Offseason Improvement Thread

[TonLocVT]

Goal:
Develop a consistent form in the offseason through filming and improving leading to a significant increase in consistency.

Background:
I discovered disc golf in October 2021 and became addicted. Over winter 2022, I performed practice putting exercises with my backyard basket, often in subzero temperatures. I also practiced considerably with streamers attached to my discs. I learned about many different techniques and components of good form and attempted to practice them with varying levels of results.

This Summer, I played a lot of disc golf, but have not become consistent enough to feel comfortable to play seriously in a tournament. I have become frustrated, and want to improve. Additionally, I am 34 years old. While I'm in fairly good shape, my 100% throw risks injury, as I can (humblebrag?) arm the disc to 400+ feet with a minorly favorable wind. This is with virtually no accuracy or control, which I'd also like to improve.

I have made multiple posts on Reddit after casually recording and posting the form. I am quickly seeing the benefit of the film, critique, adjust, repeat approach, and would like to expand beyond my casual analysis. It was suggested by an anonymous Redditor that starting a thread on this website is the proper forum for what I am trying to accomplish.

Documentation:
January 2022 - my first recorded backhand throw

August 2022

September 2022

Yesterday (11/14/2022

Today 11/15/2022

Next drills to work on:
1) Nose Over Toes
2) Hershyzer
3) Crush the Can like Lizotte

I will perform these drills, record, and ask for feedback on whether they are being performed correctly.

Thanks in advanced for any help everyone is willing to give. This seems like a great community, and I look forward to working with anyone willing to join.

 

[sidewinder22]

1. You are standing up out of posture during the throw. Stay down in the swing like Slash Thru/Battering Ram.

2. Artificial wide reachback. Your elbow is moving to the right tee throughout the throw sawing off the swing arc. Swing/toss a sledgehammer and it should be natural to let the hammer swing back more straight behind your body and then release on a wide arc like Olympic Hammer Toss. It should feel unnatural to try and manipulate the hammer it an artificial wide reachback. Bow Arrow Drill will likely fail with artificial wide reachback or be very weak - right hand should be inline with right foot.

https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139973

 

[TonLocVT]

1. You are standing up out of posture during the throw. Stay down in the swing like Slash Thru/Battering Ram.

2. Artificial wide reachback. Your elbow is moving to the right tee throughout the throw sawing off the swing arc. Swing/toss a sledgehammer and it should be natural to let the hammer swing back more straight behind your body and then release on a wide arc like Olympic Hammer Toss. It should feel unnatural to try and manipulate the hammer it an artificial wide reachback. Bow Arrow Drill will likely fail with artificial wide reachback or be very weak - right hand should be inline with right foot.

https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139973

Thanks! I'll incorporate this information in the future.

 

[TonLocVT]

Hershyzer drill part 1&2 - Looking for feedback:

My first deliberate improvement is via the hershyzer drill, as suggested from Reddit.

Hershyzer Drill pt. 2


The drill can be broken down into 4 stages.

Stage 1 - counter balance from wall
Stage 2 - counter balance from wall with dynamic movement
Stage 3- counter balance from hershyzer position without wall
Stage 4 - counter balance from hershyzer position without wall with 'reach back' and follow through.

In the videos to follow, I am stopping after stage 2, as I am not confident the drill is being performed well. How does this look?

Stage 1 - first attempt

Stage 1 - after film reviews - nose over toes

Stage 2 - after film review

Stage 2 - really trying to accent the dynamic movement and 'stick my butt out'

Thoughts? Feedback? Thanks for all of the help!

 

[TonLocVT]

1. You are standing up out of posture during the throw. Stay down in the swing like Slash Thru/Battering Ram.

2. Artificial wide reachback. Your elbow is moving to the right tee throughout the throw sawing off the swing arc. Swing/toss a sledgehammer and it should be natural to let the hammer swing back more straight behind your body and then release on a wide arc like Olympic Hammer Toss. It should feel unnatural to try and manipulate the hammer it an artificial wide reachback. Bow Arrow Drill will likely fail with artificial wide reachback or be very weak - right hand should be inline with right foot.

https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139973

Loading the bow:
Ok! So I started experimenting with the bow-loading drill yesterday and this morning. First with a pole for quite some time, then I removed the pole. The videos are just documentation once I felt comfortable with the drill, and not the entire process. I'm open to suggestions for improvement, for sure.






