Opinion & Analysis

The Wedge Guy: Understanding iron designs, Part 2

Published

8 months ago

Aug 31, 2023

As promised, here is the follow-up to last week’s post about understanding iron designs. Today, I’m going to tell you what to look for as you try to figure out which iron best suits your type of play and is most likely to deliver the performance you seek. Oh, and these principles apply to wedges as well.

Let me begin with a historical observation.

Up until the introduction of the first mainstream cavity back/perimeter-weighted irons, the entire market was limited to some type of forged blade design. Across the entire spectrum of brands and models, there were only subtle nuanced differences from one to the other. Some featured some kind of “muscle back”, where the mass was concentrated low in the clubhead and the shaping formed a sort of crescent on the back of the club, the majority of mass being in the center of the clubhead (from heel to toe). Others spread that mass more evenly across the back of the clubhead (i.e. the Hogan designs), while others shaped their back to provide a bit more mass toward the toe, as in the traditional Wilson Staff models.

Then the “revolution” came with the Ping Eye 2 and all its copies. These early cavity-back designs moved much of the mass to the extreme perimeter of the clubhead, leaving a thin face, which delivered a high degree of forgiveness of off-center hits, but also deteriorated the consistent distance control delivered by the traditional forged blades. They also launched the ball much higher, making long- and mid-irons much easier to hit, but compromising the traditional precision of shorter irons.

Golfers had to make choice between shotmaking precision and forgiveness of mishits.

This design “revolution” also set in motion the continual strengthening of lofts in the shorter clubs to where we are today when “P-clubs” can be as low as 42 degrees – a far cry from what a true “pitching wedge” must be. See my post on that here.

The one thing in common with both of these approaches to iron design was that “what you see is what you get.” There were no internal technologies, so a visual examination of the clubhead could tell you pretty much how that iron was going to play.

As iron technologies have advanced, many radical designs have come and gone, but the performance of the traditional blade and the traditional cavity-back remain. Modern technologies allow much more precision in making iron heads, and multi-material construction has given club designers much more freedom to explore and refine performance, but these principles of iron head design are constant. For the most part, the golf ball will react to how a clubhead’s mass is distributed and where its CG is located. Period.

Understand that for each clubhead number or loft, the weight of the clubhead does not vary by more than a few grams from model to model to model. The designers’ challenge is to position that finite amount of mass in such a way as to achieve the performance goals for that particular model. So, here are the parameters designers have to consider, and that you can consider when looking for a new set of irons:

To begin, golf ball performance is determined by how much mass will be directly behind various points of impact on the face. The reason blade designs are still preferred by the best shotmakers is that these designs put mass directly behind the point of impact with the ball, thereby giving the golfer the maximum ability to control distance, trajectory, and shape of the shot.

Conversely, if the area behind the strike zone is thin, the club will likely be “hotter” but distance consistency will be compromised.

If a large portion of the mass is positioned lower in the clubhead, that design will launch higher, and likely with less spin. While this might be desirable in the lower lofts; high launch and low spin are probably not what you want in your higher-lofted scoring clubs, say those over 37-39 degrees, and particularly not with your wedges.

If mass is concentrated in the center of the clubhead from heel to toe, center strikes will be extremely solid and repeatable, but misses toward the toe will be more compromised than a design that has the mass more evenly distributed across the entire clubhead.

If some of the mass is distributed toward the low toe area, that club will be more forgiving of toe mis-hits.
Thin, fast faces and hollow or foam-filled construction is the rage now, but the trade-off is losing some distance precision in exchange for more distance (which comes from higher launch and less spin).

Another modern development is the use of heavy tungsten inserts low in the clubhead, which adds to the higher loft and lower spin distance formula – that might be desirable in the longer irons, but that’s exactly the opposite of what you want in the scoring clubs.

Big wide soles were more the rage a while back than they are now, but the wider the sole, the lower the mass distribution, so the higher the launch angle and the lower the spin. And these super wide sole designs are not very good for tighter turf conditions.

