Ball Speed is King

If you happened to watch any of the PGA Tour golf from the Bahamas at the weekend, you would have noticed they talked a lot about Tiger’s ball speed.

When a golfer asks why he or she is not hitting the ball as far as someone else, there can be many reasons. One reason is that their ball speed is not high enough. Previously club head speed used to be the big thing in golf, but now I hear ball speed being discussed just as much.

What is ball speed? It is the speed the ball travels immediately after leaving the club face through impact. This is a combination of club head speed, swing speed, where the ball has struck on the face of the club, along with the type of club being used (driver, 3-wood, 7 iron etc).

All the above factors affect ball speed. For instance a heel strike tends to produce the slowest ball speed and there are arguments to say the toe may even create faster speeds than those generated from the centre of the club face.