Is TGM (The Golf Machine) Incomplete?

"I have really enjoyed learning from John "Lag" Erickson. His knowledge of the golf swing is just not based on observation, but as a former tour player he has an internal knowledge of the golf swing that you don't get from most golf instructors. I have heard him say that if he personally couldn't demonstrate his theories then they aren't worth teaching. I have seen him hit a 1958 Hogan Thrust Two Iron off his back wooden deck in Benecia, CA and I think many tour players wish they could flush their long irons that well. How many teaching professionals do you know that can go out a shoot a 67 with Persimmon woods and 1950 Vintage Irons?

If you have had some exposure to TGM and are still struggling to find your swing I would recommend visiting the Advanced Ball Striking Forum and investigate why TGM might not be satisfying your golfing curiosities. It's easy to describe what impact positions look like in golf, but John "Lag" Erickson has really helped me understand what is happening with the hands and pivot at impact. So much of that has been a mystery to me before I began taking classes at Advanced Ball Striking." - Berkeleyrican aka Jose Figueroa

The Cut it Left Power Fade with Angled Hinge from Lag Pressure on Vimeo.

This shot I like to play on the 6th at Mare. The predominant wind is right to left and somewhat face on. I low piercing 1 iron boring up the left side fighting into the wind is the right shot for me here. With this protocol, the ball is never going left. The extreme post impact cut left with a no roll hinging very pivot driven keeps the ball driving and piercing in its' flight. Set's up a short iron into a tricky green that can take that same kind of move with a shorter iron.

Here's an ABS Forum Post from John entitled "Advice for TGM Converts" that I think can be helpful for those struggling a bit with TGM.

"For those of you that are new here coming over from the TGM school of thought and are confused by the what appears to be the polar opposite sensation we are working on in Module #1:

The problem with TGM is that it promotes a pivot stall post impact. That is the reason they teach the hands leading, big divots, down and out and all that stuff.

Too much forward shaft lean promotes a disconnect from the #4 pressure point. It's like unhooking the plug from what even Homer labeled the Master Accumulator. Homer made a tragic flaw in omitting a pivot driven lever from his description of the lever assemblies.

He also made a mistake in his observation that a hitter's quest for holding shaft flex (he did get this right) was created through right arm thrust (wrong)...instead, this action is done with hand speed working accumulators #2 and #3 and not right arm thrust. He talked about the right arm driving, but also the danger of the right arm disturbing clubface alignments through impact (correct)

He talked about the right arm thrust, but never tells the reader when this happens.. All the TGM instructors therefore interpreted this to mean into the ball.. down and out.

However, when we watch the great ball strikers, they are doing everything they can to save right arm to thrusts into P4 or even beyond. Post impact pivot acceleration is basically ignored in TGM. It's based too much on the logical idea that the swing is over once the ball leaves the clubface.

Homer was correct about compression dynamics in his wonderful chapter #2. Ball speed is affected by BOTH pre and post impact clubhead velocity. He was aware of it, but didn't quite get the importance of the post impact velocity protocol. In 2-M-3 he uses the word "unless" the pivot is driving the primary lever assembly.. which should not be "unless".. it should be ABSOLUTELY IT MUST!

A simple definition of f=ma (hitters) vs p=mv (swingers) was all that needed to be said.

A force strike vs a momentum strike.

I talked to O'Grady years ago, and that's the main reason he left TGM. Homer never told us how to do it.. to strike it with force.. he made the faulty assumption that the hit was a right arm thrust and not driven through the pivot lever, which he tragically omitted.

The other tragic mistake he made is that he promoted geometry over force. So you end up with two generations of golfers studying TGM trying to find lines and angles using flashlights and lasers as if somehow geometry is going to create the physics that is needed to create it. Its' completely absurd. It would be like looking into the sky at a fighter jet and observing the white vapor trail that is left behind... then believing that if you can just create the white trail, you will then create the jet motors that are driving the plane through the air.

The FLW is another vapor trail observation. It's created by pivot acceleration, not forced by taking a pork chop divot. For hitters, post impact pivot acceleration is the imperative, the FLW just happens. For swingers it's a steady even acceleration to time the flail.

Physics creates the geometry.

Also, Homer forgot to include a component for vertical and horizontal ground pressures. There are options here. But to not consider the importance of utilizing what we will be exploring in module #2 is unforgivable. "A good starts preferably from the feet". That is all that is said. No direction, no component description, no variations. There is a lot more to footwork than opening and closing the stance. I can forgive Homer here because he was not a fine player himself, therefore being able to understand what sensations are going on within the body both when and where. This isn't stuff that is always easy to see to the naked eye. Sometimes it is as we see in module #2, but usually it is not.

You will learn in this course that even the swing plane itself must be created by opposing forces, not tracing a line with laser.

I'm setting you up to do this with Module #1 as we speak.. so that by the time we get to module #4 you will have a swing plane that is created by manipulating CF to our advantage forcefully. In Module #2, I show you how to bolt your swing to the ground, then #3.. I show you how to apply the opposing force on the front end (post impact) that counter balances the lay off we are working so hard to create now. A hook move pre impact, countered they by a slice move post impact gives a net 0.. meaning a straight shot.. but now you'll be able to properly feel the golf club in your hands harnessing CF like all the great ball strikers do, rather than throwing or dumping it all into a useless black hole of down and out divots and off plane equal angular spiral post impact swing planes.

Now remember this.. I am not teaching you to throw the club away from the top. The module #1 drill brings you fully loaded with all four accumulators into P3. So we NEED to release these big angles... quickly and with strength. CF alone can do it.. if we swing with dead hands into a quickly rotating clubface and into an off plane post impact equal angular spiral which is very risky stuff... and very unreliable. I assume you don't want to have to hit 300 balls a a day to monitor the timing of such a delicate event!!!

In the end, you will end up with a golf swing that TGM followers will be drooling over.. FLW the whole thing.. on plane.. but to get there.. you have to throw away all the garbage you have learned from TGM arm chair observers, rather than pure ball striking practitioners.

The ball does not lie, and neither do the great ball strikers that left for us an amazing legacy to learn from." - lagpressure aka John Erickson