Hyershyzer continued:
To expand on my hershyzer documents, I have begun simulating loading the disc and then an unwind. I noticed that I was often flaring my front foot out, so I attempted to correct that in the second video.

Bad:


Corrected-ish:

 

[TonLocVT]

I couldn't get the imbedded YouTube links to work, so here's the links

Loading the bow:
Ok! So I started experimenting with the bow-loading drill yesterday and this morning. First with a pole for quite some time, then I removed the pole. The videos are just documentation once I felt comfortable with the drill, and not the entire process. I'm open to suggestions for improvement, for sure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIFvaGAVgvI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6DzHx-TMGw


Hyershyzer continued:
To expand on my hershyzer documents, I have begun simulating loading the disc and then an unwind. I noticed that I was often flaring my front foot out, so I attempted to correct that in the second video.

Bad:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAzW3BQPs0Q

Corrected-ish:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooMiNcrCvOo

 

[bryantlikes]

FYI - To use the youtube embed feature just click the button and put the video id only in between the tags (the part after v=). www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIFvaGAVgvI <= this part here.

 

[sidewinder22]

Relax your rear leg into the drill, your pelvis should turn further back as you relax it. Rear knee might extend some as you get deeper into it, but should maintain some flex.

Looks like your stance might be too staggered in this drill, should only have very slight stagger. Doesn't much matter where front foot plants in this drill distance wise(unless you let go), but your front knee should bend deeper into drill, so the pressure stays mostly on the rear foot and alleviates on front foot.

Edit: After watch imaginary pole, yeah way too much stagger. Should also do Hershyzer Wall drill part instead of the imaginary pole, hit your glute medius on the wall.

 

[sidewinder22]

And Hershyzer drill you are staggering way too much and drifting to the left tee side too much. Should actually stride just slightly to the right from the crossover, so your foot is moving more underneath you instead of out away from you, which will create internal torque.

 

[TonLocVT]

And Hershyzer drill you are staggering way too much and drifting to the left tee side too much. Should actually stride just slightly to the right from the crossover, so your foot is moving more underneath you instead of out away from you, which will create internal torque.

Thanks for all the input on this. I'm responding to check that I understand what you're saying… are you saying that, in all the videos, my front foot is planting too far forward (towards the left side of the teepad), and should really just be perpendicular to my body, or almost towards the right side of the teepad?

Additionally, I confused about where the pressure should be in the bow and arrow drill… should the majority of the pressure be coming off my rear foot at the point you noted, or should my center of gravity be over it?

 

[sidewinder22]

Thanks for all the input on this. I'm responding to check that I understand what you're saying… are you saying that, in all the videos, my front foot is planting too far forward (towards the left side of the teepad), and should really just be perpendicular to my body, or almost towards the right side of the teepad?

Additionally, I confused about where the pressure should be in the bow and arrow drill… should the majority of the pressure be coming off my rear foot at the point you noted, or should my center of gravity be over it?

In Hershyzer if your rear foot is perpendicular to the target, then you should land almost inline. If you turn your rear foot back slightly then you should land slightly staggered closed.

Majority of Pressure on rear foot with CoG leveraged well forward of rear foot.

 

[TonLocVT]

In Hershyzer if your rear foot is perpendicular to the target, then you should land almost inline. If you turn your rear foot back slightly then you should land slightly staggered closed.

Majority of Pressure on rear foot with CoG leveraged well forward of rear foot.

Thanks, I did some experimenting this morning with the hershyzer drills, specifically trying to get the stagger correct:





How do these look?

I did work with the arrow loading drill, but still need to put more film work into it before posting. No sense in uploading until I think I have it.

This is great, so helpful. Thanks a ton for the feedback.

 

[TonLocVT]

In Hershyzer if your rear foot is perpendicular to the target, then you should land almost inline. If you turn your rear foot back slightly then you should land slightly staggered closed.

