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One of the things I have to do after watching a swing and looking at exactly what it is doing (although now it seems that the opinion is growing that without a Trackman no one can really see fully what is going on) is to try to come up with reasons for the movements that are present and for the apparent stubbornness of the movements to change. Some of this requires conjecture as I guess that perhaps this does that because of this, or that this won’t do that because of something else, but when it comes to finding ways to get the “light bulb” to click on and to breakthrough chronic problems I find that it takes some creative thinking and a certain amount of trial and error in testing out which ideas will produce the desired result. Experience plays a large role in the ability to come up with ways to explain what is going on and finding ways to get the student to feel the correct movements or combinations of movements. I’ve been doing this for almost 30 years and that means a lot of lessons and a lot of thinking and putting into practice ways to get things accomplished. Many times change requires new concepts, as I discover that the student has actually been told in the past to do things that are now a part of the problem. Other times the feeling that is necessary to elicit change is so exaggerated that the student simply cannot get themselves to do it enough to actually change.
Brandon’s case is interesting because I feel that his triggering move where his head tilts initially toward the target sets up a sense of lack of “turn” or upper trunk rotation, and when he approaches the top of his backswing the only way he can feel coiled is to tilt away from the ball. He could recover from this position, but he then drives his legs too much toward the ball, and when the right arm tries to move so that the elbow is in front of the body it fails to straighten and thus comes in high, while the hands are forced to release early in order to shallow out the hit. It is a complex series of movements (as is every swing) and will take some time to reorder and change, as is already apparent (Brandon has had a couple of online lessons). I do sense that there is change going on and that Brandon has a grasp on what I am trying to get him to do, and it is almost always the case that after seeing the swing resist change for a while there is a breakthrough of sorts as the most important issues garner the most focused attention. Certainly there needs to be a combination of impact work with different types of punch shots along with backswing and transition work to eliminate some of the tilt away from the ball and then to change the direction of the leg drive in the forward swing.