TheBeardedFatGuy
Birdie Member
Why the play on words? Because I'm starting to realize that a lot of the often-repeated advice isn't as useful as it could be.
For example, the reach back - most people giving advice talk about how critical it is to reach as far back as possible (except for those who say it isn't important at all), but what they don't tell you (but Will Schusterick did in his video on drives, bless him) is that the positioning of your non-throwing shoulder is critical to getting full advantage from the reach back. Just turning your non-throwing shoulder fully towards the target when you reach back makes a world of difference to your drive. (I won't go into why since that's not the point here.) It's a critical little detail (tree) that usually gets overlooked in the masses of people (forest) saying how important reaching fully back is without giving important bits like the off-shoulder positioning.
Accelerating the disc in a straight line across the body is another tip that gets repeated like a mantra, and that's probably enough for most people, but, again, some important details don't usually get mentioned. If you are trying to move the disc along a specific line, the joints and segments of body from your ankles up through your hips, torso, shoulder, upper arm, elbow, forearm, wrist, hand and fingers will adjust automatically to allow that straight line motion to happen, but not always in a way that is optimal for accelerating the disc along that line - your shoulder and upper arm may move up and out of the way, for example, so they don't 'bunch up' in the movement. And that is totally NOT the way to accelerate the disc properly. For me, anyway, the breakthrough on this came from watching slow-motion drives of the pros. I realized they were leading with the elbow even though this caused that 'bunching up' I mentioned where the elbow reaches the end of the forward motion it's capable of. But, if you watch what happens next - the forearm keeps moving, whipping around the elbow pivot point at high velocity. THAT's what's supposed to happen. It's what allows the transfer of power from everything above the elbow into the forearm and, ultimately, into the disc. It's like your forearm is a pole vaulter running at full speed, and the point where it rams the pole into the ground is when it hits the maximum extension point of the elbow. What happens next is just like the pole vaulter catapulting into the air, but turned on its side. With forward motion denied, the elbow becomes a pivot point and the forearm is levered around it. Once I realized this, I abandoned all thoughts of moving the disc in a straight line and instead thought of the move as driving my elbow towards my target. Since the forearm follows the elbow, driving the elbow like I'm trying to elbow some idiot standing between me and my target in the gut automatically causes my forearm and thus my disc to move in the desired straight line across the body. It also emphasizes that 'stick' where the elbow can't go any further and the energy whips the forearm around at high velocity.
Grip is another area that could benefit from taking a closer look than most advice gives. If you're using the standard power grip, you'll find tons of advice on how important and effective it is for getting 'snap', but a little thought reveals there's a deeper level of understanding possible. When the disc is ripping out of your hand, the last point of contact is your pinch point between your index finger and thumb, either because you're actually pinching the flight plate or, more likely, because the disc is rotating against the index finger where it meets the inside of the rim. That rotation on the index finger is a major source of power because it whips the disc around before pulling off the finger, adding spin and velocity.
I don't know about anybody else, but I'm finding my drive is really benefiting from these sorts of 'closer looks' at the traditional advice. Anybody else have something that didn't make sense or didn't work until you found or discovered a new way to look at it?
For example, the reach back - most people giving advice talk about how critical it is to reach as far back as possible (except for those who say it isn't important at all), but what they don't tell you (but Will Schusterick did in his video on drives, bless him) is that the positioning of your non-throwing shoulder is critical to getting full advantage from the reach back. Just turning your non-throwing shoulder fully towards the target when you reach back makes a world of difference to your drive. (I won't go into why since that's not the point here.) It's a critical little detail (tree) that usually gets overlooked in the masses of people (forest) saying how important reaching fully back is without giving important bits like the off-shoulder positioning.
Accelerating the disc in a straight line across the body is another tip that gets repeated like a mantra, and that's probably enough for most people, but, again, some important details don't usually get mentioned. If you are trying to move the disc along a specific line, the joints and segments of body from your ankles up through your hips, torso, shoulder, upper arm, elbow, forearm, wrist, hand and fingers will adjust automatically to allow that straight line motion to happen, but not always in a way that is optimal for accelerating the disc along that line - your shoulder and upper arm may move up and out of the way, for example, so they don't 'bunch up' in the movement. And that is totally NOT the way to accelerate the disc properly. For me, anyway, the breakthrough on this came from watching slow-motion drives of the pros. I realized they were leading with the elbow even though this caused that 'bunching up' I mentioned where the elbow reaches the end of the forward motion it's capable of. But, if you watch what happens next - the forearm keeps moving, whipping around the elbow pivot point at high velocity. THAT's what's supposed to happen. It's what allows the transfer of power from everything above the elbow into the forearm and, ultimately, into the disc. It's like your forearm is a pole vaulter running at full speed, and the point where it rams the pole into the ground is when it hits the maximum extension point of the elbow. What happens next is just like the pole vaulter catapulting into the air, but turned on its side. With forward motion denied, the elbow becomes a pivot point and the forearm is levered around it. Once I realized this, I abandoned all thoughts of moving the disc in a straight line and instead thought of the move as driving my elbow towards my target. Since the forearm follows the elbow, driving the elbow like I'm trying to elbow some idiot standing between me and my target in the gut automatically causes my forearm and thus my disc to move in the desired straight line across the body. It also emphasizes that 'stick' where the elbow can't go any further and the energy whips the forearm around at high velocity.
Grip is another area that could benefit from taking a closer look than most advice gives. If you're using the standard power grip, you'll find tons of advice on how important and effective it is for getting 'snap', but a little thought reveals there's a deeper level of understanding possible. When the disc is ripping out of your hand, the last point of contact is your pinch point between your index finger and thumb, either because you're actually pinching the flight plate or, more likely, because the disc is rotating against the index finger where it meets the inside of the rim. That rotation on the index finger is a major source of power because it whips the disc around before pulling off the finger, adding spin and velocity.
I don't know about anybody else, but I'm finding my drive is really benefiting from these sorts of 'closer looks' at the traditional advice. Anybody else have something that didn't make sense or didn't work until you found or discovered a new way to look at it?
