Extensor Action.....Questionable...

[300Drive]

I know the immediate answer to my question may be that its two different sports, HOWEVER, do you think baseball players (while batting) are executing extensor action by pushing with their right hands, OR by keeping their left arm straight (right handed batters) by simply keeping it straight by extending IT???

Sometimes I feel a better all around extensor action and swing "flow" when I execute it by "keeping my left arm straight". When I use my right hand to exeucte extensor action, it feels a bit contrived and choppy.

Said another way, when I use my right hand to execute extensor action, if feels like my right hand is in control of the BS, then I transfer control to my left arm on the forward swing. But, when I use my left arm to control the BS and FS, my swing flow is a lot smoother (or at least it feels that way). I am a swinger, if that may have anything to do with it.

Any thoughts.

[cometgolfer]

300,

I'll give you my take on extensor action as I've struggled with it for some time, but feel like (after considerable incubation) I'm finally understanding it and now believe I'm able to use it.

It's not just keeping the left arm straight. Per 6-B-1-D it's "exclusively the steady effort to straighten the bent Right Arm". I don't know how that relates to batting, but I do know that when I tried to use it I akways felt it was creating tension and interfering with centrifugal force and throwout action (I'm a swinger as well). I recently gave it another try and merely applied a gentle "pushing" motion with my right hand toward the clubhead. I've seen it described as the amount of force you might use as you try and get your right arm/hand through the sleeve of a sweater. I stuck with it during a recent range session and started to get the sense that I had more support of the power package and the flying wedges - ESPECIALLY on the downswing and into impact. Immediately the quality of my ball-striking seemed to go up a notch (and I thought it was already pretty good).

If you're struggling with the application of extensor action, I might suggest you just try and hit some chips and pitch shots using it. I think you can really sense the stability it provides on those shots, and it may make it easier to eventually incorporate into your full swing.

[6bmike]

6b1d does not push. It does not move the left arm. It tugs on the left arm. It is like a tug on a bungee cord to bring it to life.

The driving of the right arm is not extension action.

[300Drive]

Well, "you will never get the power that momentum transfer can supply". What does that really mean? Will I get 90% of the power that momentum transfer can supply?, 60%, 98%? and Really how would you know (not you personally, but anyone?)

Now here is a related thought on this, many of the tour players (best on earth)and countless others many of whom are excellent players, where taught to "keep their left arm straight". I believe they in fact learned to do just that......... NOT keep it straight by "a gentle push of their right arm". My point is, although TGM only has one way to apply extensor action (since its a TGM term specifically), some of the best in the world play without apply "extensor action" as defined by TGM (i.e., they are keeping their left arm straight). So, there is a very valid, tested, and efficient alternative to giving the power package structure than applying extensor action, I believe.

What do you think?

[Mathew]

Extensor action is nothing near gentle... It is not this soft little tug - Im giving it a firm tug whilst my left arm feels somewhat relaxed. I've tried it both ways sucessfully and im 100% convinced that this is the correct way to do this.

It gives me structure to my flying wedges

[mb6606]

When Homer states that the power can be entirely right tricep then what does the right tricep power??
The right arm straightening which I presume is extensor action into impact.

[300Drive]

Extensor action is nothing near gentle... It is not this soft little tug - Im giving it a firm tug whilst my left arm feels somewhat relaxed. I've tried it both ways sucessfully and im 100% convinced that this is the correct way to do this.

It gives me structure to my flying wedges

"I've tried it both ways sucessfully....." thats my point!

"I am 100% convinced that this is the correct way to do this" Meaning what? that when you and countless others were doing it successfully the "other way" that is was not correct?

I dont mean to badger the concept of the right arm straighting the left. I do believe that keeping the left are straight is being used on tour(s) across the world with hugh success AND it is an extremely valid way to have structure in the power package. It works exeedingly well (as does the traditional extensor action per TGM of course!)

What percentage of PGA, nationwide, Champions, LPGA tour players learned to use their right arm to straighten there left arm, or simply focus on keeping there left arm straight.???? I would say its 30/70.

[Yoda]

I posted the following in another thread last night. It belongs here as well.

******************************

In real time and in sequence photo, you've seen children -- small children -- swinging a golf club back with a straight left arm. At no time have they been advised to keep their left arm straight, nor are they attempting to do so. So why is their left arm so straight?

It is because they are swinging the club back with their right arm. And that right arm is stretching the left in the process. It's the same motion we make when we wind up to throw a ball.

This is not hard.

This is a very natural thing to do.

Put your mind in your Right Forearm, keep your Head stationary, wind up and let it happen.

[metallion]

The first time i tried Extensor Action as prescribed (in the great company of Yoda and YodasLuke) I had a hard time accepting it. It felt totally awkward. My brain was eventually convinced and comitted, but not my body. I had a hard time executing. Not until I also (in the same company) started incorporating a Right Forearm Pickup it became slightly easier.

I continued doing it and it still felt awkward.

Until one day.

The day when I really started executing a real RFP on plane. Suddenly there was basically no effort and no awkward feeling at all to perform an Extensor Action.

In my case the single reason was that I'd finally learned to get rid off my off-plane (inside) move with my hands - stemming from a Shoulder Turn Takeaway.

Nowadays I swing without (or at least seldom) thinking of the Extensor Action. What was just horribly awkward has become one of the most natural things. And my crooked left arm has become straight.

My conclusion: A STT with low hands and clubshaft off plane will basically inhibit an Extensor Action and thus inhibit straightening of the left arm.

[oztrainee]

I use to monitor my extensor action in the past, and I find that the more I am doing it, I am destroying the rhythum. I think EDZ had post a very good thread a while ago.

______________________________________
EDZ quoted:
Put your focus on what the club does, what your hands do. If you are 'thinking' about lift OR fold, you have lost your focus, which for a swinger must be the entire MOTION, not a particular part of it.
The entire club must swing. Do not get in the way of that swing.
Smooth, heavy motion, the swinging force in your hands.

_______________________________

Extensor action is similar to what he quoted... IF WE ARE "thinking" too much about the EXTENSOR. we have lost our focus, which for a swinger must be the entire motion, not a particular part of it.

The only thing I do now, is just monitor/feel the club head lag, and my hands. I think as long as you are not trying to bend your arm, you will maintain the radius anyway,during the swing.

Yoda, just a matter of interest, is the right wrist setting, got anything to do with the extensor action "indirectly"