Shaft flex, loading and unloading

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By Frank H

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  1. Frank H

    Frank H
    Delta, BC

    While I was hitting balls at the range recently, my son took a video of my golf swing.  The drives were long, and had a soft draw back to the centre, with the occaisional deep hook thrown in.  When I analysed the video I was surprised to see how much whip was in the shaft.  I have provided three photos that I would like some feedback on. 

    I did not think my hands were released in this photo, is this whip simply the shaft overcorrecting from the load in the top of the backswing, and would the weight of the D2 head force an early release on my right hand?

    The next shot in the sequence:

    Final frame, hands ahead, head behind, great weight transfer, and great result when I don't hook, but am I losing yards based on early release?

    The driver is the 909 D2, 9.5 with an Aerotech Claymore F5 shaft.  they put it between S and X, but at an approx weight of 52 is it too light for the Titleist head?  I get approx 270 yrds carry and I am right at sea level, and my driver club head speed is approx 116 MPH

    I am getting it tipped 2" this week to see if it changes it enought without a full shaft swap. 

  2. Matthew S

    Matthew S
    Mississauga, ON

    Don't worry about that, the reason the shaft is like that in the pictures is because of the shutter speed of the camera. If you were to look at it with a faster shutter speed camera it wouldn't be flexing as much as that. This is very hard to explain in words but here we go: in the down swing the shaft flexes in 2 main ways, the first is the toe down effect where the shaft is trying to align itself with the COG of the head, best picture for this one is your 2nd. Draw a straight Lind down the shaft starting at your grip and extend it through the head of the golf club. If you were to do this on your pic above the line would be well outside the head of the golf club. For physics reasons that I don't know and why there are people out there getting paid a lot more than I am, this is impossible. The bowing of the shaft cannot go past the COG of the head.....it just can't. The 2nd way the shaft flexes during the down swing is towards the target, which adds loft to the driver head at impact, seen in your last picture. Again there is a limit on how much this can flex as the shaft tried to align it self with the COG of the head again. Go get fit or try and find a professional with a better camera so you can see what's really going on. Anyways hope this helps.

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