Quote:
Originally Posted by New Era
Its partly because fitting is pretty much a scam. Unless you are playing all the time and have a grooved swing, the minuscule corrections made in fitting is not going to help your game. People that play once or twice a week have so many imperfections in their swing that change from session-to-session, whether it be stance, spine angle, take away, or swing speed, that finding a consistent point of contact in the middle of the club face is virtually impossible. Club fitting is designed to reduce your consistent impact point on the club face one point to another. If you're hitting all over the club face all the mechanical changes in club component is not going to amount to a hill of beans. All you're doing is moving your strike dispersion to a different part of the club face. You're still missing the sweet spot, just in a different spot.
Seriously, clubs are designed so they are playable by 95% of players. Even without proper posture and spine angle clubs off the rack fit 95% of people. Unless you are a genetic freak with unusually long arms, or a really compact torso, clubs off the rack should be playable and work for you. When I say playable I mean achieve pretty consistent scoring results. This is what most players should be searching for because their strikes are all over the club face (mis-hits). Most clubs today are designed to correct for those mis-hits.
That may also be part of the problem. You may have purchased too much club for your game. If you just bought some blades, and you aren't hitting a thousand balls a week (minimum) you probably bought too much club. Most players should be in some sort of game improvement club until they can hit a consistent dime sized mark on impact tape. Once you achieve this, then start looking at the clubs that allow for you to learn to work the ball.
I don't know how many players I have worked with that spent money on equipment that is not set up for their game. I have a close friend who burns through equipment left and right. Goes and gets fitted every six months and thinks the next piece of equipment is going to fix his game. Every time he does that I pull out the impact tape and do a range session with him His strike dispersion remains the same regardless of fitting. His epiphany came when he finally took my advice and decided to go after the game improvement clubs (some really nice Mizuno JPXs). He still did the fitting, but ended up playing demos (same JPXs) for a month while he waited for his "custom" clubs to come in. He played some of his best golf and struck the ball the best he has in years on those standard-standard clubs. His "customs" arrive and his game goes to #### again. It ain't the arrow, its the archer.
The bright side about this is that your body will adapt to the fitted the clubs. Your brain will slowly alter your swing to find some consistency in the striking. Your brain is correcting the tolerances the fitter did, and tweaking your swing to where the standard-standard was. Unless you are going to the range and hitting a grand a week, give it a few months and you'll get back to where you were.
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Agree with pretty much everything here, except for the comment about “most players” avoiding blades. 62 going on 63 here. Best index was 8.2, currently not counting but in the 10 range, mostly due to chipping yips. My first full set of clubs were Hogan Apex irons, 2-PW (called an Equaliser). Over the years, I’ve owned about six sets of clubs total including dupes for our VanIsle residence. All off the rack. Switched in my 30s to Mizunos, IMO the best forged irons available. Oh, and I still have a 2 iron, although I admit I’m hitting my hybrid more and more.
If you want to improve your game, blades are the only choice. They communicate misses instantaneously. There is no other way to learn and improve your swing, IMO. I will never play GI clubs.
Again, in my opinion, too many players seek a technology or fitting “cure” for their ills instead of digging in the dirt.
Oh, and if your clubs feel awkward, try gripping down a half inch. Works every time.