Swing Speed, Ball Speed and Distance

Relation of Swing Speed, Ball-Speed and Distance

Sometimes among golfers, you hear talks about Tiger Woods' swing speed going up to 180mph. This is incorrect. Once, a person told me that his swing speed is more than 150 mph, I choked and gasped for air for a moment. He was a hard and long hitter no doubt but there is no way he could top 150 mph. If he could do that, then Tiger Woods and John Daly are all wimps. What they meant is possibly his ball speed and not swing speed. Tiger's swing speed is at 125mph. Of course at times, it may increase to 130mph or drop to 115mph depending on him while John Daly could top 135-140 mph anytime. Golf legend Sam Snead, who also hit thunderous drives in his prime said: "I never saw a man who could take a club that far back and drive that well for that long. But if that swing ever comes unglued, they will never find the ball." To give you a measured perspective of swing speed in relation to carry distance, please see below:

Swing Speed to Distance

Swinging at 70-95 mph swing speed (average golfers) carry distance is about 140-210 yards (128-192m).

At 100-110 mph (better/stronger players) carry distance is about 210-230 yards (192-210m).

110-130 mph (Tour Pros) gives you 230-310 yards (210-283m).

130-150 (long drive pros) gives you 290-360 yards (265-329m).

Remarks: There are other variables that affect distance like climate, club loft, launch angles, ballspin, etc. Air density plays a part too.

Swing Speed

Swing Speed is the speed the club travels as it strikes the ball, the faster your swing speed, the further you will hit the ball. Accordingly, explained in golf physics, if it were to move in a straight line: force = mass x acceleration but golf being a circular swing, Torque = Moment of Inertia x Angular Acceleration, therefore, increase in your angular acceleration during the downturn (not economic recession) of your swing will increase your swing speed. One can either try increasing it with physical effort or reducing the MOI (resistance to twisting). At the top of your back swing, you are at zero swing speed and from here to impact, it is the swing speed measured in mph.

Note: The official statistics on average swing speed on the PGA Tour is approximately at 113 mph. Of course, there are some who could swing at or higher than 120 mph. The average 5-iron on Tour is 185 (169m) yards from fairway to green and 197 (180m) yards from the tee on par 3.

Your golf swing is like a rotation of a mass in a radius and the bigger the mass is, the larger the radius and the harder it is to control, execute or move the entire mass from a stationary point. If you can keep that low, you can make the swing easier and faster when going down. Your club that you wield and connected to you are one and the mass and we need to learn how to control it and it is part of muscle memory based on a repertoire of technique.

Your club is connected to your hands which are connected to your shoulders and shoulders to the spine become an axis of rotation. This is point where the pivot and fulcrum is formed and hinged to launch each shot. Knowing and applying when to cock and to release your hands is very crucial to your shots and the results. Some people may not cock their wrists while others do so only at the top while many others release it too early and thus suffers from power leaks.

When you watch pros on TV, they always appear to hit their shots so easily and yet achieve solid distance without much effort. Why is that so? It is because even after beginning the downswing, their hands are still cocked at the wrist to create more acceleration and generate speed, uncoiling naturally like a trigger of a revolver being released when fired. They only really start generating effort at the mid-point of their forward swing.

Timing, Tempo, Rhythm

Why do some smaller players, older golfers or even ladies hit their shots longer? It is because they are able to time their release. Muscle tension in any part of your body and especially in your hands and shoulders when evident in your swing is a distance killer. It will only destroy your "timing" which some also call "tempo" or "rhythm" which are basically one and the same thing. Older golfers love Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer. Younger ones never failed to mention Tiger Woods as their idol but to me my favourite is ................ Annika Sorenstam.

Annika does not swear nor throw her clubs after a bad shot. That's is absolute coolness because sometimes I feel like swearing or breaking my club but they are too costly to replace.

Annika, you can include the male golfers here, has the smoothest, most effortless swing in the world each and every time she wields the clubs with a smooth rhythmic tempo swishing through the ball with perfect timing. It is actually a matter of science. A very important criteria is ball speed. You may have a great and very fast swing speed but this will amount to not much if you do not hit the sweet spot each time.

In case your ball speed generated is not in proportion to your club head speed, you loose not only distance but you will also waste energy. The best ratio to be achieved is a ration of 1:1.5 meaning that if you swing speed is 100 mph, when hit on the sweet spot, you ball speed will equal to 150 mph. The lower the ration, the poorer the quality of your shots. Even top professionals mostly come in at just about 1:1.4 so remember it is all about hitting the "sweet spot".

Annika's Swing Speed is at 102 mph (even more than many of us) and she could create a Ball Speed of 155 mph and that is an amazing 1:1.52 ratio (more than optimum) based on a launch angle of 12 degree and spin rate of 2,500 rpm. This is how we should play golf - to emulate Annika Sorenstam.

Ball Speed

It takes balls to play and it takes even more balls when instead of seeing the targets you could only see obstacles.

What is Ball Speed? Ball speed is the speed of the ball leaving the club face on impact and measured in mph. A typical swing speed vs ball speed comparison looks like these:

At a swing speed of 80 mph, one gets ball speed of 110 mph, ratio 1.37.

At a swing speed of 90 mph, one gets ball speed of 130 mph, ratio 1.444

At a swing speed of 105 mph, one gets ball speed of 155 mph, ratio 1.476

Annika's swing speed of 102 mph, ball speed 155 mph, ratio 1.52!

Therefore, very simply - higher swing speed = higher ball speed = greater distance. Tiger's ball speed will reach more than 180 mph from his swing speed when applied at 125 mph. High swing speed without hitting the sweet spot will not get you there. If you were to slice or hook. side-spin being imparted makes you suffer great loss of ball speed as the ball do not get compressed. An older, less athletic person with a rounder tummy (sounds like some of us?) can still outshine and out drive someone half his age if his swing has no power leaks and by compressing the ball correctly and yes by also using the right ball. Try searching for and looking out for videos which shows you how a ball is being compressed when hit. As an estimate, you can roughly say that the ball speed is about 1.5 times of your swing speed.

Ball

Your 210 yards carry can increased by 20 yards if you have a gust of tail wind sweeping by at 20 mph but it will decreased by 25 yards into and against a head wind at the same speed. A golf ball speed is about 1.5 times of you club head swing speed. You can't hit your drives 230 yards unless you can generate ball speed of around 150 mph. Average golfers with ball speed of 130 mph will carry a driver shot averaging 180-200 yards.

Those with even lower speed gets only 150-160 yards. When a club face hits the ball, the total contact time is only approximately 0.0005 seconds and the peak force applied can reach and go on to more than 1,800 kgs. This is why safety is of paramount importance when you are out there on a golf course and the chief reason why you need a handicap - to learn and practise safety and etiquette. Help watch out for one another. Always stay behind the line of fire. There is no such thing as the longest ball, one type suitable for all golfers. Two piece ball gives more roll and maybe longer distance only when hit with irons due to less spins but weaker players will think they are getting more distance due to an enhanced feeling of getting the ball airborne more easily.

Golf as in life, play as it lies!