Stuck at 260'

[GoobyPls]

I've been throwing around 260' on average and can't seem to figure out what do to next. So this week, I finally got around to filming myself at field practice. Looking at the results, I can already see for the first set of throws I wasn't keeping my left arm down. But beyond that, I could use some feedback. Go ahead and let me have it, it's not going to bruise my ego or anything

 

[Lumberjack504]

You're definitely rounding or curling your arm and disc in the reachback/backswing. Need to turn those shoulders and hips and get the body out of the way of the backswing and keep the arm out wide. I'm sure others with better experience will chime in (my form is a work in progress as well), but that's the main thing I noticed.

 

[Lynn LeFey]

I've only been playing a little while, so take this with a grain of salt, but...

It looks to me like you're throwing nose-up and all your discs are climbing hard once they leave your grip. This might cause them to climb and stall prematurely.

I hope someone more knowledgeable comes along and either confirms what I'm seeing or gives you a better explanation.

 

[GoobyPls]

I've only been playing a little while, so take this with a grain of salt, but...

It looks to me like you're throwing nose-up and all your discs are climbing hard once they leave your grip. This might cause them to climb and stall prematurely.

I hope someone more knowledgeable comes along and either confirms what I'm seeing or gives you a better explanation.

You're right in this case, and a big part of that was that I was throwing into a headwind. Normally I prefer a crosswind for field practice, but that was the only spot where I could throw away from other people at the park and still have concrete under me the entire runup.

 

[Zphix]

I'm still working on my form and over the last few days I think I've had some breakthroughs but take what I say with that in mind. I see a lot of the same issues I've had within your video.

Rounding was already addressed so I won't beat a dead horse. Although, I think you're rounding because of how you're planting your feet - planting open straight onto your heel means you can't turn your shoulder fully/reachback in a straight line without putting strain on your front knee causing you to round.

Also, because you're planting into an open stance your weight is tipping over your front leg (same problem I'm dealing with right now!). In your case, though, it looks like you're planting your foot long before your reachback is done so by the time you actually start to throw all you have is your upper body. When you throw, you want to swing inside your posture, and you want to be finishing your reachback as your front toes are coming down.

Last bit of advice is to slow wwwaaayyyy down if you're trying to improve your form. Simon Lizotte said it best; slow feet, fast hands.






and I'd also recommend starting out with stand-still form; throwing from a standstill doesn't drain any power you have and I've hit over 350' from stand-still.

 

[treekickluv]

A fine example of strong arming.
Your reachback is basicly your arm.
you should be turning your hips and shoulders back in an axis. While having the disc in a straight line towards where you are throwing.

Begin the throw with your weight on the backfoot.(on your toes)

Then as you turn your shoulders and hips back begin to stride forward to plant your front fot.. and push your weight with your hips into your front leg.

The throwing motion allways begins with your hips.

Shoulder is what finshes your throw.

And bend your knees. your falling like a lamppost

 

[billyjacko]

I'd go ahead and pack up your speed 7 discs and above, and completely stop running up. You need to get the fundamentals of the reach back and pull through down before you move any further. You have a lot of issues with your x-step and balance, but it's useless to work on if you can't pull on a straight line. Do the one step throws seen in Loopghost's feet together drill, and combine this with the Beto drill to hold onto the disc (with your hand on the outside of the disc [NOT CURLING YOUR ARM AROUND IT]) as long as you can before releasing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pleUjYKwf0g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nED7gcXobEo

 

[Meillo]

I agree with first getting the arm motion right from a standstill, as there's still enough aspects you have to concentrate on. You don't want to have all the variables from an X-step when you try to focus on a single aspect of your arm motion. I at least had a lot of success throwing from a standstill first ... later moving the right foot only one step to the front. Now I slowly start adding the X-step. I think it's most important to allow you to concentrate on a single aspect of the overall throwing motion in each training session. The more variables you can eliminate the better for your training success.

 

[billyjacko]

I would say it's fine to start with the one step.

 

[sidewinder22]

All that stuff above and...
http://web.archive.org/web/20160408...&t=13291&sid=2ea389973b2f0bb71d61618cc3635d51

 

[GoobyPls]

Update: I've had a couple of field practice sessions where I focused almost exclusively on eliminating my curling reachback & rounding. Today was the first chance I had to video the results (and the first game I've played since then). It looks like I've maybe fixed that problem, though I'm raising the disc a little high on the extension. I also keep forgetting to get my left hand down by my hip.

Any other feedback would be helpful.

 

[GoobyPls]

Just realized the video was set to private. It should be viewable now.

 

[SaROCaM]

It has been said before, but I think working from a standstill will help a lot. You are planting open and the disc is coming out with the nose really high. As for the left hand, try putting it in your pocket. I'd recommend a combination of the one leg drill and closed shoulder drill; try to really nail those down. You don't need a run up or a big reachback to throw over 260 feet.

 

[sidewinder22]

You are crossing all your streams. Your grip on the disc is majorly oriented nose up crossing the plane of your forearm. You are throwing your balance/upper body over the front leg. Keep your balance dynamically centered upright inside your feet and swing your arm/disc instead of your balance/body. The more centered you can turn your body, the faster it can turn the axis and the more efficient your arm/disc will whip and speed gets multiplied, also helps with speed/power of your arm swing being perpendicular to the spine and same plane/level of the disc.

