Dear David,
The usual preaching about "the head must not move" during the stroke does not really survive close examination into the movement and its requirements for avoiding negatives or promoting positives. Firstly, it is an example of not really paying attention to state that golfers usually hold their heads still, even at the top levels. A recent test of golfers at all levels showed that they ALL moved their heads in the stroke action. Poorer putters' heads moved towards the target thru impact, and better putters' heads moved away from the target at impact.
When it comes to putting, Tiger and Nicklaus might not have best advice
July 14th, 2008
Tim Lee, professor in the Department of Kinesiology.
Golfers who heed the advice of instructors to keep their heads perfectly still while putting may be hampering their game, according to a study that examined coordination patterns. The research appears in the July issue of the Journal of Motor Behavior.
Tim Lee, professor of kinesiology at McMaster University and a golfer himselfsays the findings run contrary to conventional wisdom, or at least conventional golf wisdom.
"Jack Nicklaus says the premier technical cause of missed putts is head movement; Tiger Woods believes that even a fraction of head movement can throw a putting path off course," says Lee. "Therefore, it would seem that based on what the experts say good putters keep their heads absolutely still from start to finish."
The putting stroke is used more frequently than any other during a round of golf, regardless of skill. In 2007, putts represented 41.3 per cent of total strokes taken by members of the PGA tour, and 40 percent for members of the LPGA.
Lee and his team assembled two groups of golfers: one group comprised 11 volunteers, aged 21 to 56, and with a handicap range of 12 and 40; and another group of professional and low-handicap golfers, aged 24-52.
Using an infrared tracking system, researchers recorded the putter head and the golfer's head during sixty putts.
Surprisingly, both expert and less-skilled golfers moved their heads about the same amount during the execution of putts. The big difference was in the direction: less-skilled golfers moved in an allocentric direction moving their head in the same direction and timing as the motion of the putter; the expert golfers moved in a tightly coupled but egocentric direction moving their head in the opposite direction as the putter, but timed similarly to reverse when the putter reversed.
"The exact reasons for the opposite coordination patterns are not entirely clear," says Lee. "However, we suspect that the duffers tend to just sway their body with the motions of the putter. In contrast, the good golfers probably are trying to maintain a stable, central body position by counteracting the destabilization caused by the putter backswing with a forward motion of the head. The direction of head motion is then reversed when the putter moves forward to strike the ball."
"These coordination patterns are similar to the fundamental coordination patterns that we use to move our upper and lower limbs every day," Lee adds. "So, from one viewpoint, the findings are very consistent with other research. The findings are just not consistent with what most golf instructors believe to be true".
Source: McMaster University
There are two main observations about this study. First, the definition of the golfer's "head" is vague. The team appears to mean "the top of the head" by the word "head". Second, the team appears ignorant of what causes the good vs bad movement patterns. Better golfers instinctively or thru training learn that the shoulder frame needs to remain aligned parallel with the target line thru impact, and specifically that a "pull" occurs when the lead shoulder rotates out of alignment to the inside. Poorer golfers don't have this movement competency.
More importantly, the study team doesn't seem to know that the head is NOT the body part that bears controlling thru impact -- the shoulder frame is. A golfer who sets a steady muscle tone in holding onto and swinging the handle of the putter, and who also eliminates most extraneous motions other than the essentially rhythmic swinging of the putter thru impact, necessarily depends upon the shoulder frame and upper torso not rotating off line thru impact, as this will biomechanically cause a pull. A golfer with a less ordered and simplified movement pattern thru impact tries to compensate for the unwanted but unguarded-against movement of the torso towards the target with hands and arms action independent of the shoulders to react to the inconsistent turning of the torso to the inside, and the reaction is a sometimes thing seldom accurate in any event.
So, the better golfer simplifies the motion and hence wants the chest, upper torso, and shoulder frame pretty still thru impact and also aligned consistently, most normally aligned parallel to the target line. The two body parts that manage the chest are the neck and the hips. If the hips are turning, there is nothing the neck can do. If the hips are still, the chest can still turn over still hips, but not if the alignment of the base of the neck REFUSES to swing or rotate across the midline of the stroke with the shoulders turning lead-side to the inside.
If you envision the base of the neck as having a flat, round metal disc affixed to the point where the clavicle connects the shoulders to the top of the sternum, and this disc is oriented flat to the plane of the chest, and also has a rod extending perpendicularly out in front of the golfer level or horizontal to the surface, a "straight stroke" of a better golfer will have the coordinated hands and arms and shoulders unified in a rocking action, and the rocking action is devoid of any lateral swinging or rotating around the body, so that the rod off the circular disc simply spins in place but the rod does not swing targetward across the midline. This is an essential feature of body control for a forward stroke thru impact that avoids a pull and sends the ball straight off on the line where the putter was aiming at address. A push happens when the golfer allows the shoulders to rotate off line in the backstroke and then fails to return to parallel alignment before impact, so generating an in-to-out path thru the ball. (A push can also happen when parallel-aligned shoulders stay parallel but the arms swing independently of the shoulders and the arms are "brought forward" on an in-to-out push path, but these are golfers without the simplified, coordinated stroke motion we were considering.) A simple shoulder stroke action, in order to roll the ball straight, has in effect only two trouble spots: making sure that any misalignment of the shoulders that occurs in the backstroke gets rectified before impact in the forward stroke, and making sure that when the chest and shoulders are parallel-aligned coming forward before impact, the chest and shoulders are not allowed to continue past parallel alignment into the pull action of a rotation to the inside. This later point means: keep the neck line or the rod over the middle of the address position (where the leading edge of the putter face was to begin with) and never allow it to swing to the target side of the middle.
