starting again after 20 years, HELP

[dcsquare]

http://youtu.be/yYzx3vFTLZ8

[dcsquare]

Seem to only get 275' out of this form , need some advice on what to do to improve. I am 48yo, maybe I'm just too old to expect 350 but it would help. thanks

[seabas22]

That top down view is sweet...I'm gonna have to try the tripod on top my truck. It really shows you releasing way early and not getting any snap/elbow chop forward of the shoulders/wrist extension. It may be difficult to break 20 years of bad habits, but I think you should be to throw 350' easy with some conceptional changes to the throw. Working with putters and mids from a standstill and working the hit backwards with the drills from the incomplete secret thread should help get you there before end of the year or summer if you are persistent. Your footwork is not helping you get snap at this point and will most likely slow progress. So it's gonna feel like taking a few steps back, to get further forward, but will be worth it. Doing this should also help extend your playing career.

[JR]

I thought you might have a worse form than that. You have a good foundation from where to continue from. If you're healthy there is no reason why you couldn't reach 350' at some time with practice. Steady here does and he is around your age and some grandmasters throw way farther.

Your arm reaches back way lower than the release of the disc is. And you should not actively open or release the disc. The grip needs to be tight in the end (alone). The camera may have been tilted or you could have thrown uphill though so that may change the conclusion. I can't say for certain because the trees have grown to point every which way. In any case you need to avoid throwing high and getting the disc to stall out and stop then dive to the left. Reaching back and letting the disc rip out of your hand helps a lot and fiddling with the grips can help and pushing the wrist down is great. You should get the disc to be lower and parallel to the forearm bones. Or even lower but that will tighten the muscles and slow the arm motion down. What kind of grip do you use? Can you post a video about that showing the grip from above
rotating the disc so that we can see the grip from the side the fingers cover the disc and down to bottom view of the grip? That will make it easy to see if the grip forces the front of the disc up. Creating huge drag and stalling the disc after popping up high and robbing dozens of feet of distance.

I too like the top down angle so we hatched a little project like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHSZyYAVPbs That illustrates many things many of which you mimick already. Good for you.

Avery wasn't pushing his elbow as far forward as he could and for you the elbow could move about a foot forward before starting to straighten. Until that happens the chest should point around 90 degrees left of the target and once the elbow has intentionally been moved that far forward then the legs start to turn toward the target, with the hips immediately behind followed by the shoulders and the straightening of the elbow. That would make the arm acceleration way faster. The timing will change with that change alone. Your back doesn't point at the target in the reach back. The direction of the foot prevents you from reaching back far enough for best power generation. So the left foot should point directly away from the target with the landing of the x step and the right foot too should point directly away from the target in the planting of the final step before the arm swing. This will add a lot more power and everything is again gonna happen faster so the timing will be different again.

It is difficult to maintain balance timing and looseness when you reach back far. Some do it right the first time and some need months of adjustment. Body control and muscle power in the legs, waist and the lower back at least can hold your execution back if you tilt out of balance. Losing balance and then trying to do the correct motions with the proper muscle usage ain't easy and probably won't happen when the automated routines for avoiding falling down kick in and override conscious efforts. In time with enough repetitions the throw will become automated.

I wouldn't add any speed to the steps now before making the above changes. You can try to see if your balance and body control are sufficient to maintain good form and timing with good power generation. you never know until you try and if you have an athletic background you may pull of the changes quickly. Not trying won't tell where you are at and what you need to do to achieve those changes if they don't work for you right away. I'd keep filming yourself to get immediate feedback of how you move. It will look different than it feels if you're not used to making complex motion series.

I can't make any predictions to the length of time it takes you to start throwing 350' but if you are fit and are willing to throw in field practice for form the distance will come eventually. At this point you have large strides awaiting you in form changes alone so it could happen relatively quickly meaning in some weeks but for most the kind of increases in form thus distance take 2-5 months to make and solidify initially. The changes will cement even more over longer periods of time. I wouldn't push too hard making too many drives per session and too many times per week initially at your age before you get experience of what your body can handle. Disc golf can be very stressful to the body if you rip hard all the time in quick fire. At first i wouldn't do more than 50 drives per field session because you don't know if that will make something swell in the next day even though you don't feel anything bad when you throw. It has happened to younger people too. Even healthy ones. I can tell from experience that pre existing injuries for a younger guy can be painful indeed even though field practice didn't give any warning signs. At your age warming up and stretching becomes even more important than for youngsters who need it too.

This is the third day of my tenth season meaning i had 18 years hiatus between throwing prior to that. The discs have seen even more radical changes going back 20 years now than it had when i started again. That will change the needs of throwing form. Most dics penalize throwing front higher than back much more. I'd stick to speed 9 and lower discs at first. Mids and putter driving are closer in nose angle insensitivity to the discs that were around when you threw the last time. They also penalize hard for form errors so they are a good diagnosis tool for form flaws.

