What Makes The Golf Ball Move (Video) - by Pete Styles
What Makes The Golf Ball Move (Video) - by Pete Styles

So next thing we need to determine here is if this ball flight takes off in one direction and then curves, we need to understand, well, what made that happen, why did that ball curve in the air, whereas the previous shot I hit didn’t curve in the air? Now the curvature in flight is mainly caused by spin, by the fact that when this ball flies through the air, it doesn’t fly in a perfectly stationery arc like this, it will be spinning. And it can be spinning on an axis, it doesn’t just have to be spinning purely backwards or purely sideways, in fact very rarely would that ever happen to any golfer having it purely spinning on one axis or another, its generally a mixture or a tilted axis. Now, consider that every golf ball you hit goes in the air will have some degree of backspin, a ball never top spins, if a ball top spins, you’ve topped it and its coming down about 40 yards in front of you. So every ball that goes in the air with a lofted club will have some degree of backspin on to it, and if its flying through the air the backspin is actually one of the things that keeps the ball up in the air, and it’s the dimples and the way the dimples react to the airflow that keep that ball flying higher.

If we took the dimples off the ball we’d find that the ball would fall out of the sky very early indeed and have a little bit of a wobble before it does so. So a dimple golf ball actually flies better and further than a ball without any dimples. Now, when we hit a golf ball we’ve understood that the ball has some degree of backspin, it has more backspin with wedges and less backspin with drivers generally speaking, just because its more angled with the wedge. But then also, if the ball has any element of a tilted backspin some people would refer that as a sidespin that the ball isn’t just rotating backwards, but its actually got a bit of sidespin. Now a ball is never rotating on its side, the backspin sees to that, the backspin means its spinning this way predominately and its going to spin on axis if it has a bit of what some people would class as sidespin. And it’s that not spinning back purely that takes the ball offline. If you spin a ball back perfectly it would fly straight in the direction that you set it off. If a ball sets off and then it curves, its because the backspin is tilted, its got a bit of what we class as sidespin and it starts to go around corners. And particularly noticeable for golfers is the ball curves a little bit more as it runs out of speed. So when you first hit the ball it paces through the air so quickly that the spin doesn’t really seem to have much of an effect and golfers tell me, “Oh I hit it perfectly straight for the first 150, and then it just indicates and turns right.” And that’s because the ball effectively slows down in the air, but it’s still spinning quickly and it starts to grip the air more, and start to turn out to one side or another. And it’s understanding your relationship of the swing path and the clubface angle and how you imparted spin on the golf ball that we need to understand how that ball curves in flight and how you can then ultimately try and correct that to hit the ball straighter. 2015-10-16

So next thing we need to determine here is if this ball flight takes off in one direction and then curves, we need to understand, well, what made that happen, why did that ball curve in the air, whereas the previous shot I hit didn’t curve in the air? Now the curvature in flight is mainly caused by spin, by the fact that when this ball flies through the air, it doesn’t fly in a perfectly stationery arc like this, it will be spinning. And it can be spinning on an axis, it doesn’t just have to be spinning purely backwards or purely sideways, in fact very rarely would that ever happen to any golfer having it purely spinning on one axis or another, its generally a mixture or a tilted axis. Now, consider that every golf ball you hit goes in the air will have some degree of backspin, a ball never top spins, if a ball top spins, you’ve topped it and its coming down about 40 yards in front of you. So every ball that goes in the air with a lofted club will have some degree of backspin on to it, and if its flying through the air the backspin is actually one of the things that keeps the ball up in the air, and it’s the dimples and the way the dimples react to the airflow that keep that ball flying higher.

If we took the dimples off the ball we’d find that the ball would fall out of the sky very early indeed and have a little bit of a wobble before it does so. So a dimple golf ball actually flies better and further than a ball without any dimples. Now, when we hit a golf ball we’ve understood that the ball has some degree of backspin, it has more backspin with wedges and less backspin with drivers generally speaking, just because its more angled with the wedge. But then also, if the ball has any element of a tilted backspin some people would refer that as a sidespin that the ball isn’t just rotating backwards, but its actually got a bit of sidespin. Now a ball is never rotating on its side, the backspin sees to that, the backspin means its spinning this way predominately and its going to spin on axis if it has a bit of what some people would class as sidespin. And it’s that not spinning back purely that takes the ball offline. If you spin a ball back perfectly it would fly straight in the direction that you set it off.

If a ball sets off and then it curves, its because the backspin is tilted, its got a bit of what we class as sidespin and it starts to go around corners. And particularly noticeable for golfers is the ball curves a little bit more as it runs out of speed. So when you first hit the ball it paces through the air so quickly that the spin doesn’t really seem to have much of an effect and golfers tell me, “Oh I hit it perfectly straight for the first 150, and then it just indicates and turns right.” And that’s because the ball effectively slows down in the air, but it’s still spinning quickly and it starts to grip the air more, and start to turn out to one side or another. And it’s understanding your relationship of the swing path and the clubface angle and how you imparted spin on the golf ball that we need to understand how that ball curves in flight and how you can then ultimately try and correct that to hit the ball straighter.