I was confused on the loft and length of his irons because he uses vintage gear… but his specs are more “modern” than I had originally thought, and certainly not “vintage.” Lag also said he strengthens his lofts to keep the flight down, especially with shorter shafts; but his shafts aren’t any shorter than modern clubs.
It’s because of Lag that I set my irons 5* flat and up to 1" short depending on the set. I’ve never strengthened the lofts because I never felt the need, but I may rethink that.
Yeah, the older irons were not only a good bit shorter, but the lofts were a good bit weaker too compared to todays irons. You’ll still have the heavier static weight if you keep the old thick wall shafts.
Kind of makes one wonder why the lofts were so weak, and the shafts so short. You would think that club makers in the 60s and afterward would have had the technology available to know the shafts could be longer, the lofts stronger, and make the balance the clubhead better with shorter hosels, better COG and heel/toe weighting. With all the technology for NASA flights, jet engines for aircraft, etc. back then it should have been there for golf clubs too.
I’m not sure I agree.
Shorter hosel (compared to longer hosels) means weight/COG moves towards the toe. More weight towards the toe means that the club wants to close by itself thru the impact area which is not something I would label as better. But maybe that’s just me…
Golf was a precision game and control was necessary and power and distance were gained by correct swing dynamics- not by tweaking the club for your gain
Clubs were designed by players – not by hackers …the old designers all knew what was going on and what worked best
The clubs were all right where they needed to be
It wasn’t until mr.PING came along and other people saw the $$$ to be made did they start designing junk for hackers that served no purpose for the good golfer. They myth-ed the world into thinking they needed these type of clubs and …well we all know where we are at now…
I know that hosel length (height) has changed from the way it was years ago when hosels were very tall and contained more of the clubhead’s overall weight versus the actual head part of the club were the face is located. Reducing the weight and height of the hosel of course allowed the club-maker to change the COG and weight distribution in the head of the club. This rearrangement of weight within the clubhead allows the club-maker to change/alter the club’s dynamics (feel & playability) and also physical looks in a number of ways; horizontal COG Sweet Spot location (feel & playability), vertical COG location (feel, trajectory & playability), depth of COG location (feel, trajectory & playability), toe height to offset weight (looks), etc., etc. It used to be, years ago, that the sweet spot was not in the center of the head heel-to-toe, but instead the sweet spot was toward the heel. By reducing the hosel height (and its weight) it moved the sweet spot to the center of the club, which is where it should be.
When club-makers shortened the hosel (removing weight from the hosel) they redistributed the weight appropriately throughout (or within) the entire clubhead so-as not to make the club’s toe [then] too heavy. When looking at the “very” old irons you’ll see a very tall hosel and very thin clubface, thus making much more of the overall clubhead weight in the hosel - and the face was very thin and light in comparison. As the years went by the hosel size (height & weight) decreased further from what it used to be and the clubhead became a little thicker. In more recent times club-makers (starting with Ping) reduced the hosel height and weight even more and redistributed the saved weight around the perimeter (cavity-back) of the clubhead, which makes the clubhead have a bulky and thick look. The blade irons of today of course do not have this bulky cavity-back look, but neither do they have the tall hosel of yesteryear with the sweet spot off-center near the heel.
Here’s someones explanation that may help:
[i]"The basic idea of all iron designers is to have the COG (center of gravity) of an iron head be in or at least near the middle of the face. That is why the toe of an iron is tall and the heel crotch is short. The toe has to counter balance the weight of the hosel. Old blade designs had tall hosels and the COG was towards the heel. Look at a Cally Big Bertha iron or their other models with the very short hosel. They did that to push the COG out to the middle of the club. And people discovered it was easy to hit them straight, high, and long.
Whenever you hit somewhere other than the COG, you are missing the sweet spot and will get a bit less on the ball. (For some reason I can’t explain, the COG of the clubhead itself is more important than trying to add the shaft into the equation. The physics gurus say the clubhead performs at impact as though it was on a string, not on a shaft that has weight of its own.) Anyway…
If you removed the top of the toe, and added tape behind the center, you would have moved the COG significantly towards the heel/hosel. If you then hit the ball near the heel, great. But if you hit the ball towards the center, or heaven forbid, on the toe, you are going to have distance loss and direction problems."[/i]
Having the sweetspot in the center IMO is a luxury which comes at a price. The price being more weight towards the toe. But that’s just my opinion. In other words, I’d rather have the sweetspot a little higher up on the face of the club and towards the heel if that means that I can control the club a little better.
