Hand/wrist above the elbow?

[Malawi]

I have been noticed some players like Calvin and Simon having their elbow low and wrist/hand above the elbow in the run up and reachback but releaseing below the elbow. I know dropping the elbow is a nono but is there some advantage to do so before the release?

 

[Malawi]

Pics

 

[bryantlikes]

I have been noticed some players like Calvin and Simon having their elbow low and wrist/hand above the elbow in the run up and reachback but releaseing below the elbow. I know dropping the elbow is a nono but is there some advantage to do so before the release?

Looks like he is probably throwing an anhyzer shot based on that release angle?

 

[HyzerRoc]

Zach Arlinghaus also starts the sling with his wrist above the elbow. Both Arlinghaus and Heimburg eventually level their wrist and elbow during the shot. However I have no idea how they don't end up throwing an air bounce/nose up as the wrist angle will lag behind the angle of the pull a little bit as is demonstrated by Ezra in this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_ajpOY3Ohs

My guess is that both Heimburg and Arlinghaus stiffen their wrists a lot during the reachback and it ends up working for them. I cannot see any advantage this move would yield to them. They get away with it, but if I tried the same my wrist angle would change and my disc would just go nose up all day.

 

[Brychanus]

You can crack a whip out of various coil patterns.

If your elbow is following your shift and posture out of the backswing into the swing allowing the arm to maintain leverage in its most natural pattern for maintaining leverage, it will lead with the elbow forward and slightly up relative to the ground squared with the posture, providing parabolic loft sufficient for flight.

As the arm swings through, because the wrist is supinating into the release it will be nose down.

Notice that together these effects account for control over the ("lofted") line of play and plane of play (as the wrist comes through) in a "stock" drive:

Advantages for the backswing styles? I'm not entirely sure it doesn't matter at all, but it's notable that there's a large variability in people all throwing very far exiting the backswing as SW as pointed out elsewhere. Whatever the style, you definitely don't want it to get in the way of the above, which most developing players have tons of trouble with.

 

[gwsmallwood]

Pros adjust portions of their form to compensate for shortcomings in others. Nobody's form is perfect, but I think ideally you would pull along the same plane you plan to release on. There are tricks you can play with reaching back lower or higher in order to address specific problems with release points, nose angles, etc, but in my opinion, those should be short-term queues to help someone get past a particular problem with their form, not general advice for all.

 

[semisensei]

Calvin and throwers with similar style like Emerson Kieth seem to use external shoulder rotation in the backswing as a strategy to avoid rounding, as opposed to elbow extension.

 

[blayed]

Pros adjust portions of their form to compensate for shortcomings in others. Nobody's form is perfect, but I think ideally you would pull along the same plane you plan to release on. There are tricks you can play with reaching back lower or higher in order to address specific problems with release points, nose angles, etc, but in my opinion, those should be short-term queues to help someone get past a particular problem with their form, not general advice for all.

I would say unless you are Ezra Aderhold forsure the swing plane should be at least be somewhat high to low to utilize gravity to assist you. See images here in the "flat swing plane doesn't exist": https://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=134415

Ezra is the only one I know of who does the opposite and pulls low to high, everyone else uses at least some amount of "reciprocating dingle arm" to have gravity help them.

 

[drk_evns]

It's basically what Seppo did. There's probably some whip action from coming down on the release point from there. I imagine it's similar in effect to the steep anhyzer that Simon and Eagle use in their backswing

 

[Nick Carroll]

I'll just point out, as someone working on fixing wobble in my own form, and I've really become attuned to seeing it when it happens, Calvin does produce some wobble when he drives because the disc doesn't remain flat along the plane that he throws in. You can watch any slomo footage of his drives to see the effect of the off-axis torque on the disc immediately after it ejects from his hand - especially from behind. Here's an example:

 

[Sheep]

I've noticed a lot pro's start high and bring it on plane.
Its a bit easier to drive down, than pull up.

The issue is making sure you don't swoop.


I think that it's probably easier to keep it high and relax it to the pocket vs trying to jerk it up to the pocket height and not sky shot it.

Simon starts high like this also and paul sometimes does as well, but paul is a bit more on plane.

It doesn't really matter what you do previous to the pocket as long as it comes clean out of the pocket on plane.
But some things can lead to terrible habits.

 

[Nick Carroll]

Simon starts high like this also and paul sometimes does as well, but paul is a bit more on plane.

It doesn't really matter what you do previous to the pocket as long as it comes clean out of the pocket on plane.
But some things can lead to terrible habits.

Yeah Simon is a great example of changing the angle of the disc during the swing, but correcting by the time the disc travels through the power pocket. This is why he can throw a Glitch really far with a very straight flight. Calvin and Eagle produce some wobble when they drive, but they compensate with slightly more hyzer, and the discs come out with such speed and spin that the off-axis torque is corrected fairly quickly after release. I think that should comfort people (like me) who are trying to minimize wobble.

If you watch some of Eagle's recent vlogs where Ratana is recording his drives in slo-mo, you can see the wobble early on. I tried finding the JomezPro video where Calvin was highlighted, and he had 1-2 drives there where the wobble was more evident, but couldn't find them on a quick search. But I may be confusing that with recent DGN coverage where I saw those examples. I think the alignment of the disc, hand, and wrist with the elbow is a good ideal, but correction during the swing goes a long way.