Reach back era is over, long live the whip.

[Casey 1988]

over 5 minute limit above.

Here on this guys channel is Dave playing in the early 1980's. He won with DGA Glow Frisbee's and a few of the Shuttle Puppy the La Merida open as well as some unkown disc that is lid/Frisbee shaped.

https://www.youtube.com/user/wwhamer/videos

 

[SonicGuy]

A towel that is already curled up will not whip as hard as one being dynamically curled.

Is this really true? Any citations for this?

 

[bbwrenn]

He should have just posted this again:




Nobody cares about your bent elbow, snake strike, or whip Dave. Do you even disc golf???

Ah yes, the old classic - "Paul McBeth agrees with tips."

 

[UhhNegative]

Is this really true? Any citations for this?

Does it take more energy to go from 0 mph to 10 mph or -10 mph to 10 mph?

 

[sidewinder22]

Is this really true? Any citations for this?

It needs some looping chaos to whip hardest. Note how the whip is not in a flat swing plane or 2D longitudinal wave, it's a 3D loop or transverse wave propagating down the whip. People are thinking about and looking at the disc golf swing in a 2D camera view and ignoring the 3rd dimension. If you look at the video of Seppo from the side you can see how much his disc moves up and down vertically from backswing to finish while the top down view shows the horizontal in and out. It's a looping whip.

 

[SonicGuy]

Yeah that really doesn't address the question at hand. From a physics perspective, what is the difference between a whip cracked from a coiled position vs from a straight position? It seems to me that the energy your body imparts on the whip is wasted in "dynamically coiling" the whip vs starting from a pre-coiled position where the energy is directly applied to "dynamically uncoiling" the whip.

 

[sidewinder22]

Yeah that really doesn't address the question at hand. From a physics perspective, what is the difference between a whip cracked from a coiled position vs from a straight position? It seems to me that the energy your body imparts on the whip is wasted in "dynamically coiling" the whip vs starting from a pre-coiled position where the energy is directly applied to "dynamically uncoiling" the whip.

More redirection creates more acceleration. You won't find any video of people starting a whip from a static coil. You can't manufacture a static coil nearly as well a dynamic coil. When you snap someone with a towel you hold the back end straight to whip it harder.

 

[UhhNegative]

The redirection from bringing in the disc in to the power pocket dynamically creates extra lag in the wrist without even trying. The weight of the disc will bend the wrist slightly as the disc reverses directions and redirects outward.

 

[Dan Ensor]

Yeah that really doesn't address the question at hand. From a physics perspective, what is the difference between a whip cracked from a coiled position vs from a straight position? It seems to me that the energy your body imparts on the whip is wasted in "dynamically coiling" the whip vs starting from a pre-coiled position where the energy is directly applied to "dynamically uncoiling" the whip.

I suppose perhaps it's possible to have a similar coil statically, but otherwise the forward motion is going to be wasted taking the slack out of the towel.

 

[GoobyPls]

FWIW, I took a one-on-one lesson from Philo a couple months ago, and he teaches the same thing. He told me to stop "reaching back," and instead leave the wrist & elbow loose when turning the shoulders away.

 

[Codo]

I'm working on making this my driving style. It makes so much sense to me.

 

[trasf]

It's always good to have visual presentation from one part of the throw, but still, I thought this is the most obvious one from hundreds of slowmo videos. Getting in to that point is still hardest part and when you get to that point you feel like you're basically a passanger on a ride.

 

[pauldst]

Nobody cares about your bent elbow, snake strike, or whip Dave. Do you even disc golf???

The snake strike and the bent elbow (putting and forehand, respectively, right?) have been helpful to me. Over the years, my throwing suffers when I get away from them and corrects when I get back to them.

Yeah that really doesn't address the question at hand. From a physics perspective, what is the difference between a whip cracked from a coiled position vs from a straight position? It seems to me that the energy your body imparts on the whip is wasted in "dynamically coiling" the whip vs starting from a pre-coiled position where the energy is directly applied to "dynamically uncoiling" the whip.

Assuming I am understanding correctly what is meant by "pre-coiled", I think I can see why pre-coiled doesn't work. First, the pre-coiled position is too tight and too flat; the whip will bump into itself as it uncoils, throwing off the action, and not be free to form a wave pattern. Second, starting pre-coiled seems like trying to create a wave from the middle rather than an end, so to speak, and that just creates chaos, rather than a wave. Think of waves in water: they develop from a cause, they aren't born fully grown.

 

[RFrance]

Assuming I am understanding correctly what is meant by "pre-coiled", I think I can see why pre-coiled doesn't work. First, the pre-coiled position is too tight and too flat; the whip will bump into itself as it uncoils, throwing off the action, and not be free to form a wave pattern. Second, starting pre-coiled seems like trying to create a wave from the middle rather than an end, so to speak, and that just creates chaos, rather than a wave. Think of waves in water: they develop from a cause, they aren't born fully grown.

^^ I think this is a good analogy to get you head around it.