You talk about advancements in technology that certainly have their merit. But they’re just not an advancement for everybody persé…
We don’t see the pros playing with these old clubs…or newly made duplicates of these old clubs. The pros’ livelihood depends on their tools. Most of them will play whatever they believe is best for their game…and others will be influenced by being offered a club contract to play a particular brand. But even in the case of the latter (club contract) they will agree based on the knowledge that other pros have had success with the brand and the company’s ability and willingness to satisfy the pro’s needs.
Just a few days ago I saw a PGA tour player trying out different Titleist iron models - comparing them with his regular combo of AP2 and Z Muscle irons. No doubt he could choose to play with any club as long as they meet the rule requirements.
Do you have any thoughts on why the tour pros don’t play with those really old iron heads that are modified with new shafts, and adjusted lofts and lies?
The hard plastic golf balls need milled faces and more area in the grooves for spinning from the rough. Just like the drivers, the clubs and the ball are more of a match for the super long courses the tour plays.
Pros under contract are going to be persuaded to play the latest thing. That’s nothing new. That’s the core of the business model. It didn’t make sense business wise for Greg Norman to be playing a 40 year old driver in the late 80’s early 90’s. But he did it because it was a good club.
Gear needs to match the kind of course that is being played. You wouldn’t do well bringing a dragster car to an Indy track even though it’s top end speed might be faster. Same with golf.
The pros have been tweaking their clubs since day-one for their gain.
I would say that the old clubs were actually designed by people with a major interest in the game, but not necessarily by excellent players themselves, and the designers received input from pros to help fine-tune their designs to make them as good as they could in that day and time. (As an example even Bobby Jones’ clubs were mismatched in swing-weight from B# to G#.) I would say that as the years progressed golf clubs continued to be designed by people that were not necessarily expert players in their own rite, but by people with technological tools and historical knowledge…and yet these designers continued to receive input from the pros to help them fine-tune their designs. I believe this method of design principle continues to this day with one major variation.
Many years ago all clubs (brands and models) were basically the same except for quality control. Fast-forward to more recent times and the differences in clubs are not just differences in quality control, but differences and options in materials, shafts, multiple and various designs/features, advertising hype, etc. The major focus for the club-makers are the amateur golfers, the beginners, the handicappers, the hackers. That’s where the money is! But, that said, they all know they must have the pros play their brand of equipment for advertising name recognition (the purpose behind all the related advertising and multi-million dollar pro contracts) - therefore they make selected quality clubs for the pros and better players…and offer a slew of so-called “game improvement” clubs for their paying customers - the handicap golfer.
For years Mizuno, in particular, made clubs designed only for “players”. MacGregor, Wilson, Titleist, Spaulding and a few others had “players” club too but they also offered one or more lower quality club lines in the brand to satisfy golfers that didn’t want to pay the higher price for the top-of-the-line club the pros played. (Remember the old Wilson Sam Snead Blue Ridge Special irons?) Then Ping brings out their perimeter-weighted iron (actually they had it for years but didn’t promote and advertise it) and the weekend handicap hackers go absolutely WILD over the club because it was so much easier to hit with their poor swings. But, the club caught the attention of not only the hacker population - it also caught the attention of the pros too! (You know how pros are always looking for something to improve their game - kinda like hackers…) Gary Player, as well as numerous other pros, started carrying Ping cavity-back long irons in the 70s - because they were easier to hit and more forgiving of mishits. The other club manufacturers took notice…and started learning about what Karsten at Ping had found out. From that time forward the other club-makers came out with somewhat similar designs to Ping’s cavity-back clubs so they too would have a club for the weekend hacker and not lose market-share. Mizuno, to the best of my knowledge, was the only club-maker that did not offer a cavity-back iron during this period because (I assume) they felt [almost all] the better players and pros didn’t need or want a club “designed” for a hacker’s poor swing. (Nowadays, of course, Mizuno offers cavity-back irons too.) Nowadays the blade or muscle-back iron with virtually no offset is only offered by a few club-makers…and most pros play with an iron that has some degree of perimeter weighting (cavity-back). Why? Because they probably believe, as Gary Player and many other pros did in the 1970s and since, that it’s a better club design for them. As we both know a pro doesn’t always make perfect swings, or hit the exact sweet spot, every time. Therefore, in my opinion, I believe most pros believe that using a slightly forgiving iron is a good trade-off to giving up a little bit of feel, the latter of which a blade design offers [many] players.
