My Favorite Clubfitting Christmas Present...

My youngest son David (a bomber, about 115 mph swing speed who I am fitting for a new driver this weekend) bought me a wonderful new tool for my fitting business - a USB microscope. Many of my clubfitting friends are now using this to show their friends and customers how they can improve their wedge games by getting the right kinds of wedges in their bags.

The picture I show in this blog post is a USB microscope picture of the face of a Wishon PCF Micro wedge face. Notice how sharp the groove edges are and also notice the rough wedge face as the result of the CNC milling that has been done to the face. Wedges with these kinds of grooves and milled faces can help players to easily spin the ball and stop it quickly on short wedge shots - even from lies in the rough. One of my good friends has SMT Durometer wedges with these kinds of grooves and faces, and I have seen him stop 30 yard wedge shots from the rough with only a few feet of roll (again taking money out of my pocket by making par!).

I am looking forward to using this new tool a lot over the coming months to show golfers what some of the improvement opportunities are available for them by getting the right kinds of wedges in their bags. If you are at my Centenial golf fitting center some Saturday in the near future (or want to make an appointment) let me take a picture of your wedge faces and see if they look like the face shown above.

Happy New Year!

Tony

REMAX Long Drive - The BIG Bombers!

I look forward to Christmas each year for a lot of reasons, but one of the more fun ones is the opportunity to watch the REMAX Long Drive Championships on ESPN. This year the REMAX is on ESPN at two different times:

December 24, 3 pm Eastern on ESPN

December 25, 2 pm Eastern on ESPN


If you have never watched this show, treat yourself. These guys absolutely nuke the ball. I think the winning drive this year (actualy finals were I think sometime in September) was over 400 yards.


I enjoy playing back the video of the contestents in slow motion and watching two things in addition to the sheer power they display:

The beautiful BALANCE each of the contestants have in their swings, and

The LATE RELEASE of the wrist cock that they have which helps them to maintain their
clubhead speed. Usually very close to 6 o'clock release.


Besides the brute force and strength of the contestants, there is also a lot of technology involved in hitting the golf ball the distances these guys hit it. All of these bombers are using Launch Monitor data to help them optimize their distance - this includes working to optimize launch angle and ball spin to get best combination of carry and roll for their swing speeds. And working to find the right combination of driver head and loft and shaft to allow them to achieve these optimized conditions. In this sense, they are like all of us mere mortals who are looking to hit their drivers a little farther.


What a way to spend part of your Christmas holiday - I strongly recommend it!


Tony

Thank you Stuart Appleby!!

I received my January 2009 issue of Golf Magazine a week or so ago, and on page 105 there was a "Here's What I Play" article on the clubs that Stuart Appleby plays. Pretty good player, no?


Well, the article says the following things....

1. Stuart plays a driver that is 44-1/4 inches long.

2. Stuart uses a 15 degree 3 wood....hits it 260 yards the article says.


The article confirms something you will see on other parts of my site....that driver lengths played by the pros are a lot shorter than the 45-1/2 to 46 inch drivers you will by at your local golf store. I am certain that he plays this length driver because it is the length that he gets the best most consistent impact with.

The other interesting fact was that he plays a 15 degree 3 wood. And he bombs it, 260 yards. We mere mortals would do well to imitate his choice of 3 wood loft. At the very least, when you purchase your next 3 wood you should ask what the loft on the club is, and think seriously of playing with a 3 wood of at least 15 degrees of loft.

I have also recently seen some pictures of Anthony Kim hitting his driver....he chokes down 2 inches from the butt of his driver, and says that he gets more consistent driver contact that way.

So I suggest that you do the following sometime this winter season....

1. Make a "wrist to floor" measurement for yourself....make this measurement by standing upright with your feet together, and measure distance - for a right handed player - from the floor to the lifeline where your wrist bends. If you do this and send a reply to this blog with the measurement, I will provide you with a first estimate of what your best driver length should be.

2. Look at the bottom of your present 3 wood and see what the loft is. And then ask yourself if believe you get the ball in the air well with this 3 wood. If the loft is 13 degrees or less, and you do not get the ball in the air, maybe you should consider treating yourself to a 3 wood that will help you achieve better results.

So thanks Stuart!

Tony Wright

Get A Grip And MORE!!

Wintertime is often the time when many people get their clubs regripped. Certainly if you play golf at least once a week a yearly regripping is good practice - having a good hold on your golf clubs is important to hitting good golf shots. And even if you do not play a lot of golf, playing with clubs that have good grips is a good investment.

I love regripping clubs because I often take the opportunity to determine club specifications when I regrip them. I can determine club weights, lengths, swingweights, butt flexes, lofts, and lie angles when I regrip clubs. Often - more often than not - I learn things about a client's golf clubs that can ultimately help their golf games. Some examples are club flexes either much higher or lower than expected, clubs that are not the right length, and clubs that have lower or higher lofts than expected.

I believe that everyone who is in any way serious about their golf game deserves to know the specs of their tools.

So, I make this offer to you reading this post........if you come to me to get your clubs regripped during the winter months, in addition to regripping them I will determine key club specifications and let you know the results! All you have to do is let me know you read this blog post.....

Tony

Game Improvement Golf site now LIVE!

10 pm, December 4, 2008 - welcome to my web site. I hope you will find information on this site and on this blog that is of interest and can help you to play golf clubs that really fit your golf game.

More later! Tony

Game Improvement Golf web site operational!

Well, as of about 10 pm on December 4, 2008 this site is now real. I am looking forward to an ongoing conversation with people interested in how precision clubfitting can improve your golf game. At least weekly I plan to post discussions on clubfitting topics, information of interest to golfers on golf club specifications, and hopefully general information of value to help golfers get the right golf clubs in your hands.

Tom Wishon, one of the gurus of clubfitting and a maker of excellent golf club components, has written a number of excellent books related to the realities of clubfitting. One of these is "The Search for the Perfect Golf Club." If you are interested in me emailing you an ebook - "12 Myths That Could Wreck Your Golf Game" - please either send me a direct email or go to the Contact Me portion of my site and send a request for this.

Tony

Getting comfortable with posting to blog...

Well, my Game Improvement Golf web site is getting close to launch, and so I thought I had better start learning how to use this blog capability! I am hoping to convey useful information about clubfitting and clubmaking through this blog.

Tony