Majority of Pressure on rear foot with CoG leveraged well forward of rear foot.

Here's the loading drill. I'm sure I'm still doing something wrong, but not sure what that is:

 

[bryantlikes]

Here's the loading drill. I'm sure I'm still doing something wrong, but not sure what that is

I'm not the expert here but I'd try not bending your front knee like that and keep your rear foot on the ground.

I think you need to rotate your shoulders more and tilt (side bend). It looks like your shoulders are perpendicular to the target whereas sw22's are rotated.



Think about getting your body in the position where you can generate the most leverage to pull that rake through that door. Needs to be balanced but feel like you can really create power.

 

[sidewinder22]

I'm not the expert here but I'd try not bending your front knee like that and keep your rear foot on the ground.

I think you need to rotate your shoulders more and tilt (side bend). It looks like your shoulders are perpendicular to the target whereas sw22's are rotated.

Think about getting your body in the position where you can generate the most leverage to pull that rake through that door. Needs to be balanced but feel like you can really create power.

Great pic! Just chiming in here...

The front knee bending is ok although it's exaggerated because the rake is set way too low. You do want the knee to bend so the pressure is not really shifting into the front foot unless you let your hand go, then you need to catch yourself.

Need to stand upright while setting the rake/pole/arrow, should be about navel high to a couple inches higher - play around with it. Looks like the rake here is navel high after dropping down into the drill, and set somewhere belt buckle or lower while standing up. The rake slipped out once as the force was way off centered, the rake is moving around quite a bit instead of staying inline for the most part, it can get pulled back slightly more behind your body when you get really deep into the drill.

The main issue is the rear leg/hip is not really posted up and turning/coiled back/"shifting from behind" and like you mentioned the rear foot lost pressure and rolled inward before getting pulled back all the way taut through the arm. Rear foot shouldn't roll unless you let the hand go. Note how the rear hip dropped under the lead hip, should be posted up on the rear hip with the lead hip hanging from it. The rear knee should maintain some kind of flex, never fully extend. The figure 8 motion pattern/buttwipe should help. Feel the pressure move counter clockwise around the rear foot.
https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139973

 

[TonLocVT]

Great pic! Just chiming in here...

https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139973

Oh my god yes, this makes so much more sense. Definitely one of the most important things I've been missing (assuredly one of many). I'll start working on this ASAP.

 

[TonLocVT]

Great pic! Just chiming in here...
https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139973

After some work between taking care of the kiddo and doing chores, I think I'm starting to get it.

I believe my main issue at this point is ensuring my butt is pointed to the target. Before, it "felt" like it was, but had a lot more to go. It looks like it should be easy, but my body has probably never bent that way before. So need to develop the muscle memory.

Additionally, I've been working on having my gravity lean forward in the cross over, as opposed to centered (like before).

Just posting this for a check-in to see if there's any notes. I think I'm on the right track, but need to work on it more.

 

[sidewinder22]

Definitely better. Rake still looks a bit low. I'd get some side view, put the rake into the wall instead or as well of the door.

 

[TonLocVT]

Definitely better. Rake still looks a bit low. I'd get some side view, put the rake into the wall instead or as well of the door.

Here's a side view with just a wall… trying to apply the pole higher.

As a side note…. I'm a bit confused on what to do with the rear foot, regarding angle with respect to the target, and where my weight should be. I've been given advice in the past that it should be perpendicular to the target at all times, but I'm questioning that advice just based on footage I've seen of yourself and of good players. I'm also wondering if I should maintain my weight on the toes (as I would in an athletic stance) until the butt drop, or if that doesn't matter in disc golf.

Either way, I'm definitely convinced that the cure for my rear leg bend is the forward lean in the crossover, and will practice that a thousand times once I have the drill dialed in.

 

[sidewinder22]

Looking good. Rear foot angle is good 110-135 degrees is what I typically shoot for, it depends on how much backswing you want to open or close up. 90 degrees IMO is way too restricted for anything other than upshots or really short drives or unless you are physically pigeon toed like KJUSA.

Try to keep the stick level, yours tends to go up or down.

Hard to tell if your rear knee is fully extended/locked out, or maintaining some flex.