 

[Nenja]

Good thread! I'm at the same distance and will read this one through carefully before I make my own video thread.

 

[GoobyPls]

Damn, that's the second time I've discovered I have a major grip screw-up. I've been trying to put all four fingertips against the inside of the rim. No wonder I can't keep the nose down. I thought I just had less range of motion in my wrist or something. I think that's probably why I lean over my toes so much as well, trying to overcompensate for the nose-up angle. Back to the practice field, and thanks.

 

[GoobyPls]

SoSo it looks like I may be a more interesting case than I thought.

After everybody's feedback here, I looked more closely at my grip today and why everything was coming out nose-up. It turns out that (based on my wrist or shape of my hand or whatever) I can't use a power grip.

This is me trying to tilt my wrist as far down as I can get it with a power grip, while still leaving the disc in the crease of my hand. I had no hope of getting the nose down in flight. Add in the fact that most of the time I won't be able to tilt my wrist down even that far during an actual throw, and I had a real problem. I kept trying to maneuver my fingers around to get the disc angle further down, but nothing seemed to work.

Until I tried putting my index finger on the top, a.k.a. the Bonapane grip.

Finally I was able to actually keep the nose angle below the plane of my arm. I spent the rest of practice today trying to apply this new (to me) grip to my drive, and the results were immediate. I was regularly getting drives out to 290' without changing any of my other mechanics. I even managed to get one out to 330'; I've never come anywhere close to that on flat ground. And I gained some snap: I was able to flip my River all the way over from a hyzer angle into a roller (at 1:00).



Of course there were some inconsistencies, as you'd expect with a completely new grip, but it seems like I've found a winner. And that's with a ton of room for improvement in my footwork yet; I didn't want to change more than one thing at a time during one practice.

I guess the moral of the story for my fellow newbies is not to be completely wedded to one particular grip. It's worth trying others to see if they might work for you.

 

[sidewinder22]

SoSo it looks like I may be a more interesting case than I thought.

After everybody's feedback here, I looked more closely at my grip today and why everything was coming out nose-up. It turns out that (based on my wrist or shape of my hand or whatever) I can't use a power grip.

This is me trying to tilt my wrist as far down as I can get it with a power grip, while still leaving the disc in the crease of my hand. I had no hope of getting the nose down in flight. Add in the fact that most of the time I won't be able to tilt my wrist down even that far during an actual throw, and I had a real problem. I kept trying to maneuver my fingers around to get the disc angle further down, but nothing seemed to work.

Until I tried putting my index finger on the top, a.k.a. the Bonapane grip.

Finally I was able to actually keep the nose angle below the plane of my arm. I spent the rest of practice today trying to apply this new (to me) grip to my drive, and the results were immediate. I was regularly getting drives out to 290' without changing any of my other mechanics. I even managed to get one out to 330'; I've never come anywhere close to that on flat ground. And I gained some snap: I was able to flip my River all the way over from a hyzer angle into a roller (at 1:00).

Of course there were some inconsistencies, as you'd expect with a completely new grip, but it seems like I've found a winner. And that's with a ton of room for improvement in my footwork yet; I didn't want to change more than one thing at a time during one practice.

I guess the moral of the story for my fellow newbies is not to be completely wedded to one particular grip. It's worth trying others to see if they might work for you.

It's not issues with your hand/wrist, it's the way you are gripping the disc in your hand/palm(low/deep) and other fingers getting in the way. Use Robbie's two finger grip to get the nose down with proper index hook, then you can add the other two fingers without changing the orientation of the disc and pressures. Your second pic is off plane the opposite direction. You ideally want the disc parallel to the top of the forearm for plane and power.

See first set of pics:
https://www.discgolfreview.com/resources/articles/gripittoripit.shtml

 

[GoobyPls]

It's not issues with your hand/wrist, it's the way you are gripping the disc in your hand/palm(low/deep) and other fingers getting in the way...See first set of pics:
https://www.discgolfreview.com/resources/articles/gripittoripit.shtml

I saw that before, in that very helpful Techniques sticky. Maybe I'm not looking at it correctly, but that's exactly how it looks to me like they're holding it in the pictures in the article. The article even says to press the disc into the base of the thumb. I was experimenting with this before practice to see if I could somehow get it to work, but it doesn't for me. There's no way to get my short fingers underneath there and still keep the disc along that seam and keep the nose down at the same time. The nose-up picture I posted is literally as far down as I could get it with a power grip.

Your second pic is off plane the opposite direction. You ideally want the disc parallel to the top of the forearm for plane and power.

Oh I'm not actually throwing with the disc at that angle. That picture was just showing maximum angle/range of motion.

Use Robbie's two finger grip to get the nose down with proper index hook, then you can add the other two fingers without changing the orientation of the disc and pressures.

I'll definitely give that one a shot the next time I practice, thanks.

 

[esc1]

You're reaching back as high as your shoulder, coming through a little lower and finishing high. Doesn't matter how you grip it doing that, you probably won't get the nose down. Reach back somewhere between your belly button and lower chest.. across the core. Keep the throw line level.