Critique please

[ibromberg]

Looking for some advice on form, with the goal of improving distance.

Thanks,
Isaac

http://youtu.be/5oRskFgsh2U

[JR]

Welcome.

Your elbow gets a little in front of your body before you straighten the arm and it is a good thing but you might get even more distance by getting the elbow even farther forward. Just make sure that the upper arm isn't extended as far as possible because that can injure you out of the game and leave you crippled for life. For real. In any case it will hurt like hell i almost dropped to my knees doing that. The elbow locked but the momentum forced the elbow to straighten and the muscles and tendons were stretched more than they should.

Your throw is called strong arming because most of what you do is yanking the arm fast in the beginning not accelerating hard until the disc separating from the hand. The hips should twist to the right of neutral and the shoulders should turn even farther right. To get that going quickly you should stop the right leg in place once the final step heel lands on the ground and the ball of the foot is airborne. Stopping the leg movement for a while makes the next possible place move from the momentum and the place is the hips. The hips twisting and the shoulders turning makes a lever out of your arm multiplying the speed.

Your stepping direction and planting position of each step is good for accuracy throws. Distance driving can be a different thing depending on what you seek. If you gain enough distance with the above changes for your needs by all means keep on doing what you are doing. If you want to get even more distance at the expense of accuracy and repeatability at least in slippery conditions there are leg usage tricks that make the exchange for distance at the expense of the above.

One grade more power generation can come from reaching back farther by turning the back of the head, back and heels toward the target in the x step and the final plant step.

Search for double pivot and Steve Terada on this site. The only longer way to throw that i know of without using rollers is to do a 360 and that is not very golfable throw at all. Most likely doing that will worsen your score.

[ibromberg]

Thanks for the feed back. I know that I strong-arm, and I'm max-ing out around 280-300', which seems typical.
I've looked through most of the on-line vids, and followed the technique discussions for a while.
I've tried doing the right-pec drill a bit, and throwing from standing still.

Do you have any advice on the best way to get the hips and core more active?
Is there a particular drill that would help with this?

Thanks again,
Isaac

[bsnone1]

I would read, digest, understand, then reread, digest, understand the Maxing out @300 thread (stickied in technique). It is overwhelming how much good information is in those 30 or so pages. I want to say somewhere between pages 4 and 15 is a good nugget of information on hip rotation/use of core.

I'm right around the same distances that you are, I get about 280-300 with most fairway drivers, stretching out to~330 on a great throw with a Valk or an OLS. I've been working Bradley Walker's closed shoulder snap drill my last few trips out to the field and really like the results. Much more consistency already and for whatever reason I have a much easier time with his drill rather than the right pec drill in keeping the nose of the disc down. I get the results I think I should be getting from the pec drill (fast straight line drive throws) with the closed shoulder snap drills. You can find the video on youtube under citysmasher1.

[JR]

The right leg needs to stop in place for a while to Newtonian physics kicking in. Meaning the momentum does not go away it just moves forward along the path of least resistance which is to twist the hips automatically right.

The nuts and bolts are that once the ball of the foot lifts up in the plant step you should tighten the right leg muscles hard to stop in place so that the hip twists to the right. The next thing to do is to add core muscle power into the twist with a conscious effort. The timing might be hard to achieve because the command has to leave early to travel down to the core area muscles.

Since the timing and muscle power requirements are pretty steep practicing at slower speeds should help both. So i'd stand still and lean back mirroring a baseball pitchers left leg movement and stopping the leg in place until the disc is at around the right pec +- something. That optimum placement for releasing most of the right leg muscle tension varies on the speed of the throw and between persons.

As a mental image and warm up have you seen Karate Kid? The hip twist used to dodge hits gets you warmed up and looser also mimicking the movement you need to make while throwing.

[ibromberg]

Thanks for the detailed follow-up. I'll start doing some right-pec type drills with a focus on closing, and then opening the hips.


Isaac Bromberg
ibromberg@me.com

[cubeofsoup]

I think we have similar things to work on in our throws ibromberg, that being said, I've been seeing success in over emphasizing the timing of the throw by pulling from max reach back to my peck almost annoyingly slow, then adding power. My throws fall apart (loss of accuracy, loss of power) when I pull hard from max reach back. I would highly suggest focusing on that for a few throws next time you practice. Pulling at the correct time will also affect the timing of your hips...I'm having to re-learn my lower body timing after revamping my upper body/arm timing. Just some thoughts/ideas, interested to see what kind of success you have, good luck!

[ibromberg]

I'm still waiting for the weather to clear up a little, but I'm planning to use the next few months to re-build my driving form. I expect it to be an annoyingly slow process. Not sure how much I'll actually try to play league or tourneys during this time, as I think it may not be as fun. Hope to come out better on the other side.

[JR]

Do you have access to a large mirror in front of which to make no disc mock stand still throws at first and then one steps etc? That way you can see immediately what you're doing and can go for another rep fixing what you noticed went wrong.

[ibromberg]

I have done this a little, but I will put more effort into watching and feeling the hip and ab movement. Thanks.

[JR]

I forgot to type a related standard advice that helped me. You can stop at any point in the throw to analyze the current form in detail in any part of the throw that is not too fast to brake to a pose before the end of the throw. You can compare different forms that way, search for relative positions of different body parts and timing to find the most powerful way of throwing. If you get the timing and positions so good that they are automated you don't need to think of them during the throw. Which will help in making the muscles work the best in the acceleration to the end of the throw. Ensuring the creation of maximum amount of force.

Because the arm moves the fastest in the end and the angles at which the disc moves are determined at the rip (at least mostly) it is good to spare the brain processing power to guiding the movements in that critical phase of the throw correctly. You can finish the throw from a stopped position which is very helpful in working the final parts of the throw. You can have as many stops as you like in a practice/visual analysis training as you can perform. Stop motion is great for detecting small things that can easily slip unnoticed in a normal throw.

Throwing is too fast for the brain to process often times so detecting what you are doing might easily be masked by the priority override of needing all the brain processing power for staying upright. Self preservation takes over conscious effort of trying to guide a throw. You cannot think of many issues in a throw because by the time you've thought of everything the disc has left long ago.

[ibromberg]

Thanks. I had been waiting for good enough weather to get outside and use the video camera. I have read, and gotten advice from people in the past, but since I can't see myself throw, I really struggle to figure out what to change.

[JR]

And fixing that is the benefit of a large mirror as a training device. Instant feedback and good conditions in the winter is a hard combo to beat.

[ibromberg]

Ok. More vid for your viewing pleasure. I watched the recent Will Schusterick video, and tried to follow his advice. I think I need to shift my weight a little more, and bring my elbow farther forward, so that the disc is in the Right pec position before, or as I am opening the shoulders and accelerating. I'm probably still strong-arming on some/all of these.

Thanks,
Isaac


http://youtu.be/sQcEPNLW18Y

[JR]

I'd emphasize the leg push from the left leg, hip twist, shoulder turn and overemphasize the follow through. So i'd squat down lower with the knees bending more and turn the thumb quickly counter clockwise down right after the disc rips out. It will allow a less restricted faster longer follow through and to learn proper power generation the follow through emphasis is great. It should feel like you are not throwing at all but moving the arm to almost rip point and from there trying to squash a bug against a wall on your left side and behind with the arm follow through. That means a quick movement so that the bug cannot move away so the command from the brain needs to be quick. Not powerful like most think and stiffen the arm muscles and move the arm slower.