Do you really trap and compress?

[PracticeSwinger]

With all the issues that we see; from takeaway to the top, from transition to pivot and release… and all the compensations to fight these that result, for the vast majority of swings, in the wonderful combo of body stall and timely flip to some instance… what % of people would you say really trap and compress the ball with a mid-iron?...

 

I’m guessing it’s less than we think – even though people get to a reasonable shaft lean at impact from a face on view (and that’s already a minority of ams) even with less dynamic loft and a shallow angle of attack, I would assume a lot of them don’t really pivot through and play with a more down the line release than those who can get to a complete ‘DTL lean’ by trapping and compressing effectively the golf ball…

 

You know – that ‘woosh’ sound you get to hear once in a while and just see the ball explode out of the face…

 

And what do you think would surprise us the most from the guys that can achieve this – early and amount of pressure on the lead side? ‘patient’ transition to sync up and pivot through even though the swing is quick? Particular ‘delaying’ wrist action at the bottom of the swing? Speed at which the lead shoulder ‘pulls’ the body around (more than up) in the hitting zone? How quickly the hands exit low and left after impact? Other?

[SNIPERBBB]

Trapping the ball is bit of myth. 

[TLUBulldogGolf]

Very few people, even in higher level city and state level am qualifiers/events I've played in I wouldn't say everyone is there. They may hit it decently but it doesn't have that sound.

 

The last paragraph I think depends on how you are watching them, I think if you are watching at full speed it's surprising how easy it looks when someone has it all synced up. In slow motion it's mostly how good they look through impact, lot's of different ways people can get there.

[PracticeSwinger]

11 minutes ago, SNIPERBBB said:

Trapping the ball is bit of myth. 

I’ll bite - how so? latest technology proving its a myth?

[SNIPERBBB]

To trap the ball you'd have to be presenting a negative dynamic loft to the ball.  Or top it.

[PracticeSwinger]

10 minutes ago, SNIPERBBB said:

To trap the ball you'd have to be presenting a negative dynamic loft to the ball.  Or top it.

Fair enough - I’ll rephrase then; to hit the ball with less loft than the club has and on an arc tangent to the target line and exiting left 

[Obee]

41 minutes ago, SNIPERBBB said:

To trap the ball you'd have to be presenting a negative dynamic loft to the ball.  Or top it.

That's all just semantics. "Trapping" vs. "flipping" is a thing. Call both of them what you want, but there's a difference between center-face contact with the club moving downward through impact and flippy, thin, nasty contact where that is not happening in the same/similar way.

 

One can say that the club is "always moving downward," but that doesn't help the conversation about good contact versus bad.

[Krt22]

8 minutes ago, MtlJayMan said:

Fair enough - I’ll rephrase then; to hit the ball with less loft than the club has and on an arc tangent to the target line and exiting left 

Pivot properly, extend in the back swing, get the arms synced up with the body, properly shift pressure and regain flexion, shallow the shaft with the arms/wrists, and extend through impact. Such that you can deliver the club face square to the target, with a descending blow, and some shaft lean. End result is ball first contact and a nice long shallow divot. Golf is easy

Edited March 5, 2021 by Krt22

[TheDeanAbides]

49 minutes ago, Krt22 said:

Pivot properly, extend in the back swing, get the arms synced up with the body, properly shift pressure and regain flexion, shallow the shaft with the arms/wrists, and extend through impact. Such that you can deliver the club face square to the target, with a descending blow, and some shaft lean. End result is ball first contact and a nice long shallow divot. Golf is easy

Hole the putt. 

[PracticeSwinger]

1 hour ago, Krt22 said:

Pivot properly, extend in the back swing, get the arms synced up with the body, properly shift pressure and regain flexion, shallow the shaft with the arms/wrists, and extend through impact. Such that you can deliver the club face square to the target, with a descending blow, and some shaft lean. End result is ball first contact and a nice long shallow divot. Golf is easy

Haha why to we play that sport?! Love it!...

