Tour tempo

I was in NYC for the last week on holidays and decided to head into Barnes & Noble bookstore to have a look at their golf book section for any curiosities or interesting books, when I came acroos a book entitled 'Tour Tempo', I had a brief read of the back and inside covers and found the author's theory and research on the swing interesting (I wasn't taken in by it's wild claims of an instantly better swing etc etc, but nonetheless was interested enough in the author's view to buy it). Anyway, I read the book pretty quickly (it's not a heavy read and he basically has one theory only) and was eager to try out his theory which is this...All tour players have a swing tempo ratio of 3:1 and when this tempo gets out of sequence they hit bad shots. He filmed swings from hundreds of players for years and viewed them in an editing software package and noticed that there were 3 main swing tempos which were measured in the film frames 21/7, 24/8, 27/9 (with a 1 frame allowance ±). ie 21 frames to complete backswing and 7 frames from start of downswing to impact etc. so therefore a 21/7 tempo is quicker than a 27/9 tempo. Nick Price & Jesper Parnevik would be examples of 21/7, Ernie Els & Padraig Harrington 24/8, Jim Furyk & David Toms 27/9. Anytime the players tempo was out on a particular swing, it usually ended up being a bad shot. He found footage of Al Geiberger shooting a 59 in 1977 and apparently his tempo all day was a perfect 27/9.
A CD with calibrated click tracks comes with the book, so you stick it on the ipod and bring it to the range and hit balls while listening and ingraining the tempo into your swing, 1st bleep takeaway, 2nd bleep set at the top, 3rd bleep at impact...SIMPLE. Now, my point is this, it doesn't work instantly as claimed in the book (I never thought it would tbh, it takes getting used to)....BUT....there is DEFINITELY something to this theory. I'm just back from the range where I tried it for the 1st time and when my swing positions matched up exactly with the bleep track I was hitting beautiful shots, it does seem to take time to get used to, but I believe it could be of huge benefit to really make a commitment to workout with this. I never realised how bad my timing actually was til I tried it, I always thought I had quite a good tempo! I also noticed how much it changed with different clubs also, my wedge tempo was completely different from my driver and the great thing about it is you forget about mechanics and just concentrate on timing and being smooth which can only be a good thing, right? I really think there's something in this theory and I'm gonna commit to it and see how it works out. Has anyone else bought this book or tried it out? I'd be interested to hear what you think or if it helped you to improve.

very interesting, never heard that before but makes sense, i think i already unknowingly naturally do it but i will think about it next time to see what i do

I just went to my videos and was able to see exactly what you are saying here. I went frame-by-frame.

My ratio is: 28/8 every time. Except for 1 driver that I had early on and it was 32/8. All my clubs have been the same... 28/8.

Then I looked at other videos:

Ian Handcock: 21/7 (your son's didn't load right...sorry)
Ben Crane: 24/9
Fred Funk: 23/6
John Riegger: 27/8 (a Golf Machine guy I like to compare my swing to)

And this tells me that I do swing like him...very very cool stuff! Thanks jesperparnevik!

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""very interesting, never heard that before but makes sense, i think i already unknowingly naturally do it but i will think about it next time to see what i do""

To be honest, I thought I already did it too, until I actually started hitting balls while listening to the tempo beats and I was way out, and no disrespect to you, but I would guess that your swing is further out of sync than you realise. It's a lot tougher to swing to a perfect metronomic pulse than one would expect, the top of my backswing seemed to be fine, but my impact timing was all over the place! More often than not I was early which suggested that I was rushing my downswing. Initially I was listening to the mid speed of 24/8 which sounded perfect for me, but quickly realised it was too quick, 27/9 is actually spot on for me, it's slightly slower but it gives me a little more time at the top and my swing feels more solid with more carry (when I hit them flush that is).

Greg, I'm not sure this works properly on VHS video tapes, he goes into some technical details about American standard filming frames (or something like that!). Because going by the swing frames above Ian Handcock would be the only person swinging in a perfect 3:1 ratio and all the others are way out??

Your personal numbers of 28/8 would suggest (according to this theory) that your backswing is slightly too slow. If you can get to the top of your swing in 24 frames and kept your downswing at 8 it would be PERFECT

Maybe the frames/sec are off in a US version. Ian is from England, and he sent me the file. The others I made and got here in the state.

If anything then, it tells me I am conistant.

Yes absolutely, I would give anything for consistency like that, but if you want to swing even better, then try get to the top in 24 and down to impact in 8. This supposedly is the optimum swing ratio of 3:1 and will give the most consistent results for yardage. According to the book almost all players apart from Tour pros have a backswing that is too slow. He completely disagrees with the term "low and slow", and believes this will give less power than the 3:1 swing.

thats pretty neat, ive been looking at metronomes, specifically the one that they raved on at the convention this year, cant remember the name of it

is there anyways you can upload the tempos on here? so i can put them on my mp3 player?

I bought the book and CD's over a year ago - I have to admit that I only ever took it up the range once! - I just put the click tracks on an MP3 player, the book was ok-ish but you don't really need it, just look at their website and you will get the picture very quickly. It's a good concept, just hit loads of balls whilst listening to the swing-set-through prompts, or the click track, they come in all different speed to match your swing but are all at the important 3-1 ratio.

A strange thing started happening - I was killing the ball dead straight for at least half an hour!

It didn't take long to ingrain the rhythm. God knows why I stopped doing it? maybe its time for a re-visit!

According to the book, this tempo facilitates the proper position of the right hand at impact. There are also golf schools that have been developed around this idea. The main thrust is that mechanics follows tempo rather than visa versa. In addition, focusing on tempo gets your mind off mechanics. I think all this may in part be true, but... a bad set up is a bad set up and I still don't think much can compensate for that. I also have the cd and brought it to the range about 10 times last year. I found it helped at the beginning - really helped with longer distances. I'm not sure what happened, but eventually I think I was thinking about getting to the ball so much on "through" that I probably wasn't completing my backsing and I felt like I was rushing a lot. Overall, I think there is some merit to this system and is worth a try providing your setup is established.

Hi all

If we recorded a golf swing at 1000 frames per second and then recorded the swing at 1500 frames per second, would the TOUR TEMPO theory still hold true ????????????

Jesper,

What a great thread and looks good for Me......................Thanks Greg, for taking the time to test my swing...................so basically I'm perfect then.....???

It is a very interesting theory, I once saw something like this with putting using a timing machine which you find your own tempo and practice this.

I have had many people/pros during lessons tell me I have a good tempo, even more so than a good swing..................question is why am I still working on here instead of playing on the tour.

Seriously you can tell from this what you may wish to work on which can only be a good thing, a slower backswing however can not really be a fault as the swing builds speed.

Great thread, must try Liam's out.

Ian. (Hancock) no d

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Once you learn the swing, your next step is mastering golf psychology................

yep, its a ratio not an exact frame count
so you might have 3000:1000 for example

My concern would be that yeah, it makes you get a rhythm and keep it, but thats always been the problem with hitting balls at the range
I can take a guy who has a swing like a caveman catching his dinner and after 30mins at the range he can hit the ball consistently well.
The problem is take him on the course with 5/6 mins between each shot and he is useless, cant adjust his faults because he doesnt get enough shots in to groove something repeatable...

this is an excellent and insightful thread .alas, i have nothing to add but i'm enjoying reading all the posts...

Hi Greg,

My Dad perect you are joking Ha Ha!

Liam,