All golf clubhead designs are bound by two distinct principles – gear effect and smash factor.

Gear effect determines the trajectory and spin the golf ball will take. The higher the clubhead mass is distributed (i.e. blade designs), the lower the ball flight and higher the spin rates. Likewise, the more mass that is distributed toward the toe or heel from the strike point, the more likely the ball will curve back to the center.

Smash factor is the efficiency of transfer of clubhead speed to ball speed. Every club has one perfect point of impact that maximizes smash factor and that transfer of energy begins to deteriorate as impact is moved away from that point. That’s why you get occasional “heaters” off most thin-faced irons and see significant distance loss on more traditional blades. It’s also why those high-face misses with traditional wedge designs just pop-up with greatly reduced distance and spin.

I hope this has been enlightening and helpful.

More from the Wedge Guy

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19th Hole

Vincenzi’s 2024 Zurich Classic of New Orleans betting preview

Published

3 days ago

Apr 22, 2024

Matt Vincenzi

The PGA TOUR heads to New Orleans to play the 2023 Zurich Classic of New Orleans. In a welcome change from the usual stroke play, the Zurich Classic is a team event. On Thursday and Saturday, the teams play best ball, and on Friday and Sunday the teams play alternate shot.

TPC Louisiana is a par 72 that measures 7,425 yards. The course features some short par 4s and plenty of water and bunkers, which makes for a lot of exciting risk/reward scenarios for competitors. Pete Dye designed the course in 2004 specifically for the Zurich Classic, although the event didn’t make its debut until 2007 because of Hurricane Katrina.

Coming off of the Masters and a signature event in consecutive weeks, the field this week is a step down, and understandably so. Many of the world’s top players will be using this time to rest after a busy stretch.

However, there are some interesting teams this season with some stars making surprise appearances in the team event. Some notable teams include Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele, Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry, Collin Morikawa and Kurt Kitayama, Will Zalatoris and Sahith Theegala as well as a few Canadian teams, Nick Taylor and Adam Hadwin and Taylor Pendrith and Corey Conners.

Past Winners at TPC Louisiana

2023: Riley/Hardy (-30)
2022: Cantlay/Schauffele (-29)
2021: Leishman/Smith (-20)
2019: Palmer/Rahm (-26)
2018: Horschel/Piercy (-22)
2017: Blixt/Smith (-27)

2024 Zurich Classic of New Orleans Picks

Tom Hoge/Maverick McNealy +2500 (DraftKings)

Tom Hoge is coming off of a solid T18 finish at the RBC Heritage and finished T13 at last year’s Zurich Classic alongside Harris English.

This season, Hoge is having one of his best years on Tour in terms of Strokes Gained: Approach. In his last 24 rounds, the only player to top him on the category is Scottie Scheffler. Hoge has been solid on Pete Dye designs, ranking 28th in the field over his past 36 rounds.

McNealy is also having a solid season. He’s finished T6 at the Waste Management Phoenix Open and T9 at the PLAYERS Championship. He recently started working with world renowned swing coach, Butch Harmon, and its seemingly paid dividends in 2024.

Keith Mitchell/Joel Dahmen +4000 (DraftKings)

Keith Mitchell is having a fantastic season, finishing in the top-20 of five of his past seven starts on Tour. Most recently, Mitchell finished T14 at the Valero Texas Open and gained a whopping 6.0 strokes off the tee. He finished 6th at last year’s Zurich Classic.

Joel Dahmen is having a resurgent year and has been dialed in with his irons. He also has a T11 finish at the PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass which is another Pete Dye track. With Mitchell’s length and Dahmen’s ability to put it close with his short irons, the Mitchell/Dahmen combination will be dangerous this week.

