Finau Driver Swing/Distance.

[Barfolomew]

On 2/22/2021 at 4:38 PM, chipa said:

His swing is fun to watch. One thing I have noticed about a lot of big hitters is the forward hand position like Finau's and then turning the left hand over immediately during the takeaway. DJ Johnson, John Daly, Mike Austin and quite a few long drivers use(d) this technique. I use it when I'm swinging my best and hope to have it mastered sometime soon. I have tried everything like the one piece takeaway but I just can't make it work and feel relaxed too.

 

I notice it too.  It promotes wrist snap, which Im also experimenting with.  I hit my furthest shots when I snap them wrists...

[elwhippy]

A racquet sport coach would say he has fast hands. And he is obviously loose and not musclebound so plenty of leverage. 

[TiScape]

4 minutes ago, elwhippy said:

A racquet sport coach would say he has fast hands. And he is obviously loose and not musclebound so plenty of leverage. 

Good point. Before the pandemic I worked out 5x a week. Walked around at about 252lbs at 11-12% BF. Being 6’4” I didn’t look overly “muscle bound”, but let’s just say you could tell I worked out. Haha. Not an ideal build for the golf swing. Since the shutdown I haven’t been working out nearly as hard or often. Focusing on more flexibility and ROM stuff as I’ve gotten more into golf. Down to 235/240 and that’s mostly muscle loss. Been great for my game. There is a reason why guys like Bryson and Brooks who you wouldn’t look twice at in the gym, are talked about on tour like they’re “huge”. 

[NRJyzr]

21 hours ago, TIScape said:

Good point. Before the pandemic I worked out 5x a week. Walked around at about 252lbs at 11-12% BF. Being 6’4” I didn’t look overly “muscle bound”, but let’s just say you could tell I worked out. Haha. Not an ideal build for the golf swing. Since the shutdown I haven’t been working out nearly as hard or often. Focusing on more flexibility and ROM stuff as I’ve gotten more into golf. Down to 235/240 and that’s mostly muscle loss. Been great for my game. There is a reason why guys like Bryson and Brooks who you wouldn’t look twice at in the gym, are talked about on tour like they’re “huge”. 

 

This is off topic, but your post is a memory trigger...

 

I started playing golf in September, 1998.  I spent a fair bit of time playing from there to the end of the season, and we had a warm late fall / early winter, allowing me to play into December.  As my swing developed, I found I was hitting the ball some decent distance.

 

Right about this time, I started lifting 5x a week.  I was about 225 lbs at 6 ft tall.  Got quite a bit stronger, gained about 5 lbs as my muscle gain was mostly offset by fat loss.

 

And I promptly lost distance.  The entire 1999 season, I never got back to the distances I was hitting my irons in the cold in late 1998.

 

TLDR, lifted, lost distance  🙂

 

now back to regularly scheduled posts

 

[Circaflex]

On 2/22/2021 at 4:38 PM, chipa said:

His swing is fun to watch. One thing I have noticed about a lot of big hitters is the forward hand position like Finau's and then turning the left hand over immediately during the takeaway. DJ Johnson, John Daly, Mike Austin and quite a few long drivers use(d) this technique. I use it when I'm swinging my best and hope to have it mastered sometime soon. I have tried everything like the one piece takeaway but I just can't make it work and feel relaxed too.

Can you elaborate on this more please

Edited February 25, 2021 by Circaflex

[chipa]

13 minutes ago, Circaflex said:

Can you elaborate on this more please

I would look at videos of Finau and Daly, etc and watch the left hand at the beginning of the swing. This is a different move than the one piece takeaway where the triangle of the arms and hands is maintained farther into the backswing. These are the two main takeaway methods from what I've seen, and the one piece takeaway seems more popular nowadays, especially after TW came along. However, most big hitters get the left hand turned over early.

[ProStryker]

I watched a YouTube vid not long ago about this exact question, how does Finau hit it so far with such a short swing.  The teacher did some graphs and whatnot explaining his definition of impulse power.  Then he showed the swing and what that impulse power meant.  I can’t explain it, but it was interesting.  The gist of it was that Finau gets the same power in that short burst as most golfers take a full long swing to generate that same impulse power.  Or something to that effect, lol

[Sourpuss]

i look similar at the top angle but my hips clear no where near as good as his do😒

[chipa]

On 2/25/2021 at 10:01 PM, ProStryker said:

I watched a YouTube vid not long ago about this exact question, how does Finau hit it so far with such a short swing.  The teacher did some graphs and whatnot explaining his definition of impulse power.  Then he showed the swing and what that impulse power meant.  I can’t explain it, but it was interesting.  The gist of it was that Finau gets the same power in that short burst as most golfers take a full long swing to generate that same impulse power.  Or something to that effect, lol

 

You have to take most scientific analysis of the swing with a grain of salt, even from well known and famous teachers, because most of the time they do not agree with classical physics that is well established and predictable and used everyday to build complex systems. I am an engineer btw.

 

This doesn't mean these teachers can't help people swing better, only their reasoning about where power comes from is usually wrong.

 

From a purely physics standpoint, the power in the swing comes from loading and unloading flexible tissue, muscle contraction and mechanical advantages that take the most advantage of the bodies physiology.

 

IMO, taller people like Tony Finau have advantages over other players, one for the same angular velocity they generate they more clubhead speed than someone with shorter arms. Two, longer limbs allow for more loading of the flexible tissues that in the end can generate more speed. In Tony's personal case, I think he has very good mechanics in addition that from the very onset of his swing he is loading his upper body over his lower body. This is how he generates so much speed. Many coaches would tell us the legs and feet would have little do do with the swing but the reality is pro use them to generate a lot of easy clubhead speed.

 

In my personal experience this is the case as well. I am only 5'6" but have reached almost 130 mph with a swing that I resist a great deal with my feet. I can still manage pretty high numbers at 55 using the same technique. Just today I reached my personal best with my steel shafted 5 wood at 41.5" of 106 mph. A good method to get the feet involved us to use the Mike Austin Setup(which most big hitters do) that gets the legs in a good position to resist the upper body. Then push the left hand and shoulder back against the tension in the feet. It is good to only do half swings with this practice method in order to feel how much power can be created with such a short swing.

[WhostherealSlimShady]

On 2/23/2021 at 2:52 AM, TIScape said:

As I stated above he posted a video playing  in Utah I believe, going all out or close to it, and was at 206  ball speed. Don’t remember the exact #. It was a popular video. I’m sure someone else has seen it. Found it

 

ton of backspin!

[duck hook]

Main reason Tony shortened his swing when he first came on tour was for injury prevention and for longevity.