"normal" club distances

[xpavlic4]

Hi,

I am really new to the game of golf, 2012 would be my second season, but there is a one thing I was wondering about lately. I read that usual distance for example sand wedge is abou 100 yards - more or less. Depends on player. But I tried it the other day on the driving range and couldn't fly over 50! Even if I tried my full swing. Am I missing something?

[joekelly]

No, you are not missing anything. You, like most of us here, belong to the class of golfers who gamely struggle to emulate those who can hit the ball far and straight.  The vast majority of the 'better' golfers learnt the game as kids or teens. The best thing for the rest of us is to take the PW for 100 yards.

[RFetters]

When you say sand wedge,,what loft are you using,,there are sand wedges that could range from 52 to 64 degrees?

but assuming your sand wedge is 56 degrees,,50 yards seems a bit short even for someone new to golf.  It's possible you are opening the face at impact, therefore increasing loft and decreasing distance, but it sounds to me as if you could use a lesson or two from a pro to get an accurate assessment.

[ghalfaire]

Distance with a particular club has something to do with where you live (altitude), temperature, the ball you play (range balls are for durability not distance) and the loft of the sand wedge you're using.  In any case distance isn't the key to good golf although it helps is you are long and in the fairway.  But as an old friend told me "if you have to choose between long or straight, choose straight".

[Willie Malay]

PW( mine is 44 degrees, really a 9 iron) : 135

48* wedge: 125

52* wedge: 110

56* wedge: 95-100

I don't call wedges by gap wedge, sand wedge, lob wedge because I use all of them interchangeably.

Add to that whether the club is square or opened and the yardages change drastically.

[zipazoid]

Sand wedge isn't designed to be hit for distance & the harder you swing, generally speaking, the higher it will go, not farther.

I'd be more interested in if you're hitting it straight or not.

[Datsyuk]

My PW, 54, and 60 go the distances they go and what those are is not a concern for someone else. It's not like someone is going to ask, "Can I borrow your 120 club?" and I hand him my 54 degree wedge and PW in case he's between clubs. Okay, actually I'd probably say, "no" so that's a terrible example.

[AmazingWhacker]

Distances don't matter that much - the idea is to know what yours are.  BUT - if you're flying your 56 degree SW only 50 yards, then I imagine it's something in your technique.  I know that, for a long time, I had a tendency to "go underneath it" with my sandwedge and pop it straight up with no distance.  Sometimes it might go 50 yards, sometimes it might go 75 - depending on how badly I scooped underneath it.  For some reason, I was always worse about this with my sandwedge than my other clubs.

Now that I learned how to hit down on my wedges, I fly the SW a distance that is in line with the rest of my clubs based on loft.  The wierd thing is that now my big problem is hitting down on it too much - or not quite the right way or whatever - and having it fly more like a PW or even 9 iron distance.

You can drive yourself crazy guessing.  I know it sounds like a broken record sometimes but input from an educated set of eyes (like a golf instructor) can save you literally years of guesswork.  My guess is that a golf pro - or even somebody here if you posted a video in member swings, could tell you the reason why you hit your SW 50 yards pretty easily.

[slodsm]

Originally Posted by AmazingWhacker

The wierd thing is that now my big problem is hitting down on it too much - or not quite the right way or whatever - and having it fly more like a PW or even 9 iron distance.

My current problem too. I worked on it a lot today and still can't get consistency with it, I am fairly consistent 110ish with my 45* wedge on a full swing, I can "generally put a 50* wedge in the 95-100 yard range, but once you get to 56, I can make one serious mess in short order. That wedge and the 60* wedge are responsible for more double bogeys than I can count because 50 can turn into 100 really quick when I strike the ball wrong because of the shaft length, raising my head, muscling it with my right hand, etc that I tend to do with my two short wedges.