Getting back into disc golf, would like form critique

[sidewinder22]

Do the Elephant Walk.

 

[guccimane]

Tried the elephant walk today, and it did a ton for my rhythm, timing, and posture. On some of the shots I started to feel some nice weight shift, similar to what I get out of an X-step. Looking back on the Elephant Walk thread, the motion is much more exaggerated, so I'm going to keep doing it and exaggerate it more. It's definitely much more intuitive compared to a standstill.

I think it also helped with my posture and finishing position slightly, as well as reachback timing with the plant foot:

My rear leg is coming up still, but less aggressively. Going to continue to focus on making that a lateral push off vs. a vertical push up. I think this also contributes to my arched back and more open angle between my plant foot and upper body, something I also want to reduce.

I was able to get some good throws out to 340-350 with PDs and Eagles and a freak crazy roadrunner hyzerfilp. I've still got OAT though, I think still from not being used to the timing.

I'm going to spend the next couple days on fixing this stuff and hopefully post some improvements then.

 

[sidewinder22]

Tried the elephant walk today, and it did a ton for my rhythm, timing, and posture. On some of the shots I started to feel some nice weight shift, similar to what I get out of an X-step. Looking back on the Elephant Walk thread, the motion is much more exaggerated, so I'm going to keep doing it and exaggerate it more. It's definitely much more intuitive compared to a standstill.

Yes exaggerate it. Make your shoulder/arm swing heavy to pull your trailing leg forward into the next step. The backswing should be pulling your whole body away from target. Your pre-swings look light/weak and mostly just your arm without your shoulder swinging it.

Final step into plant/throw should be inline/normal walk forward perpendicular to target, not stepping laterally targetward.

 

[sidewinder22]

Note how my feet basically walk inline to each other, not stepping out to the side:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-KVWfUkQ3s#t=4m54s

 

[guccimane]

Yep, makes sense, and good catch on my lateral stepping, I didn't notice that

 

[guccimane]

Elephant walks from today, trying to exaggerate it more and not step laterally. It felt better than before. had some okay throws and also almost hit someone with a shanked hyzer. I need to exaggerate it even more, getting the shoulders into it. I think I'm feeling the weight shift, but I wasn't feeling the "brace", so I did some throws from a controlled slow x-step afterwards:



I was really struggling with standstills/one steps introducing OAT into my throw, and the X-step helped a lot with timing to prevent that. I should still probably practice from one step, as it's simpler and a valuable golf shot anyway. The temptation to just rip em is always strong in the field...

Anyway, these throws were really focusing on driving the pivot leg into the ground, bracing off of it, instead of bending the knee and crumbling into it and tipping over.

The throws felt nice, and I'm happier with my posture and balance at in the finish position with these throws, compared to my standstill throws from 11/19 (with the way too wide stance).

My weight is not shifted properly though, as I'm finishing falling backwards or centered on my legs, not balanced on the front leg, as evidenced by kicking my rear leg up and then kicking it down hard back into the ground (I left the audio in, and you can hear how hard it's coming down). Losing a lot of power here. I think shortening my final stride would probably help a lot with that, it's still so long.

Ground was also slippery, so I was scared of planting hard. Need to find some concrete.

I'm going to continue to focus on getting a good brace and weight shift, and trying to keep the rear leg down and moving laterally.

Thanks for watching!

 

[sidewinder22]

E Walk - your arm swing is not pulling your trailing foot into the next step. You are stepping with the swing and stepping out laterally rather than being pulled back across the leading foot the opposite direction. Also looks like you are really trying to turn to target too fast/early and your swings are rather light and quick, than heavy and slow with mass/gravity behind it.

Normal x-step - you aren't turning back enough into the plant and start turning forward before you plant.

Shift from behind you:
https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=118948

Note how GG is keeping his eyes on his disc, not the target.

 

[guccimane]

Good catch on the reachback, something I was doing better in my first video

I don't think the foot plant timing was any better though.

reaching back further will probably help with the plant foot timing, because it will take a split second longer all things being equal.

Next Elephant walk I post I swear I'll be swinging my body every which way . It's crazy the difference between the video and what my body feels like.

Thanks as always SW.

 

[guccimane]

Got the chance to throw today, and I really wanted to focus on reaching back more and thinking about the tilted spiral weight shift, focusing on shifting to plant leg/crushing can as the thing that leads the reachback. I threw from a standstill:




really inconsistent results (to be expected obviously), lots of putters and mids turning and burning at 250' with OAT into a headwind, then I got some really nice distance on some fairway drivers and DX rocs.

In the beginning of the practice session, I was really strongarming the discs, something I have a tendency to do when I throw from a standstill. I started really thinking about cracking the whip and throwing from my left heel, an that mental image helped a ton.

I was able to get a star eagle to 375' from a standstill (no BS i promise) and a PD to 370' (third shot in the video). I hit really really nice hyzer filp to straight to slight turnover to fade forward lines on those throws, so that helps too. The average shots during this session were more like 290-330, depending if mid or fairway (or if I was gonna hit someone's dog )

I still have horrible body control and finishing positions after the throws, even with the throws that went far. I'm really throwing my body around my plant leg in my follow through, and my rear leg is still popping up, albeit much later than it was in previous sessions. Jealous of these finish positions (and stiff plant legs) i saw in a different form thread:

I think I'm starting to understand the tilted spiral weight shift a bit more, and I think my timing with my reachback and heel plant improved. I want to keep a stiffer plant leg (I'm still "sitting" into the throw a bit it feels like) and try and maintain a much better follow through. this was a helpful thread: https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=118948

Update over...

