‘Four’ Articles at Golf Product Review by Experienced Golf Balls

The Four Key Factors In Your Swing

Article by Jack Moorehouse

When I mention the word basics in my golf lessons, players start thinking about things like grip, posture, ball position, alignment, and so on. That’s only natural. Golf pros talk so much about these subjects in golf instruction sessions that players assume they’re the focus when the discussion comes round to the basics of a golf shot.

But there are four other basics–plane, centering, radius, and face–that key good ball striking. Players must master the four factors to cut their golf handicaps down to size. These factors, which are sometimes neglected in golf lessons and golf tips, determine consistency. If you’re off with these even slightly, you’ll slice, hook, or mis-hit the shot, regardless of your grip, posture, ball position, or alignment.

Plane:

Plane is the angle your club takes at address. Your swing should have a circular look to it when viewed from a face on perspective. The swing won’t be a pure circle, but it will have a recognizable circular shape. Looking from down the target line, the circle should be tilted the same angle as the clubshaft as it sits at address. This area encompasses the most direct and powerful route back to the golf ball.

The club must remain in this defined plane as it approaches the golf ball on the downswing. While your swing plane may change from waist high in your downswing to waist high in your finish, your club must go through the original plane at address to hit straight shots solidly. So while you may see some odd looking swings by Tour players, you’ll also see that they always return the club to the same plane of address at the bottom of their swings.

Face:

Face is the second important factor. To gain control over the clubface at the moment of impact, your hands must be at the same position when you make contact with the ball as at address or may be a bit forward. Returning your hands to the same position guarantees that your clubface is pointing in the same direction as when you set up to hit the ball.

There are three ways you can hold the club at address–with your hands on the left side of the grip (weak), the middle of the grip (neutral), or the right hand side of the grip (strong) for right-handers. The best grip is the one you can produce naturally shot, after shot, after shot. If you look closely at the pros, you’ll see players with different grips, yet they still hit consistently straight shots. Why? Because the way you grip the club matters less than the how your hands are at address. If you have a strong grip at address, you better not have a weak grip when making impact; otherwise, you’ll end up with either an opened or a closed clubface at impact.

Radius

Radius is the distance from your left shoulder (for right handers) to the end of the clubshaft. In other words, it is the distance from the center of your golf swing to the outer-edge. Your lead arm must be in line with or trailing your arm at impact, known as “maintaining radius.” Bobby Jones, the great amateur, called this “good timing.”

Maintaining radius enables you to strike the ball solidly. Many recreational players that I give golf lessons to try to force the shaft of the club past the lead arm prior to impact. This effort causes the clubface to travel up not down, resulting in a fat or thin shot. A loss of radius causes a hook, slice, loss of distance, and wide assortment of other poor shots.

Centering:

Centering refers to the spine and head at address. While you may have some lateral movement of your head and spine in your swing, consistent hitters keep these areas, or their centers, steady. A steady center involves two things. From a down-the-line-look, the amount that you bend forward from your hips at address is constant throughout your swing. From a face-on perspective, your center (spine and head) remains as constant as possible as well. Your swing, as I’ve explained in my golf tips, revolves around your center.

While the basics like grip, posture, ball position, and alignment are important, they only prepare you to take your swing. They increase your chances of hitting a golf ball when the more important basics are in order, producing accurate, solid shots. To lower your golf handicap, you must the other “basics” of the swing–plane, fact, radius, and center.

About the Author

Jack Moorehouse is the author of the best-selling book “How To Break 80 And Shoot Like The Pros.” He is NOT a golf pro, rather a working man that has helped thousands of golfers from all seven continents lower their handicap immediately.

The History of Golf Clubs- Four Hundred Years in the Making

Article by Randy Raasch

The modern game of golf, as we know it today originated in Scotland around the 12th century. The exact location was on the current site of the Old Course at St Andrews. It was recorded that Shepherds were found knocking stones around a course into rabbit holes. Often players carved their own clubs out of wood and fashioned golf balls from leather bags.

The first reference to a set of golf clubs were those made specifically for King James VI of Scotland by a bow maker named William Mayne. Mayne was commissioned to make the very first set of matched clubs in the year 1603. Although reference to these clubs has been made, no clubs exist from that time.

