Redefining “Optimal” TrackMan Numbers for Improved On-Course Performance
Jack Nicklaus once said, “The toughest shot in golf is one that is perfectly straight. It’s tough to execute physically because so many things must be exactly right at impact. It’s tough strategically because it reduces the target area-If you aim at the center of the fairway, then hit a slice or a hook, you have only half the fairway to play with, whereas if you aim, say down the left side and play for a deliberate fade, you have almost the width of the fairway is at your disposal if you overdue it.”
By this quote Mr. Nicklaus was proving one very important point, that trying to zero out your club path and face angle was a good idea in theory but it is hurting your scorecard. Truth is, all great tour players consistently fall on one side of 0 or the other with great management of the clubface.
All world class golfers have a stock shot and work the ball one way or another to eliminate the trouble side of the hole. For Lee Trevino and Jack Nicklaus, it was a push fade, for Tom Lehman and Zach Johnson, a push draw; for Corey Pavin, a pull fade, and for Matt Kuchar is a pull draw.
It’s a shot that they know they can put in play and it will keep them out of trouble. The shot will, without question, move one way or another, but never straight. Whether that “go-to” or “stock” shot is a fade or draw does not really matter. However, what does matter is that it’s a shot that consistently moves the ball towards the target, and rarely ever passes across the target.
Ben Hogan, known as the best ball striker to ever play the game was spot on when he said, “You only hit a straight ball by accident. The ball is going to move right or left every time you hit it, so you better make it go one way or the other”.
Hitting a stock shot is a lot like that of a professional bowler. A PBA bowler always bowls a curve towards the front pin. However, if the ball crosses the front pin, there is no chance for a strike. If they miss it on the front right of the front pin however (for a right handed bowler) they still have hope of a strike. Golf is no different. We need to learn to play golf on the offense and try to always work the ball towards the flag, but never allow the golf ball to cross the line of your target. This will create a one-way miss and allows you to swing with more freedom and consistency.
Jonathan Bryd, a player known as one of the best ball strikers on tour and who has been compared to Ben Hogan for his technique said the following: “I try to hit a stock draw, with my club path and face open to the target line. Having a stock shot keeps things simple in decision making and it helps by keeping my path consistent and allowing me to control the face. With all the pressure that comes with trying to win a tournament on the PGA Tour, a stock shot helps to have your go to under pressure situations”.
If you look at any PGA Tour pin sheet, like the one below, one thing is certain, pin positions are rarely in the middle of the green. On average, a tight pin off the side of the green is 3 paces (nine feet) and a very generous pin seemed to be 5 paces (15 feet). If the pin sheet showed the flag to be 5 paces off the side, a tour player should feel like they will never miss the green on the short side. Therefore, the question one has to ask is this: if a tour player takes dead aim at a pin, has roughly 2 degrees of face control, and tries to “zero out” his swing on every shot, how would they ever know if your face is going to be open or closed to the target line? If we say the average PGA Tour player face variance is 2 degrees, that could mean the players face could be +1 degree open on one shot and the next shot be -1 closed, all while keeping a zero path. Therefore, if the pin was tucked on say the left side of the green, the zero out player would have to aim 12 feet right to make sure they eliminated the short side of the flag because a club path of 0 and face angle of -1 would make the ball land 21 feet left.
With this said, trying to tell the best players in the world that they cannot take dead aim at a pin 5 paces off the side would be nearly impossible. Consequently, they would have to aim 12 feet right to eliminate the short side and if their ball did finish close to the pin it was by luck and a miss hit. However, a player who has a stock draw shot pattern and has eliminated the left side of the course can take dead aim because they know they “never miss left because their 4.5 club path would have a “closed” face of 2 and finish just 9 feet left. However, with this said, the only way to prove this is to the reader is by diving in depth into the numbers and see what the perfect TrackMan numbers would be to truly eliminate the trouble on one side of the course.
My goal is to figure out what the ideal Trackman club path and face angle numbers need to be to create a desired launch direction and spin axis for the player to eliminate one side of the course like Mr. Nicklaus advises us to do. What I teach my tour players and amateurs is to hit all shots into the “zone”. The zone is defined as a field goal that is one side of the target or the other (like Jonathan Bryd above). With hitting the zone, a player would always be trying to hit it into the field goal so that they could eliminate the trouble on one side of the target. If the player hits the zone, the shot is success. Therefore, we need to figure out what an ideal club path would be that would eliminate one side of the course and allow us to have to greatest opportunity to have the appropriate proximity on one side of the green or fairway if we overdue it a bit.
