Golf Clubs

A complete guide to golf clubs

We understand the dilemma that golfers face when identifying and choosing the right golf club for the game. Also, the difficulty is different concerning different professional levels of playing golf. For instance, a beginner wonders at various golf club types, their respective uses according to the game's rules, and the meaning of golf numbers. On the other hand, veteran golfers are sometimes confronted with identifying authentic clubs aside from the counterfeit.

Furthermore, golf itself can be a little complicated for newcomers due to professional play rules and regulations. Hence, we will discuss golf clubs' crucial identifiers, such as the diverse shapes, description of different types of golf clubs, and description of their body parts. We shall discuss another essential item to find the meaning of golf numbers and their implications on your game.

What do golf club numbers mean?

Golf numbers refer to the loft or the angle to which the golf club faces. For instance, when this loft angle changes, you invariably change the golf ball's height and distance when stuck. More so, the lower the number, the lesser the loft, and the less intense the golf club's angle will be. In other words, the golf ball, when hit with that club, will cover more distance and lesser height than that of a higher loft angle.

However, with a higher golf number, there is an increased loft and a more intense angle. These qualities imply that the ball can travel higher but not necessarily farther due to a higher pitch. Besides, the golf number, its rise, and the distance it can cover are all related and simply a work of the knowledge of projectile in elementary physics. Summarily,

• 2 Iron Club will hit the ball over a far distance but at a lower height
• 3 Wood Club will also hit the ball over a farther distance
• 5 Wood Club can take your ball higher but not too far
• 9 Iron Club can take your ball very high as well, but not very far

A beginner set of golf clubs may contain Wood (Numbers 3 & 5), Irons (Numbers including 3-9 with a pitching wedge), and Putter (with only number 1).

The six main types of golf clubs and their respective uses

The six main types of Gold Club include the fooling

1. Drivers

As a beginner in the golf game, your first friend is the driver because you will need tee shorts. Interestingly, driver clubs are usually best known as wooden materials. The history of golf has it that early golf clubs are typically made of wood. However, modern golf clubs can be of different materials, including woods, iron, and a hybrid. So much so that many people classify golf clubs by the material it is made from.

You wonder which type of wood could have the required strength, tenacity, and durability that much. The Persimmon or Hickory wood does the magic as the main types of wood in use. Although early drivers are made of wood, modern drivers are now made of steel, titanium, and even heavier and more precious materials. Suppose the number of a golf club is the loft angle, as we have discussed. In that case, 1 Wood is the driver because it usually has the lowest loft angle between 7 and 11 degrees.

Therefore, the driver has the lowest loft angle among all the golf clubs due to its specific use in taking tee shots. However, your driver's actual angle depends on the level or height you want your ball to reach before landing.

Unique features of the driver

Some of the notable and unique characteristics of the drivers include the following.

• The driver has a shaft that is made of primary graphite due to the required strength and hardness
• The driver is the longest golf club you can have in the bag
• It has the most oversized clubhead in the bag because it usually can hit over an extended area. The size of a top-rated driver can reach 460 ccs. So, as a beginner, use a driver with a head as big as possible because with that, you can minimize your chances of missing off-center shots.

As you grow in experience, you can resolve to drivers with smaller head sizes and still achieve the desired shot. The measures can then be about 440 ccs or even less. By the way, the lower the cc of a driver, the better you can work with it and hit control your shot range. But it is better to begin with a significant head driver.

Use of Drivers

Drivers are the respective clubs that apply to making shorts inside the tee box. It has a relatively long length, making it easier for a ball hit with the driver to cover a long distance both vertically and horizontally. When you intend to take a shot in your par four or par from the tee box, employ the services of a driver for the best chance to hit your shot. Many professional players may have mastered using iron golf clubs for tee shots. Still, beginners and intermediates should recommend drivers in the tee box.

2. Fairways

Like the drivers, the fairways are in the wood category but are not compulsorily made of wood. For instance, fairways can be of metals, or you can call them metal woods. At the same time, they can have numbers 3, 5, and 7 made of wood or contain some other loft ranges. Fairways contain graphite for their required strength and, in some cases, may contain steel. Since the drivers are the longest clubs we have, fairways, by implication, are shorter than drivers, but the former has slighter smaller clubheads.

One way to distinguish a fairway head from the other clubheads is the flat face and a bulbous shape. Fairways also have their loft angles between 12 and 20 degrees to produce higher and shots than many other clubs. In addition to the height, it can create with the ball. The fairway can also be a bit softer on the golf ball, thereby giving you more control of the ball to the desired shape and direction.

