Where Have All The Distance Gains Gone

[JESII]

No Mike, you cannot...you need to go work on your chipping...with any era club you would like...




oh, one more thing...I guarantee you will chip, pitch and all that stuff significantly better with the old stuff than with the new...guarantee!

[Mike_Cirba]

No Mike, you cannot...you need to go work on your chipping...with any era club you would like...




oh, one more thing...I guarantee you will chip, pitch and all that stuff significantly better with the old stuff than with the new...guarantee!

Damn you Sullivan!

Here I thought I was right on the cusp of a golf-game breakthrough I could simply buy, but you have to hit me with that splash of icy water!  

Ok...I'm going out to buy a shovel and rake.   They might be the only implements that could help my chipping.  

[Jim Nugent]

Good research Jim...one thing...you have your column headers backwards.

Thanks Sully.  Made the correction.  

Mike -- one look at guys like Wadkins or Stadler and their intense workout regimes are obvious.  Whoever says golfers aren't athletes is nuts!  

[Garland Bayley]

...
I'm actually talking about a change to the way shafts are made, not the ball, so the ODS standard wouldn't even enter into it.  Imagine a shaft that behaved something like a bullwhip, but tuned to your specific swing so that it got its "whip" at the right time and place.
...

Doug,

Shaft "whip" is an urban legend.

[Paul_Turner]

Doug

I'm not just considering the last 10 years and I'm including shafts as improvements to the "driver".

The gain since the new ball was widely adopted, for the average tour pro, is about 15 yards.  This coincided with improvements in the driver most notably the spring like effect (SLE).  So the 15 yard gain is not solely due to the ball.  There other factors and it's a reasonable estimate that the solid ball has added about 10 yards to the average tour pro.  

[JESII]

...
I'm actually talking about a change to the way shafts are made, not the ball, so the ODS standard wouldn't even enter into it.  Imagine a shaft that behaved something like a bullwhip, but tuned to your specific swing so that it got its "whip" at the right time and place.
...

Doug,

Shaft "whip" is an urban legend.

Urban Legend? Please explain...

[Garland Bayley]

Sully,

A usable shaft for golf is too stiff to flex back and "kick" through to add distance to a shot. To make one flexible enough to exhibit any usable such characteristic would render it pretty much unusable (think trying to hit a ball with a head at the end of a bull whip). The golf industry has for years been misleading the public by selling slower swingers more flexible shafts so they would "kick" the ball farther. The real explanation is that a more flexible shaft allows the centrifugal force on the club head to bend the shaft forward giving more effective loft to the club and allowing them to get the ball airborne easier and to fly farther. The flex is caused by the center of gravity being behind the shaft and the centrifugal force trying to bring it in line with the shaft.

[JESII]

Garland,

Are you telling me that the only difference between a XX flex and an R flex is the loft at impact?

[Bryan Izatt]

The seniors are also hitting the ball miles further than they did when they were flat bellies 25 years younger.  Suggests to me that equipment accounts for all or nearly all the distance gains among the pro's.  

My sense is that fitness hardly affects distance at all.  A golf swing is not much about that.  Fitness can help golfers in other important ways.  But distance?  Mostly indirectly.

Check out Jim Dent or Fuzzy Zoeller from 1980 to today.  About the same distance - not miles further.  Mucci taught me this - technology offsets aging.

Fitness encompasses strength as well as aerobics.  Strength helps distance.

Average length on the Champions Tour now is as long as the longest driver on the PGA Tour was in 1980.  i.e. the average old-timer hits the ball as far as the longest driver on tour did 27 years ago.  

I checked the top 10 money winners on the Champions Tour.  They averaged 22.6 yards longer in 2007 than they did in 1980, when they played on the PGA Tour.
 