Incidentally, coming out of shoulder alignment mildly in the backstroke is not that difficult to rectify, since the body twists a bit in the mid-section during the turning of the upper torso over the lower body. Anchoring the lead hip before the start of the backstroke minimizes this chest turing, but in any event returning the chest to parallel alignment before impact is pretty simple and easy to "know" when to stop as the alignment is rectified. The twisting action is actually some stretching of muscle and connective tissue in the abdomen that serves like Hansel and Gretel bread crumbs for finding the way back home to "neutral" parallel alignment. Neutral alignment is when the "usual" relationship of "facing forward" with joint pairs more or less symmetrically aligned from shoulders thru hips and knees and ankles, so parallel-aligned as at the beginning of the stroke is simply returning to the original "facing" the putt line and is known by the body signal of twist tension returning to the relaxed, tension-free usual joint-pair normalcy.
So, managing the chest with the hips and neck while also rocking the shoulders in a simplified stroke action tilts the shoulder frame back thru impact (lead side up, trailing side down), and this tilting "moves the head". Who cares about the head, since the chest and shoulders remained in good orientation, and this greatly simplifies where the stroke sends the ball -- consistently down the line of aim established at address?
Apparently, biomechanics folks like Paul Hurrion teach "the head must not move" not based upon principles of biomechanics and kinesiology (there are none that say this), and instead are simply repeating something they read in a golf magazine tip from the 1970s without thinking about it. Ben Crenshaw deliberately makes sure his head has some movement. So does Brad Faxon and Freddy Jacobsen, to name just a couple. I think Phil Mickelson's head moves back as well, and he certainly does not have any apparent effort to freeze the head thru impact.
Yes, it is true that the "old guys" taught that the head must not move, as Gary Players taught to wait and listen for the ball to drop and Jack Nicklaus said any head movement was fatal. But they are missing the mark: it's not the head movement that is the problem, but their stopping the head from moving indirectly took care of the chest / shoulders by keeping the alignment good and parallel. So why not just do that -- still the head? The reason is that stilling the head is done with the muscles that hold the head down onto the shoulder / neck / spine skeletal structure, and tightening these muscles creates an impediment to fluid shoulder action right at and thru impact, the worst possible time for that. That's why Crenshaw and others positively cultivate a relaxed shoulder frame and neck without stilling the head contrariwise to the stroke action.
My teaching is "no face, little face" -- sort of a compromise based on what's really important. The "no face" is to hold the head and face steady looking straight down when the backstroke starts to avoid the rocking of the shoulders from tugging or dipping the head and neck either head-left of the midline (right-hander) or neck-line swinging back to the inside allowing the shoulders to come out of alignment and thus creating a problem for returning to good alignment before impact. The head is held steady until the forward stroke reaches impact, at which point the impact is so brief in time that a reciprocating and natural tilting back of the head as the shoulders tilt lead-side up, trailing-side down won't cause any harm to the stroke and also will promote the chest and shoulders staying parallel-aligned thru impact without any stiffness in the neck fighting the shoulder rock.
More generally, people don't really understand what actually happens to the head in the shoulder rock. The size of lateral or rotational "bobbing" back of the head thru impact depends upon the angle of the neck in relation to the plane of movement of the shoulders. If the shoulders thru impact rock in a vertical plane in relation to the surface, AND the neck is also parallel to the surface and perpendicular to the plane of shoulder action, the TOP OF THE HEAD DOESN'T GO ANYWHERE, but the button on the cap will simply spin in place. This is an unfettered turning of the head and face by the shoulder action, but the top of the head stays in place, although the face itself rocks to aim from straight down to aiming somewhat down the line towards the target (my "little face" turn). The more the neck lifts up and tilts up out of perpendicular to the plane of motion of the shoulders, the greater the size of the swing of the top of the head. So if the movement of the top of the head bothers you, simply set the neck perpendicular to the plane of the shoulder rock (a vertical shoulder plane requires a horizontal neck; a shoulder plane tilted back off vertical by 14 degrees requires a neck tilted up off horizontal by the same 14 degrees, etc.).
A 1952 article in the Pinehurst magazine Golf World by a physician golfer said that "nodding the head" off the spine at address as if the golfer has fallen asleep standing beside the ball will anatomically lock the head AND face in one position without tightened neck muscles, because the nodding simply maxes out the ligaments, tendons, and muscle strands to still the head. Then the shoulder action just doesn't carry the head with it, so both the top of the head and the face remain steady.
So:
1. don't bother keeping the head still -- the job is to keep the shoulders from swinging out of parallel-alignment so the stroke sends the ball where the putter was aimed to begin with;
2. keep the neck line from swinging left across the midline, and this will allow the shoulder rock to move the head and face without harming the stroke line and without fighting the shoulder action while promoting good line and smooth touch and rhythm;
3. if the head movement laterally bothers you, you can reduce it by setting the neck perpendicular to the plane of the shoulder action;
4. if the face rolling bothers your eyes and inner ear, then you can droop the head at address and preclude the face rolling without having to resort to neck muscles conflicting with the shoulder action (or at least not conflicting with the shoulder action near as much as tightening the neck muscle would do); and
5. if you insist on holding the head still with neck muscles fighting against the shoulder rock, at least KNOW that this conflict will tend to make you either quit on the stroke when the conflict develops and suffer loss of full distance, avoid the conflict by redirecting the shoulder action around to the inside of the muscle tension at the base of the neck, promoting a pull, or "power thru" the conflict with a punch stroke "hit" action that causes distance control problems and too-long putts, and you will have to pick which response you want to deal with to keep your putts good and straight and the distance nicely controlled.
Altogether, "hold the head still" isn't really required. My "no face, little face" technique respects the biomechanics and kinesthetics of a sound stroke and deals with the real problem effectively -- square, online stroke thru impact that rolls the ball where the putter aimed at address.
Cheers!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Coach and Theorist
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