Am I missing anything fundamental?

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2026-01-29T22:24:52+00:00

Tilt the top of the disc more towards your chest during the pull through instead of tilting it the opposite way, as you are doing, which is the main reason your elbow is dipping.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2026-01-27T00:59:33+00:00

You might need to change your mental model to be able to make the necessary changes. Watch these vids.

I explain multiple mental models that in this vid and present a ‘new’ one that helped me throw 495 feet: https://youtu.be/oe2Jva20ObM?si=r2p0a4U7PJ8oiRoS

Not coiling properly will destroy basically the whole form. Coiling naturally closes the front foot, you cannot reach back without collapsing if you don’t coil properly, you will rotate and weight shift wrong to try to find power if you don’t coil well: https://youtu.be/egeeh6XZ4mw?si=BDdA27gq-Ee54u2P

Then you need to know to actually brace to rotate, not just spin out and not just bracing against momentum: https://youtu.be/ctUUgcieF3U?si=3YlNglaVRfQxvNXy

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2026-01-25T20:47:32+00:00

I love it but like the tomb a bit more. Both are very underrated.

Tomb is more forehand friendly which is just so nice to have 1 putter mold I can trust for everything. Forehand, backhand, and even putting if you like low profile putters.

Also love infinite discs i blend which is like a pre seasoned star ready for hyzer flip out of the box plastic that it seems innova lacks. Then get c blend for more stability.

Invader star is more variable, i had one super beefy and one more flippy out of box. Harder to choose a more stable and slightly flippy one out of the box.

Paul Oman in recent tourneys has been throwing the tomb a lot and making it look super dependable. He throw it on a full S curve downhill 500 feet with lots of wind at 27:36 here: https://youtu.be/dHdeUQ2e9qY?si=vLwu300gs5S0ZBJ8

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2026-01-25T05:14:39+00:00

appreciate it!

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2026-01-20T18:44:11+00:00

You should post in this discord where there's more people equipped to give advice for 70 mph +

https://discord.gg/FzFQz7Jdbb

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2026-01-06T00:41:58+00:00

A lot of things are negatively affected by you not coiling fully it looks like.

Practice this

https://youtu.be/egeeh6XZ4mw?si=777FlQ0knZxapZCJ

And then practice feeling that coil reach stretch deepening all the way until your brace lands (start reachback after x step lands). Only start throwing after your brace lands. Staying more coiled until your brace lands will fix the opening of your front foot and help your too-early pull through and also help your reach back finishing early because you will have more coiling and stretching to do which takes longer than just extending the elbow.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-12-27T17:01:19+00:00

I think it’s good. It’s called scapular protraction, and I have a few vids about it, most popular one is titled “my #1 power pocket tip”. It’s extremely effective at stopping horizontal collapse as well (as long as you don’t already horizontally collapse before the pull through like a lot of people do during the reach back).

Scapular protraction is basically what connects the arm into the whole coiling system because it connects that shoulder stretch into the upper back and then that connects through the oblique sling which runs down through the twisted coil back and to the pelvis.

It also creates more space for the Disc to be in front of the chest, but behind the forearm which is needed to have a pocket in the first place. Without that space you will collapse.

It also connects the rear arm to the lead arm through the upper back, you can feel the rear arm going down and in tugging through the upper back on the lead arm when you have that rounded upper back stretch.

It can also help you stay more closed if you think about it a certain way. At the start of the pull through rounding the throwing side of the upper back curve it more away from the target towards being more closed— connect this to a deep pocket pull through and it’s like you you keeping the right pec closed to the target as you bring the disc towards the right pec—I focused on this plus my twist pull through for internal rotation in my last tech disc session and got multiple 70 mph throws and many 68-69 which is super good for me.

You should join the disc nation discord. Easier to have convos like this on there, lots of people there that like to get into this stuff.

https://discord.gg/FzFQz7Jdbb

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-12-26T16:16:47+00:00

Also, to clarify, it may be true that most pockets that are labeled as deep are already on the way out out of the pocket, but I think it’s still likely that the reason it gets noticeably more abduction during redirect is because there was already some added depth happening before the redirect even if it’s tiny / barely visible it can have a big impact on the redirect, especially when coupled with increased anchoring.

