Golf Ball Flight Laws

Golf ball flight laws explain why a golf ball flies in a certain direction. They are important because you need to have a starting point when you are trying to correct your swing. Without ball flight laws you would simply be guessing on how to correct your slice or hook. When you are making swing corrections you want to elimnate all guessing and use scientific facts that have been measured (More on this in future blogs).

In simple terms, ball flight laws are based on the fact that the balls flight pattern is primarily dependent on the clubface orientation at impact, and that approximatley 85% of the balls intitial flight direction is determined by the club face orientation while only 15% of the initial flight is dependant on the club head path at impact. Wait a minute, I was taught that the club head path determined initial ball flight direction and the ball curved off of the path because of orientation of the club face. THIS IS NOT TRUE! PGA Professiona,  Dr. Gary Wiren came up with a set of ball flight laws that have been proven to be incorrect. The initial path direction ball flight laws should be disregarded and you should either adopt the "new" laws or continue to use ball flight laws that I explained at the beginning of this paragraph. In fairness to the PGA and Gary Wiren, the new ball flight laws were reviewed at this years teaching and coaching summit. I haven't reviewed the tapes of the summit but I am sure the PGA is using the new laws. In future post I am going to explain the different ball flights (Straight, Pull, Push and Slice) and prescribe corrections.

Now that you have a basic understanding of ball flight laws, lets analyze a push slice. When analyzing your ball flight there are three measurements you need to check. The orientation of the clubface, club head path and target line. However, you always want to remember that the target line has NO infuence on your ball. The target line is the imaginary line from your golf ball to your target. A ball will push slice when the club head path is directed left of the ball target line at impact, and a clubface orientation that is directed aat the target. The ball will start off in a direction that is just left of the ball-target line (85% in the direction of the clubface orientation relative to the club head path). The ball will slice to the right later in its flight, and that is due to the presence of side-spin (due to the face that the clubface is open to the club head path at impact).