PLAYER A
|
Carry [yds] |
Total [yds] |
Side [ft] |
AttackAngle [deg] |
ClubPath [deg] |
FaceAngle [deg] |
SpinAxis [deg] |
|
184 |
192 |
-21.3 |
-3.9 |
0.0 |
-1.0 |
-2.5 |
|
184 |
192 |
-10.6 |
-3.9 |
0.0 |
-0.5 |
-1.2 |
|
184 |
192 |
0 |
-3.9 |
0.0 |
0.0 |
0 |
|
184 |
192 |
10.6 |
-3.9 |
0.0 |
0.5 |
1.2 |
184 |
192 |
21.3 |
-3.9 |
0.0 |
1.0 |
2.5 |
Above you will find a chart and graph of the club path and face numbers for Player A. Player A tries to always zero out his club path and therefore has a constant club path of 0 and club face variance of 2 degrees. As you will see, when Player A steps up to an approach shot from 184 yards, an average 6 iron distance, he can miss the ball 21 feet right or 21 feet left, a dispersion of 42.6 feet. Therefore, if the pin is anything less than 7 paces off the side, the player cannot take aim at the flag due to the possibility and probability of short siding themselves.
PLAYER B
|
Carry [yds] |
Total [yds] |
Side [ft] |
AttackAngle [deg] |
ClubPath [deg] |
FaceAngle [deg] |
SpinAxis [deg] |
|
184 |
192 |
-9.6 |
-3.9 |
4.5 |
2.0 |
-6.2 |
|
184 |
192 |
0.9 |
-3.9 |
4.5 |
2.5 |
-4.9 |
|
184 |
192 |
11.5 |
-3.9 |
4.5 |
3.0 |
-3.7 |
|
184 |
192 |
22.1 |
-3.9 |
4.5 |
3.5 |
-2.5 |
184 |
192 |
32.8 |
-3.9 |
4.5 |
4.0 |
-1.2 |
What if you just wanted to have a closer proximity to the hole than the average PGA TOUR player from 175-200 yards. If that was the case, then you would need to be inside Brendan Steele who is 32.9 feet away from distances of 175-200. However, we already know that the zeroed out player cannot aim at the flag because they will short side themselves potentially because their miss can be 21.3 feet right of left.
Therefore, with tour pins normally 9-15 feet off the side, they must aim and play away from the flag. Now however, what if Player B has a fixed club path of 4.5 degrees to the right and a face variance of 2 degrees. If the player blocks their shot and it does not draw as much as they would like they are going to be 32.8 feet away from the flag still inside the PGA Tour average. More importantly though, Player B can be very aggressive with their swing because they know they rarely miss left and if they do it is only 9.6 feet from the flag. This path and face also has a closer dispersion of only 42.4 feet compared to 42.6 feet. Therefore, with a pin that is 3 paces off the side, Player B is on the collar of the green and not in the bunker.
One argument that might arise from this logic is that if the 4.5 club path and 2.5 face angle is ideal, one might say that their face variance should be between 1.5 and 3.5. However, player B is always trying to eliminate left and to always be working the ball towards the hole. Because of that, while Player B takes dead aim at the flag on all shots, Player B is actually trying to land each ball a few yards to the right of the flag (for left pins) so that once it hits the green it continually got closer.
Not to mention, as a right handed golfer, right to left putts are the easiest putts to make compared to left to right. With most greens going front to back, I was giving myself the best chance to make putts. So while Player B’s club path would be constant at 4.5, their ideal face was roughly 3 degrees because they want to land the ball to the right of the pin. Once it bounced on the green and worked towards the hole from 11 feet, it would end right next to the hole and be in the zone and therefore a success.
CONSTANT CLUB PATH SHOT DISPERSION GRAPH
By knowing these numbers, we can now know what would be a perfect club path and face angle number on TrackMan could be to eliminate short siding ourselves or our players. I personally am not a fan of “zeroing out” because of its inconsistency in shot patterns. It enables missing both left and right of the target. I also believe it would be really hard to train three different swings with any type of consistency based around attack angle. If you were hitting down more, the player would need to go more left and then swing much more right when swinging up on it with say a driver.
Jordan Spieth said the following after winning the Fedex cup this year, “I didn’t feel comfortable striking the ball whatsoever, today or this week. I didn’t have a go to shot…it was amazing that we competed with the way I felt over the ball”. I know that all good players play their best golf when they know what their stock shot shape is doing with great consistency. It allows the player to take dead aim knowing that they will rarely ever over curve the ball past the flag. While zeroing out and having a square D-plane is a great idea in principle and mathematics, I really feel like anyone who does it is letting their scorecard suffer as a result.