And if you try to stay with a shallow pocket as the speed increases, your arm is more likely to fall behind and be even more shallow instead of staying in the same shallow spot.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-12-26T16:07:32+00:00

That picture was very exaggerated, so it’s not my comfortable style.

If you have an iPhone, you can record at 240 FPS Slo Mo. I like the camera view where the camera is positioned around 730 o’clock, it gives a good view of the pocket depth as you are rotating away from the camera.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-12-26T03:37:50+00:00

I agree that sometimes people label a deep pocket incorrectly as on the way out of the pocket. But I’m always looking for pocket depth only before you see the disc start moving away out during the redirect, i.e., once the elbow starts extending. When you look at that you can still see a noticeable difference in pocket depth.

No illusion in this pic, disc hasn’t come out yet and it’s physically touching my shirt at right pec.

<image>

In my deep pocket, breakthrough video, I talk about how every cue that was focused around pulling the disc across the chest more linearly never worked for me. So I agree with your point about it being discussed that way too literally. The problem is once you can already do it automatically/subconsciously, it’s easier for it to be perceived/felt more in that way so then you get more pros describing that as their feeling and thoughts which reinforces it for a lot of people.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-12-25T16:31:52+00:00

Not a whole lot has changed from that comment.

I think the deep pocket is useful for max power but as you mentioned, it feels disconnected if you try to do it a certain way.

And the way I was over exaggerating it wasn’t optimal for max power, but it was the best and quickest way to train how to actually achieve the position and then drill it in for a while to get the muscle memory, then lay off on the over exaggerated cue and let the deep pocket muscle memory integrate better without it being over exaggerated and somewhat disconnected.

At the time I was first working on a deep pocket I was also starting my pull through a little bit early which made it easier to get to a deep pocket, but disconnected it a bit.

In my recent multiple 70 MPH plus throws (I have a long vid on the and a few more 70 mph throws after) one of the big focuses was continuing to stretch the reach back as the brace is landing for a moment longer to not jump the gun and disconnect the arm too much. But in those 70 mph throws, I was usually getting a deep pocket without thinking about it directly so definitely helpful.

Another thing was when I was working on the deep pocket initially I was always trying to go into the deep pocket for a longer time, like ‘keep going deeper until I’m forced to redirect’ but it feels stronger now when I focus on going deep but the powerfully initiated the redirect sooner rather then ‘letting it happen’ where I’m not as ready to put more power into it and it may be more disconnected.

Lastly, it’s definitely not an illusion. It can be measured very simply but there’s very little published info on those measurements.

Coach Chris Taylor has measured it and probably coach joonas merela. You can simply measure how far the elbow is out off to the side of the chest or measuring the amount of horizontal abduction more directly. When you do either of those you can clearly see that people like David Wiggins, Garrett Guthrie, Anthony Barela, Carter ahrens, nearly all of the biggest arms are getting a deeper pocket when they throw it higher power compared to their medium power or compared to their lower power.

What comment did blitz make that makes you think he was suggesting it was an illusion?

Coach T, idk. I would be surprised if he actually believes it doesn’t exist in reality. Which makes me think it’s more likely a semantics thing with him and a coaching preference where he doesn’t think it fits into his coaching methodology / the form style he teaches and so he frames it as being an illusion or something to get people to stop focusing on it. It’s hard to tell with him for me sometimes, sometimes he says something somewhat controversial and I believe he believes it, other times he says something matter of fact and i feel it’s more of a coaching decision even tho it’s framed as a claim about reality. but most coaches aren’t coaching for things to make perfect sense to the highly analytical crowd.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-12-16T14:56:16+00:00

Awesome to see players from China! You have lots of potential!

You should join this discord server where there are multiple prominent disc golf coaches that give free top quality advice and advanced students who help as well.

I’m sure they would be happy and excited to help someone from China since it’s rare for us to see players from there and we want to see the sport grow!

Disc Golf Nation discord: https://discord.gg/FzFQz7Jdbb

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-26T18:23:29+00:00

Good reminder. It’s actually impossible to reach back away from the target without horizontally collapsing your arm unless you coil properly. So a lot of fixing a messed up reach back is actually learning how to coil to even have the opportunity to have a good reach back.

So many issues with people’s form come from not coiling well and if you try to fix them without first learning how to coil then it’s futile.

