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GOLF TEACHING PRO%u00ae 30 WINTER 2O26KNOWLEDGE USGTFFAULTS THAT MAY NOT ACTUALLYBE FAULTSActually, no. Several years ago, in the Winter 2019 edition of Golf Teaching Pro, Dr. David Wright (a Golf Magazine Top 100 Teacher) penned an article outlining the research he and his team had engaged in, revealing that in fact there is not only one swing model for ideal mechanics but three. The three swing models are upper core, middle core, and lower core. What do each of these mean?In the simplest of terms, your upper core is your chest area; your middle core area is your abs, and lower core is your hips. One of these %u201ccores%u201d will be your main rotational center for creating power. The majority of tour players are middle core, and this is the model that most golf instructors use to tailor their instruction. Noted biomechanical expert Dr. Ralph Mann researched the ideal model swing years ago, and came up with ModelGolf, a program which became the basis for his influential book Swing Like a Pro. Mann%u2019s research focused on finding the common elements of PGA Tour players%u2019 swings, removing any anomalies, and revealed what the %u201cperfect%u201d swing would look like. And since Mann%u2019s research involved common elements and averages, it perfectly encapsulated what a middle core swing would be.Wright and his team of researchers at Centinela Hospital in Los Angeles, California, found that there is not one %u201cperfect%u201d swing model but three, with the aforementioned core areas. Wright also found that contrary to what the typical tour pro swings like, most amateur golfers do not fit into the middle core model that has been so prevalently taught throughout the years. He found was that the majority of amateur golfers swung with an upper core swing. What this means is that they are physically unable to clear or turn their hips to the degree that a middle core touring professional can, and therefore their hips will be relatively facing the ball at impact and not open, as most tour players%u2019 hips are. In the world of golf instruction, there are certain tenets that are taken as gospel when it comes to faults. Such %u201cfaults%u201d include lifting your head, failing to keep your eye on the ball, and one that has been receiving a lot of attention in recent years, %u201cearly extension,%u201d formerly known as coming out of posture. What if we were to tell you that in fact, none of these are faults, and early extension is not only not a fault for many players, it%u2019s actually a good thing to do? Blasphemy, you say! Of course it is a fault to fail to maintain your posture!