Understanding Your Clubs

By: Tina Mickelson - Jun 16, 2020

One of the most common questions I get from my students is whether or not they are playing the right clubs. While it is extremely important that the specs of your clubs fit your golf swing, I want to take this one step further and talk about HOW and WHY to use specific clubs. After all, your clubs will do you no good, as perfect a fit as they are, if you do not use them properly.

So let’s just get this out of the way: get fitted for your set of clubs before you buy them. Your local golf shop should have the capability of measuring certain aspects of your swing so you can ensure the specs of your clubs fit your golf swing. And while you are assembling your set, don’t underestimate the importance of the hybrid. Generally speaking, a hybrid club generally acts as what many refer to as a “rescue” club but each has a specific loft that coincides with your longer irons. For example, a 4-hybrid takes the place of your 4-iron. Why use a hybrid instead of an iron? Because it is easier to make solid contact, you get better trajectory, and it generally goes straighter.

Now that you have your perfect set of clubs, you are ready for the next step: actually using them the way they were meant to be used. The most confusion seems to be with clubs used around the green. “When do I hit my Pitching Wedge, Sand Wedge, etc.?” General rule of thumb: the higher the degree of loft on the wedge, the higher the ball will go and the less it will roll. If you look at your club head you will (or you should) find the degree of loft. A lob wedge has more loft than a sand wedge, which has more loft than an approach wedge, which has more loft than a pitching wedge.

If you need the ball to go higher (picture a shot where you have to hit over a bunker with a tight pin) and want it to stop faster, you take the club with the most loft in your bag. If you have a longer pitch shot where you want the ball to stay low and roll across the green and up to the hole, take the club with less loft, which would be your pitching wedge. Many people will also use a 9, 8, or 7-iron for a shot like this because they prefer as little loft as possible. This is where practice really comes into play. Everyone is different and short games are unique. And since short game is so heavily based on feel, it is important to establish which clubs you are most comfortable with around the green.

When I was very young I had a limited set of clubs. I did not have a pitching wedge or lob wedge...just my sand wedge. So my sand wedge was used in a wide range of shots. When I got older and improved enough for a full set I was so used to using my sand wedge everywhere around the green, it continued to be my go-to club. It still is. My general approach when chipping is to fly the ball as close to the hole as I can and have it stop quickly. That is based off my experience growing up. Other players are more comfortable keeping the ball low to the ground and having it roll as much as possible. There’s nothing wrong with that. These players will generally use clubs around the green that have less loft so they can keep it low.

This might seem like common sense to some, but I realized how important it is to understand this concept during a short game lesson a number of years ago. I had a group of students who were all having trouble stopping the ball on the green. They showed me a particular lie where they needed a good amount of loft and because the pin was tight they needed to get the ball to stop quickly. They were frustrated at the fact they could not get the ball high enough in the air and then it would roll too far.

The first thing I did was look at the club they were using. Every single one of these students had a pitching wedge in their hand. And their reasoning is extremely common and reasonable. They thought that sand wedges were strictly for getting out of the sand and only a few of them had lob wedges. I took my 62 degree wedge (lob wedge) out of my bag and had each one of them make the same swing they were using with their pitching wedge. Suddenly, without making a single swing change, they were able to get the ball as high as they wanted, stopped it quickly, and ended up with a very short putt.

At this point I cannot overstate the importance of practice. The more you practice with the different clubs in your bag the more familiar you get with your yardages, trajectory and variety of different shots you can play. You are also able to identify which clubs you feel most comfortable with not only around the green but from different lies and situations.



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