Let's Talk Lag's Golf Machine

[lagpressure]

Page 162:

iseekgolfguru writes:

For those who have not worked this out the main people moderating this site are TGMers and has been for years. This is a TGM principled based forum. So far nobody has come up with anything that falls outside the book, so we cater for much of what goes on. If it falls outside the boarders then it can be kicked around elsewhere.

So do F1 drivers fix their own cars? Hell no. Can they converse with their mechanics and support crew? A good driver can. How may ex-tour pro’s coach? Few because they can hit the ball but not communicate how they do it. How many retired sporting greats end up coaching national teams or high level performers. Few.

If people wish to use terms that have different meanings and interpretations of what is mean then Dart and I will always ask to keep the terminology meaning the same thing. In this thread hitting and swinging have been bastardised to the confusion of too many. Indeed its called hitting in this thread yet is a CF pivot controlled action, swinging, elsewhere that ISGers have found.

Lets look a few claims:

Pivot Stall being promoted in TGM for hitters is frankly laughable.

The unhooking or PP#4 is also totally misinterpreted.

Right arm thrust vs use of #2 and #3 to keep shaft flex shows a total misunderstanding between what is working the #2 (wrist cock and roll).

Post impact speed is key to TGM all the way through to Both Arms Straight and up the Finish Swivel procedure, not AT the ball.

Golf is a power game, that is pure TGM, delivered On Plane. Why is that geometry before physics? They go together.

A FLW will happen if forces do not suffer from Quitting, Steering, Bobbing and Swaying. Hardly a vapour trail there.

For those who have read all this thread you will have seen these comments before.

Paul,

Welcome to San Francisco!

I agree, this thread has always been rooted in TGM basics and understanding. Glad to hear you agree that no one has come up with anything that has fallen outside of the book. I have done my best to try and explain the actions of many of the greatest ball strikers of all time using quotes from TGM as you well know.

What do you think of Stack and Tilt stuff? does that fall outside of the borders you find acceptable for you boundaries? Just curious really.

Paul, I think your analogy of the car and mechanic is simply poor, because in golf, the car and driver are occupying the same place in space. In golf, you are both the car and the driver.. I think it's good to understand the mechanics of what you are doing in case you break down a long way from the shop, like the first tee, and a tow won't be available till after the 19th hole cart girl brings beverages.

I agree that you and Dart have bastardized the use of hitting and swinging.. no argument here.. reading the yellow book is very clear in what is going on there.. you might want to pick up the book and have a re read as I did this year. I appreciate your suggestion that I visit Lynn Blake's site, but a few of my students have sent over some lesson vids of his that I took a quick glance at, and from what I saw, Lynn is teaching two version of swinging.. one with a passive hand and arm throw out to right field, and another active right arm driving to right field. Homer is clear that both of these methods are in fact based on a swinger's protocol.

I'll be addressing your 7 points of interest in the coming threads..

Welcome to San Francisco iseekgolfguru!

[caedus]

Lagpressure,

The divisions even amongst TGM are huge as are the interpretations of each separate sect of the cult
Smith may have a certificate from somewhere, but a golfer? I have some info , is there any swings
of this Guru around anywhere to view? Anybody got some, please show the dynamic precision action

[Justin Tang]

Page 162:

iseekgolfguru writes:

For those who have not worked this out the main people moderating this site are TGMers and has been for years. This is a TGM principled based forum. So far nobody has come up with anything that falls outside the book, so we cater for much of what goes on. If it falls outside the boarders then it can be kicked around elsewhere.

So do F1 drivers fix their own cars? Hell no. Can they converse with their mechanics and support crew? A good driver can. How may ex-tour pro’s coach? Few because they can hit the ball but not communicate how they do it. How many retired sporting greats end up coaching national teams or high level performers. Few.

If people wish to use terms that have different meanings and interpretations of what is mean then Dart and I will always ask to keep the terminology meaning the same thing. In this thread hitting and swinging have been bastardised to the confusion of too many. Indeed its called hitting in this thread yet is a CF pivot controlled action, swinging, elsewhere that ISGers have found.

Lets look a few claims:

Pivot Stall being promoted in TGM for hitters is frankly laughable.

The unhooking or PP#4 is also totally misinterpreted.

Right arm thrust vs use of #2 and #3 to keep shaft flex shows a total misunderstanding between what is working the #2 (wrist cock and roll).