Taylor Moore/Matt NeSmith +6500 (DraftKings)

Taylor Moore has quickly developed into one of the more consistent players on Tour. He’s finished in the top-20 in three of his past four starts, including a very impressive showing at The Masters, finishing T20. He’s also finished T4 at this event in consecutive seasons alongside Matt NeSmith.

NeSmith isn’t having a great 2024, but has seemed to elevate his game in this format. He finished T26 at Pete Dye’s TPC Sawgrass, which gives the 30-year-old something to build off of. NeSmith is also a great putter on Bermudagrass, which could help elevate Moore’s ball striking prowess.

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19th Hole

Vincenzi’s 2024 LIV Adelaide betting preview: Cam Smith ready for big week down under

Published

3 days ago

Apr 22, 2024

Matt Vincenzi

After having four of the top twelve players on the leaderboard at The Masters, LIV Golf is set for their fifth event of the season: LIV Adelaide.

For both LIV fans and golf fans in Australia, LIV Adelaide is one of the most anticipated events of the year. With 35,000 people expected to attend each day of the tournament, the Grange Golf Club will be crawling with fans who are passionate about the sport of golf. The 12th hole, better known as “the watering hole”, is sure to have the rowdiest of the fans cheering after a long day of drinking some Leishman Lager.

The Grange Golf Club is a par-72 that measures 6,946 yards. The course features minimal resistance, as golfers went extremely low last season. In 2023, Talor Gooch shot consecutive rounds of 62 on Thursday and Friday, giving himself a gigantic cushion heading into championship Sunday. Things got tight for a while, but in the end, the Oklahoma State product was able to hold off The Crushers’ Anirban Lahiri for a three-shot victory.

The Four Aces won the team competition with the Range Goats finishing second.

*All Images Courtesy of LIV Golf*

Past Winners at LIV Adelaide

2023: Talor Gooch (-19)

Stat Leaders Through LIV Miami

Green in Regulation

Richard Bland
Jon Rahm
Paul Casey

Fairways Hit

Abraham Ancer
Graeme McDowell
Henrik Stenson

Driving Distance

Bryson DeChambeau
Joaquin Niemann
Dean Burmester

Putting

Cameron Smith
Louis Oosthuizen
Matt Jones

2024 LIV Adelaide Picks

Cameron Smith +1400 (DraftKings)

When I pulled up the odds for LIV Adelaide, I was more than a little surprised to see multiple golfers listed ahead of Cameron Smith on the betting board. A few starts ago, Cam finished runner-up at LIV Hong Kong, which is a golf course that absolutely suits his eye. Augusta National in another course that Smith could roll out of bed and finish in the top-ten at, and he did so two weeks ago at The Masters, finishing T6.

At Augusta, he gained strokes on the field on approach, off the tee (slightly), and of course, around the green and putting. Smith able to get in the mix at a major championship despite coming into the week feeling under the weather tells me that his game is once again rounding into form.

The Grange Golf Club is another course that undoubtedly suits the Australian. Smith is obviously incredibly comfortable playing in front of the Aussie faithful and has won three Australian PGA Championship’s. The course is very short and will allow Smith to play conservative off the tee, mitigating his most glaring weakness. With birdies available all over the golf course, there’s a chance the event turns into a putting contest, and there’s no one on the planet I’d rather have in one of those than Cam Smith.

Louis Oosthuizen +2200 (DraftKings)

Louis Oosthuizen has simply been one of the best players on LIV in the 2024 seas0n. The South African has finished in the top-10 on the LIV leaderboard in three of his five starts, with his best coming in Jeddah, where he finished T2. Perhaps more impressively, Oosthuizen finished T7 at LIV Miami, which took place at Doral’s “Blue Monster”, an absolutely massive golf course. Given that Louis is on the shorter side in terms of distance off the tee, his ability to play well in Miami shows how dialed he is with the irons this season.