The oldest clubs known were discovered in a house in Hull along with a newspaper dated 1741. In the Royal an Ancient Club’s museum there are specimens of ancient clubs including two woods and a notable putting cleek. The cleek was made in the second half of the 18th century by a club maker named Simon Cossar from Leith and was made having an iron head on a wooden shaft.

For next hundred years, early players were so fond of the game that they would fashion their own clubs and balls out of wood. The clubs used ash or hazel for the shafts while the heads were made from tougher wood such as beech, pear, apple, and holly. Just like today, a variety of clubs were used in a single game:

Longnose – used for drivingBulgers – has a bulbous head similar to the wood of todayFairway clubs – for medium range shootingSpoons – used in short range shotsNiblicks – similar to the wedge we have todayCleek – used for putting.

Things would remain much the same until the early 19th century when in 1826 Robert Forgan of Scotland changed the way in which golf clubs were made. Forgan’s golf clubs were made by using American hickory to fashion the shafts instead of the traditional ash or hazel. Soon Forgan’s golf clubs became quite popular and set the standard for later makers.

In 1848 Reverend Adam Pearson was the innovator of the Gutta-Percha golf ball. Not only was the gutta-percha a better ball than the ‘feathery’, it was cheaper to make. With the popularity of the gutta-percha ball came the requirements for a new generation of golf club that could cope with the increased stress associated with this new type of golf ball. The outcome of this new generation of golf clubs best resembles the modern set of woods in today’s game of golf.

In the beginning of twentieth century, America started to manufacturer and export golf clubs in large volumes. Outdated materials such as hickory were being replaced with hard woods such as beech or American persimmon used for golf club heads. During this time there also became a growing demand for hand-forged metal club heads and in 1902, the first groove-faced irons appeared. These new club heads offered an increased amount of backspin, compared to wooden club heads.

As manufacturing technology evolved, the technique of forging clubs became more sophisticated. Now the factories could produce the irons in numbers as golf became more popular with the masses. Aluminum was first used about this same time period, replacing the hand-forged method of the previous century.

The Prince of Wales would bring about the next major change in the history of golf clubs. Steel shafts had been experimented with since the late nineteenth century but gained little acceptance. Then in 1929 the Prince of Wales began using steel-shafted golf clubs made to his specifications. He was spotted using a set of these golf clubs at St. Andrews. They soon became quite popular with golfers outside the royal circle.

Shortly after that, the Haskell ball came out in the United States and steel shafts replaced the hickory shaft altogether. This is also the time when many modifications and substitutions were made to lighten the shaft. With this new innovation, the clubs would finally begin to more resemble those we see today. The US Open was the first major tournament to feature this new type of golf club.

Along with the improvement of the shafts came the introduction of numbered, rather than named, clubs. Clubs had become more numerous and finely graduated than the names that traditionally had been applied to them. In addition, companies were able to manufacture to specifications and point of flex that allowed merchandising of matched sets rather than individual clubs. Formerly, a golfer seeking new clubs went through a rack of clubs searching for one with the ‘right feel’ then tried to find other clubs with the same feel. The merchandising opportunities of numbered clubs and matching sets was carried to an extreme and in 1938 the USGA limited the number of clubs a player could carry per round to 14.

The 1960’s saw a major innovation in putters from a gentleman named Karsten Solheim, a General Electric mechanical engineer. His first putter, the 1A, was created in his garage after his frustration with putting led him to design his own club. The putter not only improved his putting, but it was the source for the name of the putter and later the company. As he stroked putt after putt with a radical looking putter, it rang out – PINNGGG. Karsten’s persistence resulted in new designs, including the Anser putter in 1966, which proved to be the most successful putter design in history. The company PING is credited with one of the earliest golf companies dedicated to the advancement of the golf putter.

Of course today’s technology is continuing to transform the history of golf clubs. Innovations such as graphite shafts, titanium heads, adjustable distributed weight, peripheral weighting to reduce twisting if the club contacts the ball slightly off-center are just a few. Putters alone are subdivided into mallet, peripheral weighted and blade styles. The latest putter design technology incorporates power adjust-ability and practice/play convertibility features.

Who knows what tomorrow will bring in golf club design!

About the Author

Randy Raasch has been in golf for over thirty years. His website, Golf-Fever shares information and products that are sound and easy.

If you are looking for great Putting Tips to improve your game, visit: http://www.golf-fever.com/Putting/PuttingTips.html

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