Drag leg and hip snap help

STRIKE3 said:

Full count, I don't want to take over your thread but wanted to throw this picture out there to get peoples thoughts which might be helpful to you and provide more direction to go or not to go.

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DNeeld said:

Throw out a picture of a fairly obvious replant? Why?

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Not a hijack and quite relevant. This is an extreme example of where the OP's DD is headed. Why is this happening? The answer is because of the early, unnatural forced opening that is the hallmark of leapers/re-planters like Barnhill, Nevins, etc. If the OP does not get his DD to open naturally she is headed down the wrong path to achieve high level success.

So now that we know what not to do let try this instead

Might be worth taking a look before and after of CB's daughter and the progress she has made with her drive. 3 videos on page 3.

http://www.discussfastpitch.com/softball-pitching/25803-dd-pitching-video-3.html#post414647

DNeeld said:

How old is your DD?

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As we all know, the still frame captured here is quite common. It is often synonomous with the sideways turn of the drive foot before push off. IMHO we pitching coaches might be miscategorizing this posture.

Most often when we see this, we (myself included) almost always say "she is driving open" and then begin working on correcting drive mechanics.

However I think for a moderate number of girls who find themselves with this type of mechanic, they suffer from a deeper mechanical flaw. A glute activation issue. Because their glutes do not trigger correctly, they are forced to supplement their pushoff to compensate for the lack of production from the glutes. For these girls, I think a quick assesment of vertical jump and lateral bound ability would show that they are lacking in propulsion... If they do not lack propulsion, then mechanics improvements should resolve the issue. If they do lack propulsion, it is quite possible that mechanics changes will never get them up to speed...

In the last couple years, I have extensivly researched glute mechanics. It is a popular buzz phrase nowadays. In my strongest opinion, I beleive that glute activation issues are not a result of weak glutes, but instead weak glutes are the result of an underlying glute activation issue. I am working to validate this claim, but no personal evidence to support this just yet.

Late in my research I came across the foot hyperarch mechanic as taught by Chong Xie. While initially I brushed the concept off as a ploy to sell books, months later I circled back and dug deeper into it. I now think that there is a link between foot loading and glute recruitment, and that, as Chong's research demonstrates, some people lack this connection. Those people effectively turn off glute usage in running/sprinting types of motion. DD and I have been working through foot activation exercises and hope to see an improvement in glute usage.

To the OP and any others who are curious. I would encourage you to investigate Chong Xie's instagram site. His commercial website, the Secret of Athletecism can be found here.

I think that this particular area of human physiology is very under-researched. Somewhere deep in the "Drive Mechanics" thread or in the video when discussing the two step drill, Java makes a point not to let the heels touch the ground. This comment ties very closely to the hyperarch research that Chong has done. In taking Java's comment to heart, I think doing the two step drill without letting the heels hit the ground will generate two sub-groups of girls:


Group 1 girls will see substantial improvement with the drill. Group 2 girls will also improve but at a much lower rate (their inefficient non-glute drive chain can still get stronger and make nominal improvements).

Furthermore about group 2 girls... Group 2 girls are the ones who go through months of off-season work (sprinting, weights, explosive exercises) and see minimal improvements in running speed or explosiveness. Even despite large increases in lower body weight lifting amounts (squats, PC, hip sled, etc). Without learning to activate their feet, their glutes will continue to be AWOL when it comes to explosive movements such as sprinting, diving, or in a pitching drive mechanic.

Pretty interesting stuff here! I have been trying to get DD to work more on moving and playing different sports on the balls of her feet. She seems to be so "heavy footed" and on her heels a lot. Are there any particular exercises to work on, or is that the secret in the $49.99 e-book?

Full Count said:

Pretty interesting stuff here! I have been trying to get DD to work more on moving and playing different sports on the balls of her feet. She seems to be so "heavy footed" and on her heels a lot. Are there any particular exercises to work on, or is that the secret in the $49.99 e-book?

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To be honest, there is not a ton of content in the ebook. It does however explain how to "activate" mechanism. I gained a lot information and drills to follow from his youtube channel. Once you learn how to activate the hyperarch mechanism, you can progress through some mild foot exercises and squats into hops and running exercises using the mechanism. The end goal is to get to a point in which when you activate the mechanism in the foot, you automatically experience a reaction/contraction in the glutes.

Personally speaking, while we have not acheived the level in which we feel the glutes when activating the HA mechanism, we can CLEARLY feel the difference in squating with and without the mechanism. For me and my daughter who have been extremely quadracept dominant, activating the mechanism yields a completely different feeling when squatting. At the bottom of a squat or a power clean is a "hole" (so to speak) and quad dominant athletes tend to fall into it and not get out (stuck at the bottom of the lift). When activating the mechanism, I can feel posterior side resistance deep into the squat. I think the easiest way to explain it is with the mechanism, I feel in control all the way through a squat, without the mechanism, at the bottom of the squat, I feel the hole wanting to suck me into it, and I have to use a lot of quad power to work my way out of it.

To me and DD, the difference is amazing. I hope that as we continue to progress (only around 1.5 months into it), it will become more automatic and will become very obvious in everyday mechanics. I plan to write up info about it if the results turn out positive. Hopefully our work ethic does the effort justice though.

A history of ankle injuries is a big indicator of someone who could use the mechanic. Activating HA effectively locks the ankle and will prevent injury.

Really good stuff, Jryan. Gives pawing in a whole new feeling when driving off rubber. Feels like you pulling the heel and ball of foot together. And tried it squatting and can def feel the difference in hams and glutes.

Buttermaker said:

Really good stuff, Jryan. Gives pawing in a whole new feeling when driving off rubber. Feels like you pulling the heel and ball of foot together. And tried it squatting and can def feel the difference in hams and glutes.

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Thanks! I'm glad to hear that you feel the difference.

In the past when I thought about glute usage, I tended to only think about the part of glute activation as your body gets closer to straight up and down. When you form a slight bend at the waist, it is easy to flex the glutes and feel them straighten you up and drive you into hyperextension (ie go from "K" to backwards "K"). However I now know that the glutes actually engage deep in a squat. At the bottom as the thighs get parallel to the ground, for a person with decent glute activation, the glutes will be heavily engaged. For a quad dominant person, their quads become very inefficient at that point. At a 90 degree bend and below, the quads do not work well. This is what creates the hole that I talk about.

Once you learn the HA mechanic, there is a very easy way to see that it activates. My wife was a sprinter as a kid. As soon as she starts to squat down, I can see that she activates. This was not true with DD and me. My family makes for a great test bench with this stuff . So when DD and I squat down, we tend to go pretty close to butt to the floor and our heels stay flat on the ground. When my wife does it, her heels immediately pull off of the floor. It was a big struggle for her to try and keep her heels from lifting off the ground...

I started noticing these types of differences between my wife and me/DD a couple years ago, and now more than ever, I can see this same type of difference in young athletes. To me, there are clearly two sub-groups:

- Those who activate and
- Those who do not

The small girl who looks fast but runs flat footed...probably not activating. The big girl who is surprisingly fast...probably activating. The girl who has good lean forward and looks like a sprinter despite never being trained...activating. And IMO the girl who pops off the rubber and gets to 3 o'clock as or after the drive foot separates from the rubber...probably activating. The girl who looks like she is driving open and has her foot on the rubber forever (and also ends up in the butt out posture)...most likely is not activating.

Another interesting fact about using the glutes... Previously when I tried to improve speed, I would want athletes to increase their turnover rate (strides per minute). I see now that when you activate the HA mechanism and use the glutes, your stride lenght will become much longer. You will become faster without increasing your turnover rate.

BTW sorry for the long posts