Posted by: () on Fri Feb 7 15:20:46 2003

Tom,

A hypothetical swing model is not something we have focused on finding. To my knowledge the only baseball player who comes close to having a perfect swing is Bonds (with repect to distribution of power around a stable axis. Even Bonds is fooled from time to time and gets off balance (evidenced by the lift of the toes on his front foot during some swings. This is not a "Big League" technique as I heard a hitting instructor from Chaparral High in AZ tell a young hitter and his father during a lesson. It is related to a loss of balance or stability.

Your questions regarding dynamic stability and postural integrity. Simply put for the novice instructor or coach, dynamic stability is the ability to maintain stability while moving. Postural Integrity refers to maintaing a solid/stable posture while moving. Our anaylsis measure the dynamic stability, postural integrity, arcs, rotational speed of each segment, and acceleration deceleration in the forward swing. We also look at wrist angle (indicates bat casting), X-factor and X-factor stretch. Each is measured and can be accurately seen using our software through graphs. Range of motion/posture can be viewed similarly or through viewing real time numbers displayed during the swing.

The athlete or instructor views up to 120 frames per second. Our sampling rate is 30 frames per second with our four sensor analysis and 120 per second with our 16 sensor analysis. 120 frames per second viewing is achieved by speeding up the sampling rate. A viewing of the average athletes kinetic (kinematic) sequence assists instructor and athletes in determining power losses.

In all our research has shown that athletes either do exactly as they are taught (achieving success inspite of their coaching) or they do what they do naturally, and coaches focus their teaching on what they thing they see. Once the coach has been shown the light (what really happens when during the swing), it becomes easier to see with the eyes. The coach can still not see with his/her eyes or camera what we have been able to measure. See for your self.

i am making my way around the country. Let me know where you want me to stop.

By the way Bill, I reviewed the U of A's swings and Mike Candrea's athletes all cast the bat to some degree. Even there best players are achieving good results inspite of bad swings. But in the future, everyone will be capable of seeing their strengths and weaknesses and as a result fix their balance, strength, and flexibility issues.

Our research does not show that you are a bad hitter if you swing the way girls and guys are being taught to swing, it only shows that they could be much better. I wish your daughter well.

Thanks.

Zig Ziegler