Learning Zone 1

[Daryl]

There are a lot of Pivot drills aimed at teaching how the pivot components move in a coordinated way.

My favorite is the "Behind the Back Drill". Put your Dowel (or Golf Club) behind your back and through your Elbows and then assume your Address Posture. Start pivoting in a slow Backstroke and Downstroke motion. Increase your range of motion as you become comfortable. Be aware that the Backstroke Motion is different than the Downstroke Motion.

This drill isolates Zone 1 from Zone 2 & 3. You can feel all of the components involved; Feet, Knees, Hips, Trunk and Shoulders. Additionally and very important; this drill will give you a heightened sense of Shoulder Turn, Weight shift, Stationary Head and Balance.

This drill, unlike others I've used, will allow you to test component variations while you feel and see their effect on Rotation and Hip Action. You can test any Pivot you like such as "Stack and Tilt", "In the Dirt", "The Final Missing Piece", Etc. The advantages or not of each, for you, will become readily noticeable.

By using different Stance Widths, you can evaluate the Stance Width best for you and how it affects your component participation and Range of Motion. You can also Splay your feet in any direction and combination and evaluate what that does. It does a lot more than you might think.

[innercityteacher]

There are a lot of Pivot drills aimed at teaching how the pivot components move in a coordinated way.

My favorite is the "Behind the Back Drill". Put your Dowel (or Golf Club) behind your back and through your Elbows and then assume your Address Posture. Start pivoting in a slow Backstroke and Downstroke motion. Increase your range of motion as you become comfortable. Be aware that the Backstroke Motion is different than the Downstroke Motion.

This drill isolates Zone 1 from Zone 2 & 3. You can feel all of the components involved; Feet, Knees, Hips, Trunk and Shoulders. Additionally and very important; this drill will give you a heightened sense of Shoulder Turn, Weight shift, Stationary Head and Balance.

This drill, unlike others I've used, will allow you to test component variations while you feel and see their effect on Rotation and Hip Action. You can test any Pivot you like such as "Stack and Tilt", "In the Dirt", "The Final Missing Piece", Etc. The advantages or not of each, for you, will become readily noticeable.

By using different Stance Widths, you can evaluate the Stance Width best for you and how it affects your component participation and Range of Motion. You can also Splay your feet in any direction and combination and evaluate what that does. It does a lot more than you might think.

THE POST ON EA ....http://www.lynnblakegolf.com/forum/thread7432.html

Well maybe I can use this drill for a proper warm-up Daryl, thanks for the help!

(What I really mean to say is that this is way cool and something else I will use which you have described. Sometimes, it is overwhelming. Do TGM practitioner's ever shoot par or do y'all just keep experimenting and constantly keep your hcp at a 3 or 4? or a +3 or 4) LMAO

Patrick

[BerntR]

Great tip, Daryl!

It is also a way of learning how to build a pivot motion where there is a solid connection from feet to shoulders until past impact. Stance width, toe angles knee angles etc probably needs to be taylor made to each of us.

I used this drill to learn proper footwork, focusing on lead - lag relations from feet to shoulders. Driving the hips with the feet and driving the shoulders with the hips. For me anyway, the required footwork didn't come natural. The horizontal rotation is quite unique to golf and wasn't like anything I did as a child, even though I tested most sports that was available.

[Daryl]

Sometimes, it is overwhelming. Do TGM practitioner's ever shoot par or do y'all just keep experimenting and constantly keep your hcp at a 3 or 4? or a +3 or 4) LMAO

Patrick

Zone 1 leads Zone 2 and 3. So Zone 1 imperfections will show up in impact. The slightest difference in Zone 1 will stifle clubhead speed or affect the path of your hands. It's important that the Hands using the #3 PP Aim at the Ball or Aiming Point and make the Pivot comply with those alignments. Once your Pivot is functioning, I think it's easier to select variations for Zone 2 and 3.

[HungryBear]

Zone 1 leads Zone 2 and 3. So Zone 1 imperfections will show up in impact. The slightest difference in Zone 1 will stifle clubhead speed or affect the path of your hands. It's important that the Hands using the #3 PP Aim at the Ball or Aiming Point and make the Pivot comply with those alignments. Once your Pivot is functioning, I think it's easier to select variations for Zone 2 and 3.

Just my opinion, but, that is A great dichotomy of the golf stroke.

The hands direct the pivot. BUT the hands can't directly tell the pivot how to move. (I think they tell the pivot WHEN to move but not how to move)Have to change what the pivot does to the hands then the hands approve or disapprove of the pivot.

The pivot can/should function very well with or without hands but the hands can't do anything without the pivot even when the only function of the pivot, in the stroke, is to do nothing.

AND

we can get a long ways into developing a golf stroke before we realize that the problems are with the pivot and we got to this point with compensations we don't see.


Does that make any sense? ( I understand it but I wrote it)


The Bear

[Daryl]

It makes perfect sense HB.

But the Hands can sense two different Alignment Forces. One, is the Bodies Rotational Alignment Force (Thrust). If you take a simple backstroke and then rotate on the Downstroke, your hands can sense the bodies rotation. This is Pivot Controlled Hands. The Bodies Rotation is moving your hands on the Path of Pivot Rotation and the Arms and Hands must manipulate to get the Clubhead to the Ball and hit it straight.

The other Alignment Force that the Hands can sense is the On Plane Alignment to the Ball or Aiming Point or Plane Line or Delivery Line. To Direct the Force along this Alignment, the Pivot Thrust must Comply and not move the Hands from this Alignment Path. This is the essence of Hands Controlled Pivot. The Hands are dictating Pivot Mechanics (Thrust and Alignment). Everyone does this to some degree otherwise with an unruly pivot, one would always miss the ball. Homer Kelley said that manipulating the Hands and Arms to get the Clubhead to the Ball is "Hacking". But Changing the Pivot to comply is G.O.L.F.

Homer Kelley stated (in the book somewhere) that once you learn and apply the Hands Controlled Pivot Procedure, it once again "feels" like a Pivot Controlled Hands Procedure (I paraphrased - see the quote below).

6-G-0 HAND MOTION All motion is focused on driving the Hands – NOT THE CLUB – toward the BALL. This may, with habit, seem to become reversed. But this is where and how a player’s game “comes apart.” And the cure is to return to the original primary concern – the Hands and their Clubhead Lag, Flat Left Wrist, and Plane Line (2-0). Educated Hands can compensate for Off Line Hip and Shoulder Motion but only up to a point. Off Plane Clubhead Throwaway is even a very prevalent Putting and Chipping fault. It amounts to an unintentional Plane Line Shift and causes the direction control to become vague. See 2-J-3. So – learn to hit the ball with Hand manipulation rather than with Clubhead manipulation and your game is less likely to keep falling apart (4-D, 5-0). ((Bold underline by Daryl)

The Pivot Drill above, is a Pivot Controlled Hands Procedure because it completely ignores the #3 Pressure Point Aiming. That's OK. Use the Drill to learn a Pivot that works well for your body, then tweak it during Practice so that it doesn't interfere, but rather supports, the "Prime Directive".