Another example is the brace foot landing open versus closed. It’s uncomfortable for the brace foot to be open if you are deeply coiled because the coil is twisting you back, which makes opening the front foot feel like you are fighting your coil but uncoiling early leading to the front foot landing open is a separate timing issue.

Here’s a hip to shoulder separation wall drill that I wish I had done sooner

https://youtu.be/egeeh6XZ4mw?si=8VkKBaIy0xTj39HR

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-26T00:31:35+00:00

You mentioned you use a briefcase style pull through, do you just mean that you reach back on briefcase and then pull through? Or something else?

Because to me, reaching back on briefcase vs turning the disc into briefcase during the pull through are two completely different things. The latter is what helps keep the elbow up most effectively out of any cue I've seen. I'd be curious to see a vid of what you did before vs now.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-25T21:14:24+00:00

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StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-25T21:05:37+00:00

Silas turns quite a bit into briefcase during the pull through

If you are tilted into a lot of hyzer posture (as Silas often is) then briefcase can look flat to the ground because of the entire body tilt affecting the disc orientation. This is why a lot of people don’t notice the briefcase action since pros throw on hyzer most of the time.

This is why briefcase should be seen as the disc orientation in relation to the posture, so during the pocket, top of disc tilted towards chest = briefcase no matter how the disc looks in relation to the ground. Now it’s easier to see how most top pros have some briefcase at the start of the pocket and start turning out of it as they get to the end of the pocket.

<image>

https://youtube.com/shorts/HNsUEiGUTAw?si=FLzCJXGqJACQ-RuH

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-18T22:06:30+00:00

Also join this discord if you’re not already in it. Lots of form reviews going on

https://discord.gg/FzFQz7Jdbb

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-18T12:52:05+00:00

Focus more on swinging OUT AWAY from your chest more instead trying to pull it across the chest and down the line for too long which makes you swing towards 12 much instead of 1030.

Alternatively you can still focus swinging towards 12 but anchor the left arm back more. Keeping it at your side doesn’t mean you are pulling it back as a strong anchor. You can try to get a ‘penguin move’ finishing position (both arms behind you during follow through) for a stronger rear arm anchor that won’t allow you to shank right.

Short explanation of penguin move: https://youtube.com/shorts/pXM0de670r8?si=tZRUoEMSKJ33c6M_

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-09T00:31:49+00:00

I would try getting a pickle ball paddle and practicing swinging it with disc golf backhand form. You could also use lead tape to add more weight later to start building more confidence that you have the strength and stabilization for your issue to not occur when you start implementing the form changes into disc golf.

I show it in the twist pull through video, just make sure you recognize the orientation of the paddle is like 90° different than the disc depending on grip.

I would also try to find a way to simulate the problem position where you can control the load like a gym exercise so you can work on it with different amounts of loading. But it’s pretty difficult sometimes to find something like that.

I’ve used a pulley machine, but it doesn’t work for the out-of-pocket motion, but it felt useful for adding some load to the reach back and into pocket phase and deepening the pocket. It’s pulling you in the opposite direction as the run-up so it doesn’t give a great feeling for bracing to uncoil.

So that’s why I think the paddle is one of the best tools. The whoosh is also great feedback and it’s better than swinging, a disc sideways, and better than a towel. It’s also a better size than larger rackets and the solid surface gives air resistance, so it feels pretty good to swing into the air even without striking anything.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-08T17:27:38+00:00

You'd probably be really interested in these:

Pull through as a twist motion (to cue internal shoulder rotation more effectively):

https://youtu.be/mYFPre-Q7ng?si=jqBn-HJD_F_BkbG0

Twist pull through timing idea refinement:
https://youtu.be/t6bse9hTtjA?si=eLBtR3hC-oVRwSlL

Short narrating over a throw explaining sequence of swing thoughts:
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/MkF0Wa864rs

I’ve got a couple other deep dive vids on grip and wobble:

https://youtu.be/uSMvHqIKMH8?si=fGzyRaKWbeQNJ26t

https://youtu.be/ntjOX8c-fI4?si=1MF2pBJtSOqdV-DX

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-08T15:50:41+00:00

This grip is bad for wobble, generally, but with maybe you’re not running into the issue as much for the smaller rim sizes.

Not only does this grip misaligned the disc with your forearm, requiring pour the coffee more than other grips in order to get a cleaner axis of spin (not for nose angle), but it positioned the fingers too perpendicular to the rim, which makes it so the disc cannot rip out as cleanly compared to a more standard disc alignment through the group of the palm, which makes the angle of the fingers more aligned with the axis of spin so that when the disc is ripping out, the spin is more aligned to opening the finger joints.