Post impact speed is key to TGM all the way through to Both Arms Straight and up the Finish Swivel procedure, not AT the ball.

Golf is a power game, that is pure TGM, delivered On Plane. Why is that geometry before physics? They go together.

A FLW will happen if forces do not suffer from Quitting, Steering, Bobbing and Swaying. Hardly a vapour trail there.

For those who have read all this thread you will have seen these comments before.

Thanks for the quote...was meaning to do this when I got home.

What really gets me upset as a teacher who strives to the highest ideals is that a teacher need not be a good player.
Good is subjective no doubt, but there are generally accepted benchmarks.

For example, it is said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but most of us normal folk would readily concede that a Miss World would represent an ideal type of beauty.

Thus it is with golf.

If one cannot demonstrate as well as one can talk golf swing, one can mask it by:

1) Promulgating that a teacher is a mechanic while a player is a driver as quoted above.

That is great for rocket science and race cars, but this is golf and it is hardly an appropriate analogy.
Harvey Penick could play.
So did Peter Kostis and Jim McLean.
Even Hank Haney (who will never beat Tiger Woods in his lifetime) used to play to a +2.

Is that good teaching?

If you can't demonstrate what you are teaching, it proves conclusively that what is being taught is wrong or the ability to impart the correct information is lacking.

If you can't demonstrate, how are you able to translate the feeling of certain motions to the student?
In golf instruction, one of the most basic tenets is: "What you feel and what you do are most of the time anti thesis to one another."

Ye shall know them by their fruits.
Good teachers always have good students - in so many words, show me who is coming for lessons.
Just like good cheesecake will always have a queue.

2) Teach from a basement with all the latest gadgets that can detect the most minute of movements but can't show where your ball goes past 5 metres (good if all you can hit is a weak slice).

Is that good teaching?

You can fool some people some of the time.
You can fool most people some of the time.
You can fool some people all the time, but... you cannot fool everybody all the time.

3) Choose not to post swing clips on YouTube so that no one can scrutinize the action and check the veracity of the information being imparted.

Is that good teaching?

The proof of the pudding is in the eating.
Every teacher worth a dime would have a half decent swing.
Yes, the golf swing should be demonstrated at normal playing speed, not a chip or pitch shot, but a full speed at normal playing speed.
Anyone with a mirror and time on their hands can primp and pose eventually to look like Ben Hogan - just like anyone with enough paint,metal and welding torch can make a junk car look decent.

Last gripe...

"This is a TGM principled based forum"

That is a presposterous claim when the subject matter at hand cannot be quoted from the book - yes, the book is that precise if one chooses to live by it.
Worse, the instructor in question believes that quoting the book is not required to be a good teacher (see a common line of thinking). That is just like your mathematics professor saying that knowing algebraic formulae is not de rigeur to be a good mathematician.
My point is...if you are extremely familiar with a subject matter, quoting it will come naturally.

My idea of good TGM teaching is not by explaining "oh that is easy, just do this and that." Good teachers do not ever explain things away.
Its about understanding what is right with TGM and then through personal experience teach the students how to produce the right moves through drills etc.

As expressed in a post of mine here - trying to do "this and that" will not give you "this and that". What usually feels right may be wrong and vice versa, this again will be pretty abstract to the teachers who can't do "this and that" at full speed.

The only true blue blooded TGM principled based forum (read that as Homer was correct yesterday, today and forever) is LBG. Period.

Its unfortunate that things have come to such a stage, but behind every dark cloud lies a silver lining.
At the end of the tunnel, sometimes the light is really the start of a new and better beginning, not the headlamps of another train approaching.

Having kept quiet these 4-5 years I have know the person in question, it is time the whole world know what this has been all about.

[Addington Arnie]

Lagpressure,

The divisions even amongst TGM are huge as are the interpretations of each separate sect of the cult
Smith may have a certificate from somewhere, but a golfer? I have some info , is there any swings
of this Guru around anywhere to view? Anybody got some, please show the dynamic precision action

Hello Caedus,

Welcome to ABS. You say you "have some info"? Sounds intriguing - what is it about? TGM, MORAD, the golf swing, equipment, your background or own experiences? I'm sure your posts on any of those subjects would be good value. But I hope the info you refer to doesn't focus on Paul Smith. If it does I personally want no part of it or any attempt to humiliate any individual. What has happened over at ISG has happened now and I would rather we focused on going forward and not fall into the trap of aping the mistakes and flaws we accuse others of.

