A bit more golf club chatter

About a month ago I was tinkering with my clubs and decided to purchase a Nike Covert Tour 3-hybrid because of how well I was hitting it off of the mats at the local fitting range. I was hoping to use that stick to replace my current 3-wood as I never seemed able to control that stick and was missing the fairway 90 percent of the time off the tee and couldn’t seem to hit a decent shot to save my life on a par 5.

I purchased the exact hybrid and shaft that I was hitting well on the range, but when it arrived I never warmed up to it. I hit it decent off of mats (how I demoed the club as the fitting range hits off of mats only) but when I got it out on the course I just didn’t like the feel of that stick. It felt a bit too plastic-y and even though it was set to 18 degrees I could hit my 21 degree hybrid more consistently and just as far.

Today I decided to bring out my old 3-wood in it’s stead and see what my numbers were on TrackMan. To my surprise, every “natural” shot, that is a swing without trying to manipulate the club in any way, had the face shut 10 degrees at impact. When compared to irons, hybrid and driver on TrackMan I have no club that is even remotely as closed at impact. I don’t feel like I am doing anything different and am not exactly sure what is going on, but it explains a lot about why I can’t seem to hit that club on the course.

When I tried to hold the face off to compensate it was about 6 degrees open at impact. After 30 swings, the club was either an average of 9 degrees shut or 5 degrees open. Neither of those are a good sign.

I decided to bring it out with me and ended up hitting it twice on the course. The first was a huge hook and the second a large push-slice. Makes sense and basically sums up my 3-wood problems.

I’m going to try a different shaft tomorrow, but I find it odd that this one club is so difficult for me to square up at impact. At most, my current driver, hybrid and irons average about 3 degrees open or shut during my larger misses. If you add into account that my old swing was about 5 degrees inside out it made for some horrid hooks with that fairway wood.

I’ll be tinkering for a while and also am planning on stopping by Oceanside to see the Titleist fitters on January 15 next year and will have plenty of questions for them about this subject.

On a brighter note, I’ve been working hard on my swing and am hitting the driver way better over the past couple of weeks. My ball striking in general has solidly improved and I’m excited about things to come.

Shreds says:

December 18, 2013 at 5:56 pm

I know this is not too technical, but maybe it is because you do not practice the 3 wood enough on the range?

Richard Chen says:

December 19, 2013 at 6:13 am

The existing 3-wood does not fit like shaft flex, and grip size are not right, but 3-woods are not that easy, as compared to the 4-wood. Start with a 4-wood before tackling the 3-wood. Some pros like Johnny Miller pretty much just stay with the 4-wood as a go to fairway wood, and even as a go to driver, and hardly use the 3-wood. The 3-wood has to be hit very precisely, or it can pick up a fair amount of side curvature, as although it curves less than a driver, it flies higher so that it has more time in the air to curve. A few years ago in the overtime of the Masters, a 3-wood was chosen for safety, and it curved as deep into the woods as any driver, causing a lost to second place.

A 4-wood is hit down somewhat with some hand lead at impact (not as much as irons, but definitely hands in front of the ball at impact) so that it does not need perfect lies. The 3-wood is recommended to be used mostly with good lies. With good lies, learning to hit the Driver off the deck promotes proper hand position at impact, precision of hitting, and proper control of clubface angle at impact (use an old driver in the beginning of hitting none-teed up balls with the driver, so as to not damage the regular driver.) Once the 4-wood is mastered, the 3-wood becomes easier.

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