Physiologically I would believe that if you precoil the wrist you won't get the quick lengthening of the forearm muscles needed to trigger the myotatic stretch reflex. Without using the precoil, as the wave of the whip is initiated the wrist folds inward stretching the forearm muscles quickly allowing the muscle spindle fibers to signal motor neurons for a quick and stronger contraction which will snap back as the wave of the whip reaches the end of its path. I think this is what was referred to as the tendon bounce in the old DGR discussions.

 

[Dan Ensor]

The snake strike and the bent elbow (putting and forehand, respectively, right?) have been helpful to me. Over the years, my throwing suffers when I get away from them and corrects when I get back to them.

I was being fairly facetious. I read his bent elbow article dozens of times. I watched the snake strike several times. This whip video, though, doesn't seem to add anything to the current discussion of the dg throw. When you have someone like Nate that can give a clinic like that, I don't really see the point in that video.

 

[RunnerUp]

I was happy to see someone that knows more than me talk about "whip" vs "reach back". I've noticed in the field that when I focus on reaching back I end up stiff-arming throws. It feels like I have no power at all. This of course is not inherent to reach back necessarily, but it's what happens to me!

I'm finding that when I concentrate on a quick pull through and a tight snap the results are obvious. When I get it right I don't even need to see the disc in the air yet to know that it's got the mustard behind it. Good share!

 

[sidewinder22]

IMO you have to be tall/lanky like Seppo/Dave Dunipace to start the throw curled up in your center. You don't see any shorter guys doing that or any of the ladies.

Even in Dave's video Seppo's arm is basically straight back.

 

[Discette]

Well.. I walked around the house for a solid week, driving the dog nuts with my invisible disc... but I could immediately hear the snap from my hand or at least the wind movement. I would say there was a weird adjustment period for 2-3 weeks. It's not that I totally changed my throw it's just that instead of a 3 count it was 4 and instead of a straight disc/arm motion there was a pitstop where the hand tucked and the elbow cocked.

Results started to show up immediately, even with slower speed throws, I just connected easier and often providing the disc with more spin with less effort.

Adding a pause before the throw also helped me immensely. If you start "throwing hard" or "throwing fast" right after you reach back, you strong arm the disc and you won't get that whip. By "waiting" to "throw fast" until your hips have turned, you can put all your power/speed into the hit.

My four count is:

Step - Relaxed grip. Take first step with right foot
Reach- Reach back while the left foot is doing the X-step. Not necessarily a "reach" as it is a turn away from the target.
And.... - This is the "pause" where I plant the front foot, and start turning the hips. Grip is still relaxed.
Throw - Grip hard and start the real acceleration as the disc moves past chin/center line.



When throwing in the woods down tight narrow fairways, the "straight reach back, pull straight forward on a line" throw decreases distance, but definitely increases accuracy. However, there is still a pause before that acceleration. Straight line pull also works well on stand still approach shots, so it is a good skill to have.


Without knowing distance of those Seppo drives, one might infer his longer reachback is for slower throws that require more accuracy instead of distance. But that is just an educated guess, not necessarily a fact. As you see, Evelina (bottom thrower) is throwing a very, very straight shot AND using the straight line reach back.

 

[sidewinder22]

When throwing in the woods down tight narrow fairways, the "straight reach back, pull straight forward on a line" throw decreases distance, but definitely increases accuracy. However, there is still a pause before that acceleration. Straight line pull also works well on stand still approach shots, so it is a good skill to have.


Without knowing distance of those Seppo drives, one might infer his longer reachback is for slower throws that require more accuracy instead of distance. But that is just an educated guess, not necessarily a fact. As you see, Evelina (bottom thrower) is throwing a very, very straight shot AND using the straight line reach back.

I agree straight reachback helps accuracy. I disagree that straight reach back decreases distance. Swing length from the hips/pelvis turning/stride speed controls distance.

Eveliina straight crushing it:

 

[BrotherDave]

I think this is what was referred to as the tendon bounce in the old DGR discussions.

Thanks for posting that. I wish you were around when I was trying to understand what the hell tendon bounce was on DGR 8+ years ago. I finally figured it out but I had to read so many walls of text over there for it to sink in.

IMO you have to be tall/lanky like Seppo/Dave Dunipace to start the throw curled up in your center. You don't see any shorter guys doing that or any of the ladies.

One thing I really like about Seppo's form is that his setup always keeps his arm to shoulder angle at 90* or more so he's never hugging himself. I try to mimic that as much as possible when I need to throw a bent-elbow style of shot.

I agree straight reachback helps accuracy. I disagree that straight reach back decreases distance. Swing length from the hips/pelvis turning/stride speed controls distance.

Eveliina straight crushing it:

I'm kinda gonna quibble a little bit here. I don't think it's so much the reachback as it is the footwork and having a real pointed hit. I don't know many guys that throw straighter and more accurately than Barry Schultz and with his wide rail he is practically never reaching straight back. Andrew Fish is another expert needle threader and his ultimate style windup where he keeps his offhand on the disc during the reachback also keeps his reachback from being classically straight. Johansen is also not much for straight reachbacks. But all three of those guys are excellent at stepping into their throw very straight and pointed so their hits are very synced/aligned for straight ejections. I guess a lot of this has to do with which method you're using for a straight line i.e. hyzer flipping something neutral and floaty or powering up on something really HSS like a Teebird.