30 yard drive distance increase overnight? Did this ever happened to you?

[colin007]

For me, there's a huge difference when I actually hit the sweet spot. On that rare occasion the ball will go easily 30 yards farther.

BTW totally jelly over the roll y'all get. I'm lucky if I get 2 yards. Lots of times the ball is behind the pitch mark. Really soft dirt here that just takes all the roll out.

[Lihu]

50 minutes ago, colin007 said:

For me, there's a huge difference when I actually hit the sweet spot. On that rare occasion the ball will go easily 30 yards farther.

BTW totally jelly over the roll y'all get. I'm lucky if I get 2 yards. Lots of times the ball is behind the pitch mark. Really soft dirt here that just takes all the roll out.

Yes, quite a bit of difference.

[Dave2512]

It's crazy how hard it can be to hit driver. Huge face and amateurs are all over it.

I played behind some kids yesterday that didn't hit one good drive. Missed all over the place. It was like they had no game plan just hit and chase. Of course it left them difficult approaches. Just a barrage of doubles or worse. Playing the tips like idiots. Always looking for errant shots 40-50 yards further than where they found the balls. 

[Lihu]

46 minutes ago, Dave2512 said:

It's crazy how hard it can be to hit driver. Huge face and amateurs are all over it.

I played behind some kids yesterday that didn't hit one good drive. Missed all over the place. It was like they had no game plan just hit and chase. Of course it left them difficult approaches. Just a barrage of doubles or worse. Playing the tips like idiots. Always looking for errant shots 40-50 yards further than where they found the balls. 

Totally agree, and if you average a 1" hitting area over the face which is really tight then you can carry roughly 226 yards on average with a 100mph swing speed.

[saevel25]

To answer the original, yep when I switched to Taylormade drivers. THE HYPE IS REAL!!!  (sarcasm) 
 

56 minutes ago, Dave2512 said:

It's crazy how hard it can be to hit driver. Huge face and amateurs are all over it.

I played behind some kids yesterday that didn't hit one good drive. Missed all over the place. It was like they had no game plan just hit and chase. Of course it left them difficult approaches. Just a barrage of doubles or worse. Playing the tips like idiots. Always looking for errant shots 40-50 yards further than where they found the balls. 

 

@iacas, mentioned this to me once. The fact that if you have a very extreme swing path then you are decreasing the effective size of the sweet spot because it's such a glancing blow. 

Imagine you are holding a golf ball. Now take a small square object and just move it straight at the ball. It looks like you can't miss it. Now come at an angle. Now there is so much timing required to find the middle of that clubface. 

I would relate it to capture speed. Except maybe call it effective hitting area related to the angle in which the club is moving into the ball. 

1 hour ago, Lihu said:

Yes, quite a bit of difference.

It's getting much better. Given the exact CG sweet spot hit is the best.  I hit a few that were a good 1/4" an inch off center and the ball still maintained a good amount of speed. Yea extreme toe and heel shots are bad. 

 

[SavvySwede]

2 hours ago, Lihu said:

Yes, quite a bit of difference.

Hate to be that guy again but I highly doubt this info-graphic is correct (maybe for a persimmon.)

For one, toe hits are less penalizing than heel hits. And the web site this info-graphic came from claimed hits high on the face are even worse(also wrong) .

[Dave2512]

Seems the struggle for many is they try to hit the ball rather than swing through it and let the club do the work. You see a lot of guys take good looking practice swings then do some weird contortions when they hit the shot. 

I have to remind myself not to over swing driver. Just leads to a slower out of sequence swing for me. When it's windy and I try to keep it low with driver punch shots my contact is better and I keep the ball in position. It's silly given how bad I drive it you'd think I'd remember to not get all jerky on nicer days. Maybe that should be my driver swing thought, pretend it's windy. Really need to video what that looks like. Feels like I am doing the old man half swing probably doesn't look that way.,

[Lihu]

2 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

It's getting much better. Given the exact CG sweet spot hit is the best.  I hit a few that were a good 1/4" an inch off center and the ball still maintained a good amount of speed. Yea extreme toe and heel shots are bad.

Not even extreme toe and heel hits, I'm talking about the typical off center of 1/2" to 3/4". You can lose 30 yards easily.

[bubble]

happened at lot.

just right in the lag and ball. kept the wrist armed well, dragged the wing, didn't hit with hands, no release ever. hit the sweet spot. huge carry. about 50 meters all day farther than the group.

 

but then the next days are there. very handsy. poor contact. want to hit it. poor coil, poor positions etc. back to 250 yards at most. miss green a lot. poor short game and putting for the same reasons that reason can't make me do it right.  

[Braivo]

41 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

To answer the original, yep when I switched to Taylormade drivers. THE HYPE IS REAL!!!  (sarcasm) 
 

 

@iacas, mentioned this to me once. The fact that if you have a very extreme swing path then you are decreasing the effective size of the sweet spot because it's such a glancing blow. 

