Critique: Brody's RHBH

[Brodysseus]

Hi everyone. I figured it was time to post a video of myself throwing. Sorry it's a long video (7 minutes) but I taped 16 full speed drives (threw my whole main bag) and then also did slow motion on my 6 drivers. The slow motion starts at about 3:00. I am now at the point where I am very happy with the accuracy of my drives and comfortable with my distances, but would like to start adding some distance.

Here's the Video:
http://youtu.be/4yaxT__P5To

Drive Order:
Full Speed-
VP, VP, Summit, VP, Ibex, Ibex, Ibex, Obex, Trak, Trak, Ascent, Ascent, Lace, Lace
Slow Motion-
162g Medium Trak (50%, 25%), 159g Firm Trak (50%, 25%), 169g Medium Ascent (50%, 25%), 175g Medium Ascent (50%, 25%), 170g Proto Lace (50%, 25%, 12.5%), 167g Medium Lace (50%, 25%, 12.5%)

Notes-

For Reference, my comfortable, repeatable max distances are:
Putters- 225'-250'
Midranges-260'-280'
Fairways- 290'- 315'
Distance- 320'-350'

Some things I noticed:
-I seem to use a bent elbow technique... Am I?
-I keep my left hand on the disc for a LONG time.
-I do not seem to get much reach back and I do not rotate my body away from the basket all that much.
-I cannot tell how my footwork is. It feels natural when I'm doing, but when I watch it, my timing just seems off, almost like it's a little late if that makes sense.

I am hoping to get my girlfriend to go out to league early with me today. That way I can have her film me from behind and I can set my phone up to film me from the side. Then I can put together a video that shows my form on a drive from both angles, as well as the flight of the disc. I'll post it when I get it uploaded.

Anyways, I would love to hear your thoughts, thank you very much!

 

[patfan74]

Some things I noticed:
-I seem to use a bent elbow technique... Am I?
-I keep my left hand on the disc for a LONG time.
-I do not seem to get much reach back and I do not rotate my body away from the basket all that much.
-I cannot tell how my footwork is. It feels natural when I'm doing, but when I watch it, my timing just seems off, almost like it's a little late if that makes sense.

Hey Brody, this is my first review, so I'll try to help. There are a lot of people on here with more experience analyzing form, so I'll just stick to your points and tell you what I see.
1. Bent elbow technique? Sorry, no clue what that is, LOL.
2. You do keep it on there for a while. You will need to get that down earlier to help with number 3. Try putting your hand in your pocket.
3. Your reach back is starting late, which is not allowing you to fully reach back or get your hips fully turned away from the basket.
4. Being late makes total sense, because it is. It looks as if you are trying to crunch you whole throw in between when you plant coming out of the x-step to when you you plant your lead foot.

I hope this has been some help. Find some slow-mo videos of the pros and try to split screen them so that you can see the difference between their timing and yours. Good Luck!!

 

[BionicRib]

Its hard to see exactly whats going on with your footwork, but you need to get that left hand off the disc. I know its a bad angle, but I'm willing to bet when you reach back with that hand on that disc you are reaching behind your body which does not allow you to pull straight through. The only thing your right arm can do to get back on the line is to come away from your body.......which is bad....You want to be compact on your pull through. Also when you plant that right foot your toe is almost pointed straight at the target. You want that foot pointed in more......the more you point it out the more your hips open up and then all you are doing is throwing with your upper body. Your centers of gravity are not too bad though.....On your reach back you could try to be a lil more upright, but when you pull through you do a good job of not doing what most people do....and thats falling forward or lunging. Work on your weight shift also.........When you plant that right foot your toe should hit first and then you slam the heel down.......when the heel of the right foot goes down......the heel on the left foot goes up (thats the weight shift in a nutshell)

 

[TalbotTrojan]

First, thanks for posting this in the Vibram thread.

In general I think you have solid form. That means that we can get really particular here with the critique.

1. Your left hand does indeed stay on the disc for a very long time and is only getting in the way. For form that is otherwise really compact, you are creating more drag and inhibiting a better reach back with the disc. It looks like you are a fairly strong guy so you really shouldn't need a second arm to help you hold the disc up *te he he. Get that left arm down at your side and really reach back.

2. You have a bit of a Tim Tebow swooping motion on your reach back. While not entirely bad, it is requiring you to use more energy to throw the disc. When you start to reach back the disc kinds goes down before it comes back up to your throwing plane. Now you do pull through on a good plane so the big issue gets corrected. Really this is just trying to help you keep things even more compact conserving as much energy as possible for the things that are important. This one in particular is very nit picky.

3. Your footwork is good, and you have a lot of good form here but I think you can get more out of your footwork to help you throw further and more accurately. I am not really sure how to explain this one in words, but I highly recomend watching the Will S. slow motion videos. He does a great job of being compact with his footwork and getting the most out of his footwork. Paul McBeth's slow motion driving video is also very good.





4. I would love to see a video shot looking down the fairway as you are driving. I have a sneaking suspicion that your pull through could be a bit more on a straight line. The key to this is accuracy. I am guessing you spray your shots a bit based on what could be seen. I am guessing this is partly due to the fact that your left hand is on the disc for so long but is also probably just leftover from throwing a frisbee or disc without thinking about it before. Most people tend to wrap around their body rather than pulling straight through. Just something to think about.

5. I think this is the last one. Grip. In some of the videos I though I noticed that there was a distinct possibility that your grip, particularly your thumb, might need to be adjusted. For some reason your thumb looks like it is really close to the edge of your disc. Most of your grip strangth that actually helps create snap comes from your thumb, but if you have it in the wrong place, you loose a lot of the strength from your thumb. Dion Aryln does a great job of talking about this in his distance driving video.

 

[Brodysseus]

Wow, guys a lot of GREAT advice. Thank you so much. I'll respond to each of you indivually below. I did get another video done today, showing me from the side and behind on the same throws. It's only three drives, but it's got slow motion as well.
http://YouTube.com/watch?v=caO9D1K68wA
I throw a VP and then two Trak (had some issues with the camerawoman and wind so just picked three decent drives that felt like "typical" drives for me).

Patfan-Thank you for the comments. You're absolutely right, my throw does seem to start very late in my motion. Hopefully, getting my left hand off my disc will help me start reaching back and getting into my actual throw earlier.

BionicRib- Thanks for your comments and thank you for pointing out my toe angle. That is something I've never noticed in my own throw and should be an easy enough fix. That should help with my weight shift for sure.

TalbotTrojan- Ah, a fellow Vibram thread addict! Thank you for your comments. First, good suggestion to use Will Shusterick, I have been watching his videos like crazy the last few days and I am seeing a lot of things for me to try. I have also been worried about my thumb placement. I think it is another bad side effect of having my offhand on the disc too long. And I did not realize I had that little swoop in my throw until you pointed it out, thank you!

In general, I've got quite a few things to work on. However, getting my left hand off the disc is obviously priority number one. Any tips?

 

[JReynolds]

^ the best tip for getting that hand off the disc is to never put it on there. Throw with your left hand in your pocket for a while

 

[sidewinder22]

Agree with most all the above, basically you need to learn the basics of throwing a disc golf because you are trying to throw it like a frisbee.