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Desired Driver Height

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Acesteve

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How high are you trying to hit the ball with your driver and why?

I'm hitting a medium trajectory on averge on the course. I get a bit less rise on the range for reasons I don't fully understand. Clearly if I increase my loft or alter my shafts I can get the ball higher and it carries further but my on course play does not suggest this leads me to more distance. I play an open links style layout with lots of wind and I appear to maximize distance from round to round and hole to hole with a medium trajectory that runs out.

On the range though, clearly guys around me are hitting the ball a lot higher and it makes me wonder:whistle:
 
I hit the ball really high (even when I tee it pretty low). My tee height is a half a ball above the crown at address. 🤷‍♂️
 
Range balls are usually different that the ball you play on the course. This may be the reason.
 
I wish my ideal launch condition was more repeatable. I'd say "medium high" works best for me, allowing downwind shots to be aided while not suffering too much into the wind. I sometimes hit the ball much higher and sometimes much lower. Seldom can I do either intentionally! :D
 
Never really thought about it. I tee the ball up a consistent height, hit it on the up swing, and after hitting it, I want it to land in, or near the fairway. How high the trejectory is, will be what it is.

As for range balls, I only pay attention to the first 1/2 or 3/4s of the ball flight for accuracy purposes. Range balls, unless they are new, are not very consistent with longer clubs when compared to my regular gamers.
 
I hit the ball fairly low with my driver and with more backspin than is ideal. I know that I hit down on my driver a bit which causes that but when I try to change AoA I get crooked.

I need to do some work to shallow my swing but I have some golf coming up and right now it is more important to know where the ball is going.

To maximize distance you need a high flat ball flight if that makes sense. Think about how you would throw a baseball the farthest total distance. You wouldn’t throw it on a line and try to have it run and you wouldn’t throw it way high. You would get probably a medium high flat trajectory. You need the right AoA to get that though. If you don’t deliver the club properly you can’t get the ideal ball flight.
 
robrandalgz said:
I hit the ball really high (even when I tee it pretty low). My tee height is a half a ball above the crown at address. 🤷‍♂️
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tee height helps me move my ball flight some. Typical for me would be a half a ball above but at times I will go a full ball if I want to really throw the ball up in the air
 
Chef23 said:
To maximize distance you need a high flat ball flight if that makes sense. Think about how you would throw a baseball the farthest total distance. You wouldn’t throw it on a line and try to have it run and you wouldn’t throw it way high. You would get probably a medium high flat trajectory. You need the right AoA to get that though. If you don’t deliver the club properly you can’t get the ideal ball flight.
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i suspect that when I really hit it high that I'm getting a bit too much spin which would make it impacted by wind and lower the run out. last week I was playing pretty decent and after hole 6 my playing partners noted how high I was hitting my drives. Implication was my distance was not as good as normal. It clicked with me that I'd been testing in the prior round and had my driver lofted up. I altered my club back to my stock 9 setting and instantly picked up 20 yards on #7
 
I want 100 feet at my peak as the minimum, that’s always my baseline. That gives me carry that plays anywhere.
 
I’d love to get some actual numbers on my shot heights, but anecdotally I’d say my shots are mid-height.

Range balls can be very different than the one you’re playing on course, so I’d take that into consideration. I’d also look at tee height. Not too sure how many players have measured the range tees versus their own playing tee if using rubber mats or auto-tees.
 
Acesteve said:
i suspect that when I really hit it high that I'm getting a bit too much spin which would make it impacted by wind and lower the run out. last week I was playing pretty decent and after hole 6 my playing partners noted how high I was hitting my drives. Implication was my distance was not as good as normal. It clicked with me that I'd been testing in the prior round and had my driver lofted up. I altered my club back to my stock 9 setting and instantly picked up 20 yards on #7
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If you watch the pros hit their drive they generally hit their drivers much higher than I do and they also run out because they have optimized spin for their launch conditions.
 
I honestly have no idea how high I should try to hit the ball. I want the best combination that provides the best carry and total distance.
At times I think I hit it too high, but without statistical data to back it up, I don't know if I am hitting too high, too low, or right in that sweet spot.
The frustrations of a person without access to a simulator or launch monitor.
 
I prefer it to be medium/high and it typically is on the days I'm hitting driver decently. I've also developed an intentional lower flight swing for hitting into strong head winds. But all in all I typically have one of the higher flights when I play with other senior golfers. I think that helps me drive it further than on lower flight days.

As for actual height, I'd peg medium/high peak (for me @ 90 mph) to be 80-85 feet? It's a speed dependent metric though. Plugged my desired launch characteristics (14*/2250rpm) into the trajectory optimizer and changed ball speeds to see what peaks 80-120 mph swings would see if launch/spin stayed the same, (@1.48 smash):
53' at 80 mph, 73' at 90, 94' at 100, 117' at 110, 144' at 120.
 
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I like a medium/high flight, but I have a negative AoA so I often hit low bullets even with a 12° driver. I need to work on changing my AoA, but overall my game is working fairly well right now so I don't want to screw with anything.
 
I don't have any of the actual statistics on my ball flight, but I seem to hit it higher than most everyone I play with. That has been the case regardless of the loft of my driver. I've tried hitting lower drives but my accuracy goes way down. I like hitting my driver high for the most part, but it is less than ideal when playing in windy conditions.
 
Daddio said:
As for actual height, I'd peg medium/high peak (for me @ 90 mph) to be 80-85 feet? It's a speed dependent metric though. Plugged my desired launch characteristics (14*/2250rpm) into the trajectory optimizer and changed ball speeds to see what peaks 80-120 mph swings would see if launch/spin stayed the same, (@1.48 smash):
53' at 80 mph, 73' at 90, 94' at 100, 117' at 110, 144' at 120.
Click to expand...


lefty and mad brad mentioned something that made me think so I went back to a day on the range last fall when I had a launch monitor on loan. My recorded better swings were around 95mph and 140 feet of peak height. I question if many of those range balls got that high but that is what the monitor beleived. Since last fall, I have improved swing and changed driver and got a lower flight shaft. I would think i'm around 100 feet on the course with quite a bit of variation. It looks low to me vs my historical ball but the numbers from Daddio might suggest I'm closer to where I should be.

though I don't have a monitor on the course, I benchmark vs my playing partners. When we all airmail it, I'm maybe 0 to 10 yards longer then my playing partners. When I turn the loft down and hit it lower I'm about 30 yards longer best vs best.
 
9CABEE68-6549-4300-B5DA-C9B6550B7342.jpeg
This was an average result for me yesterday on the range. My first swing was around 111mph chs but never saw that again. This one was pretty much the average of what I was seeing. To me these numbers are pretty good. I am used to a lower trajectory so I wouldn’t mind seeing a little lower launch angle and apex but it is certainly playable right where it is.
 
this was my best distance wise from last fall. I would not have said it was 142ft high at apex but I would say that on my best drives I hit a relatively high ball with little to no roll

IMG_4912.jpg
 
I just raised my driver to try and get more height. I am curious to see how my #'s change.
I hit it medium height generally.
 
It changes for me based on conditions, or just hole. In general here you can't live on runners, because it tends to be soft/wet. So when I moved from Nebraska I raised my average driver flight with swing, club, and ball changes. Stock is probably mid-high, but descriptions of that aren't really consistent. High ends at productively high to me. To others, too high is still just high.
 
On a TXG video they said a good baseline number for peak driver height is your 6i swing speed. So if you swing your 6i 85 MPH you want your driver flight to peak around 85 feet.

Obviously that's a rough guideline but they implied that it's pretty reliable.
 
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