Imagine you are holding a golf ball. Now take a small square object and just move it straight at the ball. It looks like you can't miss it. Now come at an angle. Now there is so much timing required to find the middle of that clubface. 

I would relate it to capture speed. Except maybe call it effective hitting area related to the angle in which the club is moving into the ball. 

It's getting much better. Given the exact CG sweet spot hit is the best.  I hit a few that were a good 1/4" an inch off center and the ball still maintained a good amount of speed. Yea extreme toe and heel shots are bad. 

 

This is a great visual. You give yourself the best chance at a good shot when the "window" to hit the sweet spot is as big as possible. Well said. 

[saevel25]

26 minutes ago, Lihu said:

Not even extreme toe and heel hits, I'm talking about the typical off center of 1/2" to 3/4". You can lose 30 yards easily.

I'm not buying it. It's not what I've seen in my personal experience. Yesterday I was easily hitting the ball a good 1/2 - 3/4 inch off center (toe side) and the ball speed was maintained pretty well. 

I would say heel side hits would see loss of speed more so than toe-side. 

That is why the actual best place to hit the ball is usually slight above center and slightly towards the toe. You get higher smash factor, slightly higher launch angle and slightly lower spin rates. 

The only big difference I am seeing is at heel strikes. That is yardage death on a driver. High isn't too bad because you actually get closer to optimal launch conditions (higher launch, lower spin). So that helps counter the loss in smash factor. 

 

[SavvySwede]

If you look at this image for the M1 driver you can see how far out the COR is maintained. The outermost yellow ring is .800 COR)

[Ernest Jones]

On February 18, 2016 at 2:33 PM, Dave2512 said:

I am not the best example because I really, and I mean REALLY struggled with driving last year. My GG SG stats show me to be better than my handicap in every category but driving. So no it's more than hitting an occasional tree or something. I sky drives miss both directions hit weird weak drives that just seem to die.

I could never hit driver and probably score better because my average driving distance is disproportionate to every other club. But I continue to hit it because the days that aren't horrendous driving days are really good. My best driving days last year were good enough I stood a chance to post under par rounds and those weren't magical or anything I just didn't hit any OB or excessively short.

I typically only hit driver 11 times a round. If I could improve 9 of those to just be playable in the 240-260 range with a shot and nGIR I'd drop 3-5 strokes a round. I don't need more distance I just need a more consistent range. When I sky two drives a round that leave me 250 out on a par 4 it's tough to score well.

Sounds like me. My driving is abysmal, so on days where it clicks, I can easily see a 30y increase. I can score much better by hitting a hybrid off the tee but I keep pulling out the 3w and driver because they're tons of fun when they're clicking. 

[Lihu]

15 minutes ago, Ernest Jones said:

Sounds like me. My driving is abysmal, so on days where it clicks, I can easily see a 30y increase. I can score much better by hitting a hybrid off the tee but I keep pulling out the 3w and driver because they're tons of fun when they're clicking. 

You're in the same group with a lot of other golfers. Even though it's being disputed*** as to why, I'm sure hitting over the face is one of the factors along with the swing just not "clicking" right.

 

***Not going to get into marketing hype of the latest driver technology.

[Ernest Jones]

1 minute ago, Lihu said:

You're in the same group with a lot of other golfers. Even though it's being disputed as to why, I'm sure hitting over the face is one of the factors along with nothing really clicking right.

I've been using my RBZ 3w off the tee. My last simulator round I had a 160y differential between my worst and best drive. Lol. 108 yard drive and a 268 yard drive. 

[saevel25]

2 minutes ago, Lihu said:

***Not going to get into marketing hype of the latest driver technology.

Not really hype. It's measured numbers. If COR is maintained further from the center then the ball speed is maintained. Ball speed maintained = maintained distance. 

Lack of distance is probably more to do with an extreme path to face angle. Some days you might find it easier to sync those up than others. 

Driver's today are getting thinner and thinner on the edges, to the point most companies have made the center of the face thicker to compensate for the COR limit by the USGA.

[Lihu]

6 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

Not really hype. It's measured numbers. If COR is maintained further from the center then the ball speed is maintained. Ball speed maintained = maintained distance. 

Lack of distance is probably more to do with an extreme path to face angle. Some days you might find it easier to sync those up than others. 

Driver's today are getting thinner and thinner on the edges, to the point most companies have made the center of the face thicker to compensate for the COR limit by the USGA.

I do admit that the simulator shots I took with the M1 were better on average than my Ping i25 driver, but it wasn't even close to 30 yards difference. I thought it was mainly just the shaft was fit better for me, but maybe not?

[saevel25]

2 minutes ago, Lihu said:

I do admit that the simulator shots I took with the M1 were better on average than my Ping i25 driver, but it wasn't even close to 30 yards difference. I thought it was mainly just the shaft was fit better for me, but maybe not?

The shaft would have very little to do with ball speed on off center hits.