Hi
Already wrote about this in the Youtube commentary section "THIS is the BEST SECRET to Incredible Ball Striking (Move Your Wrists LIKE THIS)" and i will also copy it here. For me this made a world of difference to my downswing. I have to force this to happen because until now my "release" pattern has been wrong, either a flip or roll or both.
I saw few similar posts about this same topic but i will share my own thoughts here, hoping it might be of help to someone.
"This was a real eye opener for me. I have had trouble squaring the clubface, even with bowing the lead wrist, i just couldnt figure out how in the world i can get the face square at impact, constantly hitting to the right with an open face. Only way i got the face square was to bow and rotate my forearm closing the face, but the shots were too low and too much shaft lean. i watched this video again on youtube that you made "You Need to Know this Shocking TRUTH About Your Grip to Hit Consistently Solid Golf Shots". At one part you said that pointing the club down by unhinging the wrists squares the clubface. At first i didnt believe that how can that be possible. Then i revisited this video and tested myself and it really does square the face. Now i can finally start my dowswing by pulling the butt end off the club towards the ball letting my body move along and then release the wrists down at the hitting area and keep moving my body through the shot in sync and be certain that the clubface will square itself. This also creates huge amounts of speed. Also now the followthrough starts making more sense. If after impact i continue to point the club down constantly i get that short finish arms straight and flying wedge intact. If i sort of let the momentum go and dont force the club down constantly after impact, my wrists rehinge and i get that proper finish position. This truly is in my opinion one of the best tips ever, because it teaches the proper way to square the face without the need of timing it all up.
My brother, whose backswing position was perfect, started downswing with rotating his body and internally rotating his trail arm and casting the club (this was his way of squaring the club). I told him this same unhinging move to square the face and it fixed his whole downswing. Now his trail arm stays tucked, he tilts his body and wrists release properly with a square face. Everything achieved with only this tip :)"
For me, I follow the "Magic Elbow" and adhere to Tom's backswing baseline of connecting the left upper arm to the pec area on the takeaway. After that the rest is almost "automatic" unless I lose connection during the shoulder turn and start arming the club to the top. As such, I don't think about internal/external rotation details. If I do start questioning those details, then I bet I'm starting to apply needless leverage (arm swinging, or excess wrist movement) by mistake somewhere in the backswing or downswing.
Played around a little more today and I feel like when I get my setup I can use more trail, or right forearm rotation through the hitting area and don’t need to think about the unhinging.
part of this is because I have been playing with different “end range of motion“ options and if my trail elbow is pointing down, that means my upper arm is fully externally rotated. That allows me to fully rotate that forearm and will be locked at square since the forearm has a limit on how far it can rotate with the upper arm fully external.
For me, this seems to be more powerful, however, will get on my launch monitor this weekend and see what the numbers show.
Thanks for sharing. I missed this episode but certainly resonates with me! I do tend to sweep the ball so it was really insightful. When I do get compression, it's only when I play a deliberate punch shot!
Just out of curiosity @Jari Hissa when do you start to unhinge the wrists? Is it when you get the club parallel to the ground with your hands by the lead knee?
If you work the Grid properly, the face, path, starting direction, and curvature all take care of themselves. Everything required is built into the swing motion and adjusted accordingly by the Grid based on the type of shot we wish to play. No need to concern ourselves with rotation, separation/disassociation, or anything else.
Also, while we enjoyed watching him swing and bomb it, I don't think any of us want Fred's lower back issues, likely due to years of creating all that unnecessary resistance and torque. We can hit our own bombs in a much more body-friendly way.
As an aside, check out the angle of his shoulders at impact...this is where I struggle because my shoulders tend to flatten on the downswing.
The video is excellent. In the video references were made to Couples, among other tour pro's, playing with strong grips. Couples also has unreal lower body rotation on the downswing such that his belt buckle is practically pointed at the target at impact. Thus, given his lower body rotation it seems the club would end up in the same position (open - push draw) as someone else with less body rotation with a weaker grip. Is that a reasonable observation? Meaning if he had a weak grip the face would be wide open at impact. I'm wondering if there's a correlation between lower body separation/rotation to grip strength position.
FYI, here is the link to the video that @Jari Hissa is referencing.
This is an interesting idea. There have been some other coaches that recommend unhinging the wrist to square the face. Darrell Klassen referred to that motion as "curling the toe". That is also the motion that Marty Sheimblum also suggested that kind of motion directly from the top.
I played that way for a while.
The uncocking motion of the left wrist, ulnar deviation, is also tied to the bowing
motion. The biggest issue I had was that the force was being directed down toward the ground, not forward toward the target. Also, the idea of actively uncocking the wrist instead of making the motion and allowing centripetal force to automatically do it became a bit of a timing issue.
I do still use that type of motion for a bunch of the touch shots around the green. This does have me wondering if the shorter backswing position from stack n tilt would be especially good for this release pattern because with the shorter backswing there is less time to get rid of the angles before impact. Interesting.
Do you feel the release happening toward the ground, or toward the target?