Golf Reviews

Most often , making fine pitch shots is a matter of being aware of the ball’s lie situation and hitting it accordingly. You won’t have to change much of anything in your stance or stroke, just attempt to make good contact with the ball.

Check the lie carefully before your pitch shot . Then, try some practice swings in similar conditions, somewhere away from the ball. There are 3 situations in which your ball will likely lie. The first is the ball is sitting in an up position on top of the grass. The second is when the ball is sitting in a low rough. And 3rd is when the ball is lying in a deep rough. Let’s describe what to do in each situation.

Ball is sitting up -This is where the ball is sitting on top of the grass. Keep your stance the same , and play the ball mid way between your feet. Here your swing will bottom out under your ball.

Ball is sitting is sitting in low rough - In this case, you will position the ball off your back foot. You want your shaft to lean toward your target, so you want to set your hands in front of the club head. You want to get a good solid hit on the ball, not the turf .

Ball is in a deep rough - Place the ball nearer your front foot. Now, keep your hands forward of the club head, and swing at a spot beneath the ball. If the grass is extremely thick, you will want to open the club face in your hands because the thick grass will try to close it . Not opening the face before swinging will result in a shot that is pulled low and left .

It’s best to have 3 wedges for these types of shots , pitching, auxiliary and lob. Golf clubs of this type can be purchased from pro shops and online retailers who offer discount golf clubs and clone golf clubs.

Irons are the most expensive part of your equipment and a new set of irons is difficult to justify . Getting new irons isn’t as exciting as buying a new driver . However, if your golf irons are five or six years old, they are missing some of the latest technology advances.

The most popular advancement in golf clubs is that manufacturing processes have improved in use of materials . Manufacturers can now make irons of multiple materials rather than just steel. Titanium is 42 percent lighter than steel, and tungsten is more than two times heavier than steel. Use of those materials assists in optimizing the center of gravity. The lower and deeper the CG, the higher the ball launches. Therefore, companies can offer stronger lofts without sacrificing trajectory. Think of a ball coming off at a 7-iron launch angle but with 6-iron ball speed.

The ability to cast faces of less than two millimeters thick is another recent technological leap . The thinness promotes faster ball speeds across a larger area of the face. It also frees weight that can be moved to the perimeter to increase forgiveness by as much as 20 percent. Probably most important, the ability to cast this type of design advances mass production, which lowers the cost to the consuming golfer .

Manufacturers have also improved the way they study club-turf interaction. Using advanced computer simulations, designers can more accurately measure the drag forces of a design as it rotates on an arc through turf at a given speed. As a result, an iron’s recessed areas can be shaped to make it play like a wide-sole iron but not feel like one.

Feel is another area that designers have been able to improve. Companies now have the equipment to study the different sound waves emitted by an iron as it impacts a ball at various points on the face. Engineers can then design dampening inserts and stiffening ribs to make it sound better.

Another improvement is in set makeup. Set design has progressed with hybrids replacing long irons and even full-hybrid sets.

To translate all these advancements golf equipment into added yards or improved scores would be impossible. But the improvements that have come along in the last five years are very significant.

The loft and lie of a golf club are often misunderstood specifications . They can be difficult to explain without pictures , but we will keep it simple and use some basic descriptions that will help to you understand .

Loft: To start, think of a golf club in your hands, sitting flat on the floor in a playing position. Then think of a vertical straight line coming up from the center of the club face an extends upward to the sky. The club face tilts backward to give the ball a high trajectory when it is struck. The angle between the imaginary vertical line that we envisioned and the club face is called the “loft”.

Golf clubs have different degrees of loft, lower angles for the longer clubs and getting progressively larger for the shorter clubs. For example, the typical driver loft is normally 9 degrees to 12 degrees depending on how high you want to hit your drives. The 3-iron typically has 20 degrees of loft, the 5-iron has 25 degrees, the 7-iron has 32 degrees, the 9-iron has 41 degrees, and increasing in  the wedges. The lob wedge will have the most loft at 60 degrees. So, we see that the shorter clubs have the most loft to allow hitting the ball higher with additional spin .

Lie: Again, we need to envision a golf club in your hands, sitting flat on the floor in a playing position . If the bottom of the club is contacting the floor at a point that is directly under the center of the club face, it is sitting in a proper playing position for you. In that playing position , the angle between the centerline of the club shaft and the floor (between your feet) is called the “lie”. If the toe of the club head (the end farthest away from you) is pointed upward, the contact point between the club and floor will be nearer the heal of the club (the end of the club head nearest your feet). That position is not correct for you and will result in shots that will travel to the left or hook left (assuming you are right handed). In this case, you would require a lie angle adjustment (bending) that would lower the lie angle by 1 to 5 degrees, depending on the amount of hook you hit .

Conversely, if the lie angle is too flat ( meaning the bottom of the club is contacting the floor nearer the toe), your shots will have a tendency to fly to the right or fade (again, assuming your right handed).

Conclusion: If your golf clubs do not sit perfectly flat , contacting the floor at the vertical centerline of the face, you may need to take them to a pro to have them adjusted. It should be noted that the present day stainless steel cast irons can only be safely bent a maximum of 3 degrees. Forged clubs can be bent up to 5 degrees. It should also be noted that it is almost impossible to bend drivers or fairway woods. It’s a difficult task that normally leaves dents and marks on the head.

Golf irons age and must be replaced after continued use. Perhaps you’ve outgrown them or there useful live is history. While purchasing new ones there are four important considerations to be sure to get the best clubs for your game.

