The Myth of Driving Distances

Just like most of you I watched parts of this year's Open Championship on tv, and again fell of my chair laughing at the golf pundits' comments concerning golf equipment. Unfortunately being expert in many areas of the game appears to give them the confidence to spout nonsense about things way beyond their ken.

I noted their concern over the fact that today's long hitters (McIlroy, Watson, Daley etc.) had turned many par 5s into a drive and a short iron to the green.

I also noted their 'solutions' which included insisting that drives be hit off the deck, and the size of driver heads reduced in order to reign in power.

Such comments are so idiotic that they do not warrant a reply. Unfortunately though I personally consider it useful to expose a few myths before new myths are created. I recall it taking almost three decades before P.A's. advice that a driver's centre of percussion ('sweet spot') was significantly above the centre of a driver's face started to significantly fade, as most golfers missed his retraction.

The entire golf club industry is sadly based on largely false golf marketing, namely that latest golf club models (woods and irons) enable golfers to hit further and more accurately than earlier generation models. However, few things in life are black and white and I should qualify my dismissal with a caveat, namely that with very low talent golfers modern clubs have made it easier to get the ball away. Arguably that, in itself, could potentially cause improvements to both.

But for the purpose of this epistle let's imagine that we are considering an average player playing off say 10. How about his/ her driving distances?

Let's take a look at what he/ she might be using for equipment say 50 years ago:

Likely as not his driver would have been 42-43" long, steel shaft, 220cc-230cc persimmon head of around 12 degrees, and either a leather or simple rubber golf grip. His golf glove would have been of better quality than most of today's gloves. Apart possibly from the steel shaft such reads like an almost perfect set up for most of today's golfers who tend to opt for too long drivers with not enough loft.

So, would that set up of yesteryear generate poorer results than say a modern graphite shafted driver of 42.50" and 12d. of loft?

Essentially no. And for many golfers their results would actually be better with 50 year old equipment. How can this be so when C.O.R. of modern driver faces is set at 83% compared with persimmon's 78%; the old heads were half the size of their modern counterparts; and modern drivers are lighter and shafts more flexible?

The true perspective of driving is that most of it is carried out not by world class experts securing every last piece of performance from their equipment but by every day weekend golfers struggling with the most demanding club in their golf bag.

One of the most difficult challenges is to catch the ball centre face. It is massively easier to catch a drive centre face on a small headed driver. Such is entirely opposite to what most assume to be the case. Standing behind a ball at address with a driver it is almost impossible to even line the ball up with centre face (due to the today's massive heads shrouding / masking the ball) let alone strike the ball centre face!

Striking centre face is key to securing significant distance and giant driver heads frustrate that intent. But yes they do allow a 'golfer' to miss centre face by say 2" and not be punished with an air shot. Most players have to pay a heavy price in order to boost the unjustly earned confidence of beginners.

So, the driver heads of yesteryear would enable most of today's competant players to play even better.

So, what about all of the advantages of graphite shafts - lighter, better energy return etc?

At first one may find it daunting to try to argue against potentially higher swing speeds. The fact remains however that most golfers do not require higher swing speed. If anything they need to slow down, swing better and strike the ball better. A heavier shaft supports that intent, and a steel shaft - because it flexes less than graphite, will assist in bringing the head in square rather than advanced or retarded by an over-flexed or under-flexed shaft. A principle used by all good iron players who almost to a man reject the use of graphite shafts for irons.

OK, all of that said let's consider golfing reality: Most golfers are optimists and believe that most of the time they will catch centre face and swing reasonably well. If such occurs which would they fare best with - a driver of yesterday or today's latest sparkling come on? A modern driver would win by a handful of yards. But not much.

The bottom line is are golfers prepared to be realistic about matching themselves properly to their equipment? In 99% of cases alas the answer is 'No.'

And what about irons? Broadly speaking if an expert compared two steel shafted irons of different generations of the same loft and length today's iron would not hit longer.

Finally, how can then return golf courses to a 'normal' length where most par 5s are a drive, three wood, followed by a puppy to the green?

The simplest and most effective way to do this, with negligible discomfort to short hitters, is to limit the compression of golf balls. How would this work?

Essentially 330-340 yard hitters like myself are reduced to 250 yards. A golfer who normally drives 250 yards might be reduced to say 230-235 yards by very low compression balls. They adversely affect everyone's distances but massively more so for big hitters.

To end, let me throw into the arena arguably the most radical concept of all, namely that today's very long / low lofted drivers are making golfers worse not better. The golf industry love that notion as it encourages replacement buys.

Such if life. At least golf life.

i liked your post, its interesting to note irons of two generations ago,the such that faldo would use,is remarkable, they were great shot makers,such talent! an average two iron was about 200 0r so yds, now people are managing this with say a 5 iron, its sad to see long irons being replaced by the utility woods, having said that it does give us amateurs a chance to reach long pars with a drive and a utility wood.