You know, the only thing that sports like football, basketball, baseball, hockey and tennis have over golf is that you can still "win" when you're not playing your best. As long as your opponent is playing worse than you are, you can reign triumphant in any of these other games.
But not golf. As Bobby Jones once labeled "him," Old Man Par never has a bad day! Rain or shine, wind or calm, cold or hot, Old Man Par never gives in to any of us who love this game and keep trying to get the best of him. That may also be one of the reasons why so many of us keep hunting for new and different, "weapons of grass destruction," with which to better arm ourselves to go into combat against this unrelenting adversary.
I've been a club designer and a custom fitting specialist for more years than I sometimes care to count. It's my job to help custom clubmakers learn the most up-to-date skills and techniques so they can advise golfers of the best specifications of their golf clubs to get the very most from their individual swing and playing characteristics. As such, I have written tons about how best to choose the right loft, lie, face angle, length, swingweight, shaft flex, shaft weight, and all of the other 20 odd specifications which make up the individual "playing personality" of your set.
While all of these golf club specifications are both individually as well as collectively important to nail down correctly for each golfer, they pale in comparison to the game improvement value of one fitting factor that you must customize to precisely how YOU swing as well as the courses on which you play. The most important specification you can address in your equipment buying decisions which will make the most difference in your shotmaking consistency AND your score is the Set Make-up, i.e. the complement of what clubs you heft and carry in your golf bag.
While the USGA keeps acting to limit the ability of us designers to help regular golfers gain more improvement, their rule which restricts us to carrying 14 clubs still leaves you a lot of "wiggle room" that I bet many of you are not taking full advantage of. See, they don't restrict what 14 clubs you can carry, and within that "loophole" lies the chance for you to play the game better and have a lot more fun, if you just use a little common sense.
You Call That a Driver?
In a survey taken at the PGA Tour's 2006 AT&T tournament, the average loft of the pros' drivers was 9.2 degrees. The average loft of their amateur partners was 9.4 degrees. Talk about people with more money than brains. Golf brains that is. Go get your driver swing speed measured accurately. If it's 110 mph or higher, go ahead and use that 9-degree driver because you have the swing speed to use that low of a driver loft. If it's lower than that, here's a chart to let you know what loft will get you more distance off the tee. And please don't let your ego get in the way of achieving your maximum distance for your swing speed.
Optimum Driver Loft for Maximum Distance:
- Swing speed -- 60 mph; Driver loft -- 17
- Swing speed -- 70 mph; Driver loft -- 15
- Swing speed -- 80 mph; Driver loft -- 13
- Swing speed -- 90 mph; Driver loft -- 12
- Swing speed -- 100 mph; Driver loft -- 11
Optimum driver loft in this chart is based on the golfer swinging with a level angle of attack into the ball. If you hit the ball on the upswing (upward angle of attack), subtract one degree. If you hit the ball with a downward, steeper angle of attack, add one degree. To be sure, visit your local clubmaker and be custom fit using a launch monitor. If you have a 60 mph swing speed and you can't find an actual "No. 1 wood" with 17-degree loft, then whatever fairway wood with that loft will become your "driver."
One more tip -- if you live at 4,000 feet or higher elevation, add one more degree to the lofts in this chart. That "rarefied air" has less density and the spin you generate won't work as well to keep the ball in the air as it will at sea level. Oh, and while you're at it, shorten that driver to 43-44 inches and re-swingweight the head for that shorter length. You'll hit the ball more squarely, more often and not lose a smidgen of swing speed. Remember, you lose 5 to 7 percent of your potential distance when you hit the ball 1/2-inch off center. Learn to develop your golf brain.
What Do You Mean My "Second Longest Hitting Wood?"
Because we can only use a tee peg on the tee, and because few of us can hit the driver off the deck, we all need to have a "second longest hitting wood" in our bag. No, I don't mean a 3-wood. For a minority of golfers, the second longest wood might have a number "3" on the sole, but for the majority of us, it more likely will have a number "4" or a number "5".
When I say we all need a "second longest hitting wood," I mean we need to find the lowest loft fairway wood that we can consistently hit well up in the air to really be that second longest hitting wood in the bag. I do not mean the lowest loft fairway wood that you can hit well up in the air two times out of six. I mean the lowest loft fairway wood that you can hit well up in the air four or five times out of six at the least.
