The "Ball Under a Foot of Water" Challenge

[MS256]

  Shorty said:

Not if you tried a thousand times.

Hate to post this because nobody will believe it but who gives a crap.

Last year I had a shot like that. Can't say for sure it was a foot deep because I didn't measure it but it was close to that.

I was going to try the shot and my son basically told me I was an idiot so I decided to take a drop.

After we were done with the hole I couldn't resist trying the shot and I got it on the green. I don't know if it was a 1 out of 1001 luck shot but I would say it wasn't far off of that.

I told my son "See I could have done it" and he just shook his head and walked off.

[Shorty]

  MS256 said:

Last year I had a shot like that. Can't say for sure it was a foot deep because I didn't measure it but it was close to that.

I can assure you that it wasn't a foot.

[MS256]

  Shorty said:

I can assure you that it wasn't a foot.

I'm sure you know but that's okay. I expected it.

[MS256]

For anybody crazy enough or curious enough to try it I can at least give you a tip (whether you believe me or not).

The way this guy goes about it has 0% chance. For any chance you have to position your hands ahead and chop straight down behind the ball as hard as you can with the club face vertical so the face isn't fighting through the water until it gets as low as it can go. More like splitting a log than swinging a golf club.

Have fun!

Ed: Moved from here .

[Shorty]

It is a physical impossibility.

It can't be done.

A couple of inches, yes. A foot  - not possible.

[Lihu]

We would need to calculate the drag force on the ball. It seems like the guy actually hit the ball, but the ball only shifted a couple inches. That could be the drag force on the ball retarding its forward movement. Maybe a lower lofted club could "hold" the ball better? The club would probably need to stay in contact with the ball until it exited the water? Seems really hard to do, but sports science did something with jello a few inches thick.

 

 

[Fourputt]

  On 11/12/2014 at 12:39 AM, Shorty said:

It is a physical impossibility.

It can't be done.

A couple of inches, yes. A foot  - not possible.

Expand  

Agreed.  Nobody will ever convince me that it's possible to hit a ball in a foot of water and make it go anywhere.  Just isn't possible.

[Ernest Jones]

  On 11/12/2014 at 6:52 PM, Fourputt said:

Agreed.  Nobody will ever convince me that it's possible to hit a ball in a foot of water and make it go anywhere.  Just isn't possible.

Expand  

Same here. I'm not even convinced that you get the club all the way through let alone with enough force to carry the ball out.

[iacas]

  Fourputt said:

Agreed.  Nobody will ever convince me that it's possible to hit a ball in a foot of water and make it go anywhere.  Just isn't possible.

Sorry, @MS256 , I don't even know if I believe you hit a ball out of 6 inches of water. Consider that a far more aerodynamic bullet traveling over 15 times faster can only penetrate water a few feet and you will begin to understand my skepticism. Never mind the loss of clubhead speed from entering the water as well.

[MS256]

  iacas said:

Sorry, @MS256, I don't even know if I believe you hit a ball out of 6 inches of water.

Consider that a far more aerodynamic bullet traveling over 15 times faster can only penetrate water a few feet and you will begin to understand my skepticism.

Never mind the loss of clubhead speed from entering the water as well.

That's alright. As I said from the start I didn't expect anybody to believe it. Pretty sure I wouldn't believe it myself if I wasn't there.

Maybe when the weather gets warmer I can see if I can do it again on video or something. I'm not even sure myself how many tries it might take.

[Jakester23]

  MS256 said:

That's alright. As I said from the start I didn't expect anybody to believe it. Pretty sure I wouldn't believe it myself if I wasn't there. Maybe when the weather gets warmer I can see if I can do it again on video or something. I'm not even sure myself how many tries it might take.

It was probably like 2 inches under water objects always look bigger under water. See all the fish I've caught especially ice fishing over thin clear ice. If it was fully submerged it impresses the hell out of me nice job.

[Ernest Jones]

  Jakester23 said:

Quote:

Originally Posted by MS256

That's alright. As I said from the start I didn't expect anybody to believe it. Pretty sure I wouldn't believe it myself if I wasn't there.

Maybe when the weather gets warmer I can see if I can do it again on video or something. I'm not even sure myself how many tries it might take.

