Body Swing vs Arm Swing

[FormerBigDaddy]

I really like using an impact bag but as always I find my swing stuck between 2 feels. One is very much focused on my body tilting and rotating with the feel of absolutely no hands and arms and the other is much more hands and arms focused around the body. The hands/arms swing feels more natural and the feel is more of the “throw” release. It feels like more of a slap of the impact. However you can really see the clubface is more open and requires more timing from me. The body release, or the one where I feel like I’m simply turning and tilting with no hand/arm swing/release is much more closed and the club travels more outside my hands on the way back. This feel like I’m using my body to smash the bag and not anything like the slap/throw feel. You can really see the difference in tilts. 
 

I can hit the ball very solid with both swings. I would say contact is more consistent with the throw style awing but the misses are MUCH bigger. The body tilt/turn swing I can really struggle with contact at times but the misses are always smaller. I play better golf in general with this swing but contact can be a real struggle at times. Thins/fats come in to play more often but the big miss is much less often. That being said when contact is good I can really go after it without fear of the big miss and this is the swing I’ve done all my speed training with. 
 

I’m going to get some lessons here again shortly but I wanted to hear what people had to say. 
 

Which one is more of a “Golf swing” and which should I invest more time in? This to me is a prime example of a body swing/release vs an arm swing/throw release. 
 

Thoughts?

Edited June 28, 2023 by FormerBigDaddy

[iacas]

Neither of those are golf swings and so no real valid opinion can be given. You should record yourself from face on and down the line in slow motion trying to hit a ball doing both swings at the very least, and even then I don’t think they will look that different.

[Zitlow]

You want the body and arms working together with the arms taking the speed of the body.

 

Swinging into an impact stops the club from releasing past your hands which is no good.

 

The way to use one is to hang it on something a couple feet past the ball and a couple feet in the air.

 

The club is fully released here. 

 

 

Edited June 28, 2023 by Zitlow

[getitdaily]

From my own experience...

 

What may feel like an arm swing still needs the body to tilt and rotate. The body cannot be "still or calm"...it has to move. Folks who fire the hips too quickly or rotate the shoulders open too soon CAN see improvement by having a feeling of an arm dominant swing. The arms effectively pull the body through impact. 

 

What may feel like a body driven swing still needs active arms. Turn the body in the backswing with passive arms and you're dead. Turn the body through impact with passive arms and you're going to have bad things happen often. You'll also lose clubhead speed.

 

The point is, there is no arm dominant swing or body dominant swing. Both have to work together. What you may feel is dominant could be ok, as long as the non-dominant part is not overly passive.

[GoGoErky]

Most, if not all of this has been discussed in most of the swing threads the op has posted.

 

 

[Soloman1]

5 hours ago, FormerBigDaddy said:

Which one is more of a “Golf swing” and which should I invest more time in?

 

The swing in the second video.

[phizzy30]

Whichever swing that helps you find the center of the face more often is the one you should stick with IMO.  You can always work on face control after you've grooved your swing. 

[TLUBulldogGolf]

Neither of these are truly swings since you are stopping everything but the second one looks more like a real move.

[RoyalTroon]

6 hours ago, FormerBigDaddy said:

 Thoughts?

 

Either one, your choice,  but I wouldn't spend much time thinking there's a big disparity between the two, but there can be.    Instead, think of a feeder tributary into a large river, the body is the river and arms the feeder branches.     Where they merge with the river,  or combine into one system, would be a little post impact as very thoughtfully shown by Zitlow.  

[Pepperturbo]

Neither - hitting into a bag restricts seeing your full mechanics. 

 

IMO, exploit the mechanics that gets the ball going in the direction you want. 

 

DO NOT CHASE the perfect swing, better to chase the perfect score.  I am more upper body/arm hitter of the ball, vs eloquent Ernie Els full body swing.  No my swing is NOT perfect.  But I still, for the most part, hit the ball solid and straight, can create a baby draw or fade when needed.

[golfarb1]

Rob Cheney , a well respected instructor on YouTube , strongly advocates the “ hit hard , stop quick “ drill , in which the golfer hits balls and tries to stop the clubhead  shortly after impact . 
This feel of stopping the clubhead can be simulated via an impact bag. 
 

Edited June 28, 2023 by golfarb1

[Valtiel]

On 12/3/2022 at 11:27 AM, MonteScheinblum said:

Would forget all the excess thinking here and just shorten your swing to a point where your right palm doesn’t separate from the club.  Then hit the ball.

 

On 12/3/2022 at 1:19 PM, MonteScheinblum said:

You’re swing is too long from over hinging 

 

9 hours ago, FormerBigDaddy said:

Which one is more of a “Golf swing” and which should I invest more time in?

EDIT: This came across harsher than I intended by the time I finished it, please take this as trying to be helpful in a blunt way and not confrontational. 

At risk of being the guy pissing in your cereal.....if you want to spend time on anything you need to listen to past advice that's been given instead of chasing a new thing every few weeks. Last December Monte gave you those two replies quoted above in your "which 3 swings should I use" thread, which were basically the "diet and exercise" answer to the question "what should I do to lose weight?" and 6 months later you haven't really changed your diet or exercised:



In both of these swings you're still significantly overswing/over-hinging (moreso with the "arm" swing). No amount of false dichotomy "body swing vs. arm swing" questions are doing anything to help you, especially if you can't change one simple fundamental in what you're doing, and this has been a recurring theme with multiple past threads as @GoGoErky mentioned. Monte said:



And it feels like you're still trying to solve this problem with binary thinking here. Maybe this is just how you're choosing to describe "feels", but it isn't a useful or productive way to approach making any kind of progress. And you acknowledged the issue in that thread...
 

Quote

Been doing a lot of video from different angles and the over hinge is a huge problem and probably the biggest factor of my inconsistency...  I've been trying to search for the root cause of it as I can clearly see my right palm come off my left thumb in my grip at the end of my swing.  Now I that I've seen it i can feel it happening now.  So I started to explore ways to swing back that makes it easier to keep that from happening.  Simply just being aware of it and trying to stop from over hinging wasn't the answer.  No matter how much I tried to stop it or shorten my swing it was still there.  UNTIL... I experimented with getting some more width in my swing and getting my hands/arm more away from me early (think the Arm swing illusion thread).  For whatever reason that makes it 100% easier to stop my swing earlier and keep my right hand in place, thus stopping the over hinge.

...but the problem is still there both of these swings today in different amounts. The solution you felt like you found either wasn't one to begin with or you've lost it along the way. Regardless, no amount of asking "this or this" is helpful and you need to instead spend your time figuring out why you can't do something as straightforward as making a shorter backswing, because if you can't do that then none of these other concepts you're asking about are attainable either even if you DID get the binary answer you're looking for, which itself wouldn't do you any good either. 

[RoyalTroon]

2 hours ago, golfarb1 said:

Rob Cheney , a well respected instructor on YouTube , strongly advocates the “ hit hard , stop quick “ drill , in which the golfer hits balls and tries to stop the clubhead  shortly after impact . 
This feel of stopping the clubhead can be simulated via an impact bag.

 

https://www.facebook.com/bobgrissettgolf/videos/mac-ogrady-doing-a-drill-called-hit-hard-stop-fast-unbelievable-strength-control/2702367029988010/

 

A good wind cheater too, stopping after impact.