Choosing the Right Golf Club

     Once you understand the mechanics behind hitting the ball, it is time to choose a club. This in part depends on your terrain, but in general the choice is an easy one. The club will help determine your shot's distance, height, and direction, and these three things together let you know exactly which club to pull out of your bag. As an added benefit, knowing how to choose your club properly can help you narrow down which clubs are strictly necessary to take in the first place, which can help reduce your practice time and speed up your improvement in the game.

Drivers

    The driver is a classic golf club. It appears in every "grand slam" type of golf image, it shows up in logos and cartoons, it creates excitement in the golfer and in onlookers, and it has the most raw power. Often, the driver is the first thing people practice with on the range, and the one they practice with the most. Unfortunately, this doesn't make much sense, because the driver is only used for one shot per hole, if even that.

    Now, it is important to practice with the driver, even to practice proportionally more than it is used during a typical round. As the longest and hardest-swung club, it is extremely important to learn and develop swing control when using the driver. A poor drive has a significant psychological effect that can ruin the rest of the hole. 

    Drivers are best used from the tee box, where the ball can be elevated on a tee. They are not designed to meet the ball at ground level, and using a driver successfully from the ground is very difficult. Drivers make up for this lack of versatility by covering the largest distance with the ball and making it easy to apply spin to curve the ball for mid-air control.

Irons

    Irons are the bread and butter of the fairway clubs. From the 1 iron all the way down to the 9 iron, these clubs are used to travel towards the green each with its own range of distance. These ranges tend to overlap significantly, so it is not necessary to have an iron of each type. Remember that you need to practice with and be familiar with each of the clubs you carry, so having adjacent irons (think a 3 and a 4 or a 6 and a 7) will likely offer you no benefit for double the practice time.

    Unlike drivers, irons are designed to be used from the ground. The clubface is flat, meaning that the ball doesn't have to be raised in order to hit the right part of the face. The blade of the iron is sharp, allowing the club to scoop underneath the ball without bouncing off the ground. Irons also have a flattened heel, which helps to slide the club along the ground instead of sticking in deeply at first contact (assuming you aren't hitting behind the ball, of course).

    

Wedges

    Wedges are shaped like irons, but have higher lofts than the 9 iron does. They are primarily used for short game shots like chips and pitches. The high lofts and large heels help to lob the ball high into the air when pitching, and to softly scoop the ball forward when chipping (as opposed to launching it over the green like an iron would). 

    Generally wedges and other short game clubs should receive the most practice time out of any other type of club. These shots can be difficult and stressful, as mistakes can send the ball either just a few feet or over the green entirely. I also recommend spending the most time on non-bunker shots, a little bit of time learning how to get out of the bunker, and the rest of the time practicing not getting in the bunker in the first place.

    

What clubs should I take on the course? 

    You can choose up to 14 golf clubs to take on the course with you. This offers plenty of room to choose a variety of clubs for any situation. However, I prefer not to take 14 clubs. I don't want to take a club that I probably won't use, and so any club I do take needs to be one that I've practiced and become familiar with. I also don't want to waste space (and weight) with overlapping clubs, because they don't provide much benefit when I can just give a harder or softer swing. In general, I prefer to take only 7-8 clubs that I feel provide a good balance of necessity and variety:

  • Two Drivers, a 1 and a 5
  • The 3, 5, and 9 irons, with an optional 7
  • The Sand Wedge
  • The Putter

Summing Up

    There are plenty of golf clubs to choose from, but they narrow down to just a few different types. Discounting hybrids, which I'll discuss another time, clubs fall into the categories of drivers, irons, and wedges. Each category has its own purpose, and within each category are plenty of choices for variety. It is not a good idea to over-saturate any one category, as the benefits by closely related clubs can be gained by varying your swing a little bit. There is a balance, however, as having related clubs allow you to gain different results without adjusting your base swing significantly. Whichever clubs you choose, remember that you need to practice with each of them to become familiar and choose the right ones for each and every situation. 

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