John I also have the book and the manual for the platform to perfection which covers the grip and you are correct in describing the grip. A touch it grip for rhythm and clubface control-not power!!

Hi John, Yogi very much advocated only a very light grip .. his description of 'Touching' the grip rather than 'Holding On To It' was a perfect description .. Yogi never thought of 'applying'Power in the Golf Swing .. he just swung the club with the maximum radius it could be swung with and let gravity and Parametric acceleration 'develop' the 'Speed/Power' that it can produce if left to its own unimpeded devices. No One ever had more of a True 'Swinging' action than Count Yogi .. No one...not even Bobby Jones .. although Jones was very very close to Yogi's swing flow dynamics. cheers JH

Hi JH, here are some things that are common to CL, as you demonstrate it, and Yogi: 1) addressing club with hands behind the ball - negative loading or 'la queue de la vache' (tail of the cow) as the French call it 2) no transfer of weight -weight on trail foot. 3) club not lifted sharply on back swing but taken back low to the ground 4) left heel not raised 5) no wrist cock 6) takeaway in a straight line.Though his channel was not the same as yours, he still had a channel I have played golf for 20 years using his method, though I am sure he did not tell us all in his books and CDs. My interest in CL has come about as a result of hip and knee problems. I wanted a system where I moved as possible and with minimal strain on the body. CL my way gives me this. Cheers, John

Ronbo, Ihanks for your confirmation. I'd be interested to know what the angle is on the platform to perfection between the target line and the takeaway line (Yogi's channel so to say). Many thanks.

Hi John, With the CL address I advocate aligning the club shaft perpendicular at address .. I don't want it angled away from the target at address in a negative angled configuration because I am not advocating a negative loading pulling back of the hands ahead of the clubhead in the backswing. I want the clubhead pressured downwards in the backing by a 'pushing' action of the hands/arms.... not a 'Pulling/dragging' action as Yogi had in his swing. Because Yogi played the ball so far up in his stance he had lead side loading at address because his stance was quite wide to facilitate the forward position ball position at address... his pivot action was similar to Hogans in that he preloaded his downswing lead side clearance into his lead leg/hip in the backswing whilst still going back in the backswing. He was very much a diagonal weight loader in his backswing and downswing .. the fact that he didn't lift his lead heel in the backswing was an obvious indicator he had weight loaded into it on the backswing ... I personally don't see any real similarity in the Yogi mechanics to CL except his intention to get the clubhead going straight inwards as much as it could go in the backswing and a suggestion of the clubhead doing a reverse of that direction in the forward swing ... he did have a 'channel' on the backswing ... he didnt make any effort to stay in his trail axis at impact or post impact ... in fact he let his entire trail side release completely as the downswing started and his head started to rotate towards the target quite early in the downswing compared to conventional swings of his time ..CL has a strict advocasy of not letting the head rotate at all at impact or before impact . Yogi's swing was very much moulded by his incredible body flexibility and general body components lengths ... he had long arms and legs and a short torso for his height which was perfect for a Golfer in the application of a Golf Swing. We have never seen a swing like Yogi's from any other golfer of world repute... and I don't think we ever will frankly..... he was IMO totally unique as a swinger of the golf club... I just wish I could have seen his ball flight in the flesh.... and of course talked to him about his swing thoughts and processes. cheers JH

Hi John, I havent heard of anyone of Professional Golf world standing who saw Yogi hit the ball and wasnt super impressed by his swing repeatability and power. Snead.. Moe norman.. Byron Nelson all told me that Yogi was the best player/balstriker 'never' to play golf on the World stage.. I think he would have set records that woul;d have never been broken becausde he would have still been swinging the same at 60 as he was at 25 .. which would have given him 15 years more to break all the records the great players had achieved.. and again because we know know player has won multiple Majors after 45 years old .. I have no doubt Yogi would have been doing it untill his late 50's.. But.. we will never know will we.. I just like to 'think' he would have.. cheers JH

Hi John , I wouldn't pursue the Yogi grip at all while you are building the CL protocol...its way to specialist in its application and would require a huge amount of commitment to perfect it ... Yogi didn't try to be a firm lead wrist player with his pitch shots at all .. in fact he did the opposite .. he just fired the clubhead past his forearms at impact to get the clubhead moving straight upwards .. again his process was so specialized as to be almost impossible to learn. The driver I find is the easiest club to hit with the CL protocol .. you will have problems if you are too far away from the ball at address and reaching for it.. that will make the backswing to arc like and not straight line like it is when you are closer to the ball as with the irons. Hitting of the toe is a resultant of moving away from the ball at impact .. you must not 'fall' backwards at impact .. you must stay in the same place with your upper spine at impact as it was at the top of the swing. cheers Jh

Hi John, Bill Phillips sent me a video of your swing ..it looks really good, you don't need much tuning to get the swing really percolating.. Bill will put you on the right path for the tweaking your swing needs .. but overall I think you could really get some significant results with Channel Lock.... you have very good free arm swing speed which is a major plus for CL. cheers JH

Thanks JH. After seeing myself on video for the very first time I noticed I was lifting the and my posture was terrible. Bill sent me a critique and I’ll becworking on it. I learned golf from a pro who grew up with the Turnesa brothers and Gene Sarazen here in New York. My swing has always been more Bobby Jones than golfing machine me. Thanks for your review it means a lot.

Thanks for that.. I did find that depiction of Yogi's grip in that video shortly after I did the video about Yogi's grip etc. cheers JH

Hi Kirk, The grip is absolutely a normal overlapping grip.. it is not a split-handed grip..it may look like it is a split grip when I am taking the club back and referring to how the lead hand is on the club.. I am not really paying much attention to my trail hand positioning.. but the grip is very much an overlapping two hands melded together grip . Yogi never 'pulled' or pushed' either hand against one another .. he never wanted to break his wrists in any manner on the backswing othher than the amount that natural enertia created. cheers JH

Sorry JH - I meant on videos of Count Yogi hitting driver

Hi Kirk, I was referring generally to 'Yogi's' grip .. I am not aware of him ever using a split grip for any shots or in his swing generally .. he would never have separated his hands I don't think because that would create ' 'independence' of movent/force intent from 'each' hand and his whole;e overall intent was the total blending of the Anatomy into one homogeneous 'entity'... f course I don't know if that was his thinking but it probably was close to the mark when you listen to his general swing philosophy of just getting the body to be 'Loose and boneless ' in its movement/motions.. that indicated to me his emphasis was never of a 'specific ' part of the body and its independent process of movement. As I have said many times the great regret I have in my golfing life was not being able to quiz Yogi on his Golf Swing thoughts.. I have not heard a single person explain to my satisfaction what Yogi was 'supposed' to have done in his golf swing .. no one remotely comes up with any credibly supported explanation of what he was supposed to have done in his swing. I don't say that in a disparaging intended way... I just cannot see any evidence from anyone that clearly defines his swing process .. Yogi himself never gave any definitive 'mechanics/thought process'enlightening insight into his swing .. everything he ever said was non-definitive relative to concrete supportable mechanics evidence ... To me he just always gave obscure abstract descriptions of his golf swing ... and frankly I think that was because he didn't think or see the Golf swing in any way relative to specific swing aspects ... he imo just 'felt' the golf swing into motion... and 'felt' it precisely the exact 'same' way every time he swung the club ... he called it himself an ' Infallible Mental Routine' ... and that to me was his 'Secret' ... and in itself that is something you cannnot teach or explain .. its an individual/personal cerebral conditioning process ... he had it clearly .. but he couldnt explain 'how' he created it or maintained it . Least that's how I see Yogi's Swing ... cheers jH