What Are The Reasons And Benefits To Having Fat Or Thinner Grips For Golf Clubs And Putters - Golf Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles
What Are The Reasons And Benefits To Having Fat Or Thinner Grips For Golf Clubs And Putters - Golf Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles

Because I am a bit of a golf geek, there’s a past time I do quite enjoy. And its standing in the golf shop, watching golf customers pick up the latest greatest golf club. Now tailor made, might have invested millions of dollars of research into this golf club. And somebody walks up, picks it up wiggles it and says ‘no I don’t want that’ and puts it back on the shelf. And I think, all that guy is going to do in that is he’s testing out whether he likes the grip or not, he doesn’t care about the 100 pounds shaft and the 200 pound pad. He’s bothered about the three pound grip. And if he doesn’t like the feel of that three pound grip, it goes back on the rack. And it’s a massively underdeveloped and underutilized part of the golf club, and certainly part of the club fitting process for most players. If they don’t feel comfortable holding this bit, it doesn’t matter how much technology is packed into this bit, they’re never going to feel it because they don’t like this end.

So when you’re setting up to the golf club – golf ball, we’ve got to make sure that the club in your hands is the right length, the right angle, the right loft, the right weight but also the right thickness of grip. And it’s only recently that manufacturers have really started to cut it on to this and start to custom fit the grip size, grip diameters, grip shapes and the feeling of the grip as well. Now the simple thing is, just make sure the size of the grip is correct for you. So one checkpoint we would run is when you’re setting up to the ball and you put your left hand on. As your left hand meets around here, there shouldn’t really be any pressure. Now this is actually not one of my clubs, I picked up a different club. So if I was to grip that, then grip it – how I would do, my finger starts to push in to the back of my hand there. This grip is a little bit too small. I take one of my own clubs. This has got a midsized grip on it, there’s a slightly thicker material at the top, when I put my left hand on there, there’s less pressure and that feels instantly more comfortable. So the easiest way for you to check is go and see a club fitting specialist and they’ll probably produce a chart like this from one of the manufacturers and simply you put your hand in the right position, lay your fingers on and then it comes out with me here saying that I need to be a midsized grip. If your hands are really big, you go to jumbo, which to me feels almost like a tennis racket. If your hands are smaller, smaller juniors, ladies, that sort of thing, you have undersize grips. But it’s important the grip position or the grip size is correct, so that when you‘re coming down to the ball the hands couldn’t release correctly. It’s generally considered, if the grip is too thick, the hands will be too slow through impact, the ball will go to the right hand side. And even though it might feel comfortable with a thick grip, it might actually be detrimental to your shots to the right. And if the grip is too thin the hands could overwork, be too active, and pull the ball down the left hand side for the right handed golfer. So let’s get – let’s make sure the grip thickness is correct. Let’s also make sure the grips are new enough. Everyone that has got grips that are more than five years old, go and change them, it will feel like a brand new set of irons all of a sudden. Because this is the only bit you hold, let’s make sure you get that bit right. Then if your hands start to blister or if you practice a lot, get a different compound of grip, maybe a softer compound of grip that puts less stress, less pressure on your hands. If you play in the rain a lot, you can put a cord through the grip. A corded material just absorbs a bit of moisture. If you have sweaty hands, same thing, get some cord in there that will take the moisture off the grip; give you a better hold and better feel. Then we look at putters, now recently we started to see putters coming again with all different sorts of shapes and sizes. I still prefer my pretty standard and regular Scotty Cameron grip here, but I see somebody the other day putting with what looked to me like a table leg in their hands. It was like this big. And they said ‘oh no I swear by this Pete I don’t allow my hands to get too active, with the big grip.’ I got to be honest, that’s all personal preference. But what I would suggest you do is next time you’re looking at purchasing a golf club or trying something out make sure you take notice of what’s on this end as much as what’s on this end. This is the bit you hold, this is the bit that gives you the most feedback, let’s pay attention to the grip next time. 2014-03-26

Because I am a bit of a golf geek, there’s a past time I do quite enjoy. And its standing in the golf shop, watching golf customers pick up the latest greatest golf club. Now tailor made, might have invested millions of dollars of research into this golf club. And somebody walks up, picks it up wiggles it and says ‘no I don’t want that’ and puts it back on the shelf. And I think, all that guy is going to do in that is he’s testing out whether he likes the grip or not, he doesn’t care about the 100 pounds shaft and the 200 pound pad. He’s bothered about the three pound grip. And if he doesn’t like the feel of that three pound grip, it goes back on the rack. And it’s a massively underdeveloped and underutilized part of the golf club, and certainly part of the club fitting process for most players. If they don’t feel comfortable holding this bit, it doesn’t matter how much technology is packed into this bit, they’re never going to feel it because they don’t like this end.

So when you’re setting up to the golf club – golf ball, we’ve got to make sure that the club in your hands is the right length, the right angle, the right loft, the right weight but also the right thickness of grip. And it’s only recently that manufacturers have really started to cut it on to this and start to custom fit the grip size, grip diameters, grip shapes and the feeling of the grip as well. Now the simple thing is, just make sure the size of the grip is correct for you. So one checkpoint we would run is when you’re setting up to the ball and you put your left hand on. As your left hand meets around here, there shouldn’t really be any pressure. Now this is actually not one of my clubs, I picked up a different club. So if I was to grip that, then grip it – how I would do, my finger starts to push in to the back of my hand there. This grip is a little bit too small. I take one of my own clubs. This has got a midsized grip on it, there’s a slightly thicker material at the top, when I put my left hand on there, there’s less pressure and that feels instantly more comfortable.

So the easiest way for you to check is go and see a club fitting specialist and they’ll probably produce a chart like this from one of the manufacturers and simply you put your hand in the right position, lay your fingers on and then it comes out with me here saying that I need to be a midsized grip. If your hands are really big, you go to jumbo, which to me feels almost like a tennis racket. If your hands are smaller, smaller juniors, ladies, that sort of thing, you have undersize grips. But it’s important the grip position or the grip size is correct, so that when you‘re coming down to the ball the hands couldn’t release correctly. It’s generally considered, if the grip is too thick, the hands will be too slow through impact, the ball will go to the right hand side.

And even though it might feel comfortable with a thick grip, it might actually be detrimental to your shots to the right. And if the grip is too thin the hands could overwork, be too active, and pull the ball down the left hand side for the right handed golfer. So let’s get – let’s make sure the grip thickness is correct. Let’s also make sure the grips are new enough. Everyone that has got grips that are more than five years old, go and change them, it will feel like a brand new set of irons all of a sudden. Because this is the only bit you hold, let’s make sure you get that bit right. Then if your hands start to blister or if you practice a lot, get a different compound of grip, maybe a softer compound of grip that puts less stress, less pressure on your hands. If you play in the rain a lot, you can put a cord through the grip. A corded material just absorbs a bit of moisture. If you have sweaty hands, same thing, get some cord in there that will take the moisture off the grip; give you a better hold and better feel.
Then we look at putters, now recently we started to see putters coming again with all different sorts of shapes and sizes. I still prefer my pretty standard and regular Scotty Cameron grip here, but I see somebody the other day putting with what looked to me like a table leg in their hands. It was like this big. And they said ‘oh no I swear by this Pete I don’t allow my hands to get too active, with the big grip.’ I got to be honest, that’s all personal preference. But what I would suggest you do is next time you’re looking at purchasing a golf club or trying something out make sure you take notice of what’s on this end as much as what’s on this end. This is the bit you hold, this is the bit that gives you the most feedback, let’s pay attention to the grip next time.