It was probably like 2 inches under water objects always look bigger under water. See all the fish I've caught especially ice fishing over thin clear ice. If it was fully submerged it impresses the hell out of me nice job.

I could buy 2" on a lucky break. A foot? Not a snowball's chance in hell. I think you're onto something with the optic distortions of water, may have looked like a foot and it certainly makes for a better story.

[MS256]

  Jakester23 said:

It was probably like 2 inches under water objects always look bigger under water. See all the fish I've caught especially ice fishing over thin clear ice. If it was fully submerged it impresses the hell out of me nice job.

That theory is out. I carried around a tape measure on my belt for 36 years on the job and I'm pretty good at estimating distances.

The only two options are that I'm lying or it happened.

Funny thing is that I won't even say how far I hit a golf ball on the internet so nobody will think I'm lying but I slipped up here.

Should have just waited until next summer and tried it again.

[newtogolf]

I used to shoot fish with bow and arrow in streams and lakes.  Light diffraction makes it difficult just to know where you have to aim just to hit an object in the water.  Factor in the difficultly of getting something with as much mass as a club head to cut through the water with enough force to launch the ball out of 1 foot of water and you have an amazing if not near impossible shot for someone to make unless they've spent a significant amount of time practicing it.  Doing it on your first try without practice makes the story hard to believe but I hope you played the lottery that day cause you would have won.

[iacas]

  MS256 said:

That theory is out. I carried around a tape measure on my belt for 36 years on the job and I'm pretty good at estimating distances.

The only two options are that I'm lying or it happened.

Sorry, @MS256 , it's not us: physics says you're lying, because it didn't happen.

Did you read my post above about bullets? Remember too that a foot is the SHORTEST distance the ball could travel, and that's if it's going straight up. If you hit it on a 45° angle the ball is going through nearly 17" of water.

Pretty sure everyone here would gladly send you $10 each if you can demonstrate this. No tricks - we want to see a ball under 1 foot of water a few feet from the shore.

[jamo]

Some back-of-the-envelope math tells me that a golf ball has a maximum density of ~1129 kg/m3. Water, by contrast, is 1000 kg/m3. So golf balls do sink, but just barely, and pretty slowly. That is, the buoyant force very nearly balances out gravity. That means that whether a golf ball is moving vertically or horizontally or diagonally through water, it'll behave pretty much equally. Knowing this, we can devise a simple, quick, rough experiment to find out how far a golf ball, moving at a certain speed, can move through water. All you need to do is throw a golf ball downward into water and measure how deep it goes. Easiest way would be to fill a clear plastic bin to different heights with water. If you hear a thud, you've hit the bottom. Keep filling and throwing until you find the point where there's no thud. Or when you need Tommy John surgery. Obviously, there are some other simplifications. We're overlooking things like surface tension, lift, that density difference, etc. We're assuming you make great contact and can actually deliver some speed to the golf ball. (Let's assume that you can throw a golf ball 50 MPH. Even perfect contact with a wedge underwater is going to be well below that.) But it should give you a decent maximum barrier (with a FOS of probably around 1.5-3) for how far you could hit a golf ball underwater.

[Ernest Jones]

  MS256 said:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jakester23

It was probably like 2 inches under water objects always look bigger under water. See all the fish I've caught especially ice fishing over thin clear ice. If it was fully submerged it impresses the hell out of me nice job.

That theory is out. I carried around a tape measure on my belt for 36 years on the job and I'm pretty good at estimating distances.

The only two options are that I'm lying or it happened.

Funny thing is that I won't even say how far I hit a golf ball on the internet so nobody will think I'm lying but I slipped up here.

Should have just waited until next summer and tried it again.

There is a 3rd option. You blew the estimate because the optic distortion from the water threw you off. I don't care how long you carried a tape measure, unless you spent 36 years measuring submerged objects through a pane of water, that experience doesn't really translate all that well.

[MS256]

  iacas said:

Sorry, @MS256, it's not us: physics says you're lying, because it didn't happen.

LOL. But I was there.

  iacas said:

@MS256Pretty sure everyone here would gladly send you $10 each if you can demonstrate this. No tricks - we want to see a ball under 1 foot of water a few feet from the shore.

I hope that works out for me.