Hot Take! There is no inside-out our outside-in golf swing...

[knotthead17]

Has anyone come across the theory / idea that there is no such thing a an inside-out our outside-in golf swing? I've been thinking a lot about this lately and feel like it's not an accurate way to think about what's going on in the swing and causing more harm than good. 

If I showed you a target, the club path related to the target and the face angle you have all the info you need to know what that shot looks like (assuming a half decent strike). You don't need to see the golfer to know the starting line, the curve direction and amount, and roughly where it will end up. If you add in the golfer you can now see if their stance is open or closed to the path, but that does not change the shot. I think people are doing far too much harm by seeking out an inside-out path when really all they should think about is proper alignment / aiming based on their natural swing path. If that's aligned then it's all about the club face at that point.

[cnosil]

31 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

Has anyone come across the theory / idea that there is no such thing a an inside-out our outside-in golf swing? I've been thinking a lot about this lately and feel like it's not an accurate way to think about what's going on in the swing and causing more harm than good. 

If I showed you a target, the club path related to the target and the face angle you have all the info you need to know what that shot looks like (assuming a half decent strike). You don't need to see the golfer to know the starting line, the curve direction and amount, and roughly where it will end up. If you add in the golfer you can now see if their stance is open or closed to the path, but that does not change the shot. I think people are doing far too much harm by seeking out an inside-out path when really all they should think about is proper alignment / aiming based on their natural swing path. If that's aligned then it's all about the club face at that point.

I think that for good golfer that has  a good swing they can have and  in to out or out to in path and like you said, probably isn’t a big deal.   You are essentially talking ball flight laws with path and face angle.   You do seem to focus on setup,  but I can setup open and have an extreme in to out path and vice versa.  Do you advocate being more open to fix the path or change the swing to neutralize the path?  For example, my swing was measured on a GCQuad and I would have 8+ in to out path.  When if significantly opened my setup I was still in the 4+ range.   Should it open up more and  almost be facing the target when I swing?    
 

So in general terms, I agree with you, but golfers can get to extremes and need to make swing adjustments beyond setup to hit the ball consistently 

[NM01]

It’s a lot more nuanced than that.

But anyone tho understands ball flight laws can tell if a person is out to in or in to out.

Most of the time the golfer that is to much in to out our other to in has incorrect sequencing and setup alone isn’t going to fix it.

Fixing the way the body moves will fix the path and face to path issues 

[knotthead17]

On 4/24/2023 at 1:40 PM, RickyBobby_PR said:

It’s a lot more nuanced than that.

But anyone tho understands ball flight laws can tell if a person is out to in or in to out.

Most of the time the golfer that is to much in to out our other to in has incorrect sequencing and setup alone isn’t going to fix it.

Fixing the way the body moves will fix the path and face to path issues 

I'm curious do you have any resources that I have a good info about understanding the ball flight laws?

[cnosil]

6 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

I'm curious do you have any resources that I have a good info about understanding the ball flight laws?

[knotthead17]

On 4/24/2023 at 12:26 PM, cnosil said:

I think that for good golfer that has  a good swing they can have and  in to out or out to in path and like you said, probably isn’t a big deal.   You are essentially talking ball flight laws with path and face angle.   You do seem to focus on setup,  but I can setup open and have an extreme in to out path and vice versa.  Do you advocate being more open to fix the path or change the swing to neutralize the path?  For example, my swing was measured on a GCQuad and I would have 8+ in to out path.  When if significantly opened my setup I was still in the 4+ range.   Should it open up more and  almost be facing the target when I swing?    
 

So in general terms, I agree with you, but golfers can get to extremes and need to make swing adjustments beyond setup to hit the ball consistently 

Yeah, I think that's a really good example about you moving your stance and it changes your club path. The face to path relationship is what's important, right? I mean if you have a path that is directly at your target and your face is open to the target you will fade or slice off of your target. It doesn't matter if your feet are pointed left or right--that doesn't change the physics of what's going on right? If you get path to target, and face to path right you're going to have a decent shot regardless of where your feet point. I have a naturally out to in swing and whenever I try to swing more inside out it just creates tons of problems. If I just adjust my alignment where my naturally over the top swing path is roughly in line with the target and get my face somewhat matched up to the path I can hit really nice shots all day. So why in the world have I been trying to be less over-the-top when all I had to do was aim slightly differently.

I think there is really one more component to this-- a subconscious component as well where we are manipulating the club face relative to the target based on our alignment. If we aim/align more extreme than we normally do then we unconsciously adjust the face to try and correct for that alignment, but doing that is what causes the more extreme slices in hooks in the first place

[knotthead17]

2 minutes ago, cnosil said:

This graphic is really interesting. It's actually kind of what I'm trying to get at. We don't have to see where the golfer is aligned to know what the golf ball is going to do. Under the example labeled "straight", that golfers feet could be 5° open or closed but the ball is going straight towards target and it's not curving off of target right?

[NM01]

19 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

I'm curious do you have any resources that I have a good info about understanding the ball flight laws?

