Comments on: Hitting vs Swinging – Part 1

By: John

John — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 20:57:29 +0000

Excellent article.
I play left handed. My right side and hand is stronger than my left. Apart from cricket and golf I am right handed. I figured sometime ago that for me swinging is more suitabe than hitting.
I look forward to your additional articles on this subject.

John

By: Hideo Kobe

Hideo Kobe — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 01:35:35 +0000

Swinging versus hitting becomes even more complicated on half wedges, pitches, chipping when you must use your arms, hands for feel and accuracy. Swinging maybe okay for full shots. But not with the half shots.

By: Coltsfan

Coltsfan — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 17:37:58 +0000

dont know if he has seen a game live, but I belwive they do get NFL games in Europe on cable.

The Bears are my second favorite ….

By: Charles

Charles — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 10:06:25 +0000

Hei John!

Wonderful site about hitting, I’ve soaked it up over and over.

I recently bought a Suunto G6 golf watch. It measures degrees of backswing, estimated clubhead speed, tempo(swing time, %of time in downswing), and a good/bad rating per swing.

From my first results, it appears as though I my shortest backswings produce almost as much clubhead speed as my longest backswings, and my % of good shots is far higher with the short backswing. This was quite surprising to me, and I am now working on shortening, rather than lengthening my backswing. My temp was rock solid on 33%, where I read that 25% is the golden figure to strive for. Can’t seem to do that, and I’m guessing it’s because of my short(er) backswing.

Any thoughts on that?

Best Regards,
charles

By: innercityteacher

innercityteacher — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 23:24:20 +0000

Hey CF, being a native of Chicago (unlike Daryl), and watching Peyton at the Univ. of TN, the Colts are my second fav. team!

Do you think the author of this site has ever seen an Americain Football team?

By: innercityteacher

innercityteacher — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 23:08:17 +0000

NO, he’s with OB in Toronto learning the “secret handshake” and getting the Yoda decoder ring, en francais!

Sacre Blue!

By: Coltsfan

Coltsfan — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 14:30:46 +0000

He’s French and apparently MIA….

By: innercityteacher

innercityteacher — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 23:46:46 +0000

John, ca bien! Are you French? French-Canadian? Your english c’est magnifique!

By: innercityteacher

innercityteacher — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 22:28:03 +0000

Very concise, John. The videos are great! On point. With our championships coming up soon here in the Delaware Valley, it is great to have another TGM source that is so well organized!

I have gone from a 21 hcp. to a 12.4 since March ’10 with TGM and have broke 80 twice in the last several weeks. TGM is way cool!

By: Charlie Y

Charlie Y — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 18:24:35 +0000

If you are still monitoring this blog for questions from readers, I have two from watching the videos again (and again and again).

The first one is on a difference I think I see of head movement in the vertical direction during the downswing. On the swinging video, the head does not travel downward, and on the hitting video, the head travels downward slightly before traveling back up, like on some of the Nicklaus videos. Is this a swing difference or something that is individualistic, depending on the person?

The second thing relates to something I heard on the course yesterday–to look at the ball with the forward eye during the takeback, presumably on the assmption that if you turn your head slightly to the rear to look with your forward eye, then as your head rotates with your body to the target, you still have more “eye” to use to see the ball. Is this a general principle, or is this a technique developed by golfers who are forward eye dominant? In my case (right handed), I am very right eye dominant and have an uncomfortable feeling in my visual system if I try to focus on the ball with my left eye.

Thanks for responding if you come back to this page and catch this question.

Charlie Y

By: Sven

Sven — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 14:58:59 +0000

John,
Great stuff here about “swinging” and “hitting”. I really feel there is a best seller of a book somewhere here. Just as Jim Hardy wrote a book explaining the differences between a one and two plane swing, you could write one detailing the differences between hitting and swinging. I am sure I am not alone in this, but sometimes I may read a lengthy instructional article or watch a video and at the end of it, I still don’t know whether it was about pulling or pushing the club. Knowing that would make learning the game a less frustrating task. Keep up the great work.
Sven. (Canada)

By: Charlie Y

Charlie Y — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 02:54:31 +0000

I came across your lesson on swinging versus hitting today, and it has helped me quite at bit. I thank you very much for it. You are the first online eaching pro that I have found has recognized the there are different kinds of swings that come from different approaches to moving the ball. I read an article on LPGA tour players about 20 years ago on a similar subject, but not since. In that article, the author talked about the swinger who is ballet like, where the ball just happens to be in the path of the swing, and the striker who sees the ball as an object to be struck. It also talked about the advantages of each method. Since I do research in cognitive differences in the ways that people approach learning biomechanicsl movement (dancing, drawing, etc.) and making decisions (risk/reward), I have been looking for information like this to help justify my way of thinking about golf. I have tried to convert to being a swinger, but I always to back to being a hitter on the course when I have to revert to my natural tendencies. I am more kinesthetic than rhythmic, and I see motions in terms of hits pieces more than its holistic image. Now, I feel like I can be me and not someone else. Now I know that I can search for a local pro that knows what you know. Thank you.

By: Coltsfan

Coltsfan — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:52:21 +0000

Hi John,
Hope all is. I was wondering your thoughts on if you felt the hitting procedure is more “back friendly” than swinging.
I dont have a bulging,ruptured disk or even sciatic pain, but I think I have have abused my back from landscaping and poor swing form over the years.
I know thet the golf swing is inherintly bad on the back no matter how you swing, but I was just wondering if using primarily #1PA #4PA may spare my back a little more than pulling hard w/ #4

Thanks!

By: NYC Lagster

NYC Lagster — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 05:06:54 +0000

Great job of explaining the different procedures! Keep up the good work.
NYC Lagster

By: John Di Lagito

John Di Lagito — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 18:10:32 +0000

Hi Jake

I give a lot of credit to Lynn Blake’s work. I take him as one of the best TGM expert around and his PGA tour student, Brian Gay, is doing wonders this year.

3 years ago I didn’t know a thing about TGM and I’ve never heard of Hitting.
At that time, my game hit a plateau. I’ve tried all the Leadbetter crap with no improvement at all.

Then I bumped to Lynn’s site and TGM and while very complicated, it sounded right…

So, I used Lynn’s site as a starting point to learn that TGM stuff. It was tough at the beginning because the forum is haunted by hard time TGMers and sometimes you can get lost if you don’t have the book with you as a reference!

But the results and improvements on my game were staggering!

This is why I decided to create that site: to talk in Layman’s Terms about the important TGM things I’ve learned so that it could be accessible by the average golfer.

And, yes Hitting produces a shorter backswing.
You must also make sure you perform a slower stardown and focus on destoying the ground!!! (I love that )