Finally, in summary, my suggestion for you would be the following: pick a shot pattern and stick to it. With the help of TrackMan, you can now make sure you are always near your perfect workability numbers. Check out my youtube page, The Golf Room for suggestions on feedback drills to move your numbers either more positive or more negative pending which side of zero you are wanting to be on.
Appendix: Please check out the attached excel sheet and see what the perfect TrackMan numbers would be to always remain in the zone. From here, you can now know what path and club face numbers would be too aggressive and which ones are too conservative. In my opinion, I would like to have the largest club path and face differential that still starts and finishes the golf ball in the zone. Therefore, I am not opposed to the 6-degree club path angle because it nearly fully eliminates one side of the course. Zach Johnson, one of the most consistent ball strikers on tour has a club path of 6.7, a face angle of 3.4, swing direction of 4.1, while hitting down 2 degrees. By having a stock shot the golf ball will always be playing offense and moving towards the flag. Now the question becomes, are you ready to start making more shots from the fairway because it will always have a chance to go in (Zach Johnson seems to hole out a wedge every tournament and Jonathan Bryd’s winning hole in one at the PGA TOUR Shriners Hospital Open are a few examples that come to mind). I hope these findings help paint a littler clearer picture as to what is true “optimal” numbers should be using trackman. Enjoy the journey and always continue the process of unleashing your potential. More information can be found me at www.TheGolfRoom.com and www.KyleMorrisGolf.com.
How to practice it
While training we always have to have a way of monitoring whether we are accomplishing our goals. Our changes for example in our swings and motor pattern training must have feedback so that we know if you are actually doing it. With this same concept, when working on shaping shots we have to some type of assessment to know if we are getting better in managing our face variance and shot shape. Here is a simple game to assess yourself or your players to maximize their birdie opportunities. Count out 50 balls. Now with a short iron, mid iron, long iron, fairway wood, and driver, see how many you can hit that have a positive launch direction but have a negative spin but never finish left of the target line (this game is for someone who would like to hit a push draw, everything would be the opposite if they wanted to hit cuts).
Quantify how good you are at eliminating a side of the course and still hitting it into your zone. The zone size changes based upon the distance. For instance, with a 9 iron the zone may be 15 feet and with a 5 iron be 35 feet and 25 yards with a driver. Figure out your stock shot and you surely will start beating the golf course.
How to read the appendix
Attached is an excel file proving the math behind hitting a one way shot to eliminate trouble on the course. I believe this is conclusive in its geometry but also through personal firsthand experience. I have seen too many good players come in for lessons who are at zero but hit it both ways. They tell me they do not know which way the ball is going and want more “consistency. Having a two-way miss is a very scary place to play from.
Please feel free to contact me at Kmorris@thegolfroom.com with any questions and hope this gets the mind thinking a little bit outside the box.
Your Bowling analogy isn’t accurate at all. “If they miss it on the front right of the front pin..” That’s not really a miss, a pro bowler’s target (for right-handers) on strikes is actually to the right of the headpin known as the 1-3 pocket, and crossing to the left of the headpin (a.k.a Brooklyn) actually yields a much greater chance of striking than hitting the headpin directly. The shot is usually delivered with a certain amount of curve or “hook” because that trajectory has the highest chance to knock down pins. Then again, there’s single-pin spare shots that are usually delivered with a straight trajectory for accuracy on tougher tournament conditions.
Anyways, your course management analysis is solid.
Skip, his analogy is spot on, the point is they rarely roll it straight, it has curvature.
With all due respect, the idea of “eliminating one side of the golf course” is a flawed one…so is trying to “always work the ball towards the hole” with shot shape.
If you have a 30 yard wide fairway and you try to hit a straight shot and miss left by 15 yards, you’re on the left edge. If you try to work the ball in to the middle from either side in an effort to “eliminate one side of the golf course”, a 15 yard miss left still ends up in the same spot. There’s no reduction in the size of the target area. Understanding your dispersion pattern no matter the shot shape (fade, straight, draw) and aiming that dispersion accordingly is the important thing.
Similarly, if you try to hit the ball straight at the flag and you miss 15 feet left by hitting a shot that visually appeared to work it’s way away from the target, it’s no different than if you tried to curve it towards the target from the left but not enough to cross the target line and it ended up 15 feet left. Yes, the ball flight of curving it in visually appeared to be “working towards the target”, but that doesn’t matter because the end result of the ball’s finish position was the same whether the ball flight fell away from the target or worked it’s way in to it.