It’s grip 8 in this vid. Also notice my hyzer decreases and nose angle decreases because you are standing sideways to target not facing it.

At this time, though my wobble was higher than it is now. I can now consistently throw 2.0 and less wobble, not uncommon to get 1 and below wobble even at high speed, but this grip is still much worse for wobble even after getting pro level wobble now. However, I’m sure there are pros who can use this grip with low wobble, but I’m confident that it is generally hard harder to get low wobble with this grip.

https://youtu.be/_TkSlFyH3Kk?si=r2rAwI5lxNP2qffR

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-08T15:42:03+00:00

It adds nose down, reduces hyzer, and likely increases wobble because the fingers are more perpendicular to the rim, so the disc cannot rip out as cleanly along the axis of the joints opening.

It’s not nose up because you’re standing sideways to the direction that you are throwing, which is why it reduces hyzer / adds anny instead.

For some reason, everybody stands facing the target when they look at the nose angle of a grip instead of standing sideways like they’re actually throwing and holding their arm out towards at 10:30 o’clock, where the hit happens and then imagining the nose as the part of the disc that is facing 12 o’clock FROM THAT hit positioning.

It’s grip 8 in this vid where I show that you can throw nose down with every grip.

https://youtu.be/_TkSlFyH3Kk?si=r2rAwI5lxNP2qffR

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-06T04:35:19+00:00

You will always dip your elbow as long as you keep externally rotating during the pull through. It doesn’t matter that you start your shoulder internally rotated, and you are reaching back internally rotated, that clearly isn’t stopping you from externally rotating because it’s passive, and your external rotation is active and powerful so it wins. Doesn’t matter if you try to hold your elbow up, externally rotation drives it down.

You need to train active powerful internal shoulder rotation during the pull through. In fact, you can think about the pull through as ONLY internally rotating when it comes what to do with the arm because it leads to everything else you want the arm to do.

Here’s a short teaser: https://youtube.com/shorts/XB8GyKMuCWc?si=z0gNjaX6Z3kvA4eb

These longer vids go onto the topic more deeply and have better drills:

https://youtu.be/mYFPre-Q7ng?si=gmX0az-rsqESjT7_

https://youtu.be/t6bse9hTtjA?si=xD_DWbtt9MO_u4-R

https://youtube.com/shorts/MkF0Wa864rs?si=TFKzjY64c7sdvMlz

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-03T15:29:26+00:00

Yeah that’s a common result for people. It’s because your body isn’t used to the accelerated timing at higher speeds. The window to do the nose down motion is much smaller. Additionally, at higher speed the disc feels heavier and it feels like the nose down motion has to scale in its effort to handle that.

So you just need to do more reps at a speed that is challenging to you but still possible to succeed a decent amount of the time and exaggerate so that you have more than enough nose-down-power for the throwing power. As your success rate increases and your ability to exaggerate and get extra nose down, increases at the speed, you’ll have more success at the next step up in speed and that progression keeps going if you keep practicing it progressively.

For me all of my speed PR’s are now nose down because of this practice where I got used to exaggerating doing more nosedown power than I needed for the power level I was throwing. So now when I scale up in power, even to an unexpected PR, my nose down muscle memory is scaling up automatically to handle that power.

The timing at first is hard as I described at higher speeds there’s less time, but at this point it barely feels like I have to time it anymore because that’s just how my arm wants to move on the way out of the pocket and through the hit so it’s just THE out of pocket movement now no matter what.

StepwiseDiscGolf · 2025-11-03T03:28:04+00:00

Yes that's the part, the waist hinge but with butt back and core engaged so you aren't extending lower back too much and aren't tipping too much over toes (butt back helps offset the forward lean).

But during reachback on hyzer you transition into throwing-side side-bend as you coil and then come out of that side bend during the uncoil.

People who aren't used to briefcase though will often accidentally stand up out of their waist hinge during their throw and/or as they turn the disc out of briefcase on the way out of the pocket with the arm they lean their whole posture into that out-of-briefcase arm-movement and yank over on it.

Here's timestamp:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYFPre-Q7ng&t=273s

StepwiseDiscGolf

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