Remember, when you don't use your golf brain, Old Man Par is already several shots up before you put the first shot in play. Most 3-woods today have 13, 14 or maybe 15 degrees of loft. Most golfers with a 90 mph or lower swing speed are going to have a tough time getting that little loft well up in the air to fly. Be honest and make your second longest wood be the lowest loft that you can consistently hit high in the air.
How Many Headcovers are in Your Bag?
More than there were last season or the season before I hope. Yes, I may sound like a broken record to many of you, but unless you are able to hit a 3- and 4-iron high and solid 80 percent of the time, forget about 'em and stick 'em in the closet where they belong. For that matter, for a whole lot of you unless you can hit your 5 and 6-iron high and solid 80 percent of the time, make them join the 3 and the 4 in that closet as well. Having a golf brain says what the heck do you want to lug around any club you hit high and solid half the time or less.
For most golfers today, the 7-iron is the longest iron they can hit high and solid 80 percent of the time. For another group that is smaller than you might think, that cut off club is the 6-iron. And for yet another darn small segment, it's the 5-iron. You want to really play more consistent, better golf? Be honest with yourself and your irons and load more hybrids with their accompanying headcovers in your bag this year.
One tip though -- the assortment of hybrids is vast, and so too are their lengths and lofts. Some hybrids are simply "narrow bodied fairway woods" because they are the same loft and length as your fairway woods. That's no good. Well it isn't unless you hit your present fairway woods crummy a lot of the time. If so, fine.
But if you are chucking more irons out of your bag, then what you want are hybrids that will hit the ball the same distance as when you put that purest of pure swings on each of those low and lower lofted irons. If you have golf brains, that means match the loft and the length of each hybrid to each iron you are retiring.
Fit Your Wedges to the Golf Course More than to You
If you are a skier, you know that there are different ski designs that work better for different snow and mountain conditions. Same thing for the wedges and the many design differences between golf courses. Raised greens vs. greens on the same level as the fairway. Undulated greens vs. flat greens. Small greens vs. large greens. Soft vs. firm greens. Fluffy vs. coarse sand. Steep face vs. flat bunkers. Longer vs. shorter rough around the greens. Lush, moist grass vs. dry thin grass. Bent, rye, blue or Bermuda grass on your course. The player with golf brains thinks about these things before selecting the complement of wedges that will live in the bag.
Actually, there is so much to the matter of selecting the loft, sole width, bounce sole angle and swing-weight of the wedges to accent the specific shotmaking requirements of the golf course that one could write a whole book about it. I can't do that here, so here are some key tips for selecting your wedge set make-up to better address the shotmaking requirements of your course. And if you travel and play a lot of different courses, then you may need to have different wedges to switch out when you do head to a different track.
First rule of thumb for wedge set make-up is to have a consistent spacing of the loft angles between each wedge. Four degrees between the 9-iron and the PW and between each wedge thereafter is ideal for most golfers. More than five and you'll be overhitting one wedge too often to make up for a yardage gap. Three or less and you may be wasting one of the 14 clubs you can choose to fight off Old Man Par. Exception -- advanced players who may wish to carry two sand-wedges.
The smaller the greens, the firmer the greens, the more undulating the greens with multiple "shelfs", the more you need to hit high, soft landing wedge shots to get the ball to stop with less roll. That means more loft on all the wedges, but especially for the sand-wedge and a lob-wedge. Vice versa on these design factors of greens means you'll be smart to roll the ball to the hole more with the wedges, which means a little lower loft on the wedges.
The thicker the rough, the more lush and/or moist the grass and include Bermuda, kikuyu and other southern "creeper" grasses in this as well, the more bounce sole angle you can use on the wedges you'll be using mostly from the grass. Numbered irons too by the way. Having a lower trailing edge on the sole, which means a little more bounce sole angle will definitely help get the wedge through these grass conditions. Thin, dry, hardpan and thin-blade grasses mean less bounce sole angle for the wedges used more often from grass lies.
Light, fluffy, "sugar" sand in the bunkers means more bounce sole angle and/or a wider sole width on the wedges you choose to use from the "beach." Thin, coarse, heavy sand means the opposite.
All in all if you use your golf brains to really figure out how to "build" the complement of clubs you carry, aka your set makeup, you will be able to replace hard to hit clubs with ones that are easier to hit more consistently and which do the same job. That's something your local professional clubmaker can help you with, and in the process give you just a little more edge on Old Man Par.
