Thread: Softball Hitting Drills To Increase Your Hitting Success

Marc, Can any dynamic athletic move be started from the core and not the legs.

Marc,

You ever read Dixon?

Thank you very much Marc, I knew that! I'm glad Someone on this web site can explain the true dynamic athletic process. Could you please explain the chain in throwing and hitting, and how they are simular.

Besides being an amazing example to us all, what do you see this young man's swing teaching us about momentum development?

2008 May 31 | Heraldleaderphoto.com

Makes you want to stand up and cheer or salute or something doesn't it?

who is Dixon?

The late Jim Dixon "The Exceptional Athlete". His son still has copies though it's out of print. You may be able to get your library to find it. Can't say I'm with Dixon in all of his ideas but his characterization of how elite athletes move has been helpful to a lot of people over the years. If you read it, don't look for ways to pick at because you can find them. Look to understand his observations about the differences between the movement patterns of elite athletes vs the rest of us.

Originally Posted by Marc Dagenais

Almost physically impossible if you have a closed-chain. Let me explain - whenever your feet are "grounded" or "anchored" to the ground (they touch the ground basically), naturally, even if you try really hard, most of the movements are being started through the legs and the big buttocks muscles.

I would add on up through the muscles attaching the lower torso to the pelvis. Would you agree?

Originally Posted by Marc Dagenais

When you are in open-chain position (feet not touching the floor), like sitting on your butt legs in the air and you start doing trunk rotation, your butt is the anchor so the muscles initiating the movements will be the core muscles (muscles all around your spine).

Yes! Now how to use this knowledge to build momentum we can use in throwing or swinging. This goes to Dixon's point I believe.

Originally Posted by Marc Dagenais

A movement is always initiated by the muscles above the "anchor" point. If your butt is the anchor, then your core will initiate. If you legs are the "anchor", then your legs do initiate, etc...

Does that makes sense?

Sort of yes and yes in a physics sense though that's not the whole story... but...I encourage you to read Dixon. I see the legs as posts used by the muscles from the upper thighs to the lower torso to achieve using the butt as the anchor since we can't get the power from the ground to the bat quickly enough to do what we need to do in a little over a tenth of a second. Hope I'm communicating my intent here. A fabulous example of is Koufax throwing. Did the foot against the ground contribute/initiate. Whatever. Look what leads. His feet are certainly on the ground but there's a ballistic motion anchored by the butt if there ever was one.