Average Distances - How Far Do You Hit Each Club? (And Don't Lie!)

[Lihu]

All very true. And obviously the high handicapper (me, for instance) is going to make a poor contact often enough to make it sensible to lay up rather than attempt the carry over a hazard that would require me to hit my best possible shot.

But if there's no particular trouble in the way I'm going to take the club that will get the required distance if I hit it properly. My "average" distance, counted to include the bad shots, is completely unhelpful in terms of planning my way round the course, because I'll almost never hit it the "average" distance. i'll either hit it properly or screw up and be much shorter, or off-line. There's no point in taking a five iron when I'm 150 yards from the green just because I sometimes mishit it.

Don't assume that you will make bad contact with any club, or it will probably come true. Irons are harder to hit well. When tired, these are more than likely the first things to go awry. Let's say you only drive 200 yards (carry and roll). You are more likely to hit a driver to make a 150 yard carry over a 7i to make even a 100 yard carry. Woods are more forgiving than irons.

Yes, I agree that full statistics are better than just an average, and indicate what you should do more accurately. However, average does indicate skill level.

BTW, I meant to address this in the post to @flopster that I agree that the lower handicaps have every right to be suspicious of any claim a 17/18 handicap will make for any driver distances over 240 yards. For the benefit of higher handicaps making these distance claims, the reason is because even a mediocre somewhat off line tee shot you would be less than 100 yards to the pin on many normal par 4 holes. The first question would be "How could anyone take 4 shots from inside 100 yards?". Okay, point taken. Laugh away, because no matter what, it is laughable.

[chasm]

... The first question would be "How could anyone take 4 shots from inside 100 yards?". Okay, point taken.Laugh away, because no matter what, it is laughable.

LOL. If you'd seen my meltdown on the greens yesterday, you'd know how easy it is to take three shots from inside forty feet. Four from 100 yards is child's play.

[Lihu]

LOL. If you'd seen my meltdown on the greens yesterday, you'd know how easy it is to take three shots from inside forty feet. Four from 100 yards is child's play.

This happened to me last Friday. I got to the fringe (2 feet off)  in two on a 400 something yard hole, the decided to use my 9i to bump and run to the pin from the fringe. It past the hole and rolled downhill all the way to the fringe on the other side. Same thing from the other side, then back towards the original side and finally close to the hole and finally in. Nice triple from the fringe for one of my blow up holes, which set my mood for the rest of the round.

Oh yes, do you want to hear about the two 4-over's I got that day from OB drives?

My one putt's did save pars and bogeys that day too. Both me and my son were surprised I started making serious putts. However, I still manged a lot of 3 putts.

What's funny is that course (San Dimas Canyon Blues) is rated slightly lower than the course I played yesterday (Brookside Course 1 Blues) and about 350 yards shorter, but feels way harder . Maybe, I just need to play it more.

[iacas]

CG and face "springiness" have almost no effect-----it is loft that matters.

HighlandLaird is right in this spat.

It makes no difference that Titleist irons are not low lofted, the question was "how far do you hit each club?" and lofts are highly variable, as  shown by HighlanLaird's post.

It is useless asking how far do you hit each iron?------irons should show their loft, not an arbitrary number.

You are simply @HighlandLaird with a different account. This account has now been banned, and @HighlandLaird has been placed in the penalty box.

We do not appreciate or tolerate liars, and pretending to be someone else is lying.

[jthomp007]

D - 285+

4i - 255

5i - 240

6i - 225

7i - 210

8i - 195

9i - 180

PW - 165

AW - haven't hit with a full swing yet

SW - 130

LW - 110-115

Granted I just got new irons (X-Hots - 4-AW) so I'm still ranging them in.  I used to play CG Reds and I would constantly hit my 7i between 200-205, which you could extrapolate ranges from there (10-15 yard gaps)  These are not kill it swings..  Technology has changed a lot since I used to play frequently.  My club head speed was measured at 135 when I was in high school nearly (gulp 16 years ago).  You put today's clubs in those hands, yikes...I have never played with anyone who is longer with their irons.  I'm sure some will flame away =)

[flopster]

D - 285+

4i - 255

5i - 240

6i - 225

7i - 210

8i - 195

9i - 180

PW - 165

AW - haven't hit with a full swing yet

SW - 130

LW - 110-115

Granted I just got new irons (X-Hots - 4-AW) so I'm still ranging them in.  I used to play CG Reds and I would constantly hit my 7i between 200-205, which you could extrapolate ranges from there (10-15 yard gaps)  These are not kill it swings..  Technology has changed a lot since I used to play frequently.  My club head speed was measured at 135 when I was in high school nearly (gulp 16 years ago).  You put today's clubs in those hands, yikes...I have never played with anyone who is longer with their irons.  I'm sure some will flame away =)

You do realize they are asking for "average" distances not potential or what you can do every one of 10. So I guess it would be safe to assume you can hit your 5 iron upwards of 260 yards and your misses are about 220 right? Honestly I don't understand why you don't hit your driver closer to 350 because I hit my driver a good 75 yards further than my 5 iron and I would figure at least 100 yards difference in your case. So in high school you were swinging the club 10mph faster than Bubba and Tiger I'm impressed.

