understand video on the "controversy" over alpha torque in the so called alpha wars.

[Nard_S]

Wow, who knew that EE, early extension is not a thing. They lied, you can keep the club head accelerating once shaft passes the hands. Why worry about maintaining angles of wrists or other things when it is meaningless to ball speed? Force has no directional component, conservation of energy, Newtonian physics need not apply.

[wagolfer7]

I actually like the snap the towel analogy. The difference is the towel has no face angle to be concerned of. So try to snap the towel and feel like your rotating the face to closed position. If you just use your wrists, the face closes immediately. Not what you want. If you let your wrists unflex while rotating your forearms you get the best of both worlds. I think that's the missing ingredient in the snap the towel analogy.

If you just think of snapping a towel. You bend your wrists, then it straightens out to snap. It doesn't go bent, straight, bent. That's what the OP article pictures show, which I think a lot of us disagree with. Create the angle with your wrist, then release that angle. Don't create a new angle on the follow through and allow your wrists to bend again after snapping the towel.

[glk]

The wrist "flicking" that I'm aware of and train at time is this

[sfong33]

I just read the article and I agree with Fireballer. As a lifelong “hold the lag” player (literally just tried releasing way earlier/casting a week ago), releasing the angles has allowed me to better synch the arms/club with my body turn. Before I was just wood chopping and swinging out to in while dragging my arms through and holding the face open. Releasing (or what Manzella is recommending) for me results in a completely different feeling vs my old hold off/drag the handle swing. Pivot is in synch, don’t have to worry about hitting massive pulls. The pictures are static, when swinging at full speed you really don’t have the strength and control to exactly duplicate the sequence/positions pictured and I think on video the flick wouldn’t look as drastic. So bottom line to me is it is applicable to a certain % of golfers out there.

[Barfolomew]

Look like he's talkin about something that already happens in sound swings..... but if you're new, too wrist stiff, or in a funk this could bring you back to life

 

I do practice getting very wristy with chips because really develops your feel and distance cotrol

[torbill]

Well, that’s four data points of actual evidence more than what what the instructor in the OP link provided. If you have any data that suggests that there is a problem with the study data, please feel free to post it. This is a topic that needs analysis and actual data to get the matter sorted out.

[Fireballer]

Yes. It reminds me of this video. If your pivot is trash, of course you will flip like crazy with this intent. I dont really see it much different than the no turn cast drill.https://youtu.be/vuBfHhCLEvU

[Fuscinator]

Right, but it's only four. That's an extremely small study group given how many golfers there are in the world and how much variability there is in methodology and quality of play.

I came across this video made on 1/23 (I assume of 2020) of Manzella talking a little bit more about the subject using something call Hackmotion -

[sfong33]

Exactly, “casting” or the feel of casting was the key for me. I never learned to release the club properly so combining the flick/cast with a proper pivot = much better results. It really is whatever works best for you. I believe the flick is also what Mike Austin and his disciples are espousing.

[torbill]

I watched the video, to the end. I don’t understand the point of it, in the context of your concern about the small sample size. Does he say anything at all that would provide added data or refute the 6%? If he does, I sure missed it. If you don’t believe the small sample, per se, I suggest a sanity test. Look at the muscles that control the movement of the wrists and only those muscles. Now look at all of the other muscles in your body, that should come into play in the golf swing. Can you honestly say that it is sane to believe that the muscles that move the wrists have the capacity to store much more than 6% of the stored energy that is released in the swing?

My take on that video is not that he is teaching us to flick our wrists to generate added power and speed. Rather, he seems to be reacting to the square-to-square method, in which the swing is flat, the club is laid off, and there is a late release/blocking action through impact. He doesn’t like that. He wants the club to go more back and up, not so much around. I didn’t hear a word about flipping the wrists to generate more speed/power. Maybe he teaches the feel of flipping the wrists in order to help students who are holding off the release overcome it and get more of the stored energy in the wrists released in the hitting zone.

Do you believe that there is some magical source of energy, over and above the 6% as measured in the test, that is brought about due to actively snapping the wrists? If yes, what is the source of energy? I mean, what are you doing, other than creating innuendo, in lieu of providing a supporting argument or supporting data for whatever it is that you believe?

[Fuscinator]

Well, considering your points, why bother with any sampling at all?

