Top of the Bag Gapping and Strategies

[Shindig]

17 hours ago, Sweep-n-Swing said:

I think that is a good way of thinking about what club to hit off the tee. I'm pretty risk averse so for me I might want to have say a 70% chance of advancing the ball towards the green. As of right now that often isn't the case with my driver, but I definitely plan on changing that. 

As you think about the risk averse aspect, I encourage you to not think about fairways hit;  I know you didn't say that, but some people do think in that direction.  Looking at your numbers from earlier, a driver (vs a 2-iron) gets you about 25 more yards.  There are very few courses I've ever played where I wouldn't make the trade of "+25 yards off tee, higher chance of rough."  

[billchao]

On 8/5/2025 at 3:46 PM, Sweep-n-Swing said:

I have a Garmin watch, this is what it says at the top of the bag:

 

If these numbers are accurate, you need to work on your driver (and your longer clubs in general). You should be hitting a fair bit farther than 230 with your driver if you hit your 7i 175.

Unfortunately part of getting better with your driver is actually using it on the course, IMO. You have to go through some growing pains.

[saevel25]

14 minutes ago, billchao said:

If these numbers are accurate, you need to work on your driver (and your longer clubs in general). You should be hitting a fair bit farther than 230 with your driver if you hit your 7i 175.

Unfortunately part of getting better with your driver is actually using it on the course, IMO. You have to go through some growing pains.

I agree. 

If his 8 iron is 163 carry, though Garmin is probably measuring total. So, I am not sure how much roll out he is getting. Maybe it is around 158 or something. Anyways, if it is 163, that is 1 yard short of PGA Tour average. So his swing speed should be mid-teens for the driver. He should be like 270+. That is a guess, he could be hitting low and getting run. With out launch monitor data, it is hard to say,

 

 

[ChetlovesMer]

1 hour ago, saevel25 said:

I agree. 

If his 8 iron is 163 carry, though Garmin is probably measuring total. So, I am not sure how much roll out he is getting. Maybe it is around 158 or something. Anyways, if it is 163, that is 1 yard short of PGA Tour average. So his swing speed should be mid-teens for the driver. He should be like 270+. That is a guess, he could be hitting low and getting run. With out launch monitor data, it is hard to say,

I think the other problem he has is that he doesn't correct the ones that are missed shots or whatever. I mean it's tough to know what the true average is when you have a 400 yard 5-iron in there. There's an old saying about no data is better than bad data. 

[billchao]

4 hours ago, ChetlovesMer said:

I think the other problem he has is that he doesn't correct the ones that are missed shots or whatever. I mean it's tough to know what the true average is when you have a 400 yard 5-iron in there. There's an old saying about no data is better than bad data. 

That’s pretty rich coming from a guy whose longest drive came from hitting a cart path twice and then a coyote came and picked up his ball and ran it 100 yards further 😜

[ChetlovesMer]

1 hour ago, billchao said:

That’s pretty rich coming from a guy whose longest drive came from hitting a cart path twice and then a coyote came and picked up his ball and ran it 100 yards further 😜

That coyote only ran about 60 yards with it! ... Maybe 65. 

BTW - Farther is distance ... Further is extent. .... So we could discuss who hits it farther, but if you want to further that discussion we should agree on some ground rules. 🤣

.... Actually my longest drive really did hit the cart path twice. .... 

[billchao]

1 minute ago, ChetlovesMer said:

BTW - Farther is distance ... Further is extent. .... So we could discuss who hits it farther, but if you want to further that discussion we should agree on some ground rules. 🤣

I know the difference. I wrote farther. Autocorrect sucks. I didn’t proofread. I’m lazy. Deal with it.

[Carl3]

22 hours ago, ChetlovesMer said:

That coyote only ran about 60 yards with it! ... Maybe 65. 

BTW - Farther is distance ... Further is extent. .... So we could discuss who hits it farther, but if you want to further that discussion we should agree on some ground rules. 🤣

.... Actually my longest drive really did hit the cart path twice. .... 

Never heard that story before. What is the estimated length of this legendary drive?

[gg194]

This got me thinking about the top of my bag so going to try something for a couple of rounds. Pulling the FW, 16.5 or 19, and going to a 19* hybrid. Played without a FW for years and put one back in last year and occasionally it’s longer than the driver. I’m such a short hitter that my second shot is pretty much always a long one and the extra length makes sense until I look at all the bad ones. Have played my best golf without a FW so we’ll see how it goes for a few rounds. 

[Shindig]

11 hours ago, gg194 said:

This got me thinking about the top of my bag so going to try something for a couple of rounds. Pulling the FW, 16.5 or 19, and going to a 19* hybrid. Played without a FW for years and put one back in last year and occasionally it’s longer than the driver. I’m such a short hitter that my second shot is pretty much always a long one and the extra length makes sense until I look at all the bad ones. Have played my best golf without a FW so we’ll see how it goes for a few rounds. 

I think experimenting is a good idea.  However, if your FW is longer than the driver enough to notice it (I assume you mean more than just "my best FW shot is better than my worst driver shot"), consider checking out this instructional thread;  I've been going back to it whenever I have driver problems, dating back to around when it was posted. 

 

[Typhoon92]

Did I miss what your handicap was or how long you’ve been playing?  That Garmin chart is pretty useless.  Is the max number one of the numbers used to compute the average?  Without the chart don’t know how far you hit your clubs?  What do you hit from 150, ,160 etc….

Not looking at max and figuring the other numbers will probably have 10 yards of roll built in. It seems your launch and peak height are low.  I’d probably go Driver/5 wood/7 wood/ 5 iron

Edited August 15, 2025 by Typhoon92