[late347]

285 is not exactly optimal distance at 135mph clubhead speed! I average 230 yards with my beginner push slice shots.. I only average 105-110mph clubhead. (With hand muscle injury still recuperating)

[flopster]

285 is not exactly optimal distance at 135mph clubhead speed!

I average 230 yards with my beginner push slice shots.. I only average 105-110mph clubhead. (With hand muscle injury still recuperating)

105-110 is nearly tour level.

[Lihu]

105-110 is nearly tour level.

The average PGA swings 112, so it is tour level for some pros.

Plus @late347 , your smash factor is not all that good if you can only drive 230 with a 107.5 average swing speed.

[flopster]

The average PGA swings 112, so it is tour level for some pros.

Plus @late347, your smash factor is not all that good if you can only drive 230 with a 107.5 average swing speed.

With impact like this I would say 230 is a stretch, but in his defense he is a beginner.

[Lihu]

With impact like this I would say 230 is a stretch, but in his defense he is a beginner.[URL=http://thesandtrap.com/content/type/61/id/98358/] [/URL]

I remember the days not too long ago (months ago) that I also needed more than one impact tape. :whistle: Is this from someone you know? That low on the face I would tend to agree with you.

[flopster]

I remember the days not too long ago (months ago) that I also needed more than one impact tape.

Is this from someone you know? That low on the face I would tend to agree with you.

@late347 it's from his swing thread.

[late347]

105-110 is nearly tour level.

ya that was flightscope. I guess the true average was exactly speakin 105mph, but I had a couple 113mph in there. I just got so frustrated at the club fitting center you know, only hitting push slices and not knowing what to do

yardage is total distances on flightscope so it's perfectly reasonably in that sense.

Smash factor sucked, because open clubface to clubpath (if I understood correctly the flightscope terminology). I'm gonna take camera phone snapshots next time I take a flightscope lesson definitely thx for the idea!

I had mostly push slice or push fade with pretty high spin numbers. Golf is not exactly intuitive! Unless you're really gifted sort of athletically with your body and mind it seems.(like bubba watson or somebody like that homegrown effective swing)

But I definitely need better technique it seems. Haven't had a lesson since last autumn, and only restarted at golf about last autumn also.

gonna take the new driver out for a pro lession next week so I'm really pumped about that ! hoping to hit some tight straight fades as my main shot.

I was at the doctors a awhile ago because of hand pain. They did all the testing and it turned out to be a muscle injury of the hand. It happened becaues of a duffed driver shot at the practice range (hitting mats). So, it's gonna take about 2 weeks more to heal really... But the doc said that I could do activities and sports normally so go figure.

[Golfingdad]

I still got it!!  Hit a 310 yard drive today!  It was the perfect storm of being directly downwind (not heavy winds, but definitely helping), and I struck it right in the center of the face and got it up in the air.  But I think I'm more proud of the drive I hit on the previous hole.  It was exactly 180* to this hole, so dead into the wind, and I teed it low and hit it low, and got it out there to 270!!

[MS256]

There was a young guy in our group today (early 20s?) and was hitting his tee shots in the fairway most of the time but very, very low. Some probably weren't getting more than 10 feet off of the ground and 20 feet was about his max. The rest of his clubs weren't too bad for somebody relatively new to golf. He had some decent pop and was getting some roll out but still losing a ton of distance with that trajectory (especially on that course where the fairway grass is cut too long). After the round I asked him what loft he had on that driver and he said 9 1/2*. I told him I thought he might do better without changing anything else if he had about a 12* driver. Another guy in our group said "Wait a minute, and went to his cart and got a 12 degree driver. We went over to the closest tee box and he hit the best tee shot he had hit all day with a much better trajectory. I'm curious now to see if he shows up next week with a 12* driver. ;-) P.S. If he does I hope it works for him so I won't feel partially responsible if it doesn't. ;-)

[Lihu]

I still got it!!  Hit a 310 yard drive today!  It was the perfect storm of being directly downwind (not heavy winds, but definitely helping), and I struck it right in the center of the face and got it up in the air.  But I think I'm more proud of the drive I hit on the previous hole.  It was exactly 180* to this hole, so dead into the wind, and I teed it low and hit it low, and got it out there to 270!!

Nice, Drew. I knew you had it in you!

There was a young guy in our group today (early 20s?) and was hitting his tee shots in the fairway most of the time but very, very low. Some probably weren't getting more than 10 feet off of the ground and 20 feet was about his max. The rest of his clubs weren't too bad for somebody relatively new to golf.

He had some decent pop and was getting some roll out but still losing a ton of distance with that trajectory (especially on that course where the fairway grass is cut too long).

