The Golfing Machine, The Walking Machine and the Mo-ron.
 

Ok boys. Stay with me on this.

I pose to y'all a question . . .

What is WALKING? or What causes WALKING?

When you don't hit it past the forward tees..then we all know what that walk involves.......;)

Dinkout!

Tee. Hee. HEE!!

"You put one foot in front of the other ... and soon you'll be walking 'cross the floor-or-or ...":)

A Walking Machine and A Golfing Machine
 

More to come on this . . .


WALKING MACHINE


GOLFING MACHINE

I can already tell this is gonna be good (CG rubs his hands together in anticipation)! :)

Comet

Fearfully and Wonderfully Made
 

Ah . . . The Human Machine blessed with truly amazing complexity involved to make exponential computations that would explode a super-computer by just walking across an everyday beach . . . or fairway . . . or even to retrieve another barley soda.

Witness its splendor and glory . . .



I posed a question to y'all: WHAT IS WALKING?

Boosted a few things from the internet on Walking Simulation:

Passive-dynamics presupposes that the motion we understand as walking may in fact largely be the natural dynamical consequence of the mass properties of the human body. That is, people may mostly let their legs swing as they would on their own, then add a little control and power, yielding a gait with inherently low energetic and control demands.

Human walking can be approximated as a mechanical process governed by Newton's laws of motion and not controlled.

Some Results in Passive-Dynamic Walking (Garcia, Ruina & Coleman)

Look at how this fine human specimine above is built in comparison to the "Walking Machine" in the previous post. Look how the Mass is arranged. The majority of the Mass is in the big mellon head plus about 250 lbs of serious Camero Mullet, back hair and the trunk. The majority of the mass is dristributed atop to legs that are relatively less massive.

So I pose the question again . . . WHAT IS WALKING?

Walking is a method of moving the feet in a pendulous motion. The trunk shifts the hips and the quads flex the knee to the point that the foot is lifted off the ground and the leg can swing forward. Once the foot strikes the ground in a heel-to-toe motion, it creates traction allowing the weight to shift forward and repeat the process.

It's amazing how hard it is to describe something we do all the time unconciously. Since this is a TGM site, it seems you want to draw the parallels from golfing machine the a walking machine?

Rats Scurrying
 

Ah the Devilish Mr. RChang72,

I trust that you are doing well. Feel free to embark upon any chiding that you may wish regarding the victorious Goober Squad over my young impressionable friends from just up the road. Quite frankly I was disappointed that you didn't drop the blade upon my neck after being taken to task by Bucket in the fortnight leading up to the contest. Have you fallen ill? I imagine that you will have your Rat Face on in the next get together?

It is to my chagrin that I must admit that you have certainly received an excellent education at the University of New Jersey at Durham. Would you like to summarily postulate a connection of the dots?

I have some theories upon our beloved Golfing Machine and human locomtion but I would certainly be delighted to hear your presupposition upon the subject at hand.

To ponder . . . what do you think the impetus to be in walking?

Very well then.

Good day sir.

Bucket

Suggestion
 

12-Piece,

May I suggest a warning be placed on your forum that food not be consumed while reading your posts. I almost choked on dinner while reading about the "Camaro Mullet".

CG

Be Warned Do Not Feed the Camaro Mullet
 

Cometgolfer,

Better that you "almost" choke upon your dinner than to disturb the most violent and nefarious character that is the Camaro Mullet. Such a mistake in judgement could lead your being choked and consumed for dinner.

This creature is extremely dangerous. Its habitat is typically Adult Book Store Parking Lots, Office Supply sections of Walmarts where it can be found sniffing magic markers, sand boxes, and mama's underwear drawers where sniffing is also taking place. Should you ever hear Dokken, Black Sabbath, or Ratt cacophonously being emitted from an 80's circa muscle cars, you should turn and walk away . . .

quickly.

Here is a more gaunt version of the same.

Well, after enough contests, learned to wait until the end of the season to gloat. Have some conflicting memories of '91 when we lost to those baby blues by 30 in the ACC Championship, only to pull off one of the greatest upsets in NCAA history over the Running Fugitives of UNLV.

Back to the point, you can even draw more parallels when you consider divying up a walking machine in to zones 1(trunk & hips), 2 (leg & knees), 3 (feet & ankle). Zone 1 powers & positions the legs and feet. Zone 2 is the lever assembly. Zone 3 is predominantly sensing(or propioception) to make sure the walking is correct.

Since I know you have young kids, you probably remember how your lil Parfait hesitantly took his first steps. My boys all started by mostly by focusing on their feet. Not recognizing that the trunk could do the work, it was a bit herky-jerky. But once the feet are "educated". They let it swing & it is much smoother.

The Devilish One,

Very nice analysis concerning the Zones. Hadn't thought of that but very nice.

I used to have a tee shirt of Larry Johnson with the gapped-gold toofus smile of his stepping on Greg Kobeck (sp?). Wore it so much it just fell apart.

Educated feet. Like it. I'll further disseminate my theory . . . as I make it up.

A shift in the center of gravity so as to cause a "controlled fall".

the fall
 

I totally agree with Tom. It is a "controlled fall", and your feet continuously keep your face from making contact with terra firma. It's when the feet are uneducated as to their respective tasks that impact is inevitable, of which my 7 month old is becoming more aware. One of the major snares in this model is alcohol. This substance interrupts the brain to feet connection.

"Occifer, I'm not as think as you drunk I am."

Boo Yow!!!!!
 

That is the answer I was a lookin for! How would you connect that to The Golfing Machine?

Yep. You think this has anything to do with the operation of the Machine? The "controlled fall" not the alcohol part . . .