 

Do you think that more emphasis should be placed on the ‘DTL view lean’? meaning the pivot and compression that has the hands exiting low and left... seems that the majority of instruction that I see on this subject is ‘face on lean’ / on dynamic loft... a lot of people chasing it and sliding doing so - stall, killing their pivot, having to flip late and no ‘real compression’ 

[Krt22]

2 minutes ago, MtlJayMan said:

Haha why to we play that sport?! Love it!...

 

Do you think that more emphasis should be placed on the ‘DTL view lean’? meaning the pivot and compression that has the hands exiting low and left... seems that the majority of instruction that I see on this subject is ‘face on lean’ / on dynamic loft... a lot of people chasing it and sliding doing so - stall, killing their pivot, having to flip late and no ‘real compression’ 

Depends on the golfer,  some flaws are easier to monitor in certain views. Shaft lean is the end result of everything else happening correctly, a good instructor should  be able to spot a handle dragger right away

[Petethreeput]

I tend to pull this off and then watch my shot go 30* left into the pond.  But man o man, did it feel good.

[Nard_S]

3 hours ago, MtlJayMan said:

Other?

Impact with crowned lead wrist, in effect a greater de-loft seems to be a key component of a truly compressed hit. It can heard and seen in results. I always thought ,'yeah, I do that okay', when in reality I don't because it is done to a higher  degree in tour level swings than one imagines.

[sevenfourate]

I'm more of a pick-n-flick guy.......

 

[PracticeSwinger]

9 minutes ago, Nard_S said:

Impact with crowned lead wrist, in effect a greater de-loft seems to be a key component of a truly compressed hit. It can heard and seen in results. I always thought ,'yeah, I do that okay', when in reality I don't because it is done to a higher  degree in tour level swings than one imagines.

Agree completely - I would guess that most good players think they do it, but don't... playing with a few local pros that 'shaft lean' (great players) like a lot do - but night and day when I get to play with the friend of a friend that missed the cut once at the US Open (yes that US Open); don't know how to say it but he definitely 'squeezes' it differently; pivot related - and (on full swings ovbiously) it's shot out of a cannon; not even the same game / same distances...

[Pepperturbo]

Trapping the ball IMO is a figure of speech.  It refers to the relationship between how the club head comes into the ball and simultaneously impacts the ground.  And, yes, if you hit the ball using the sweet spot, hard, the ball compresses.  I notice it more with driver though - as the sound even impact feel is different. 

[Obee]

9 minutes ago, MtlJayMan said:

Agree completely - I would guess that most good players think they do it, but don't... playing with a few local pros that 'shaft lean' (great players) like a lot do - but night and day when I get to play with the friend of a friend that missed the cut once at the US Open (yes that US Open); don't know how to say it but he definitely 'squeezes' it differently; pivot related - and (on full swings ovbiously) it's shot out of a cannon; not even the same game / same distances...

 

I absolutely do this when healthy, but my clubhead speed is just too slow nowadays to get the "shot out of the cannon" effect.

[Nard_S]

4 minutes ago, MtlJayMan said:

Agree completely - I would guess that most good players think they do it, but don't... playing with a few local pros that 'shaft lean' (great players) like a lot do - but night and day when I get to play with the friend of a friend that missed the cut once at the US Open (yes that US Open); don't know how to say it but he definitely 'squeezes' it differently; pivot related - and (on full swings ovbiously) it's shot out of a cannon; not even the same game / same distances...

I've come across 3 guys in last 3 years who are like this. It's completely different sound, an explosion. This one guy was an urbane 45  y.o. ,slightly round & soft gentlemen. was hammering range balls, 150 yard PW, a driver that was banging the net  50 feet up and 240 yards away. It was unreal because he was not a physical specimen of any sort, but he could smash it with great rhythm and poise.

[pinhigh27]

2 hours ago, Obee said:

That's all just semantics. "Trapping" vs. "flipping" is a thing. Call both of them what you want, but there's a difference between center-face contact with the club moving downward through impact and flippy, thin, nasty contact where that is not happening in the same/similar way.

 

One can say that the club is "always moving downward," but that doesn't help the conversation about good contact versus bad.