You are not likely going to mistake that for another club in the golf bag. When you take a fairway shot, you hear it slide over the grass of the golf course. It is also very crucial to discuss the detailed use of fairways below.

Uses of Fairways

1. When you need to take a short beyond what an iron club can handle, then it is time to draw out your fairway. You may discover that your next shot requires a bit more distance than an iron club can give you, then use a fairway for it.
2. Drivers are designed explicitly for tee shots. However, if you need to control the shot slightly, it is more suitable to use fairway wood for the shot instead of a driver. For instance, the fairway wood is a better club for a short Par 4 tee short and a long Par 3 tee shot.

3. Hybrids

Hybrids clubs, also known as utility golf clubs, are a modern golf game product. The reason is that they combine the old wooden club types with the later club type's iron material. This combination material combines the rare benefits of these two materials constructively to improve the golfer game. If you are not using a wooden club, you can replace all 2, 3, 4, and 5 Iron clubs in your bag with all hybrid clubs.

The use of hybrid clubs gradually entered the professional golfing experience after it became widespread in recreational golfing. Some of the notable benefits of using hybrid or utility clubs include the following.

1. Hybrids are the number one choice for airborne shots
2. You can hard mishit with a hybrid golf club
3. Hybrids allow golfers to have more swing control for the hit and the direction of the shot
4. Generally, hybrid clubs have epical functionalities that make it worthwhile to replace either the wooden or the iron-made clubs.

4. Irons

Irons are now perhaps the most highly used club on the course as you can hit any short or mid-range shot to practically any hole. It may not offer much control as the fairway. Still, it also can be ideal for long shorts from a tee box, especially for professional golfers. The clubs are made of iron metal and contain deeper grooves in the club's heads, running from the toe to the heel. Besides, it can also create an extra spin with the ball through its grooves, and this spin adds a bit more control.

Iron clubs come with a bit thinner head than the hybrid or the woods, which can be a significant advantage for better accuracy. In other words, when taking a close shot that you cannot afford to miss, take an iron golf club, and you can get more confidence towards a positive hit. There are two main types of iron golf clubs: ' cavity back' and 'cavity muscle back' or simply 'muscle back,' also known as the 'Blade.'

5. Wedges

Professional golfers appreciate the use of wedges more than amateurs because of their unique ability to turn the game around for anyone. Wedges are pretty similar to irons due to physical characteristics and build but differ in the loft angle. In other words, wedges often possess a higher loft angle that can range between 46 and 64 degrees. One property you will quickly note is that wedges are not the ideal choice for long-range shots.

Wedges are specifically created to remove golf balls from sandy or turfy surfaces. It has a 'Bounce' property that professional golfers explore in such challenging situations. This uniqueness is possible through a slight angle that the club's edge makes with the clubface's sole. In other words, you can use a wedge to cause the golf ball to bounce off the surface of the ground. Moreover, it is ideal for chipping shots in the air rather than hitting long distances.

There are four common wedge types: the Sand wedge, gap wedge, pitching wedge, and the lob wedge. The name of each type of wedge already suggests what they are used for and how they are used.

6. Putters

An outsider used to soccer games than golf may think of a putter as the striker or center forward. A Putter is the most critical golf club that every golfer must know and must use. As the name sounds, Putters finally puts your ball into the hole as it has a design for gently and smoothly rolling the ball over the surface into the hole.

One distinctive feature of a putter is its flat clubface and does not add to the bounce nor the loft angle of the ball – It simply puts it into the hole, that's all! A putter can have a metallic or a plastic surface, depending on how smooth you want it to feel on the ball. Furthermore, there are just two main types of putters, namely the Blade and the Mallet Putters.

Parts of a Golf Club

A typical golf club has four crucial parts that a golfer needs to learn. These parts include the grip, the shaft, hosel, and clubhead.

1. The grip: the grip of the club refers to the part where you hold it. It is often made of rubber but with a bit rough to reduce friction and increase firmness. In addition to the grip's firmness, you may use a glove to hold it more tightly.
2. The shaft: the part that connects the head with the other parts of the club is called the shaft. This connection involves not only the grip and the clubhead but also the hosel. The shaft is perhaps the most critical part of the club.
3. The hosel: the hosel of a club is the connection between the shaft and the clubhead. The hosel also controls the lie angle of the golf club. At times, it is the hosel that carries the serial number in some brands of clubs. Meanwhile, we will discuss the significance of these numbers later in this article.
4. The clubhead: the head is the last part of the golf club, which is the part that hits the ball. It is usually strong and in different shapes, depending on the type of club in use. The golfer's strength lies so much in the head's contact with the golf ball and the power with which he hits the ball.