 

[guccimane]

Thinking about reachback and leg position. Did some work today, mostly stuff not worth sharing, but I was focusing on maintaining balance throughout the throw, mainly in the finish. I was able to get my rear leg to move in a closer to correct manner, but I'm noticing that my leg position in my reachback is totally off.

I saw a Schusterick video in another thread, and was looking at his leg/hip position in the reachback, and was shocked by how rotated in his plant leg is. His asscheek is at the target. Just trying it around the house it feels like the lower body is much more coiled up for rotation. Posted up a comparison with a screenshot from today's fieldwork (I will never not wear all black and throw from the shadows, it seems)

I think a lot of my balance issues come from rotating "out" of the throw and not "into" the throw, if that makes sense, so I think i'll experiment with this on top of everything else. I also wanna try the one step, I think it's gonna help with timing, I really struggle with timing when both feet remain in contact with the ground.

 

[guccimane]

Drives today working on what I was talking about in the previous post. Basically, getting my legs a lot more internally rotated on both sides of the swing.

I was throwing into a 25mph headwind, so distances were consistently terrible. There was a slight drop in windspeed and I got two destroyers out to 385' back to back from standstill. They weren't even really on good lines either, so I think they could have had some more on them. Average distances were about 260-310' into the wind (with putters to distance drivers lol), with occasional good 330'-340' shot.

This actually really helped with both weight shift and keeping my rear leg from flying up like in my previous videos. This really makes it feel like swinging a bat or something compared to what I was doing before, which felt more like "spinning".

My plant is often happening after I've already started to pull through from max reachback, so something else to watch out for.

I'm actually pretty happy with some of my body positioning at the hit and right after the hit, especially comparted to previous field work sessions.

Now I think I've got a couple things to work on from here:
- Obviously dragging rear foot
- Hips rotate/open up early, then they swing around vs transferring power; this what I'm talking about in the above post with rotating "out" of the throw vs rotating "into" the throw;
- More in control finish position with this same leg action
- Squishy pivot leg again; losing power by not blocking off my pivot leg, but sinking weight into it again.

For the rear foot, I think this should be easy to fix, and will start to fix itself once my hip timing is right. I'm cool with dragging for now because it's better than rocketing straight up :|

in this video (at 3:15), Will's hips totally open at the end of the throw, but the stop there. Mine are continuing to rotate around after the hit, so I'm definitely bleeding power there, I think.



I think fixing the hip timing is going to sort out some of my out-of-control finish positions

Pivot leg got messed up cause I'm thinking about so many different things, but now I know to watch out for it next time.

 

[guccimane]

Also going to get some footage from behind next time, so I can better see what my hips and shoulders are doing. Tough to tell with my consistently awful lighting as well. I blame the December sun never actually being overhead at any point....

 

[sidewinder22]

Need to setup in a more neutral/natural stance and then turn/load back into more dynamic stance during the backswing.

 

[guccimane]

That makes sense. I was definitely forcing it so I could get a better feel. I'll have to learn how to move into the position anyway when I put an x-step in front of it, so good call on learning how to move into it now. Thanks!

 

[guccimane]

I'm watching your Power of Posture video and what you're talking about with the closed stance near the end is exactly what I'm feeling with the swinging into vs. out of thing. I'm throwing the hammer behind me What's the best way to adjust this? It seems mostly like a timing problem.

Re-watching my video, I'm also definitely still throwing with my weight in between my legs, vs freely rotating on front leg, like you're saying in the video.

 

[sidewinder22]

 

[UhhNegative]

I'm watching your Power of Posture video and what you're talking about with the closed stance near the end is exactly what I'm feeling with the swinging into vs. out of thing. I'm throwing the hammer behind me What's the best way to adjust this? It seems mostly like a timing problem.

Re-watching my video, I'm also definitely still throwing with my weight in between my legs, vs freely rotating on front leg, like you're saying in the video.

Need a much narrower stance, at least from a standstill/one step. The only reason you would have a stance as wide as you are doing is if you are bringing a ton of momentum in from the x-step. Try something just slightly wider than shoulder width. Your typical athletic stance.

 

[guccimane]

Need a much narrower stance, at least from a standstill/one step. The only reason you would have a stance as wide as you are doing is if you are bringing a ton of momentum in from the x-step. Try something just slightly wider than shoulder width. Your typical athletic stance.

Is this something that is good to start narrow and then get wider as you get the feel? I see this advice a lot but lots of pros are in wider stances; maybe because a lot of them do a slow x-step for most shots anyway. In that above video Will is definitely throwing from a stance wider than just outside shoulder width, from a standstill/one step. I'm not Will though.

 

[guccimane]

 

[UhhNegative]

Part of it is that you are still starting the throw with weight on your back leg, so there's no real weight shift going on, or a soft one at best.