Tour Tempo

[Yazzman]

I bought the book Tour Tempo by John Novosel, I read it and followed the instructions., I am killing it now off of the tee. This stuff really works!! I recently played and was on par 5's in two shots. Now that for me is new. I read about this book at Amazon.com and read other golfer reviews. I really recommend this book to golfers that want to improve their golf games.

[emc]

Well done! If it helps your golf game in the long run then it was a terrific buy. Just remember to refer back to the book whenever your game sours slightly

[fred3]

How about some more info about your game. Nothing says 'reliability' in golf than what their game is about.

[massey]

I wanted to chime in on the book Tour Tempo. I purchased TOUR TEMPO during the holidays, read, listened to the DVD, practiced, and then took it out on the course. My practice swings in the living room as I watched the video seemed impossibly fast in the beginning ... " I can't swing THAT fast," my brain said ... but then I sat down, flipped on the Golf Channel, and tapped out the tempo of the pro's swings ... and sure enough, they WERE that fast, and were close to the 3:1 tempo. I realized that my S-L-O-W backswing followed by a similar tempo forward swing (to avoid errors) was killing my distance--and not always helping to eliminate errors anyway. Despite my inner golfer screaming "You can't swing that fast without hitting it into the trees," I repeated the mantra, "Swing Speed = Distance" over and over again. Then I trotted out to my local course in late December, 40 degrees, not a recipe for big drives. WOW. My drives went anywhere from as far as in the summer, to as much as 20-30 yards further sometimes, with wet fairways. Repeat after me: "Swing Speed = Distance." I am not a big slicer anyway, but I now find it almost impossible to slice. The slightly abreviated backswing encouraged by the rapid tempo seems to short-circuit a host of swing plane ills (many of which occur in the final quarter of the backswing, in my estimation) while encouraging a more flowing, natural kinetic chain. I can audibly hear a much bigger "swoosh" at the bottom of my swing. The ball goes straight and far. My approach shots on par 4's are now 140 yards instead of 170. I have invested $25, and about 3 hours reading, practicing, and gained ALL of this good stuff with nary a pro lesson, and relatively little sweat. Now I simply chant, "Swing-(pause)-Set-Thru" and play better golf all the way from tee to green. Tour Tempo? For me, a big thumbs up. My handicap last summer was a 9, but I am not a big hitter, focusing more on shot selection and short game. So swing consistency and distance are the only two ways to go lower .. and Tour Tempo is helping with both.

[lorenzoinoc]

When I first started playing golf, I viewed tempo as being on a low rung of importance in the golf swing. The longer I play the more I think it actually belongs at the top. I have the Novosel book and CD and have found them to be excellent.

[FreakOfNature]

Tempo and rhythm are most certainly essential elements of a repeating golf swing. There's a catch though, as I've discovered, and it has to do with gravity. Gravity - as we all hopefully learned in school - is a constant. It is a constant rate of acceleration, and it is ALWAYS present whenever we swing a club. Therefore, I strongly believe that it should be a component of a good golf swing; a piece of the puzzle connected to proper mechanical action throughout the swing. It is a natural convergence which can be used to set a "boundary" point upon which to calibrate the rhythm and tempo of a swing.

My reasoning is this - if we use gravity to set the tempo for the backswing and to initiate the transition into the through-swing, we implement a constant which is seperate from the parameters of the mechanics of our desired plane of motion, which by virtue of it being constant, itself INDUCES the correct plane, rhythm, and tempo of the motion unto its most desirable automations. Basically, what I mean is that gravity introduces a guiding constant in our swings, which helps to make them repeatable - and thus useful when we need to go out on the course with a swing that will be what we're envisioning before each and every shot. It helps us learn how to do what we are trying to do, much more repeatably. Gravity is easily PREDICTABLE, and thus incredibly USEFUL.

When using gravity as a guide through the motion of the golf swing, we create momentum in the swing motion. This momentum (provided it is initiated from the correct position) guides the club on plane and squares it naturally, promoting a consistent and natural release of the clubhead along a repeatable and consistent swing plane - which is "on plane". It is this momentum that produces the desirable rhythm and tempo we're talking about. You need to learn "dead hands" (where your hands move in reaction to the club, as opposed to "directing" the club into the ball) to achieve this correctly, but just incorporating ANY club momentum should allow you to get close enough to see immediate improvement in consistency. Once you can feel the club "swing", you're grooving it. The body reacts to where the club wants to go. The swing also becomes dramatically more repeatable.

The only real limit to how fast you can swing the club will be determined by your ability to remain "reactionary" to the momentum of the club itself (basically, how hard you can ALLOW the club to swing, without losing balance and control). Most people are capable of swinging FAR faster than they tend to, with equal consistency if not better, due to the added repeatability that the increased momentum of the club provides. Too many people give up far too early on their quest for more distance, and tend to settle for about 60% of their true distance potential (ok I admit, I made up the % figures, but nobody over 5'6" with two fully functional arms and the ability to walk should be hitting under 250yds, it's biomechanically ridiculous, and detrimentally overcautious).

I know some people have difficulty understanding how someone 5'10" and 160lbs can hit a ball 360+ yards, but equally so - I can't understand how anyone over 5'6" can hit driver under 250 yards. Leverage and momentum just seem to provide so much more power than that, with no effort required. Momentum helps us to find the sweet spot on the clubhead just as effectively, so don't go laying that "but I hit it more solid when I swing slow" BS on me. If you swing the club incorporating a gravitational momentum release, you will wear the sweet spot OUT on your clubs.