A few examples of them and other seniors:

Player           2007  1980
Purtzer         298    269
Stadler         289    266
Fergus          288    268
Morgan         286    256
Mast            287    258
Jacobs         283    276
B. Wadkins    282    258
Thorpe         281    268
Bean           280    265
Kite            277    253
T. Watson    279    266
Haas            277    254
Weibring       276    245
O'Meara        275    253
Irwin            270    250

Of the 30 or so golfers I checked, I only saw one who does not hit the ball further now.  Jim Dent.  He averaged 267 in 1980, now he averages 265.  Jim is nearly 70 years old.  Fuzzy averaged a little more at 56 than he did at 29.  

These guys are much older, weaker and less flexible than they were in the prime of their PGA Tour careers.  From what I've seen on TV, their swings look much shorter.  Yet they hit the ball around 20 yards longer, on average.  

Maybe the course setups are drastically easier, so they can swing away with carefree abandon.  If not, seems to me these distance gains have come from technology.    
 

Who would've guessed that I could randomly pick the two players who didn't change much.  

The original chart showed that the average tour pro (presumably in their fitness prime in each era) gained 30 yards from 1980 to 2007.  Some or much of it from technology - ball, shaft, clubheads.  Some of it likely from fitness and agronomy.

Looking at your numbers above it looks like your smaller sample set indicates an average 22 yard gain for the same golfer despite having aged 27 years.  So, the senior tour guys got almost as much out of the technology gains as did the regular tour flatbellies.  Maybe the difference from 22 yards to 30 has to do with fitness and strength, which is affected by age.

Notwithstanding the tour calling players old at 50, I suspect that real physical deterioration and loss of distance doesn't occur until somewhat later in life than 50.  Maybe after 60 or 65, depending on the person.  So maybe it's not really surprising that the senior tour players have gained length.  Most all in your list are mid fifties to early 60's, what I'd personally still like to consider the prime of life.

[Garland Bayley]

Garland,

Are you telling me that the only difference between a XX flex and an R flex is the loft at impact?

The industry would tell you that the R flex allows the slower swinger to feel the club head better at the top of the back swing. I don't know if anyone has tried to prove or disprove that one. I am a skeptic.

When it comes to the topic of "kick" that is the only significant difference.

[Garland Bayley]

...Maybe the difference from 22 yards to 30 has to do with fitness and strength, which is affected by age.
...

I sure hope you aren't using that to support your workout hypothesis.

[Steve Kline]

In an article posted yesterday at ESPN.com Tiger says that he regularly hits persimmon drivers and balatas on the range and that if it were up to him everyone switch back to that equipment - probably because he knows beat everyone by even more shots with that equipment.

BTW - that article is one of the most interesting on Tiger I have ever read.

[Chuck Brown]

In an article posted yesterday at ESPN.com Tiger says that he regularly hits persimmon drivers and balatas on the range and that if it were up to him everyone switch back to that equipment - probably because he knows beat everyone by even more shots with that equipment.

BTW - that article is one of the most interesting on Tiger I have ever read.

Steve - As with all things golf, the conversation inevitably turns to Tiger Woods.  He's something of an outlier for most purposes.  Frankly, I don't believe him when he casually says that he'd like to go back to persimmon and balata in tournament play.  I do believe that he loves the sound, just like anybody else who became proficient with clubs of that era.  He is one of the few people in the USA who gets to enjoy the clack-clack of his metal spikes on sidewalks these days.  He probably likes that, too.
If Tiger Woods is pining for retro equipment, and he may be, I think that one of the major reasons is that he'd almost certainly be EVEN MORE DOMINANT than he is now, if all drivers had steel shafts at 43.5" and if all balls spun more.

Did Tiger ever win a national championship of any kind, even as an amateur, with a persimmon driver?  Certainly, he started out with persimmon, or a laminated driver.  But I am quite certain that every one of his U.S. Amateurs was won with a metal driver (the last one being a King Cobra Deep Face head and a 126g Dynamic Gold X100 shaft at 43.5") and metal 3-woods.  I don't recall what he used to win his three USGA junior titles.  Maybe one or two of those were won with a wood driver.

