Today we start a weekly blog series from the academy highlighting different areas of the game to help you play better golf.
As we near the opening of our season, and the outdoor club fitting season, we will be highlighting some things to look for this year if you are in the market for some new clubs. To kick this off we will be looking at wedges.
The claims on what the latest and greatest wedges can do for your game have become quite comical lately.
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While the design of the wedge has primarily stayed the same since the invention of the sand wedge (1930s) the true advancements have come in the manufacturing tolerances and the ability to cut the grooves right up to the legal limit. Add the improvements in face texture and a plethora of loft/bounce options and the average golfer should be making the ball dance all over the greens. What is it about the spin that has us so enamored? Is it because that's what we see on tv? Or are we just tired of watching our ball bound through the back of our tough firm greens?
Here are a few helpful ideas when selecting wedges. As mentioned earlier when looking at loft / bounce configurations you want to address a few key areas.
The bounce angle will as a whole help golfers get into or get out of the ground easier depending on their swing profile. Low bounce tends to want to dig a bit more (great for shallow players who don't take much of a divot or firm conditions) while High bounce will tend to help players with steeper attack angle and that may take a large divot or play in softer conditions).
Like with most things in this game, these are merely suggestions and not hard fast rules. Some wedges might have a higher bounce number due to the grind profile on the sole of the club. Just because both wedges have a 10* bounce doesn't mean they will interact with the ground the same way. It's best to try out a variety of wedge bounces and even the most novice of players will likely be able to tell which grind/bounce feels best to them.
In terms of spin production, there are a few factors other than just sharp grooves that contribute to higher backspin. Grooves are number 1 however. If you practice frequently or use the wedge out of the sand a lot you may need to replace your wedges more frequently. One study found that for every 75 rounds under normal conditions, your wedge starts losing spin characteristics.
Another very important contributing factor is the ball. To achieve the highest level of backspin you must be playing with a premium golf ball preferably with a softer urethane cover. This will greatly increase the potential for an ultra-high spin shot. The final factor lies in the playing conditions and your strike. To achieve the most friction between the club and the ball we would prefer dry + clean contact. This is why shots from the fairway tend to have more spin than the rough due to the cleaner interaction between the club and the ball and the contact point being slightly lower on the wedge.
As we're lucky to have the latest and greatest when it comes to testing products, I decided to see if I could find any differences in our top 3 selling wedge brands. The only metrics I was concerned with were launch angle and spin. The recipe for maximum spin usually lies in a launch angle lower than 30*. I used a 56* model with the same grind/bounce, a brand new pro v1x golf ball, and a perfect lie on the turf in our simulator bays. Now obviously with a test like this, there will be some human error however I did the best I could to replicate the same shot across the wedges and tried to switch out wedges often so I didn’t manipulate any numbers. Here is what I found from a 15-yard, 50-yard, and full-swing shot.
15 Yards
Wedge A - Launch Angle = 30.8* / Spin = 4453rpm
Wedge B - LA = 29.6* / Spin = 4405
Wedge C - LA = 29.7 / Spin = 4422
50 Yards
Wedge A - LA = 28.6* / Spin = 6522
Wedge B - LA = 28.6* / Spin = 6683
Wedge C - LA = 27.9* / Spin = 6676
Full Swing
Wedge A- LA = 27.3* / Spin = 10200
Wedge B - LA = 26.7 / Spin = 10192
Wedge C - LA = 29.7 / Spin = 10176
Based upon these results alone, selecting a wedge from these three would merely come down to look, feel, and price. There is nothing in this data that could persuade me one way or another that one wedge was better than the other. But what if the conditions were not perfect? Now it's nearly impossible to recreate the same lie in the rough over and over again but what if the conditions weren't perfectly dry? If you play in the morning when there is some dew still on the ground or you may find it in our shoulder seasons where the ground holds more moisture, it can be difficult to get a clean strike with a lot of friction for maximum spin.
So I decided to retest the 50-yard and Full Swing shots but I used a spray bottle to spray the face and the ball with a spray of water and then hit the shots. The results looked a tad bit different.
50 Yards WET
Wedge A - LA - 32.5* / Spin = 5513
Wedge B - LA - 30.8* / Spin = 6176
Wedge C - LA - 28.2* / Spin = 6601
Full Swing WET
Wedge A - LA - 33* / Spin = 7453
Wedge B - LA 32.7* / Spin = 7546
Wedge C - LA 27.2* / Spin = 10029
It was incredible to feel the loss of friction between the club and the ball. The best way to describe it was it felt like I went right under the ball, almost as if I whiffed it. Now we can clearly see one wedge separate itself from the rest as it lost zero performance from the dry to the wet. According to one study for every 1000 rpm loss of spin could result in an additional 6’ of rollout. I feel that this is something that cant be overlooked when it comes to purchasing a wedge as all wedges perform nearly identically in clean dry conditions.
Now you may be looking at this and saying to yourself, “this really doesn't apply to me” and that's fine. However, if you are serious about improving your wedge play can you really give up that much control simply because it's a bit wet outside?
Stay tuned for more thoughts on equipment and how we can knock some shots off our handicap