Also, having a stock curvature still has a two-way miss. The ball may only curve in one direction, but you can still miss left and right within your zone or field goal area. All you did was aim the dispersion to the one side to “eliminate one side of the golf course”. That could have just as easily been achieved by appropriately aiming your straight shot dispersion.
Jaacob Bowden that’s exactly what I always have thought when someone brings up the concept of eliminating one side of the golf course, it just doesn’t make sense mathematically to me. Not to mention his numbers were based on the advantage it provides if for example you work it right to left as opposed to straight on a left pin. He never mentions the severe disadvantage you would have with a right pin and say a tree or water right as opposed to a person with a straight shot. I think you are spot on in that it only changes people’s perception rather than provide tangible results on the long run.
Jacob,
Thanks for the response. I would like to answer a few of your concerns about the paper. First in regards to the circle size, the circle is actually smaller with a path of 6 and face variance of 2 degrees compared to zeroing out. The diameter of the circle of 0’s is 42.6 and of a path of 6 is 42.2.
Regarding your second comment about the dispersion pattern, you are absolutely right. One must know their miss and then be able to play for it. The player who has a path of zero has no “miss” to play because it is a two way miss. Jordan Spieth, after winning the Fedex cup last year said that “I am lucky to have won the tournament because I was missing it both ways and when that happens it is really hard to play aggressively (this is paraphrased). When you do not know if you miss left or right it is really hard to play golf on offense. Unfortunately the zero out player has this two way miss cause anything other than 0 0 is missing.
Regarding another claim about the perception of the ball working into the flag and finishing the same distance. The truth is that the ball that has a a path of 0 and a face of say +0.7 and is 15 feet right of the flag compared to the player who has a say a path of 4 and face of 2.5 and also lands 15 feet right, player b will be closer because the player B’s ball will continually move towards the flag where player A has his ball continually moving further away from the flag once on the green.
Having a stock shot does have a better miss because the short sided shot is 9.6 feet compared to 21.3 feet. Regarding the “aim”, the stock shot player who hits for instance a push draw, can actually aim at the tucked left pin where player b who zeros out has to play away from the the tucked pin. Like I said in the paper, good luck telling a tour player to not go flag hunting and to play defense on the course. That is sure fire way to loose your card or your job as an instructor. The zero out player would have to aim 4 yards more right of the flag than the stock shot player to have the same result but then could also miss it more right if he has his number at club path of 0 and face angle of 1.5.
For right pins, as a side note, that is the best shot in my bag. Zach Johnson, who plays this stock draw made more birdies last year on right pins than left. For me, Zach Johnson, and Jonathan Byrd, this might be the safest shot in our bag as you just have to aim everything parallel left and then make the same path swing (+4) but just hold the face off open to the path. Because the club is swung on plane, this shot goes nearly as far as a normal shot.
Thank you so much for all your concerns and these are some awesome discussion points you bring up. Maybe it just allows you to see the other side of the coin
Jaacob is absolutely correct. I used to be a +4 handicap, but have since dropped to a +2.6. I’ve been trying to figure out where my game is losing strokes. It’s because I adopted this “let’s always try to fade the ball and eliminate the left side of the course” mentality.
All it’s done is move my dispersion left, which was getting me into more trouble. IF I faded the ball correctly, I was on target. If I ended up hitting a straight one, I’m in the left rough (or far away from the pin), then if I miss left (which happens because it’s impossible to eliminate one side), then I’m in deep trouble. It’s the same thing Tiger struggles with when he’s trying to fade the ball and hates the left-going-left miss. Well, news for you Tiger, it’s golf and you will NEVER eliminate that shot because that is your NATURAL DISPERSION. Instead, aim the damn dispersion safer!
I had WAY more success when, in general, I always aimed down the middle, and always aimed at the flagsticks that a general miss wouldn’t get me into trouble.
I just stumbled across some other stuff today that talked about what you did Jaacob, and it’s like a massive light bulb went off all over again.
Hitting is close is almost just an accident, not necessarily intentional by “working the ball perfectly towards the hole”.
Jaacob, that’s how I look at it. Whether you hit straight, left or right then you still have a middle of your shot dispersion.
If you have a 30 yard dispersion then the center of that dispersion doesn’t magically change just because you draw of fade the ball. Maybe having a fade or a draw makes you feel more confident, so it’s a psychological help, but if you “always” fade or draw your shots then you get in trouble when that shot shape doesn’t work. Ideally, you should be able to shape the ball either way if needed on a dog leg or similar. If you’re simply hitting onto a straight fairway or green then your shot dispersion is what it is. Aiming left of right to put your shot dispersion circle in safe spots ends up with the same results. You could argue that you’re more likely to get closer to your expected distance if you don’t always try to shape the ball.
