Feel vs Real
Also known as: feel versus real position
"Feel vs real" describes the frequent gap between what a golfer senses their body is doing during a swing and what a camera actually shows it doing. This means a mismatch that is completely normal and is exactly why video review is. As a result, valuable.
Golfers routinely describe a new position as feeling extreme or unnatural, only to see on video that the position is actually correct. This means or, conversely, describe a swing as feeling exactly like their normal motion. At the same time, video shows it has drifted noticeably from where it used to be. This "feel vs real" gap is not a sign that a golfer is bad at sensing their own body. It reflects genuine limits of proprioception (the body's internal sense of its own position) during a fast, largely automatic motion.
The gap tends to be largest exactly when a golfer is making a swing change. This means an unfamiliar but correct new position often feels more extreme than it actually is. This is. This is because the nervous system is comparing it to years of a different habitual pattern. This is why coaches frequently ask a golfer to exaggerate a new feeling well beyond what seems reasonable. This means the "real" result on video often turns out to be far more modest than the "felt" exaggeration suggested.
Video review is the most direct way to close the feel-vs-real gap, since it replaces an unreliable internal sensation with an objective external record of what the body actually did.
Example
A golfer feels like they have shallowed the club "way too much" on a swing change. But the video shows a shaft angle barely different from before. This means the felt exaggeration and the real change were far apart.
Common mistakes
- Abandoning a correct swing change. This is because it "feels wrong," without checking video to confirm whether the feeling actually reflects an incorrect position or simply an unfamiliar one.
In SwingVantage Motion Lab
Closing the feel-vs-real gap is one of the core reasons video-based swing analysis is valuable in the first place. This means SwingVantage reports what the video shows rather than what a golfer expects it to show. This is often exactly where the useful new information lies.
Related terms
- Swing ThoughtA swing thought is a single, simple cue a golfer holds in mind right before or during a swing, and most coaches agree that one clear thought. This means or none at all over the ball. This means outperforms trying to consciously manage several mechanical details at once.
- Self-DiagnosisSelf-diagnosis is a golfer trying to identify the cause of their own swing fault without outside feedback. This is prone to error. This is because feel is an unreliable guide to what the body is actually doing.
- Trained Eye AssessmentA trained eye assessment is an experienced coach's visual read of a swing, drawing on pattern recognition built from watching thousands of swings. This means a genuinely different and complementary skill to numeric or video-based analysis.
Related guides & benchmarks
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