I don't really have a stake in the experiment. I just find it odd that they could only find four golfers for their experiment, or would want to limit it to only four.

I posted the video of him in response to subject in general, not to anything you said.

[torbill]

I misunderstood you. Sorry for the impatience. I spent the better part of an hour, plowing through that video, frustrated by looking for actual data that wasn’t there.

It’s fair to question insufficient data. But that doesn’t mean that what the study concluded has no value as confirming evidence. The door jamb experiment that I suggested, to try to isolate/demonstrate the limited effect of pure wrist power, hopefully begins to shed light on wrists and power/distance. And looking at the relative size of the muscles that move the wrists, in comparison with the size of the big muscles that are involved, is further indication of where power comes from, and doesn’t come from. So these things point the way to the findings of the published study, which take us further down the same path. Conclusive data? No, but It is confirming data so far as it goes, until something better comes along.

The point I’ve been trying to make - and the only point - is that there is no magical snapping/flipping source of power. There is simply the straight addition of the various mechanical forces that the body generates. Time the application of the forces well, so that they all come together at the right time, and there is a sense of power, often with a feeling of wrists snapping/releasing through impact. I would argue that this is feedback that tells us that all of the elements came together in the right way - not that there is some occult force that materializes if we try to flip hard. The danger, IMHO, is that we don’t want to get overly distracted by something that really won’t give us more distance and control, and lose focus on getting the entire body wound up in the correct position to make a powerful pass at the ball.

[golfho50]

I think "flick your wrists" might be a less than ideal description of a "release". Maybe same thing but different description. Semantics and degree of? I don't think many people would argue the club needs to be released in the golf swing except maybe in a flop shot and even then there is some release.

[Fuscinator]

You were looking for actual data in that video? I was just looking for one complete sentence. Despite how inarticulate he appeared in this video (he's not anywhere near that bad in other videos I've watched of his), I think I got a sense of what he was trying to say.

In the video, I think he is saying that, in some professional golfer's swings, the lead wrist appears to go from flat to extended (towards the target), just past impact, rather than staying flat, bowing, or rolling over. As it occurs past impact, I think he thinks of it as a release rather than a flip. And, I would separate this observation from his theory as to why this occurs.

In the article, he actually suggests swinging with just the wrists, as an exercise, but I don't know what he means by that. If we saw him actually doing it, I bet he'd be swinging his arms back and forth while letting his wrists passively hinge, and I say this based on my general impression from the other videos of his I've watched.

In another video I watched recently, I think it was Steve Pratt who talked about starting to pull the top of the grip backwards right around impact. It's very much in the same idea as the towel snapping you mentioned earlier where you throw the towel at your target and then pull back on it to accelerate the end. So, Pratt was talking about snapping the club instead of pushing against the shaft, like snapping a punch instead of just pushing the guy. I suspect Manzella has a similar thought and that's why he uses the word 'flick'. Either that, or I have too much imagination.

[Zitlow]

Fling is a better term than flick.

Fling: To throw something quickly and energetically with a lot of force.

 

[Fuscinator]

In this interview with Andrew Rice, Sasho Mackenzie talks about the same observation of the lead wrist extension post impact made by Manzella. The question leading to the observation begins right around the 18:00 mark. Later, he talks about any additional force close to impact as being applied through the wrists by the rest of the body rather than by the wrists themselves. If you're not going anywhere ? it's worth listening to the whole thing.

[torbill]

Yeah, I was. I thought that you posted it because there was some added data in there.

In any event, if I understand what you are saying, I get the same sense about his message in the long video. He seems to be concerned about players holding off the release. Up front he talks about the square to square method. I can see from his comments and movements that setting the club flat and around, and holding off the release, is something that he thinks isn’t the best idea for many amateurs. Which of course isn’t at all what I thought he was promoting in the OP video. For me, the whole idea of it isn’t about trying to make a snap happen. Rather, its about having a swing that unloads all of the muscles in sync, which creates a maximum speed and the feeling of an effortless snap. So a snapping sort of feeling, in my world, isn’t about the snap as a cause but rather as feedback to the player than everything released in sync, all the forces peaked at the right time.

[Fuscinator]

There are also videos of him going off on handle draggers.

[Brian Manzella]

Here is a video looking at the "Flick" from a measurement of the left wrist perspective:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unZp6qUIiDk