Anyway, I do think that if Tiger had his way, he'd ban all graphite shafts, and he'd limit clubhead size to about 275cc.  He KNOWS that that equipment would give him a massive advantage (as if he needs it).  But persimmon and balata are probably not serious wishes.  (Nike wouldn't like it either; in the persimmon era, remember that every head was like a different creature altogether.  Players sometimes took months or years to find exactly the right dirver, and then used them as long as possible until the head or the insert split and became unrepairable.  There was no thought of getting a half-dozen drivers made up on the tour van and then figuring out which one was best on a launch monitor.  And there was no thought of asking a player to switch drivers based on the new model year in retail production.)

[Bryan Izatt]

...Maybe the difference from 22 yards to 30 has to do with fitness and strength, which is affected by age.
...

I sure hope you aren't using that to support your workout hypothesis.

Nope, just a random thought.

BTW, the urban legend about shafts kicking the ball applies to today's shafts.  That's not to say that you couldn't create a bullwhip shaft that does accelerate the clubhead through the ball given a particular swing.  I'd be sceptical that anyone would have a repeatable enough swing to actually time it right often enough.  

[Doug Siebert]

Sully,

A usable shaft for golf is too stiff to flex back and "kick" through to add distance to a shot. To make one flexible enough to exhibit any usable such characteristic would render it pretty much unusable (think trying to hit a ball with a head at the end of a bull whip). The golf industry has for years been misleading the public by selling slower swingers more flexible shafts so they would "kick" the ball farther. The real explanation is that a more flexible shaft allows the centrifugal force on the club head to bend the shaft forward giving more effective loft to the club and allowing them to get the ball airborne easier and to fly farther. The flex is caused by the center of gravity being behind the shaft and the centrifugal force trying to bring it in line with the shaft.

Garland,

The shaft is flexed forward at impact for pretty much everyone (with a properly fit shaft)  That includes Tiger, and even the long drive gorillas with their XXXX shafts.  If the shaft isn't properly fit, like a hitter using a shaft that's too flexible, it may flex forward too far (the "high hook") or if its way too flexible it might not yet have flexed forward yet (the "low push")

I see both of those outcomes when I play around with overly flexible shafts, though its usually the high hook unless the shaft is really whippy or I'm swinging really hard -- which is actually kind of hard for me to make myself do with a whippy shaft because I can feel the clubhead moving out of position at the top of my swing since I don't quite pause long enough there.  But that's because I'm a hitter, that is I don't have a smooth power buildup (lots of 'jerk', to put it in physics parlance)  Some guys smoothly build power throughout their downswing, so for them it matters little what flex the shaft is -- but it'll always be flexed forward at impact.

You are correct that there's no "whip" in today's shafts, at least in terms of gaining any mph since the transition from the clubhead trailing the shaft to the clubhead leading the shaft takes place a couple feet from the ball.  An overly flexible shaft might buy a hitter like me a few mph if you got the timing right, but it'd be a absolute crapshoot that would take away any hope for consistency because it'd be mostly luck since not even Tiger can feel what is happening with the shaft and make timing changes on the level of a millisecond.

However, if you think that because it is not possible to gain yardage from shaft "whip" today that it never will be, I guess you are expecting there isn't much more that materials science advances can buy us.  I happen to disagree quite strongly with that.  But far be it for the USGA to have the foresight to preemptively ban that avenue for distance increase today before the equipment makers are investing in it, because they probably think like you do.  I don't claim that I'm certain this can be done, but I think it is quite possible it can, and figure it wouldn't hurt anything for the USGA to ban it today, just in case.

When the Top Flight was introduced with much less spin than the other balls of the day, the USGA didn't worry about what might happen if someone made a ball that had even less spin than a classic Rock Flite off the driver with nearly the spin of a classic balata off wedges and around the green, and look what that got them.