1. Clubhead
The clubhead style can make a big difference in how well you strike the golf ball. There are two main types of clubhead styles, cavity back perimeter weighted and traditional blades. Perimeter weighted golf irons are more forgiving . What you sacrifice for this forgiveness is the ability to work the ball left and right with as much ease as the blade style . Most mid to high handicappers use this style of clubhead, although you do see them in some pros bags.

Forged style blades usually have an extremely small clubhead and a much smaller sweet spot. The advantage is that you can hit any shot with a blade style club . When you hit it dead center in the sweet spot you barely feel it . It’s a great feeling. Low handicappers and pros usually use this style of club .

2. Type of Shaft
This is normally a very easy decision. The two main choices are steel or graphite. There are some other exotic metals and nano fibers available but we are only dealing with the two most popular shafts . Graphite shafts have a slightly softer feel which is great for anybody that has bad wrists or elbows because they offset the vibration that is sent up the shaft and into your arms. Steel shafts give more feedback on how well you struck the shot and are more durable .

3. Flex of the Shaft
Shafts come in 4 basic flexes, regular, stiff, senior and lady. Your pro shop can determine your swing speed and suggest the proper shaft flex . The flex that is right for you will be so for steel or graphite material. Having the proper flex shafts is most important to your game.

4. What kind of grip
An often overlooked component of your new irons are the golf grips. There are many different types of material and sizes that can be installed. Some grips use space age polymers to give the grip a soft and mushy feel. Other grips are coarse with woven cord material throughout. Jumbo size grips are great for people with larger hands or arthritis. Keep these four points in mind when choosing your new golf clubs. Getting the correct golf equipment will help you shoot lower scores and increase your enjoyment.

Any golfer , including the professionals, has difficult times related to the longer irons . The old saying “the longer the club, the harder it is to hit” has been true since the beginning of golf time. Any golfer struggles to make clean contact with low numbered irons and to get the right direction . It is just common sense that the greater the distance between your hands and the club head the more difficult it is to make it do what you want. Think about the difference in control of a one foot long club and a ten foot long club. That is a gross exaggeration, but it illustrates the point.

If you go to PGA events , or watch them on TV, you will notice that many of the pros carry 1 or 2 hybrid irons. They want that extra advantage by replacing some long iron shots. Lee Trevino said it best when he said “in a thunderstorm, I hold a 1-iron over my head because even God can’t hit a 1-iron”.

Hybrid irons are built on iron shafts, at iron shaft lengths, but have heads that are a cross between an iron and a wood. That design provides the best in ball striking advantage. Hybrids are now being offered by many manufacturers in clubs from the #1 to the pitching wedge. These full sets of hybrids can be a great improvement for golfers, especially the ladies, who have difficulty in making clean contact with standard irons.

So, if you have not tried a hybrid yet, it is a good idea to start with a #2 or #3. Give it an honest effort with a hybrid from a supplier of discount golf clubs and you will see that it is easier to hit than the comparable standard iron. If the first one works out for you, consider replacing other long irons that may be causing you trouble.

Golfers often ask which golf iron style is best , cavity back or blade. The cavity back style has pros and cons . It has many fans who want and need them , and those that don’t require them.

The choice should not be made by what is popular in the clubhouse or with your friends, since that type may not fit your game. It’s most important to find what’s right for you.

Cavity backs have grown popular for good reason . The cavity back style has material hollowed out from the center of the back of its clubface, producing a cavity. Removing the metal at that location re-distributes the clubhead’s weight around the edges of the clubface, fathest away from the center of gravity (which should be the center of the club head).

This weight re-distribution creates a much more forgiving iron, with a larger sweet spot. A mis-hit with a cavity back is more likely to be a better shot than a similar shot with a blade style club . Why ? Because the cavity back twists less in the golfer’s hands when the ball is mis-hit. A mis-hit with a cavity back is also more likely to travel farther than with a blade style .

Cavity backs are “game improvement” clubs , offering features like the oversize head to assist playing better . Players with high and mid golf handicaps prefer cavity backs, although some low handicappers and touring pros use them .

Blade irons are not as popular as cavity backs. A blade iron features a solid, fairly flat, clubface back, distributing the weight more evenly across the clubface . Consequently a blade has a much smaller sweet spot than a cavity back. A blade is also much less forgiving than a cavity back because it twists more on mis-hits.

Distributing the weight evenly across the clubface, however, creates an iron with better control and more feel. These irons need to be hit nearly perfectly, though, to avoid a bad shot. Thus, it takes a lot of practice and experience to hit these irons well.

The blade iron is known as a more traditional iron. Players with low golf handicaps and touring pros prefer the blade style golf clubs because the added control and feel enables them to shape their shots better–a necessity when playing on challenging courses.

Manufacturers of golf irons make cavity backs and blades in cast and forged versions . The terms “cast” and “forged” refer to the manufacturing process used to form the iron head’s shape.

Casting turns the metal from which the iron head is made into a molten liquid, which is then poured into a mold to form the iron head. It’s then left to cool and solidifiy.

Forging requires hammering or compressing the metal, in it’s solid form, from which the iron head is made into the desired shape. Other machining complete production.

The manufacturing process has no impact on the iron’s capabilities. If you have two irons, one forged and one cast, of exactly the same shape, with the same center of gravity, same loft, same lie, hitting the same ball, and so on, the shots will travel the same distances 99 percent of the time. And the players won’t know which iron head is cast and which forged.

You need to go to a supplier of discount golf clubs to find the iron style that best fits your game. If you’re a less experienced golfer, the cavity back is probably a wiser choice, since you’re more likely to mis-hit a ball. If you’re a more experienced player, then a blade is probably your best choice, since it provides more control and better feel for shaping shots.

The best way of choosing a style that fits your needs is to test it out. Hit a few balls with each style. If one style feels better than another does, and you have confidence in it, that’s the style that’s right for you.