Launch angle and club head speed

[iacas]

I don't understand how speed can change the effective loft of a club. My hands at impact, forward press, flipping, opening/closing club face change the clubs loft. Swing speed does not. Am I wrong for thinking this??

Speed doesn't change the effective loft. It changes the interaction between the delivered loft and the ball, thus affecting the launch angle.

The frictional effect of the grooves would be to "carry" the ball a bit more in the direction of the vertical component of the clubhead path, but the frictional effect would not be so strong with regards to the horizontal direction?

Why is that a question? Grooves have a larger effect vertically than horizontally.

Sounds fine in theory. But longer clubs are also less lofted - which in turn will compress the ball more too, even holding clubhead speed constant, no? Which would trend in the same direction but for a different reason.

Yes, I said that - not the exact way that you did, but as we know, the lower the spin loft the more a ball is deformed - a ball is not really "compressed." It's deformed.

I'm still not sure though whether these effects are "significant" - or if in the real world the effects are so minor as to be negligible.

4° is probably a stretch, yes, but the launch angle can and does change because of changes in clubhead speed (keeping all else constant, which MEfree had effectively no chance of doing).

[birlyshirly]

Why is that a question?

Because I wrote what I supposed you were getting at - but I was hoping you would confirm.

Yes, I said that - not the exact way that you did, but as we know, the lower the spin loft the more a ball is deformed - a ball is not really "compressed." It's deformed.

My bad. I lapsed into the vernacular there, didn't I?

[iacas]

Because I wrote what I supposed you were getting at - but I was hoping you would confirm.

Yes, grooves have a bigger effect vertically.

My bad. I lapsed into the vernacular there, didn't I?

Indeed. Deformation. :)