Basically dispersion is key. Play your stock shape – whatever that is, including straight and whatever numbers if you can repeat them – but if you have no control or no apparent bias develop a slight bias, say under 2 degrees. Never try and play the opposite shape. Fit your centre of dispersion to your target and rid yourself of the idea of the shot-cone because everyone misses their dispersion two ways.
Very interesting analysis.
Great paper Kyle, it does make for a compelling discussion. Obviously from a mathematic point of view as zeroing is the most efficient way to swing the club it makes the most sense. From a playing perspective life is not always as simple as that. I think most players would agree with you and say they feel most comfortable when the ball is consistency moving 1 way. Unfortunately as our feelings are not measured on trackman it is going to be hard to get data to back this up. Maybe there is a future update for trackman, can that little orange box 1 day measure our feelings :)
From a psychological point of view if you have a player that has zeroed their path and takes dead aim at pins (whether they are tucked pins or not) the ball will always be moving away from the pin unless they hit the 0.0 swing. This opposed to someone like Zach Johnson who’s shots will start right of the pin and will move towards the pin more often than not. Now some may turn too much and some may not turn enough but they are moving in towards the flag for the most part. This again is hard to quantify.
Very interesting analysis Kyle, this deserves further study to better understand how to optimize shot shaping for each club. Another related discussion point is the validity or otherwise of changing your swing direction to ‘zero-out’ the clubpath in order to produce a straight shot. This is referred to by some as ‘chasing the numbers’ generated by the launch monitor.
Launch monitor impact data tells you what happened. It should not be used to modify the swing direction or clubpath. For example, if you try to ‘zero-out’ your clubpath by swinging more to the right or to the left, you increase the risk of a hook or slice. From my experience of extensive research and shot testing, if you want to ‘zero-out’ your clubpath, a much more sensible approach is to check and work on improving your set-up and target alignment, as well as your balance, rhythm and tempo on every shot.
Just one example: If a push draw lands short of the pin, it can work both towards and away from the hole. It depends on if the landing is near the target line or to the right of it. I don’t think it is very easy to prove that any path/face relationship is clearly better than another.
I find it a little funny that we use electronics to fine tune degrees of path, face orientatians, and attack angles then try to put it into practice as if it’s our holy grail to better golf. Golf scores would drop dramatically for a golfer the moment they 1.) stop attempting to hit the ball from a closed stance which is what a standard parallel setup is otherwise we wouldn’t need such a clearance of the left side. 2) the golfer needs to understand how to open up the playing area which means no more hitting across the body rather instead out into the playing area which is 90 degrees of openness. Simply put a draw is the same swingpath with a face aimed more left of the path regardless of where I align myself to on the course and a fade is the opposite. A draw is a mistake unless you deliberately closed the face at address period than swung your normal swing such that the face was always more left than the path. Again the fade is just the opposite face path relationship. Angle of attack is the relationship between the butt end of the shaft and the leading edge of the club face this is know as lead angle. That has nothing to do with curvature only compression by allowing more of the club face of say an iron to contact the ball producing a low launch with more backspin to reduce distance lost during the initial launch. Backspin does not rob one of distance as much as a club face that cannot contact maximize its contact with the ball reducing the MOI. Backspin is the only spin in golf and it is put on a tilted axis with either an open or closed face against a club heads centre of gravity. Jaacob Bowden is correct. Personally he holds sufficient credentials from long drive, speed golf wr, pro golf, speed training, club designing with Tom Wishon as well as being taught the Mike Austin swing principles. Today’s golf is played with such inferior awareness of simple body levers that track man is all the industry has to either sell or attempt to sort out the poor understanding of safe golf otherwise Tiger would have been already past jacks record.
Its really more great resources. thanks
i think the point here is this…
if you play a cut and it goes straight you’re in the left rough but not ob
playing straight balls down the middle bring in 3 types of shots. draws , straight , or cuts. – 3 outcomes
playing a shape typically brings in straight or desired shape. – 2 outcomes
i don’t know about the rest of you, but i can swing harder into the straight side of my chosen shape and leak in my shape most of the time – i can release hard into 2 outcomes.
i don’t really care under extreme pressure where the ball is going as long as it’s reasonably safe.
then i can focus on the shot, hopefully it’s a birdie putt.
remember, the putter wins tournaments.
Have Zach Johnson hit wedges to a back right hole or Nicklaus to a front left…100% they won’t follow their natural shot shape into those pins. Ludicrous, and misleading by the author, to presume they would, especially on firm courses. I’m all for a “stock” shot but to advocate it through the green is poor advice.