Along with what cnosil posted there are two good articles on wrx if you search new ball flight laws you will find them along with several other articles 

Leadbetter, Breed and McLean have videos on them as well

[knotthead17]

Okay so thinking it thorough here I guess the term inside-out is really saying path-to-body which is definitely a real thing. However I'm thinking that path-to-body isn't material in the physics of the golf shot and yet so much of our teaching revolves around it--maybe we're making things harder on some people doing it that way.

[cnosil]

30 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

Yeah, I think that's a really good example about you moving your stance and it changes your club path. The face to path relationship is what's important, right? I mean if you have a path that is directly at your target and your face is open to the target you will fade or slice off of your target. It doesn't matter if your feet are pointed left or right--that doesn't change the physics of what's going on right? If you get path to target, and face to path right you're going to have a decent shot regardless of where your feet point. I have a naturally out to in swing and whenever I try to swing more inside out it just creates tons of problems. If I just adjust my alignment where my naturally over the top swing path is roughly in line with the target and get my face somewhat matched up to the path I can hit really nice shots all day. So why in the world have I been trying to be less over-the-top when all I had to do was aim slightly differently.

I think there is really one more component to this-- a subconscious component as well where we are manipulating the club face relative to the target based on our alignment. If we aim/align more extreme than we normally do then we unconsciously adjust the face to try and correct for that alignment, but doing that is what causes the more extreme slices in hooks in the first place

28 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

This graphic is really interesting. It's actually kind of what I'm trying to get at. We don't have to see where the golfer is aligned to know what the golf ball is going to do. Under the example labeled "straight", that golfers feet could be 5° open or closed but the ball is going straight towards target and it's not curving off of target right?

 

Ball flight is controlled by face and path. stance can be used to manipulate the path to avoid having to change the swing dynamics to change ball flight.  

Lets assume perfect consistency  I'm right handed, I stand square to target line and My path is 2 degrees in to out and my face angle is 1 degree closed to the path so ball will start right and curve back left.   

If I close my stance by 2 degrees,  my path becomes neutral and face angle is still one degree closed so ball will start down target and curve level. 

If I open my stance to 4 degrees,  my path is now 2 degrees out to in and face is 1 degree open to path so ball will start left and curve right.  

So with the same swing I can appear to have drastically different paths based on setup.    Ultimately to understand how to influence ball flight you need to understand the ball flight laws.  

 

 

In your case,  you have an out to in path;  no reason to change it; people play a fade all the time.  I don't know why you are trying to change to an in to out path.   

[cnosil]

3 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

Okay so thinking it thorough here I guess the term inside-out is really saying path-to-body which is definitely a real thing. However I'm thinking that path-to-body isn't material in the physics of the golf shot and yet so much of our teaching revolves around it--maybe we're making things harder on some people doing it that way.

No,  it isn't path to body. Inside to out means the club is moving on a path that starts inside the ball and moves toward the outside of the ball.   Your body isn't considered.  Look at the image I posted,  the body isn't referenced. 

[NM01]

49 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

Okay so thinking it thorough here I guess the term inside-out is really saying path-to-body which is definitely a real thing. However I'm thinking that path-to-body isn't material in the physics of the golf shot and yet so much of our teaching revolves around it--maybe we're making things harder on some people doing it that way.

Has nothing to do with the body. It’s swing path and face relationship to the path. 
 

A golf swing is hard and unnatural. Things have to happen in a proper sequence and if that is off then there are compensations that at made to get the in back to the ball. Those lead to different swing paths and face to path relationships. One can have an open stance or close stance and not have a severe swing path as some setup squares.

Would suggest doing some study on the golf swing to fi along with your learning about ball flight 

[StrokerAce]

...as someone who recently went for a lesson to correct this, if you can get your swing path correct (which is a real thing) you will start to be more consistent and shoot lower scores.

simply looking at the result of the shot isn't enough. 
I thought I was hitting it 'fine' but when I looked at the video my hand path was way outside. I've worked hard to fix that and move my hand path more inside and it's led to more GIR, better distance and more consistency and reliability.

long story short: it's real and it matters!

[knotthead17]

@StrokerAce@cnosil @RickyBobby_PR Like the title says "hot take" haha thanks for sharing your thoughts and discussing, it's been helpful! 

[cnosil]

6 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

@StrokerAce@cnosil @RickyBobby_PR Like the title says "hot take" haha thanks for sharing your thoughts and discussing, it's been helpful! 

That’s what the forum is for.  We all share and learn.  

[StrokerAce]

8 minutes ago, knothead17 said:

@StrokerAce@cnosil @RickyBobby_PR Like the title says "hot take" haha thanks for sharing your thoughts and discussing, it's been helpful! 

well, certainly "HOT!"  and whenever something is hot there are plenty of firefighters around here!

I do agree with your statement: aiming based on their natural swing path I think once you try to do something that isn't natural your body fights against you.

But I played with a guy years ago who had a horrible slice and would align 40 degrees left of target because he knew that was the only way he could hit the fairway.
If he adjusted his swing path he would have hit it longer and straighter.

[AndySP]

Trackman measure swing path—the direction the club head is moving relative to the target, the swing plane—the vertical angle between the shaft and the ground, and the club head angle (among other things). I think these articles might be helpful to understand how “inside-out” and “outside-in” are different.

https://blog.trackmangolf.com/swing-direction/

https://blog.trackmangolf.com/swing-plane/