Mike need some feedback please...

[Twitch127]

In Summary,

Everybody wants to be more consistent so could you not define consistency as having a consistent (close to 0) horizontal launch angle and small (close to 0) vertical spin axis (of the golf ball folks)?

This is really the formula for consistency don't you agree. I mean isn't consistency being able to hit the ball to your intended target most of the time! What about swing path, clubface and AA you guys might say, well you have to blend these 3 to 0 out anyway if your horizontal launch angle is to be close to 0.

Horizontal Launch Angle + Vertical Spin Axis = Consistency

One more thing Mike, what do you think the vertical spin axis tilt tolerance is +/- in degrees. Assuming the horizontal launch is close to 0. I would say that to hit a standard size green it's about +/- 4 degrees. For a driver to hit a standard size fairway it's more like 2-3.

Any thoughts on the above, anybody feel free to comment.

Twitch

[Michael Jacobs]

In Summary,

Everybody wants to be more consistent so could you not define consistency as having a consistent (close to 0) horizontal launch angle and small (close to 0) vertical spin axis (of the golf ball folks)?

This is really the formula for consistency don't you agree. I mean isn't consistency being able to hit the ball to your intended target most of the time! What about swing path, clubface and AA you guys might say, well you have to blend these 3 to 0 out anyway if your horizontal launch angle is to be close to 0.

Horizontal Launch Angle + Vertical Spin Axis = Consistency

One more thing Mike, what do you think the vertical spin axis tilt tolerance is +/- in degrees. Assuming the horizontal launch is close to 0. I would say that to hit a standard size green it's about +/- 4 degrees. For a driver to hit a standard size fairway it's more like 2-3.

Any thoughts on the above, anybody feel free to comment.

Twitch

Twitch,

Enjoyed reading your post and I am glad you have opened the door for a great discussion.

Everything you have seen:
"RELEASE" talk
Coupling Point Path
"The Line Up'
"Closing the Gap" etc...


Has been designed with the goal of promoting something pretty close to what you are saying in your above post. We know with 100% certainty exactly what the ball and the club head mass are doing thanks to Flightscope.

Reducing the initial launch direction closer to 0 degrees will obviously result in a more consistent initial direction. I would like to take everyone through the different parameters of the initial direction of the ball both on a horizontal and vertical scale.

Let's start with 1 parameter and work our way through a Ball FLight breakdown. Often I hear students saying that they understand bits and pieces of Ball Flight components but find the terminology and topic difficult. So lets slowly move our way through a tough topic:

TOPIC #1 - HORIZONTAL LAUNCH ANGLE

What does that parameter mean ? Quite simply it is the side to side launch direction of the ball relative to the target line.


The measurement is taken in degrees form the target line in either a
"L" or "R" measurement. "L" would indicate an initial launch of a certain numbers of degrees to the left of the target line and "R" would indicate right of the target line.

Here are some screen shots from a Flightscope X2:

These screen shots are not from the same golf shot but are just some random screen grabs to help show you how Flightscope displays the data.





The main screen shot is from the home screen of the Flightscope and shows the flight of the ball and has a dashboard on the bottom with a variety of information. I have put a red circle on the Horizontal Launch Direction. The small screen grab of the chart/table is how the information is displayed in a table chart setting where all the information can be examined and averaged. I have placed a red box to indicate the section where the Horizontal Launch appears. The final screen shot shows an image of a club head and the initial launch of the ball. The Launch angle is clearly displayed and visualized with this Flightscope screen which is located in the 'Club Angles' portion of the software.

When I teach and analyze a golfer, I do spend a lot of time reviewing this intricate data. Very rarely do I spend any lesson time discussing this data as most of the time is spent making adjustments to the golfer to bring this parameter as close to zero as possible.

That is horizontal launch direction in a nutshell, lets let everyone digest it and ask any questions before we get into other impact and ball flight dynamics.