[TEPaul]

"When the Top Flight was introduced with much less spin than the other balls of the day, the USGA didn't worry about what might happen if someone made a ball that had even less spin than a classic Rock Flite off the driver with nearly the spin of a classic balata off wedges and around the green, and look what that got them."


Doug:

The truth is it wasn't exactly that they didn't worry about it but rather up until about 15-20 years ago virtually noone thought that was possible.

When Frank Thomas and the USGA Tech Center realized that was going to be possible and probable there was a whole lot of Rules and Reg and testing catching up to do, and part of the problem was the powers in golf (R&A and USGA boards) were either not willing or able to listen to his warnings about what it would mean.

By the way, the two piece or hard cover ball was introduced nearly fifty years ago and the purpose it was designed to serve was not exactly about distance. It was primarily the fact that it did not easily cut.

Still today, the I&B Rules and Regs on balls do not have any limitations or regulations on spin rate.

In my opinion, they should have or that should be considered. If it was it essentially would be the sixth regulation on golf balls.

[Doug Siebert]

TEPaul,

My point exactly!  Likewise, they probably don't think there is any possible way a shaft could lead to substantional distance gains either, but I think its quite possible.  Now I could be wrong but if the USGA wanted to try and limit this avenue before it ever became a problem they'd just need to specify a few rules about shafts:

1) minimum weight - lets say 45g because I don't recall ever seeing a driver shaft less than that, so how about 1g per inch of length

2) maximum amount of flex under some sort of test condition - pick what an Iron Byron test with the whippiest ladies flex shaft made today deflects, that's your limit

3) designed to bend the same amount regardless of orientation....OK, all but the very highest quality graphite shafts violate this to at least a small degree today, otherwise "spining" and "FLOing" shafts wouldn't exist, but they could just specify a lower boundary for how different the flex/frequency could be when measured along different axes

4) put some limits on the amount of difference in flex between different points along the shaft....i.e., now you can have "high flex", 'mid flex" and "low flex", though in reality the bend points differ by only a few inches today, and the difference in flexability between those points is quite small.  They need to eliminate the possibility of shafts that are ultra stiff everywhere except for one (or more) spots where they are extremely flexible.

They ought to do this because trust me, you don't want to see what might happen when materials science advances to the point that you can have your swing tested in a manner similar to the TrueTemper ShaftLab of today, feed that data into a computer, and have a custom designed shaft that's of essentially infinite stiffness along every axis except the one your club will be moving along as it approaches impact, where you'll have one or more soft spots that allow the shaft to deflect 20-30".

I think its not impossible that they could engineer it to react properly with the way real people swing so it kicks right at impact.  That'd be a bit tricky since on a full swing you reach your maximum acceleration and maximum clubhead speed before impact, but I think its a tractable engineering problem when you can custom tailor the shaft to the individual.  The further from the ball you hit your maximum acceleration the more flex points you need to add some delay in the rebound...

Before anyone says "20 to 30 inches of lag, you are insane, no one could hit the ball!" you have to consider how much lag there is in today's shafts.  I was measured with True Temper's ShaftLab with 7.2" of shaft deflection with the driver.  That's on the high end of their range but isn't terribly uncommon.  And while I'm not Tiger Woods in the consistency department (or a TEPaul, for that matter, I'm sure) I get sweet spot to meet ball more often than random chance would allow for  I think also with that much lag you'd feel what the clubhead is doing and be able to sort of adjust the rhythm of your swing to match it.  Of course I could be wrong and maybe that'll never work, but do you REALLY want to risk that I might be right when it would be so easy to fix it today before the technology is developed?

And oh yeah, the fact they'll be able to make that shaft weight maybe 5g instead of the current 45g-85g range for graphite might also help the clubhead speed, and allow increasing club length even further if they want to, and that's true (and I guarantee you the technology to do that will be available in a couple decades at most) even if nothing else I'm talking about comes to pass.