The X-Factor: An evaluation of common methods used to analyse major inter-segment kinematics during the golf swing

Susan J. Brown, W. Scott Selbie, Eric S. Wallace

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

25 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

A common biomechanical feature of a golf swing, described in various ways in the literature, is the interaction between the thorax and pelvis, often termed the X-Factor. There is no consistent method used within golf biomechanics literature however to calculate these segment interactions. The purpose of this study was to examine X-factor data calculated using three reported methods in order to determine the similarity or otherwise of the data calculated using each method. A twelvecamera three-dimensional motion capture system was used to capture the driver swings of 19 participants and a subject specific three-dimensional biomechanical model was created with the position and orientation of each model estimated using a global optimisation algorithm. Comparison of the X-Factor methods showed significant differences for events during the swing (P <0.05). Data for each kinematic measure were derived as a times series for all three methods and regression analysis of these data showed that whilst one method could be successfully mapped to another, the mappings between methods are subject dependent (P
Original languageEnglish
Number of pages9
JournalJournal of Sports Sciences
DOIs
Publication statusPublished (in print/issue) - 6 Mar 2013

Bibliographical note

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Keywords

  • X-Factor
  • pelvis
  • thorax
  • methods
  • golf

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