You can pure it with flippy swings. There are pro flippers on the pga tour. Everyone acts like it's this dichotomy of release it down the line with a ton of lean and a very stable clubface and you're a pro or flip it and you're a 20 handicap hack. There are flippers out there who are really good at golf. It doesn't mean you teach someone the way to do that. 

[SNIPERBBB]

Isn't phil a flipper?

[Obee]

13 minutes ago, SNIPERBBB said:

Isn't phil a flipper?

God no. Look at him at impact with a 7-iron and tell me he's a flipper.

 

This is him with a long iron, and it's after impact. He is absolutely not a flipper prior to impact or at impact.

 

[wagolfer7]

47 minutes ago, MtlJayMan said:

Agree completely - I would guess that most good players think they do it, but don't... playing with a few local pros that 'shaft lean' (great players) like a lot do - but night and day when I get to play with the friend of a friend that missed the cut once at the US Open (yes that US Open); don't know how to say it but he definitely 'squeezes' it differently; pivot related - and (on full swings ovbiously) it's shot out of a cannon; not even the same game / same distances...

 

Yup.  I've ran across two in my life.  I've played with an assortment of good golfers all the way to a +8.  Funny enough it wasn't the +8 that could make that sound.  

 

One of them made his run on the Canadian Tour but didn't make it.  The other flamed out at Q school.  

 

I can compress the ball.  But certainly not at that level I've seen.  There is that "sound" that once you hear it, you go "whoa".  It's just on a different level.  

[Arn]

When I was a teenager I could compress the ball pretty well, my shots had a heavy thuddy sound off the face. Fast forward 20 years, 10 of which I didn’t really play, and I can't get that sound anymore. I miss it, I hit it well but it’s just not the same, no clue how to get it back.

[SylvesterLundgren]

1 hour ago, wagolfer7 said:

 

Yup.  I've ran across two in my life.  I've played with an assortment of good golfers all the way to a +8.  Funny enough it wasn't the +8 that could make that sound.  

 

One of them made his run on the Canadian Tour but didn't make it.  The other flamed out at Q school.  

 

I can compress the ball.  But certainly not at that level I've seen.  There is that "sound" that once you hear it, you go "whoa".  It's just on a different level.  

Is that the whistle/ball spinning sound the ball makes when it’s quiet? That’s what I imagine when you guys are saying that. Usually the sound that comes when you catch one real good??

[Shilgy]

3 hours ago, sevenfourate said:

I'm more of a pick-n-flick guy.......

 

We’re not talking noses here!***

 

 

 

 

*** sorry, couldn’t resist that one.🙄

[Soloman1]

There was a time in my youth (40 years ago) when I could get a balata to sizzle as it started low for a while, then climbed the ladder.

 

Now, it's more of the sound of soft toss nerf ball into a shower curtain...

[80sFredriksson]

15 hours ago, Obee said:

God no. Look at him at impact with a 7-iron and tell me he's a flipper.

 

This is him with a long iron, and it's after impact. He is absolutely not a flipper prior to impact or at impact.

 

Yeah not a flipper, probably more Face rotation than the average pga tour pro thou, I would assume you need a decent swing speed to get that compress sound as well as the correct delivery, I could probably never do it with my speed 75mph 7 iron

Edited March 6, 2021 by 80sFredriksson

[ElliotBradleyGolf]

In my experience, for many club golfers 'trapping' the ball is a bad thing. Shaft lean and low dynamic loft would need to be matched to an appropriately high club speed. For most, the extra launch from producing higher dynamic loft would be closer to optimal.

[ThinkingPlus]

1 hour ago, ElliotBradleyGolf said:

In my experience, for many club golfers 'trapping' the ball is a bad thing. Shaft lean and low dynamic loft would need to be matched to an appropriately high club speed. For most, the extra launch from producing higher dynamic loft would be closer to optimal.

Excellent post.  Without speed, delofting irons as the touring pros do will lead to hitting ground balls with 7 irons.

[SNIPERBBB]

Anytime you're having to force something, odds are you're doing it wrong. Especially in the golf swing where most of what people try to force are the results of something they did a few steps ago in the process.