How to compress on wet fairways

[MiniJeffrey]

Oh yes, this time of year where fairways are wet, muddy and you ball goes actually into the fairway and doesn't roll an inch anymore. Your feet are sinking away in the grass as you walk towards your ball and you can just feel the water splashing everywhere.

Now, on these kind of fairways I am struggling A LOT to hit decent shots... With my irons I cant seem to have any normal distance. To me it feels like these soft fairways are absorbing all of the power and energy I try to give to the ball. I feel like there is no compression whatsoever possible. I lose 1-2 clubs in distance in these conditions (combined with little colder and windy). 

Is this normal? How do you play your shots under these conditions?

[SavvySwede]

The ball doesn't actually compress into the ground, very common myth. The ball being wet reduces potential spin and the ball can seem to fall out of the sky prematurely. Hitting the ball even the littlest bit fat exacerbates this issue. you'll want to get the low point of your swing further out in front of the ball to ensure cleaner and consistent contact.

[Patch]

When the fairays are wet, and unforgiving I usually take one less lofted club, choke down and contact the ball more on the thin side. This when using an iron. It's way too easy to hit a fatty off wet fairways. 

Also, with wet fairways, my 5 and 7 woods get more use than they normally would. They tend to not dig into the wet turf as much as an iron would. 

[Pretzel]

When fairways are wet it's important to make ball-first contact. As @SavvySwede mentioned, the golf ball does not compress into the ground ever, but it deforms against the clubface before springing back. The wet ball would reduce spin, and if your golf ball is muddy it can also reduce the distance the ball flies. 

Ensure you are hitting ball first, not ground first or ball and ground at the same time, and you should get distances that are at least in the ballpark of what you would otherwise get, less the distance reduced by the other factors.

[JonMA1]

5 hours ago, MiniJeffrey said:

Oh yes, this time of year where fairways are wet, muddy and you ball goes actually into the fairway and doesn't roll an inch anymore. Your feet are sinking away in the grass as you walk towards your ball and you can just feel the water splashing everywhere.

Now, on these kind of fairways I am struggling A LOT to hit decent shots... With my irons I cant seem to have any normal distance. To me it feels like these soft fairways are absorbing all of the power and energy I try to give to the ball. I feel like there is no compression whatsoever possible. I lose 1-2 clubs in distance in these conditions (combined with little colder and windy). 

Is this normal? How do you play your shots under these conditions?

Is there any chance the wet fairways are adversely affecting your footing? I have problems playing on very wet fairways as well and sometimes wonder if that might not be the cause.

[Club Rat]

9 minutes ago, JonMA1 said:

affecting your footing? 

I like flat sole golf shoes on saturated turf surfaces. When I used to play with traditional (raised heels) I often found weight displacement to the ball of the foot difficult due to the heel sinking into the sponge turf. Wearing Zero Height shoes (True) and similar soft spikes shoes helped maintain a better platform and better footwork.

The problem I was having when the heel pad would sink, my weight would get stuck on the heel of foot on soft wet dormant turf during my swing sometimes.

[inthehole]

If you hit ball first, wet doesn't matter.    Playing on wet fairways is like a test - you can get away with catching a little turf BEFORE that ball on nice dry fairways, but on a soggy wet fairway, you'll know immediately if you catch it just a little fat - goes nowhere.     I love playing on wet fairways - it tells me how good or bad my ball striking is ... forces you to catch ball first ...

[TN94z]

8 minutes ago, inthehole said:

If you hit ball first, wet doesn't matter.    Playing on wet fairways is like a test - you can get away with catching a little turf BEFORE that ball on nice dry fairways, but on a soggy wet fairway, you'll know immediately if you catch it just a little fat - goes nowhere.     I love playing on wet fairways - it tells me how good or bad my ball striking is ... forces you to catch ball first ...

I have always thought it was a good test as well. With the swing flaws I have faced, the wet fairways would just destroy any chances I had of scoring close to my dry fairway days.

[MiniJeffrey]

Been analyzing a bit and it does seem that when distance is nog 100% but like 80-90% I do seem to hit it just a fraction fat I think. It's really millimeters but I guess with these kind of conditions even a millimeter causes distance loss. So I started looking why I'm hitting a bit fat, for me it could be a little to steep swing and the ball being a fraction foward in my stance.

 

So will be working on that in the next couple of sessions.