Golf Backspin, How Can I Create Back Spin With Wedges (Video) - by Pete Styles
Golf Backspin, How Can I Create Back Spin With Wedges (Video) - by Pete Styles

There really is nothing nicer than seeing the professionals land the ball on the green and it bounces around the hole and spins back. Well, maybe there is one thing nicer than seeing the pros do it, and that’s you doing it yourself. Hundred yards out with a wedge in your hand, fly the ball up; it’s covering the flag all the way. It lands behind the flag and spins back a little bit and it just adds that little sort of icing on the cake, a little cherry on top when that shot comes off with a bit of backspin.

So how do we create the backspin? How do we get that shot to happen more regularly? The certain set of conditions that we really need to have in our game and on the golf course to produce that back-spinning shot. And even the pros can’t overcome a lot of these conditions. So as we run through the equipment side of things, first we need the appropriate club. We probably need something from a nine iron to a pitching wedge, maybe even a sand wedge. There are going to be the clubs that help you spin the ball the most. We also need a relatively new club. So if you’re looking at a 10 year old wedge with barely any grooves on it, there is one of the reasons why you’re not spinning it. Most of the pros are changing their clubs every couple of tournaments to keep the groove nice and fresh and clean to spin the ball more. So sharp, clean grooves of – of a decent quality wedge and a relatively soft golf ball, you can often hear the cover of a golf ball or you’ll see on the packaging, you know, the distance ball or the spin and the soft feel; simply the distance ball, it’s too hard a cover. It’s not going to spin on the face. It’s not going to spin on the green. So a softer covered golf ball is definitely going to help you spin the ball. The next thing you got to consider is the green needs to be appropriate as well. There’s no point trying to land the ball onto a; down sloping green, British open conditions when it’s absolutely bone hard and running. You’re not going to spin that ball on the best of times. So it’s nice if we’re playing into a green that’s slightly angled towards us, a well watered, quite soft green, but also quite a quick green, so when the ball lands and spins and starts to track backwards, the faster green enables that ball to then spin further back; makes it look a bit nicer. So that’s covered the equipment side of things. Now if we look at the actual way to play the shot. If we have a dry club and a dry golf ball and dry grass, that’s definitely going to help as well because any moister stuck between the club face and the ball is going to hamper the amount of spin that we can correct on the – or we could actually implement onto the golf ball. So as we set up to this good wedge shot, we’re going to play the ball from the center and the stance, narrow stance, leaning on the front side and being quite aggressive with our strike down because it’s important we contact the ball and not the ground first. If we contact the ground and we get grass between club and ball, it won’t spin. So we’re going to try and hit the golf ball with a nice downwards trajectory. The next thing we’ve got to consider is simply the amount of power that we use. If you try and hit a short shot and you’re not hitting very hard, there’s just not enough club head speed when it hits the ball to generate the amount of back spin. So very difficult to actually sort of spin back the ball unless it’s going more than 30, even 50 yards, feel the side of the green hitting a little flick like this. That will simply – is not going to sort of back up and track back on the green. You need to be really generating a little bit more club head speed, maybe 50, 80, 100 yards – that sort of shot there; plenty of power, plenty of down strike. That’s going to start to check up. So you’ve got to have a good club, a good ball and a good green; dry and good – a good lie, good dry grass, ball in the center, striking down aggressively on the back of the ball with plenty of club head speed. And that’s the best way to try and get that ball with checking up on the – on the dance floor. 2014-11-07

There really is nothing nicer than seeing the professionals land the ball on the green and it bounces around the hole and spins back. Well, maybe there is one thing nicer than seeing the pros do it, and that’s you doing it yourself. Hundred yards out with a wedge in your hand, fly the ball up; it’s covering the flag all the way. It lands behind the flag and spins back a little bit and it just adds that little sort of icing on the cake, a little cherry on top when that shot comes off with a bit of backspin.

So how do we create the backspin? How do we get that shot to happen more regularly? The certain set of conditions that we really need to have in our game and on the golf course to produce that back-spinning shot. And even the pros can’t overcome a lot of these conditions. So as we run through the equipment side of things, first we need the appropriate club. We probably need something from a nine iron to a pitching wedge, maybe even a sand wedge. There are going to be the clubs that help you spin the ball the most. We also need a relatively new club. So if you’re looking at a 10 year old wedge with barely any grooves on it, there is one of the reasons why you’re not spinning it. Most of the pros are changing their clubs every couple of tournaments to keep the groove nice and fresh and clean to spin the ball more. So sharp, clean grooves of – of a decent quality wedge and a relatively soft golf ball, you can often hear the cover of a golf ball or you’ll see on the packaging, you know, the distance ball or the spin and the soft feel; simply the distance ball, it’s too hard a cover. It’s not going to spin on the face. It’s not going to spin on the green. So a softer covered golf ball is definitely going to help you spin the ball.

The next thing you got to consider is the green needs to be appropriate as well. There’s no point trying to land the ball onto a; down sloping green, British open conditions when it’s absolutely bone hard and running. You’re not going to spin that ball on the best of times. So it’s nice if we’re playing into a green that’s slightly angled towards us, a well watered, quite soft green, but also quite a quick green, so when the ball lands and spins and starts to track backwards, the faster green enables that ball to then spin further back; makes it look a bit nicer. So that’s covered the equipment side of things.

Now if we look at the actual way to play the shot. If we have a dry club and a dry golf ball and dry grass, that’s definitely going to help as well because any moister stuck between the club face and the ball is going to hamper the amount of spin that we can correct on the – or we could actually implement onto the golf ball. So as we set up to this good wedge shot, we’re going to play the ball from the center and the stance, narrow stance, leaning on the front side and being quite aggressive with our strike down because it’s important we contact the ball and not the ground first. If we contact the ground and we get grass between club and ball, it won’t spin. So we’re going to try and hit the golf ball with a nice downwards trajectory.

The next thing we’ve got to consider is simply the amount of power that we use. If you try and hit a short shot and you’re not hitting very hard, there’s just not enough club head speed when it hits the ball to generate the amount of back spin. So very difficult to actually sort of spin back the ball unless it’s going more than 30, even 50 yards, feel the side of the green hitting a little flick like this. That will simply – is not going to sort of back up and track back on the green. You need to be really generating a little bit more club head speed, maybe 50, 80, 100 yards – that sort of shot there; plenty of power, plenty of down strike. That’s going to start to check up.

So you’ve got to have a good club, a good ball and a good green; dry and good – a good lie, good dry grass, ball in the center, striking down aggressively on the back of the ball with plenty of club head speed. And that’s the best way to try and get that ball with checking up on the – on the dance floor.