Can AI correct your golf swing?
Scott Kramer
My golf game has gotten worse over the last three years. I just can't figure out why I've lost about 25 yards off the tee and about 10 yards off my irons. It feels like nothing has changed except for age and flexibility. The ball still flies mostly straight, with a slight draw honed over decades. But my friends who never hit the ball before are starting to hit it faster than me. I wonder if it's something in my downswing that's to blame – either the rotation of my upper body, the movement of my head, or the speed of my hands. Friends who know my swing have watched it and nothing has changed. So I decided to use a little technology to solve the problem.
Enter Mustard Golf, a brand new golf swing analysis app now available exclusively on the Apple App Store. Mustard originally launched as a baseball app two years ago, but it's the brainchild of renowned pitching coach Tom House. PGA TOUR pro Justin Rose was an early investor, along with other notable athletes. This golf app integrates AI to analyze your golf swing and provide specific instruction based on your unique needs. Simply shoot a down-the-line video (or import an existing one), and the app will analyze it, give you a report card, and provide prioritized drills to address your most prominent issues.
I don't go to the driving range that often, but I do hit wiffle balls in my front yard a few times a week. This practice has really helped my game. Thankfully, this app can analyze my swing while I'm doing it. Plus, I was able to try it out on the actual driving range and got consistent results.
Basically, I set up my phone behind my swing and prop it up against a small flower pot. Then I turn on the camera and swing. There are a few oddities here. First, when I turn on the camera within the app, it launches the rear camera. I don't understand why it doesn't default to the front camera, because the app needs to use the front camera to make sure the swing is in the viewfinder and being filmed. Second, you can take as many swings as you want in one “take”, but the app analyzes based on only the first swing. Also, the more swings you take, the longer it takes the app to analyze, so it's wise to turn off the camera in between swings. I find this annoying. And then there's the analysis time. It takes a minute or two for the app to analyze your swing, give you a gradebook and a rating, and devise a game plan. Maybe I'm just impatient, but it's just slower than I expected.
But the app does show you your swing backwards, overlaying dots on key points of your body — shoulders, elbows, hips, knees, ankles — and traces your backswing and downswing. It then gives you analysis from those data points, and offers “personalized” insightful instructional video tips from teaching pro Mark Blackburn from a library of 450 videos. Officials say this will soon expand to video instruction from Rose and other pros, making the library even bigger. And the videos you see are part of a report card and game plan for getting your swing on track.
In my experience, this was extremely enlightening. I thought the feedback pinpointed the flaws in my swing, and there are many. It also confirmed my suspicion that hip rotation was likely the main cause of my distance loss. So I vow to follow the app's plan to get back on track.
The Mustard Golf app is available for a very limited free trial, but you can also subscribe for $25 per month or $150 per year.