[dcsquare]

Thanks JR, Went out Tuesday and scored my best round yet and was tossing some nice 300+ shots, Birdied hole 1 which is 326'. This was done whith just turning my feet away from the target. Still working on the elbow forward and locking the grip at the snap. Still do not really feel the snap or get good wrist etension but it will come. Still had a few high shots and a couple of (grip-lock way to the right bombs) but i figure that comes with the form change, all in all nice flat lines.
Went out yesterday and just threw some tee shots, nice flat lines with a little s curve for some really nice distances getting the reach back up and more nose down and tring to push the elbow forward, also slowing down to feel the motion instead of all-out.
In the video the ground is level, not throwing uphill, I do try to keep the disc on a level flight plane but sometimes they do get to high and stall so your advice of higher reach back helped a ton, I new too high was not good at all.
I do stretch and twist before a good feild session, usually toss 40-60 at a session, sequence is 10 drives. 10 upshots, 10 putts from upshot lays, gives my knees a resting period, seems to be the only thing bothering me. And I know driving is not the most important thing to learn. You must have a good upshot.
I will try to get a photo/video of grip up soon. It is the basic three finger power grip, I have tryed the 2 finger, birdie, fan and some other and always go back to three fingers under the rim, thumb on top close to edge of rim but have noticed if I move my thumb towards the center of disk it really helps me keep the nose down under those full drive shots off the tee especially with my beat in dx valkrye.
My main drivers are a roadrunner and valkrye, I also throw a beast on ocassion for a little more fade at the end and a 164 vulcan which I was quite suprised with as far as distance(300-315) I try to keep disc weight at 167-169 and try to stay speed 10 and under Thanks again for the tips. will post a vid again as I get the form more solid. Then we will go to step 2.

[JR]

It's good to have progress any particular problems now? Since you are already making progress are there other things you'd like to polish?

[dcsquare]

Thanks JR. so far so good

Wathched the LtDan914 video (the thread above mine) and noticed the wrist bounce in one of the slo-mo sections at 20 seconds in and a light bulb went off. That is the wrist bounce and snap creation! So at work, I did it all day with the towel snap drill tring to make the wrist bounce and wow, significant popping of the towel. Took it to the field and threw 17 paces farther than I have ever thrown which at 2.7 feet per pace = 46 feet. I have been wathing video for 6 months and never noticed it before but during the upload it stopped right at the wrist movement so I really got a grasp of the bounce. Played a round with my buddy who throws 400' and he was impressed with my new driving distance

Now I have to work on holding my line to the basket and accuracy off the tee. Some shots are still going array but I think that is to be expected due to the timing changes, but all in all 300-325 feet drives, 50-60 extra feet in 2 days, I'm a happy discer. Will start working on form consistency, the bodies speed and arm control to become more accurate.

Thanks also seabas22 I did slow down the steps and tried not "reaching" so far forward with my plant foot which helped with shifting more weight forward.

Thanks again!!

[JR]

That sounds like a revolution in form Congratulations!

[LtDan914]

Glad I could help

[dcsquare]

Your more than welcome ltdan, I'm really glad you could help too. That was a vid moment were you could actually see it happen and then it was easily understood, especially for someone trying to start playing again after 20 years away from the game. There were no courses around me when I moved here so I just stopped playing, then they put a course in Mt. Sterling KY, 3 minutes from work. Grabbed some old sharks from 1989 out of the basement toy box and just went out and chucked 'em around and became addicted again, so now I play every day I can.
Thanks for the vid LtDan.

[Steady 26542]

Actually JR, I'll be 58 this year and had surgery this past fall to remove a cancerous tumor from my right kidney. But I can still get a QOLS out to 325' and with the help of the new blizzard technology, I hope to hit 350' - 375'. Don't give up dcsquare, you're still a young pup. Work at what these guys say, it works! JR has a tone of knowledge. Good luck!

[JR]

Sheesh i hope you're all right now Mark. I hear keeping fit can't hurt for future. Being able to fight harder and to have a better immune resistance. So happy hucking if you feel up to it.

[Steady 26542]

I get better every day. We've been having a warm streak here (70's) and it's been lovely. I'm probably back to 90%. My stamina continues to improve and I really love just being able to play. Thanks for your kind words JR.

[dcsquare]

Now it has all gone crazy. sky hyzers, grip lockin' to the right and nice flat little S shots that go about 300+. The farthest shots are the ones goin' to the right. Now that I have my timing all screwed up, where should my shoulder, arm, elbow and chest be pointed at the release point? (The main question)
The rest is just ramblin'
I thought it should all be pointed at the target but it seems my longest d is when my body is about 25 degrees to the left and my arm is just flingin' around my right shoulder and the disk is leaving my hand as it has nowhere else to go.
One hole I get some snap, and the next, who knows?
I could just be,,,being myself, overthinking and trying to get too far too fast (expecting too much of myself), but this cannot be that hard, it's just tossing little round disks.....YEA RIGHT!!!!
The mechanics and timing are complicated to put together at exactly the perfect point.
Sooo,,,, how would you start over and delete the bad habits. (2nd question)
There is not a person in this specific area that is qualified to teach, it is hard to watch the vids and read the words and actually translate it into a "repair my form" which is already embedded into my brain. I will always learn a little from every person I play with but it is hard to find the secret throw for myself because everyone seems to throw a little differently.
Wow maybe my information/application ratio is over it's limit . Too much input over the last 6 months.

[seabas22]

A few things to think about....your max reach back position should be similar to playing tug of war or starting the lawn mower, so you're pulling toward the target and almost backwards and can feel leverage from rear foot through front shoulder. Your arm should be loose as it comes into the body following a straight line to the target and then sling it forward elbow then wrist/disc down the same line to the target.

Try standing 2-3" facing a wall and going through the throw slowly without hitting the wall. Try throwing a stick or hammer or heavy stick like object and just feel how to throw the momentum out the target.