Game Improvement Golf Clubs
By PinemeadowGolf.com
Staff Writers
In the 1980's, huge improvements were made in golf club design
and construction. Most of these improvements increased both forgiveness
(the ability of the golf club to compensate for swing error -
and the golf ball to go straighter) and distance (the ability
of the golf club to hit harder - and the golf ball to go farther).
The object of the game is to hit the golf ball straight and far,
so golf clubs designed to do that are called "game improvement"
golf clubs. The primary characteristics of game improvement clubs
consists of three things:
- Perimeter Weighting
- Large Sweet Spot
- Low Center of Gravity Design
In contrast, there are actually golf clubs that are not designed
as "game improvement" golf clubs. Those are used by professional
golfers who always hit the ball straight - so, they don't care about
forgiveness - they just want distance. If we could always hit the
ball straight, we wouldn't care about forgiveness either. Unfortunately,
that doesn't always happen, so we take advantage of these help aids
as much as possible.
Blade irons are a good example of a non-forgiving club. A professional
level golfer likes blade irons, because they can "shape the
shot." It becomes very helpful for players that have the skills
and ability to play draws, fades, and other type of shots to go
around the tree. Forgiving irons tend to "correct the shot."
They don't shape the shot as well as blade irons, but they can hit
the ball straighter if you miss-hit the shot. Professional golfers
don't care much about miss-hits. We do.
Perimeter Weighting
Perimeter weighting means that the weight of the golf club head
is positioned around the perimeter of the golf club instead of at
the center. As we said above, if you always hit the ball perfectly
dead center, you would want a small sweet spot without perimeter
weighting so you could put physical mass directly behind the impact
point of the ball. This would make a very long shot. However, if
your shot is off - even just a millimeter - your ball will go astray.
By perimeter weighting golf clubs, you maximize forgiveness. Some
designs have more or less emphasis on perimeter weighting.
Large Sweet Spot
A large sweet spot is generally created by perimeter weighting
design. The sweet spot is the optimum place to make contact with
the ball. The larger the sweet spot, the greater allowance for swing
error. Designing for the largest sweet spot leaves less room to
correct other common swing errors. Perimeter weighting can be shifted
to cure toe-miss-hits and to help get the ball up in the air.
For example, certain iron designs are heavily toe-weighted, meaning
the weight of the club is heavier at the toe of the club head, which
decreases club twisting from severe miss-hits off the toe of the
golf club. Ping golf is most famous for this design in their the
Ping Zing. This idea cures one very important problem - toe hits
and twisted shots. However, it may decrease the overall size of
the sweet spot. Increased toe-weighting can stress the shaft and
increase golf shaft breakage. There is a fine balance in club design
between doing a good thing and doing too much of a good thing.
Low Center of Gravity Design
Another example of using perimeter weighting to solve a problem
is the low center of gravity designs of Callaway Golf. Callaway
Golf iron designs tend to shift weight to solve the problem of getting
the ball up in the air, but may decrease the sweet spot size. However,
take heart - we are talking about fractions of millimeters of sweet
spot size here, not inches.
Recently, low center of gravity (LCG) has become a favored design
concept. This means shifting weight to the bottom of the club to
increase the ability to hit the ball up into the air. This design
is the reason why you see wider soles on the bottom of some club
heads. If you don't have a problem getting the golf ball off the
ground, then LCG should be less important to you. It you have a
big problem in this area then LCG matter a lot. Golf clubs with
tungsten inserts focus on LCG, because tungsten is heavier than
steel and allows the club to have even more weight where it counts.
To conclude, the overall goal for someone looking for maximum forgiveness
in their golf clubs is to find clubs with oversize clubface resulting
in a larger sweet spot. It will help solve some other common swing
problems and improve striking of the ball. Certain designs by manufacturers
may orient more towards solving one problem than another, and other
designs provide a very balanced approach that can help in all areas
of the game.
The Pinemeadow Staff Writers are made of what we like to call "golf
gurus" who specialize in a variety of subjects in golf. The team
is comprised of employees of PinemeadowGolf.com,
a website that builds and sells custom golf clubs to thousands of golfers
worldwide.
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