I'm gonna kick your Mass
 

Determinants of the center of mass trajectory in human walking and running
CR Lee and CT Farley

It happens that about 5 years ago, a fellow by the name of Tad McGeer built some mechanisms, basically legs with knees and hip masses, that walked down shallow slopes with NO CONTROL or actuation. Stability was born from the passive interactions of gravity and inertia, and dissipative collisions at kneestrike and heelstrike. In other words, walking is a "natural mode", if you will, of a set of legs.

Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley 94720-3140, USA.

Walking is often modeled as an inverted pendulum system in which the center of mass vaults over the rigid stance limb. Running is modeled as a simple spring-mass system in which the center of mass bounces along on the compliant stance limb. In these models, differences in stance-limb behavior lead to nearly opposite patterns of vertical movements of the center of mass in the two gaits. Our goal was to quantify the importance of stance-limb behavior and other factors in determining the trajectory of the center of mass during walking and running. We collected kinematic and force platform data during human walking and running. Virtual stance-limb compression (i.e. reduction in the distance between the point of foot-ground contact and the center of mass during the first half of the stance phase) was only 26% lower for walking (0.091 m) than for running (0.123 m) at speeds near the gait transition speed. In spite of this relatively small difference, the center of mass moved upwards by 0.031 m during the first half of the stance phase during walking and moved downwards by 0.073 m during the first half of the stance phase during running. The most important reason for this difference was that the stance limb swept through a larger angle during walking (30.4 degrees) than during running (19.2 degrees). We conclude that stance-limb touchdown angle and virtual stance-limb compression both play important roles in determining the trajectory of the center of mass and whether a gait is a walk or a run.

Above is an example of the SPRING LOADED INVERTED PENDULUM MODEL

Look anything like a G.O.L.F.er?

gravity
 

Are you trying to make the connection with the "counter fall" as described in David Lee's Gravity Golf?

I've seen his stuff. But nope not going there. I got a hunch on something that I think Mr. K had right. But I'm still chasing it down. Google is a wonderful thing.

At this point, it seems to me anyway, that walking is dependent upon how our mass is distributed. And as we "lean" or "tilt" our mass forward the Laws of Physics enable us to walk. It's like it was supposed to be . . . that if we stand up right then in turn we would walk. Top heavy mass leans forward, then leg movement follows. A lot of what I have read says that there is an "optimum" gait velocity at which we reach optimum efficiency. Also, they say that running is easier than walking. Other interesting things are the transition from walking to running.

I've got some ideas on what application this has to The Golfing Machine, but I'm still looking for the precise connection.

You got any thoughts on this? I think a lot of it has to do with our INTENT with regards to the execution of the golf shot. And as a result where our COM moves as a result.

You know golf better than me. Do you think this crap is at all relevant?

Or am I just . . .

Technically speaking...Walking is "controlled falling"!!!!

Cg/m
 

I agree.

I ran 15 miles a day for eight years (5 every morning, and 10 ever afternoon). I was on athletic scholarship throughout my college days for cross country and track. So, running is something that I've experienced. I remember a road in Brevard, NC that was so steep to get to the top of the mountain that you couldn't walk it. It was much easier to run, or shuffle, with a smaller gait.

I think CG/M is very important in the stroke. I was skimming through to find things that could affect CG/M, and the Sit Down came to mind. It's a possible connection. Here are some of the places in the book where it's referenced, but there may be others. Here are the ones that I found: 7-16, 10-16-A through C, and 10-17-0. Also in 7-17, you'll find references to the feet and the location of the weight throughout the stroke. Is this the direction in which you're going?

A Guess?
 

Let me hazard a guess. I think Bucket is trying to say that the mass alignments and distribution results in walking once a little control / education is applied. Similarly, in TGM, the alignments of the club, arms, and hands with control / education will naturally result in proper golf strokes. Create the wedges / flat lead wrist / bent trailing wrist (stand upright with body mass over legs), use magic of the right forearm to reach top / end (fall forward), drive down plane letting educated hands maintain your alignments through impact (let your educated legs and feet catch you alternating to propel you forward), and swivel into finish to maintain balance (swing arms to counter leg motion to maintain balance).

This description probably butchers both TGM and walking, but I think this is the gist of what Bucket is implying. The geometric principles of TGM naturally and inevitably lead to proper golf strokes like the geometric arrangement of the human body inevitably leads to proper walking.

geometry and CG/M
 

Butchered, no. Precisely sliced with a Ginza knife by Steph, yes.

Yeah. You're on it. I didn't know you knew my mom? That's a great picture of her . . . she's sooo cute.

I was going this way on my INTENT thing.

I was struck (pun intended) by this Yoda quote . . .

The Impact Plane Line is in front of you and down on the ground. You swing the Club Down and Out toward that Plane Line and through it toward the Low Point Plane Line.

The Target, on the other hand, is well to your left...way out there...somewhere. Steering the Club on a Line to that distant Target is completely different than swinging Down and Out toward the Plane Line down and in front of you.

I think this is HUGE. If people have the wrong TARGET/INTENT, then what will the motion of the Center of Mass be as a result?

In addition, I was struck again by your Tracing the 7 with the Right Shoulder. As a result I thought . . .are we really "swinging from the ground up?" Or is what we FEEL in the feet a result of our top heavy mass being tilted and we thus feel the ground pushing back against us?

I bet some mad scientist type has already figured this out, BUT what I think it will prove is that Mr. K was RIGHT.

Form Dictates Function
 

Gotta get lucky sometime! The title sums it up in as few words as I could find. ;)