Golf Club Head Technology

One of the keys to a forgiving golf iron technology is lowering the center of gravity of the head. What some companies are doing is making hollow back or hollow heads in their golf irons. By hollowing out the area behind the face and moving that weight back into the back end of the iron, the center of gravity moves with it.

Fat Golf Shaft Technology

Fat golf shafts perform better for most people for no other reason than the fact that they have less torque. Torque is the amount of twist that a shaft has, usually measured in degrees. Because of the larger diameter, it is much harder to twist a fat shaft than a standard diameter shaft. Standard shafts usually have a tip diameter of about .355 and a butt diameter of .600. Fat shafts usually have a tip diameter in the .535 range with the butt tapering to .600.

Taylor Made R7 and Movable Weights

TaylorMade has come out with a new driver called the R7. The thing that is special about the R7 is that it allows the golfer to move weights to different parts of the head to promote different ball flight patterns without changing the swing weight of the club. The R7 has 4 weight ports One in the heel, one in the toe and two in the back. The club comes with 4 weights, 2-10 gram weights and 2-2 gram weights. The weights on the heel and toe mainly affect whether the club will promote a draw or fade, the weights in the back mainly promote either a higher or lower ball flight. Putting more weight in the heel allows the face to close faster promoting a draw, while putting more weight in the toe slows the close of the face promoting a fade.

The pro version of the R7 comes with about 10 weights allowing for more combination of heel, toe and back weighting.

Wilson True Series Golf Balls and Perfectly Balanced Golf Balls

If you ever missed a putt because at the last second the golf ball turned away from the hole although it did not look like there was a break, you may be the victim of an unbalanced golf ball.

Golf balls are made of several layers of materials, some being denser than others. If each layer isn´t perfectly centered on the ball, the ball may have a heavy spot. There are many machines that can tell you if your ball has a heavy spot, one spins the ball really fast and the heavy spot goes to the top of the machine. The point is, if you ball isn´t perfectly balances it will fly and roll differently than expected. To exagerate the effect, put a small piece of gum on one side of a golf ball and roll it on a flat surface. The ball will roll toward the side where the gum is. Another test is to take a golf ball and put it into a bowl of water. Keep adding epson salt to the water until the ball floats. When the ball settles, the light side will be up. Put a mark on the light side with a permanent marker, now spin the ball in the water, if the mark that you put on the ball comes to the top, the ball has a heavy side. Estimates show that nearly 12% of all golf balls are unbalanced and every major manufacturer has balls that fall into this category.

What Wilson has done in their true line of balls is to make all of the layers of the golf ball the same density so that if any layer is off center, there will not be any affect on the weight distribution throughout the ball.

Perfectly Balanced Golf Balls

If you ever missed a putt because at the last second the golf ball turned away from the hole although it did not look like there was a break, you may be the victim of an unbalanced golf ball.

Golf balls are made of several layers of materials, some being denser than others. If each layer isn´t perfectly centered on the ball, the ball may have a heavy spot. There are many machines that can tell you if your ball has a heavy spot, one spins the ball really fast and the heavy spot goes to the top of the machine. The point is, if you ball isn´t perfectly balances it will fly and roll differently than expected. To exagerate the effect, put a small piece of gum on one side of a golf ball and roll it on a flat surface. The ball will roll toward the side where the gum is. Another test is to take a golf ball and put it into a bowl of water. Keep adding epson salt to the water until the ball floats. When the ball settles, the light side will be up. Put a mark on the light side with a permanent marker, now spin the ball in the water, if the mark that you put on the ball comes to the top, the ball has a heavy side. Estimates show that nearly 12% of all golf balls are unbalanced and every major manufacturer has balls that fall into this category.

What Wilson has done in their true line of balls is to make all of the layers of the golf ball the same density so that if any layer is off center, there will not be any affect on the weight distribution throughout the ball.

Hybrid Golf Club Grips

Some golf club grip manufacturers are producing what is called a hybrid grip. A hybrid grip has a full chord grip surface at the top of the grip for the best grip and control and has a standard style or soft style grip near the bottom for feel. This lets you get the best of both worlds in one grip.

Golf Putting Alignment Aid

The best golf technology that I have seen so far is being used by the people that make the proaim. The Proaim is basically a pair a glasses that you put on that draws lines onto the putting surface so that you can easily line up putts to the hole. This is a great practice aid because it will familiarize you with the target path from both behind the ball when you are lining up plus when you are standing over the putt ready to hit. Putts look very different from these two angles, but, wearing the Proaim, you will gain the confidence that you are golf putting on the right line.