Coaches’ perceptions of Club Motion

The key technical parameter ‘Club Motion’ included three sub-categories, ‘Club Path’,

‘Club Face’ and ‘Swing Plane’. Although it has previously been stated that coaching

in the past relied too heavily on the club’s position, many coaches commented on the importance of club motion.

I’m a big believer in the swing plane and keeping the club swinging on a constant plane around the body…To create a correct impact position you need the correct club path, you need the correct angle of attack and you need a certain degree of clubhead speed and you’d need a very centred strike.

‘Swing plane’ was defined by coaches as the angle of the club shaft, relative to the horizontal and vertical and would be examined at stages throughout the swing including ‘set-up’, ‘backswing’, ‘downswing’ and ‘impact’, from a predominantly ‘down the line’ position.

Swing plane is the angle that the club is swung around the body…it changes from one player to the next…but if we get a good swing plane then [it] controls the angle of attack into the ball.

Plot the clubhead at address and at the position at the top and draw a line between those two points…it should cross through their sternum…The more we get it on that swing plane the less dispersion of the ball initially.

For one coach, swing plane was defined by a specific value for the shaft angle.

Shaft plane is the angle of the shaft at the crucial points in the golf swing…I very much believe golf is a game of 45 degree angles so at the start, club shaft is 45 degrees, or three quarters of a way back the shaft is 45 degrees, coming back down the club shaft is 45 degrees, coming into impact club shaft is 45 degrees.

28 Several coaches advocated that a golfer should remain on the swing plane throughout the swing and described deviation from the swing plane using words such as ‘shallow’, ‘steep’, ‘flat’ or ‘rounded’. Remaining on the swing plane was deemed to influence other club motion parameters including ‘club face’ and ‘club path’ at impact, which would affect accuracy. The ability to maintain a constant ‘swing plane’ was influenced by ‘body rotation’, ‘posture’, ‘sequential movement’ and ‘arm and wrist parameters’.

You will never get a golf swing that will work if it’s off plane, if it’s too shallow, if it’s too steep. If you get the club swung on plane, you will strike the ball well, the angle of attack will be good.

Conversely, for two coaches the term swing plane was used to aid the explanation for the golfer. These coaches commented that there were different planes throughout the swing and they did not require a golfer to remain on the swing plane for the whole swing, only at impact.

It’s a funny one plane, because there’s actually no such thing…the golf swing is more of a rotatory axis but players understand plane…so [the golfer] would believe that it works on the same plane…whereas it can’t there’s going to be different planes.

For one coach they used the terms ‘primary’ and ‘secondary’ planes to describe the changing planes throughout the swing. Primary plane was defined as the shaft angle at address and secondary plane was defined as the plane created during the backswing when the club was ‘hinged’.

Shaft plane is the plane that’s set at takeaway, the primary plane and then secondary plane where he’s working up to, and then they look at the line through the shaft at the ball.

As aforementioned, the coaches believed that remaining on plane would influence other parameters such as the ‘clubface’ at impact. The ‘club face’ was also strongly related to ‘club path’ and they were both used interchangeably when discussing ideal impact positions. Club path referred to the direction of the path that the clubface was travelling on and clubface referred to the orientation of the clubhead, whilst performed at speed.

...the clubhead path, how that is coming into the ball, the direction, the alignment of the clubface, the speed of the swing, the angle of attack and then it’s what most amateur golfer’s miss out, the centered strike.

29 For one coach the ability to repeat these characteristics of an impact was deemed to separate amateur golfers from professional golfers.

...at the end of the day golf is about the collision between club and ball, that’s ultimately what we judge by how repeatable that is...you need the clubhead square on the right angle of attack and repetitively done at speed.

Some of the most popular words used to describe the club face orientation were ‘open’, ‘closed’, ‘neutral’ and ‘square’. The orientation of the clubface was linked to the different types of ball flight, for example, a closed clubface would produce a draw.

Although the orientation of the clubface was deemed critical at impact for generating accurate golf shots, for some coaches the ‘club face’ orientation was important throughout the swing. The orientation of the clubface was often deemed to be controlled with ‘arm and wrist motion’. Nevertheless, this coach believed that if club face orientation was repeatable at stages during the swing then a golfer’s body action and impact would ‘match’ that club face orientation. Finally, the angle of attack or angle of approach, as one coach defined it, was important for generating spin during the golf shot.

...you want a fairly steep angle of approach to generate a nice bit of spin and a medium to high swing.