While some pros still play blade irons, most (by a long shot) play with some cavity-back design feature. Are the pros today any less accomplished at hitting the exact sweet spot compared to decades or centuries ago? Hell no! But when they do miss the sweet spot (just like the pros of yesteryear did) their missed shot usually has a better outcome. I can’t argue with a pros’ choice to play a more forgiving iron because I think it’s logical. I also can’t argue with a pro’s choice to play a blade iron if they prefer to continue using what they learned the game playing or thinks the feel is that much better. Some people swear they can tell the difference in feel between various softness of steel used to make forged irons. Mizuno uses a very soft 1020 steel they forge in a certain way called “grain flow” compared to harder steel used by other clubmakers. Cast versus forged. Steel versus stainless-steel sounds different. A difference in “feel” due to clubhead materials - I’m not so sure about.
In the case of a beginner golfer or a weekend hacker it really doesn’t make much difference whether they use a blade iron or the most forgiving cavity-back iron. Statistics have shown that golf handicaps have remained virtually unchanged forever. There may be a slight advantage going with the blade iron for a person that really truly works very hard on improving their swing…but I believe there is an advantage going with a cavity-back iron for a person that wants to [just] enjoy the game more. A bad swing, regardless of club design, is going to produce bad results. The problem with weekend hackers and mid-to-high handicap golfers is not the clubs they play - it’s their golf swing. That’s always been the case.
“With perimeter weighted clubs, considering my shots on a scale from 1 to 10, I know I wouldn’t hit a shot worse than a 6, but because of the club’s resistance to subtle influences I may want to impart, my best shots wouldn’t be better than an 8 or a 9.
With blades, my bad shot might be as bad as a 3, but my best shots would be 10’s, and the difference between 8 and 9’s and a 10 at the top end of the scale is the difference between winning and losing a major championship”
This was a quote by Nick Price about 2 years ago…we can talk in circles all day long if we want…but there are 2 sides to every story
Price really blows ‘the people’s logic’ about the pros and cons of club design out of the water with what he says above
The big reason pros play off the rack equipment is that all the companies WANT them to…companies do little or no tweaking to a players equipment like used to be done years ago (sometimes by the players themselves)… they always would come up with some excuse to not alter a club when I wanted something done uttering it would screw something up…so they resisted altering anything
I played a set of perimeter clubs for 6 months one season and was having a real hard time getting them to come out of the rough on full shots. I eventually complained and asked what the hell is going on…They told me …"Oh yeh…the center of gravity is pushed up on the set so it will be harder to get the club under the ball …or something to that affect…I had turned off my listening mechanism by then and was offering the clubs to someone walking past the trailer so I would never have to see them again…It just would have been nice to have some input to how I wanted the clubs to play FOR ME…but they offered no opportunity for that…play them because that’s what we sell…we offer no choices
Most of the guys on tour wouldn’t know how to regrip a club these days let alone reshaft one…so they are in the hands of the companies who WANT the players to use exactly what they can sell to Joe Public because that is what sells and makes the $$$
Why do you think Scotty Cameron’s with a circle T on them sell for so much ?..because the public think they are getting something special when in reality it is the same putter but with a cool stamp on it…all about marketing
The only real difference in pros club and off the rack stuff will be the shaft- different weights and flex points amongst the pros than what they put on the racks
We seem to be going in circles here, but the difference in feedback you get from cavity-back vs. blades is huge.
The weekend golfer obviously hits the ball better with a cavity back at first, but the severe lack of feedback will hold back any kind of real improvement. Which is fine if you’re not really looking to get better if you only play every once in a while. I see it this way: At first the learning curve for blades seems to be steeper but there is a very high ROI.
Say you have a problem where you are hitting fat shots. If you were to practice with blades with little to no bounce on them, every hint of a fat shot will send lots of vibrations trough the shaft towards your hands.
This speeds up the learning process don’t you agree?