After the round I asked him what loft he had on that driver and he said 9 1/2*. I told him I thought he might do better without changing anything else if he had about a 12* driver.

Another guy in our group said "Wait a minute, and went to his cart and got a 12 degree driver. We went over to the closest tee box and he hit the best tee shot he had hit all day with a much better trajectory.

I'm curious now to see if he shows up next week with a 12* driver.

P.S. If he does I hope it works for him so I won't feel partially responsible if it doesn't.

I won a Cobra Amp driver with a 6.0 shaft, and decided to test it out at Golfsmith today.

For the first time, I was hitting simulator results*** that seemed reasonable on the optical simulator. I hit 8 shots with the AMP driver with the 5.5 shaft set to 10.5 degrees. 4 shots had 2800rpm, 235 carry give or take a few yards at 94-97mph speeds. The dispersion was only 10 yards. This accuracy was not something I would expect with a regular flex graphite shaft.

We brought the loft up to 11.5 degrees. I hit two drives that had 3800 rpm spin for 223 yards, and thought, man that was bad, I lost 10 yards lofting up.

I tried again slowing myself down to "half speed" and "not holding back" as the salesman put it. Basically, 1800rpm, 225 carry, 91mph, 267 yard total drives. Half the effort and the same drive distances as my current Ping G15 10.5 with X100 shafts.

I'm definitely going to be using 11.5 to 12 degrees . If I can swing that easy and get those kinds of distances, I will.

***These were all cold shots and wearing street shoes, so I expect these will be my worst case course carry distances.

[MS256]

Nice, Drew. I knew you had it in you! I won a Cobra Amp driver with a 6.0 shaft, and decided to test it out at Golfsmith today. For the first time, I was hitting simulator results*** that seemed reasonable on the optical simulator. I hit 8 shots with the AMP driver with the 5.5 shaft set to 10.5 degrees. 4 shots had 2800rpm, 235 carry give or take a few yards at 94-97mph speeds. The dispersion was only 10 yards. This accuracy was not something I would expect with a regular flex graphite shaft. We brought the loft up to 11.5 degrees. I hit two drives that had 3800 rpm spin for 223 yards, and thought, man that was bad, I lost 10 yards lofting up. I tried again slowing myself down to "half speed" and "not holding back" as the salesman put it. Basically, 1800rpm, 225 carry, 91mph, 267 yard total drives. Half the effort and the same drive distances as my current Ping G15 10.5 with X100 shafts. I'm definitely going to be using 11.5 to 12 degrees . If I can swing that easy and get those kinds of distances, I will. ***These were all cold shots and wearing street shoes, so I expect these will be my worst case course carry distances.

I about 95% sure that I would be having a much easier time right now if I had a higher lofted driver. I have an R9 that's 8 1/2 and since changing up my swing it seems like a chore to get the trajectory I want, and that may be contributing to some of the hooks I'm hitting (since there isn't much problem with the 3W). I have no idea what my AOA is now or ever was but it's either not as positive as it used to be or maybe even negative. Either way I am having a heck of a time trying to force a trajectory to happen.

[late347]

Nice, Drew. I knew you had it in you!

I won a Cobra Amp driver with a 6.0 shaft, and decided to test it out at Golfsmith today.

For the first time, I was hitting simulator results*** that seemed reasonable on the optical simulator. I hit 8 shots with the AMP driver with the 5.5 shaft set to 10.5 degrees. 4 shots had 2800rpm, 235 carry give or take a few yards at 94-97mph speeds. The dispersion was only 10 yards. This accuracy was not something I would expect with a regular flex graphite shaft.

We brought the loft up to 11.5 degrees. I hit two drives that had 3800 rpm spin for 223 yards, and thought, man that was bad, I lost 10 yards lofting up.

I tried again slowing myself down to "half speed" and "not holding back" as the salesman put it. Basically, 1800rpm, 225 carry, 91mph, 267 yard total drives. Half the effort and the same drive distances as my current Ping G15 10.5 with X100 shafts.

I'm definitely going to be using 11.5 to 12 degrees. If I can swing that easy and get those kinds of distances, I will.

***These were all cold shots and wearing street shoes, so I expect these will be my worst case course carry distances.

That's very effective yardages out of that driver gratz!

That's with older model cobra driver? Amp cell?

I got the new cobra biocell, hoping to try it out at the range today for real, not only simulator!

The stiff shaft is a little bit different feeling to regular I must admit. I just hope that I can learn this club well as I improve ballstriking and fix some swing issues.

All my shots went push fade/ slice basically at the golf simulator LOL. The clubfitter joked that it's a good thing because at least, all the mishits are the exact same type. It's the exact same golf shot all the time, push fade /slice.

If you got rid of the push aspect of the golf shots, more straight at impact... you could play game with a fade off the tee, I reckon!

With push slice, the smash factor is just plain bad in shot like that. 1,3 -ish

Also side axis is tilted, and spin rate is massive (4000-5000)