RustyP's Drive...critique away!

[sunspot]

Here's something that JR responded to me about getting more lower body into the throw:

Stand up straight and twist your hips as far to the right as you can. Do it faster and faster until you can't add more speed. I can't twist that hard while throwing but it's something to strive for. Perhaps you have better body control and can twist as hard as you can while standing still.

Pushing as hard as you can with your left leg in the x step is the key to pivoting. But you also must have the legs planted in proper places. Sideways direction governs hyzer, flat or anhyzer but for pivoting back to front distance separation between feet vs speed of back to front momentum is a major concern for pivoting with the right foot in the plant step. The faster you're moving forward the longer the plant step can be. Unfortunately it requires more right leg muscle power too to have a long plant step and not flying forward off of the tee. That's not pivoting. Therefore pivoting training should start at slow speed of the steps without run up prior to x steps.

While you're planting the right leg it should remain loose in muscle tension so that you can bend the knee down enough for weight shift forward. After you're weight forward, meaning the left knee is about to become straight, it's time to tighten the right leg muscles so that it becomes immobile. At this point you absolutely must have little sole to ground area or you'll twist wrong parts with too much power probably sending you off to a hospital some day. Maybe today if you have grippy soles on grippy surface on a warm day. Doesn't matter that much in early stages of training if you have the heel or the ball of the foot or just tip of the toe on the ground as long as the whole sole ain't flat on the ground.

It's basic laws of physics from here on. The momentum you've created has to go somewhere. As long as your right leg power maintains the leg in the angles it's at once you tightened the muscles (not 100 % as nobody's that strong but the attempt suffices) the momentum with the last of the left leg push pivots you around on your right foot. Just because the force keeps going on and the left leg pushes you around as well because it's not inline with the right leg on the vector of the previous momentum. Thereafter do the hip twist and you're fine. Timing is best once the motion feels most fluid and natural. Actually you should be able to feel it once the timing is right. You can't help but going along on the ride given by the left leg push and right foot pivot. It's a tangible feeling of mass moving along with momentum. Then you just have to be brisk enough with the hip twist and using a lot of power to add max power to the twist to snap hard. What the arm does afterward is just the finish of a good snap. much/most? of the power is created in these steps I've described earlier.

One of the ways to pivot greater with the lower body is to a quick pivot with the hip. Kind of like swinging at a pitch in baseball.

I've kind of being experimenting with different foot angles to see which one can help produce more explosion from the lower body. Going from 45 degrees (before plant foot lands)and opening up to 75 degrees (after plant foot lands) may help generate more power from the lower body. I assume that pivot acceleration is one of the keys in utilizing the lower body.

I believe that the lower body in disc golf is not utilized as much as it could be. More people talk about how to get snap (which is good) and fail to realize that the lower body is also an integral part of the throw.

Edit: BTW, I'm also in the same boat as you.

[Blake_T]

I believe that the lower body in disc golf is not utilized as much as it could be. More people talk about how to get snap (which is good) and fail to realize that the lower body is also an integral part of the throw.

harnessing leg power is a big thing for maximum throwing power/efficiency and while that and snap are separate entities, both involve a lot of timing.

it's very possible to throw 450' with very little leg power but pristine timing and big snap.
it's very possible to throw nowhere near 450' with lots of leg power but very little snap.

there is more power throwing with lots of leg power and with pristine timing and big snap.

timing is separate for the upper and lower body. with poor timing in your leg drive/pivot you can f up your timing so that good upper body timing (snap) is impossible. having great timing in your leg drive/pivot doesn't necessarily mean you have good upper body timing.

in the greater scheme of things, upper body timing will contribute more to distance than leg drive. the average disc golfer only hits ~10-20% of their throw. increasing that % to more like 80% will add 80-100' of line drve power.

the average disc golfer only utilizes ~10-20% of their leg power. assuming they only hit 10-20% of their snap, increasing the leg drive % to more like 80% will add 40-60' of line drive power.

both are important in terms of establishing max D, and it's often hard to improve one without improving the other.