IronOfZion, I guess your replay is directed to me…
What you say is true…to a point in my opinion. The weekend golfer would almost certainly hit the ball better with a cavity-back iron. A beginner golfer would almost certainly hit the ball better with a cavity-back iron. If someone really dedicated themselves to becoming [say] a low single-digit or scratch player he/she might want to experiment with blade irons but I would only suggest doing so only after they have a good enough swing and can score around 80 or less. Learning to swing a golf club, regardless whether it’s a blade or cavity-back, is what beginners and higher handicap need to do. They get feedback from any type of club. In my opinion I think learning to swing a golf club would be a easier and likely a good bit faster progress with a cavity-back simply because there will undoubtedly be a whole lot of miss-hits (toed, heeled, shanks, tops, thinned, etc.) when learning to swing. Why not use the most forgiving club? The high handicap golfer will get all the feedback they could ever desire using a cavity-back when learning to swing. They’ll both feel and see their mishits whether they use a cavity-back iron or blade iron.
If you were learning to drive would you want to learn in the cab of an 18-wheeler or an automobile? Maybe an extreme example…but both will give you feedback when you make mistakes. I say give yourself all the advantages you can when you’re learning. Then, once you learn (I mean really learn) move to what feels the best and gives you the best results.
When looking at only two pieces of the golfing puzzle (golf swing and golf clubs) the swing is 99.999999999999999999999999% and the equipment is 0.000000000000000000000001%. Someone could lay every golf club that has ever been made at your feet and also give you all the club-maker’s engineering and design staff but without you learning how to effectively swing a golf club the equipment and all those people wouldn’t help you one iota. It’s you learning how to swing a golf club effectively that is paramount. Once you learn to effectively swing a golf club you can play “effectively” with ANY club. Then you can start seeing what feels better to you and results in better playability.
Bold and underlined by me… this sounds like it was written by the Callaway marketing department. A golfer with poor mechanics rarely hits any iron “straight, high, and long” and to say they do it easily is laughable.
But…you do prove a point. The manufacturers have done a hell of a job making golfers believe it.
I failed to address this specific part of your question…
While it would be most helpful to know the status of your game and golf swing, as well as seeing your swing in person or on video…I’ll offer this. Thin or narrow sole irons with little bounce will make a digger’s club go down deep into the turf. Therefore a person with a digger type of swing should have a wider sole and more bounce. A picker swing can use a a thinner or more narrow sole with less bounce. That said, some golfers have a steeper swing and will be more inclined to dig in than others. Some will have more shaft lean and will dig in more than others. Most (but not all) swingers of the club will swing the club more downward, and then out compared to hitters that will move the club more around them thus not disturbing the turf as much. All of these are (or can be) effective swings, but they have different results in terms of what the clubhead does post impact.
Now then, if you are truly hitting fat shots, that means you are hitting the big ball (Earth) before the little (golf) ball. That is absolutely and most definitely a swing issue, not a club issue! And that is why I strongly suggested (in my previous post) that learning to effectively swing a golf club was VASTLY more important than the club you’re learning to swing.
Go Low,
While I appreciate the offer to look at my swing but I did not mean to say that I was having trouble hitting fat shots.
I was merely providing an example with the intention of showing how feedback can help you cope with issues in your swing.
You say:
"Therefore a person with a digger type of swing should have a wider sole and more bounce. "
I take the view that the person with a digger type of swing can learn to swing more ‘cleanly’ from playing with narrow soled, negative bounce clubs.
For simplicity’s sake let’s talk about a hitter’s style (which is also more along the lines of lag’s teachings).
Actually the manufacturers job has been very easy because 90% of golfers believe that both their golf swing will improve and their scores will drop drastically with the latest and greatest golf club on the market. That’s something that never happens, yet they still hold out hope and faith it will. Another 9% believe there’s nothing wrong with their golf swing - that it’s the inferior clubs they’re swinging. Some people buy/trade clubs mulitple times a year. They really believe that their swing will change from looking like a octopus falling out of a tree into one that looks like their favorite pro’s swing. Doesn’t happen!
I did not offer to look at your swing…or suggest making any swing changes. That’s Lag’s job.
No, there’s nothing wrong with a digger swing. As I stated; “All of these are (or can be) effective swings, but they have different results in terms of what the clubhead does post impact.” If a digger golfer wants to dig less he can change clubs…but if a digger golfer wants to change and become a picker he will have to change his swing. Two entirely different things…which fits in nicely with what we’ve been talking about - golf swing & golf clubs.
Depending on how the golfer chooses to aid his swing change from a digger to a picker the results will can be seen and felt with either style of club. There’s a wide range of sole widths and bounces to choose from - from super wide to super narrow and from huge bounce to practically zero bounce.