In addition to the LIV finishes, Oosthuizen won back-to-back starts on the DP World Tour in December at the Alfred Dunhill Championship and the Mauritus Open. He also finished runner-up at the end of February in the International Series Oman. The 41-year-old has been one of the most consistent performers of 2024, regardless of tour.

For the season, Louis ranks 4th on LIV in birdies made, T9 in fairways hit and first in putting. He ranks 32nd in driving distance, but that won’t be an issue at this short course. Last season, he finished T11 at the event, but was in decent position going into the final round but fell back after shooting 70 while the rest of the field went low. This season, Oosthuizen comes into the event in peak form, and the course should be a perfect fit for his smooth swing and hot putter this week.

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Opinion & Analysis

The Wedge Guy: What really makes a wedge work? Part 1

Published

7 days ago

Apr 18, 2024

Terry Koehler

Of all the clubs in our bags, wedges are almost always the simplest in construction and, therefore, the easiest to analyze what might make one work differently from another if you know what to look for.

Wedges are a lot less mysterious than drivers, of course, as the major brands are working with a lot of “pixie dust” inside these modern marvels. That’s carrying over more to irons now, with so many new models featuring internal multi-material technologies, and almost all of them having a “badge” or insert in the back to allow more complex graphics while hiding the actual distribution of mass.

But when it comes to wedges, most on the market today are still single pieces of molded steel, either cast or forged into that shape. So, if you look closely at where the mass is distributed, it’s pretty clear how that wedge is going to perform.

To start, because of their wider soles, the majority of the mass of almost any wedge is along the bottom third of the clubhead. So, the best wedge shots are always those hit between the 2nd and 5th grooves so that more mass is directly behind that impact. Elite tour professionals practice incessantly to learn to do that consistently, wearing out a spot about the size of a penny right there. If impact moves higher than that, the face is dramatically thinner, so smash factor is compromised significantly, which reduces the overall distance the ball will fly.

Every one of us, tour players included, knows that maddening shot that we feel a bit high on the face and it doesn’t go anywhere, it’s not your fault.

If your wedges show a wear pattern the size of a silver dollar, and centered above the 3rd or 4th groove, you are not getting anywhere near the same performance from shot to shot. Robot testing proves impact even two to three grooves higher in the face can cause distance loss of up to 35 to 55 feet with modern ‘tour design’ wedges.

In addition, as impact moves above the center of mass, the golf club principle of gear effect causes the ball to fly higher with less spin. Think of modern drivers for a minute. The “holy grail” of driving is high launch and low spin, and the driver engineers are pulling out all stops to get the mass as low in the clubhead as possible to optimize this combination.

Where is all the mass in your wedges? Low. So, disregarding the higher lofts, wedges “want” to launch the ball high with low spin – exactly the opposite of what good wedge play requires penetrating ball flight with high spin.

While almost all major brand wedges have begun putting a tiny bit more thickness in the top portion of the clubhead, conventional and modern ‘tour design’ wedges perform pretty much like they always have. Elite players learn to hit those crisp, spinny penetrating wedge shots by spending lots of practice time learning to consistently make contact low in the face.

So, what about grooves and face texture?

Grooves on any club can only do so much, and no one has any material advantage here. The USGA tightly defines what we manufacturers can do with grooves and face texture, and modern manufacturing techniques allow all of us to push those limits ever closer. And we all do. End of story.

Then there’s the topic of bounce and grinds, the most complex and confusing part of the wedge formula. Many top brands offer a complex array of sole configurations, all of them admittedly specialized to a particular kind of lie or turf conditions, and/or a particular divot pattern.

But if you don’t play the same turf all the time, and make the same size divot on every swing, how would you ever figure this out?

The only way is to take any wedge you are considering and play it a few rounds, hitting all the shots you face and observing the results. There’s simply no other way.

So, hopefully this will inspire a lively conversation in our comments section, and I’ll chime in to answer any questions you might have.

And next week, I’ll dive into the rest of the wedge formula. Yes, shafts, grips and specifications are essential, too.

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