Tags: The down low on better iron shots.

Are you a golfer who loves their woods but has always struggled with your irons and wedges. Your woods love to be swept off the turf. Swinging with a shallow angle of attack, where the club-head catches up to your hands, can work really well at launching high straight drives and fairway woods. The problem is while this works well with your longer clubs it can cause struggles with your irons and wedges. When the club-head catches up with our hands it forces us to pick the ball off the turf leaving very little room for error. Additionally it tends to add loft to the club-face at impact reducing the energy transfer and increasing the trajectory both of which can drastically reduce distance. Ideally we want to have the hands leading the club-head at impact with our shorter clubs. Hybrids, irons and wedges are all designed to be struck in such a manner. This is one of those things all better players have figured out that separates them from the rest of the golfers out there. When the hands lead the club-head it encourages a downward or steeper angle of attack into the ball allowing for better impact location of the club-face and a big increase in backspin. This allows for more efficient energy transfer (more ball speed=more distance) and increased backspin equaling additional carry and increased stopping power. As an added bonus it also dynamically strengthens the loft of the club-face at impact effectively turns say a 9 Iron into a 8 Iron or maybe even a 7 Iron making many golfers 10 to 30 yards longer with every club in their bag. So how do we make this happen? Well as a visual guide try to think of doing the limbo with your irons, make them fly lower than you normally do. To do this you’ll have to practice keeping your hands ahead of the ball through impact. To get a feel for this stand at address and place the ball in a position where when you look down your hand appear to be closer to your target then the ball or club-head, for many of us we’ll find this ball position is further back than we’re used to. When we get it right you’ll see the ball leaving the club-face faster than ever before and you’ll be taking little divots right after impact. As a bonus you’ll also be taking longer walks straight down the middle between shots.
For help with this or any other part of your game don’t hesitate to come see Edwin for a lesson to get the most out of your swing.