As you know Lag’s swing method is hitting with a club left pull-in move post impact, which means the golfer will be more of a picker.
GoLow
What do you think about Diablo drivers (for eg) where the face is hooked in an attempt to help slicers hit straight balls
OR
The upright lie angles that most clubs are set up with today by the manufacturers?
Upright clubs just lead us farther off the sodded path that the great ball strikers enticed us along all those years ago
Isn’t playing with that junk design of hooded faces, upright lie angles, delofted irons, big wide bounce soles, sweet spots the size of dinner plates, spring effect woods giving you no hope to improve your swing?
Here at ABS we believe in having equipment set up in a manner that will long term improve your swing- because as you are what you eat- you are what you swing with
We aren’t in it for instant gratification- we are here long haul- hence the name ‘Advanced ball Striking’
the students realize it won’t be an overnight occurrence but that by using harder to hit clubs now their swing will improve as well struck shots will be felt and poor shots will be felt and the differences in the feel of the swing can be summarized and used toward greater improvement
Plus they will gain confidence to such a point that you could put a stick with a tin can attached to the end in their hands and they would know the correct sequencing of events to still be able to hit that ball well with the tin can…(that’s a bit far fetched but you should see the point)…
so that if they do make such a playing standard that full blown competition at a high level is an option then using a frying pan and shovel to hit the ball with will be a piece of cake because they are only interested in the sweetspot of the club and not the surrounding edges with weight all over them and they will know how to find that sweetspot with any weapon they choose to use because they have done it with small headed blades for months on end.
By making the quest and the search more intriguing, more difficult, more of a workload, things become easier. How many rich kids become bums and a-holes because they are given everything their entire life that when they grow up they don’t have a clue how to cope or react…it’s the same with golf. Give a guy a big club that he thinks will be a breeze that he may be able to hit well every now and then offers no room for improvement. They all talk about the 280 boomer they got away on one hole and quickly forget the other 17 drives that ended up as lost balls.
If you play with equipment that offers no hope of swing improvement but instead serves up swing deterioration over an extended period of time- isn’t that a recipe for farther disaster and just adding snow to the snowball of destruction that is already rolling down the hill into oblivion?
I feel the hook-faced drivers are more hype than helpful. Weekend golfers with poor swings buy them …but they can (and do) still slice the hell out of them. I feel the game improvement irons to be in a totally different category compared to the hook-faced driver because they are being played by some (most) of the best golfers on planet Earth. As for what you consider upright lie angles in irons, I feel the standard lie angles to be very reasonable…and I suspect practically all of the best players on planet Earth play with lie angles that don’t vary more than a couple degrees + or - from those angles. Don’t you agree?
I have to disagree with you that todays equipment “offers no hope of swing improvement but instead serves up swing deterioration over an extended period of time”. I think we’re seeing first-hand, on a worldwide basis, that the young stars playing this “junk” are doing quiet well. In fact Lee Westwood (the #1 player in the world) has played that Ping junk for decades. Go down the player list on any tour you wish and you’ll find all the players playing frying-pan drivers and most playing cavity-back irons. Many carry a nasty looking hybrid (or two). They certainly don’t have to play that so-called junk. In fact, they could have a club contract and play the company’s blade irons…but most elect to play the junky cavity-back irons. Makes no sense does it? Is anybody carrying a bullseye putter besides Corey? Damn that perimeter weighting crap!
I have to admit however that my view is actually at-odds with myself in terms of what I personally like in an iron. I grew up playing blades (and persimmons), much of the same stuff that ABS students are collecting and playing. I play blade irons myself. I don’t care much for cavity-backs. Offsets of more than 0.10" gives me heartburn. I don’t care much for stainless-steel heads. I don’t like thick top lines. But I honestly think I only feel that way because I grew up playing blades. I consider irons to be more special, more personal you might say, than woods and putters. I was one of the last to change to graphite in my driver…and one of the last to go to a metal driver. Man, that first Big Bertha head was huge compared to my persimmon driver head! I’ve never looked back. I like the metal “woods”. I carry a hybrid. I have no clue what I did with my old blade putters.
In my case I do not believe starting out with blades or small head persimmon woods helped me learn to swing effectively any faster. In fact, I believe it probably hindered my development…but I had no choice in the matter. This view is something I have no way of knowing is correct, but that’s what I believe. This brings up a good question - what type of clubs are the top swing coaches around the world recommending to their young pupils and stars of tomorrow?
RR