Thanks, Arnie

[lagpressure]

I agree Arnie, this isn't about Paul Smith..

I think this thread seems to have the spirit of exploring and questioning golf swing theory from an intellectual lens, and keeping debate open, and hopefully insightful.

My hope for the continuance of LTLGM here is that we continue to question, analyze, scrutinize, and grow from the power of respectful discussion.
The success of this thread certainly has not been due to everyone agreeing on everything. Debate is healthy and often informative.

Abraham Lincoln was once quoted

"I hold on to an idea until I am shown a better one"

The spirit of this thread has never been that of censorship, and that is what was happening at iseek... and that is why it is now here in San Francisco.

I hope we can all breath a bit easier now.. and let this thread evolve further if it still has any legs left.. it certainly has run a long way!

[aiguille]

This thread will run and run......the transplant is complete and the heart beats again.

Onwards with advanced ball striking!

[TeddyIrons]

I'm on page 50-something of that thread on ISG. It has been interesting and insightful. I'm sometimes surprised at how adults behave on an internet forum. I think Jeff Mann behaved impeccably as did Lag in his responses to him. There was a healthy debate on different opinions from many contributors - obviously I will take Lag's real life experiences over Jeff's but the debate was nonetheless very good for the thread - and yet some people from a very early stage in the thread wanted to stifle it. Later on it was not just Jeff that was ostracised. I've seen this behavious in just about every discussion that dicusses advanced matters. It's quite surprising how intelligent people can behave when backed into a corner or when their belief system has been challenged. Nevertheless there is some great debate going on there. Just a pity that some felt it necessary to close it down when there were claims being made that did not fit with their own version of the bible - oops I mean HG's TGM. It would be good if that thread could continue here with lots of questions to Lag, Twomasters and other gurus of the golf swing about sustaining the lag.

[stinkler]

This is great, one of the main reasons I liked the ISG forum was this thread. Hopefully some others that were banned can come here and I can read and learn! Bring it on fellas.

[lagpressure]

We'll, like I have said before.. I have never had a problem with a thread dying, or running out of gas.. that happens, and it may very well happen here... but I don't like the idea of one man making that decision for the rest of us.. that doesn't work for me..
so we go on..

I'm not interested in intellectual censorship on a public forum. It should be a given that we are decent to one another obviously.

I have been receiving a lot of emails from iseekers, that have been just silent viewers, not ever posting, and many have shown support if not anger at what has happened. In my opinion we are in good shape here.. the thread is alive, and all we can do is on occasion, put something up on iseek to let the silent viewers know that the resurrection has taken place.

I believe that if people who have enjoyed this and want to continue to follow this thread, they should have the opportunity to do so. It's been a good thread, lots of good stuff, and if someone has a question or something they think is a relevant point of interest or topic, then they should be open to chiming in.

I suppose if one where to simply google "lagpressure" you will quickly find this site.. an new hidden garden of golf goodies tucked away in a far away corner of the internet.

I'm not interested in this becoming some big commercial golf site.. just a good one, with lots of fantastic content. My feeling is that if we keep our heart in the right place, the rest will take care of itself..

[caedus]

Lagpressure,

The divisions even amongst TGM are huge as are the interpretations of each separate sect of the cult
Smith may have a certificate from somewhere, but a golfer? I have some info , is there any swings
of this Guru around anywhere to view? Anybody got some, please show the dynamic precision action

Hello Caedus,

Welcome to ABS. You say you "have some info"? Sounds intriguing - what is it about? TGM, MORAD, the golf swing, equipment, your background or own experiences? I'm sure your posts on any of those subjects would be good value. But I hope the info you refer to doesn't focus on Paul Smith. If it does I personally want no part of it or any attempt to humiliate any individual. What has happened over at ISG has happened now and I would rather we focused on going forward and not fall into the trap of aping the mistakes and flaws we accuse others of.

Thanks, Arnie

Arnie,
Info on all subjects you mentioned , but is it anything others have not said before, most likely not. With regard to Paul Smith
I have no intention of deriding his swing , I just want to see it out of Curiousity
I even asked on ISG and got blown off, Simply cant fathom why no demonstration , Its just a golfswing not something that is going to change the world