Anyways, I didn't mean to rant, it's just one of those little pet peeves of mine - shortknockers not even knowing WHY they're shortknockers... and trying to tell folks like me how the distances we achieve are boisterous, unrealistic, fabricated, exaggerated... until they see it for themselves. The thing is - I actually know WHY and HOW I hit it so far. It ain't rocket science, though some might like to believe it's that complicated. Those who think it's complicated must've read "the 8 step swing" or something some other guru wrote to cash in on your ignorance. Best of luck hitting the long ball with all those mechanical thoughts dancing through your mind.

I shall now don a fire-retardant suit in anticipated response to the requisite flaming I shall undoubtedly be receiving. (if you can't swing it, then bring it )







FON

[Horseballs]

FON, this is way too long of a post.
Please summarize.

[macmai]

Yazzman, you rock...I admit I was hesitant to believe the posts about this book, but I figured I was on vacation, had some time, so I went to the bookstore to pick up a copy this morning. I read it a bit, met some friends for lunch, listened to the CD on the way home. Went to the range this afternoon, listened to the tempo sounds a bit more on the iPod, and started practicing to the beat. It took me two shots to get the tempo down right (turns out I'm comfy with the 24/8 tempo) and starting puring the irons. MAN, it's been a LONG time since I had that much fun hitting my irons, and even longer since I hit that many shots dead center on my club face.

There was a 1 - 2 club wind, depending on gusts, into my face, but I was STILL hitting very close to my normal distances. That is, I was still getting my 7 iron to the 150 mark even in 1 - 2 club wind. Obviously when it gusts up to the 2 club wind, I fell a bit short, but DUDE!!!! Anyway, I know this sounds like a bad info-mercial, but for $26, it's worth it to just try it out. I can't wait to get to the course this Saturday.

I REALLY enjoyed my range session today...thanks a bunch for posting this tip Yazz!

[Not a hacker]

Wow FON,

Did you swallow a physics textbook?

But in spite of the verbosity and techno mumbo jumbo of your post, I get what you are saying. I have had heaps of trouble with my ball striking the last month or so. I haven't hit a sweet long iron in longer than that. The other day I went out into my courtyard at home and noticed I could get a full body reflection from the neighbours window so I had a good look at my swing. I was way too tense in the arms and my hands were definitely manipulating the club on the downswing. After some trial and error I started going back to letting gravity and weight transfer start the downswing with totally relaxed hand and arms letting the clubhead swing through impact and it felt and looked great. I am looking forward to taking it out to the course tomorrow.

Expect some flaming, but you have shown an insightful side that I never would have thought existed in such a cynical, bitter and twisted poster.

[lorenzoinoc]

It's interesting that just about all of the pros fit a rythm formula, meaning, if you read the book, there is a mathematical basis for good tempo. Good rythm fixes alot of swing flaws automatically.

FON, I brewed a fresh pot of coffee, read your post and agree. Even with the coffee I still fell asleep a couple of times but managed to get through it.

[lorenzoinoc]

noticed I could get a full body reflection from the neighbours .

When I first scan read that, I thought you had some hot neighbors, but upon reading it more carefully, I realized the word you used was reflection. Oh well.

[Not a hacker]

It's interesting that just about all of the pros fit a rythm formula, meaning, if you read the book, there is a mathematical basis for good tempo. Good rythm fixes alot of swing flaws automatically.

FON, I brewed a fresh pot of coffee, read your post and agree. Even with the coffee I still fell asleep a couple of times but managed to get through it.

The one time in the last 2 months that I hit it even half decently was when I decided from about the 9th hole to concentrate on nothing but tempo and leave all other swing thoughts out. I agree that good tempo can make almost any swing work. Bad tempo will result in bad shots, no matter how good your tecnique.

P.S. I thought you Italians all drank short blacks like they make in cafes over here. They have me buzzing and awake for days, so it says something about FON's post's effect. I will keep it saved as a sleeping tablet.

[lorenzoinoc]

I'm a notorious insomniac, maybe because of the coffee. I'm going to try reading the post again before bed tonight.

[FreakOfNature]

You know guys, I could divide the post into chapters and even add some cartoon pictures if it would help. Scratch-and-sniff would be ok as well (you guys would recognize banana immediately, I'm certain - though duck can be tricky for novices). Don't ask for cardboard pop-up pictures though, they have not been approved by the idiot-proofing committee, thus I just wouldn't feel right providing some of you guys with information in a way that could possibly injure somebody. I wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing that someone put an eye out, or even worse - got a paper cut.

I'm also beginning to suspect that by typing more than 4 paragraphs worth of text, I've already caused more than one reader on here to miss a tee time/nature call/birthday/anniversary/other date of importance, and for that I am deeply sorry. You just let me know what schools unleashed the likes of yourselves upon this world, and I'll make sure that future generations are able to avoid such issues - by making a generous donation to promote literacy. Think of the children. THE CHILDREN.


Ok, on a serious note, just in case some people didn't fully understand what I was saying above...

To summarize, here's WHAT to do as opposed to my previous post which describes WHY - Learn the fundamentals of setup, grip, and posture. Use a weighted club and learn to swing it in harmony with gravity. You'll be shocked to discover that the club actually releases consistently with perfect rhythm and tempo, and with effortless speed. Instant improvement. You're welcome.






FON

[lorenzoinoc]

I wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing that someone put an eye out, or even worse - got a paper cut.

FON

Just re-read that earlier post and it wouldn't be a problem

[FreakOfNature]

Just re-read that earlier post and it wouldn't be a problem

Could you summarize this for me? I was lost after "Just". I just don't have the kind of time it would take to get through all that reading.







FON