It looks like you could do with a few more yards added to your drives.

Did you know that, for every 20 yards you gain, it can save you 0.1-0.3 shots each time. Hit 14 drives in a round and that could mean 1.4-4.2 shots better, per round, per 20 yards!

In this article, I’ll show you how to add more yards to your drives.

Before We Read On

If you haven’t read my Ebook, “Golf Hacks” – a quick and easy guide to fixing

• shanks,
• toes,
• fats,
• thins,
• slices,
• hooks, as well as
• practicing better and improving on-course strategy –

I’m giving it away FREE!!!

Just pop in your email below, and continue to read this blog. The book will be sent to your email.

 

 

Three Ball Flight Laws

Maximum distance is ruled by 3 laws;

• Ball speed
• Launch angle
• Spin rate

While most people believe that distance is is just about how fast you swing it, launching the ball optimally can do a massive amount for increasing your distance.

Ball speed – this is as it sounds. How fast is your golf ball moving as it leaves the clubface. More is better for distance.

Launch angle – this is what angle the ball initially takes off on – generally, higher is better (between 16-18 degrees)

Spin rate – If you launch the ball optimally, you will want a low backspin rate to match. Generally, 2000 RPM is a good number

So, how to we achieve a better ball launch?

Club Speed 

All else being equal, a faster club speed will hit the ball farther.

Club speed is like the limiter for our potential. The below chart shows the maximum carry distance you could achieve for a give club speed.

So, at 100mph club speed (for example), you could potentially carry the ball 260 yards at sea level (as long as the other factors are perfect).

To increase club speed, some things you could do

• A longer swing can offer more distance for the hands/club to accelerate. This could be achieved by a bigger turn, or even allowing the left foot to come up off the ground in the backswing (like Nicklaus)
• More force – increasing how much force you put into the grip, either through intention to swing it harder, or through speed training with different weight sticks (like The Stack System)

But adding speed alone won’t make you better/longer unless that speed gets into the ball. Which is why we need……

 

Strike Quality

Vertical Gear Effect

In order to get that club speed to the ball, we need to have a good-quality strike.

Now, we need it to be close to the sweet spot, but there’s actually a secret place on the face that offers even more distance.

When we strike slightly above the center of the face, the club actually twists in a way that

1. adds loft
2. creates a counter-twist on the ball that reduces back-spin

This serves to increase the launch angle of the ball (helping us get closer to that 16-18 degree window) while also bringing the spin rate down closer to the 2000RPM mark we desire.

 

Face Curvature

The other reason we want to strike slightly higher on the face is that the face of our driver is slightly curved. We call this “roll”.

What this means is, while your club might have a static loft of 10 deg stamped on it, the loft actually varies across the face from top to bottom. Higher on the face = more loft (pink)

So, why not just change the loft on our driver, instead of hitting slightly higher on the face?

Well, hitting higher on the face offers more loft WITHOUT increasing spin – due to the vertical gear-effect we discussed in the last point.

It’s high launch and LOW spin that creates distance.

 

Face Speed

Most of us know about club speed, but did you know that the ball only knows about face speed! What on earth does this mean?

Well, while your club mass might be moving 100mph (for example), the speed of different parts of the club-face can be higher or lower than this.

As the clubhead is always rotating from open to closed through impact, the TOE of the club actually moves faster than the heel. As a result, we may actually get a little bit more ball speed when the shots are struck ever so slightly from the toe.

 

Put it all together

So, we can get a touch more ball speed, higher launch and lower spin (all optimal for distance) by striking a point on the face that is slightly high and toe.

Note – don’t over-do this or you will start to get diminishing returns.

In order to improve your strike location, the first thing you should do is to check it with some foot spray.

Simply use some Dr Scholls foot spray, or CVS/Daktarin. Spray the face and check your strike location after each hit.

Then, make sure to record your score in the Tangent app, in the practice drills section.

Attack Angle and Loft

Attack angle refers to whether the club is ascending or descending into the ball. In the below picture, we see an optimal upwards ascent into the ball.

Dynamic loft refers to the loft you present at impact. This is a product of

• the loft stamped on the club
• location of strike (higher/lower on the face)
• any face twisting (open faces present more loft and vice versa)
• shaft lean changes (leaning the shaft back at impact presents more loft, and vice versa)

In order to maximize distance, we want to launch the ball at 16-18 degrees. However, this can be very difficult with a 10 degree driver (or even lower, loft in some cases).

Just adding more loft might increase the launch, but it will be at the expense of ball speed dropping, and spin rate increasing – not good! This is because something called “spin-loft” increases (the difference between attack angle and dynamic loft).

In the below picture, the pink arrow is the attack angle, and the green arrow is the dynamic loft. We see how this makes the blue shaded area (representing spin loft) too big/wide.

However, if we hit up on the ball, we tend to automatically add more loft and do so while reducing spin loft – resulting in a higher launch, low spin and high ball speed.

Perfect for maximizing distance.

Some things that can help us hit more up on the ball would be

• a forwards ball position
• head more behind the ball at impact
• a swing direction that is more to the right/less left

 

Learn More

If you want to learn how to improve your distance through

• Improved strike quality
• Better attack angle
• More optimal spin

Check out The Strike Plan, my program designed to get you longer drives, better-struck irons and more greens in regulation.

Click the image below to learn more

 

 

Caveat

I’ve mentioned that reducing spin rate is generally good for most. However, occasionally there will be a situation with a player where they need more spin. To get more distance.

This is rare, but you might see this with a lower speed player whose ball falls out of the air quickly – like a dive-bomb.

This is a relatively easy fix – simply add more loft, ether through a better club fit, changing the settings on your exiting club, or technique changes that can add more loft (like an earlier release, or a less closed face position at impact).