Where Should I Place The Ball For Each Golf Club? (Video) - by Pete Styles
Where Should I Place The Ball For Each Golf Club? (Video) - by Pete Styles

Really important part of addressing the golf ball correctly is understanding where the ball should be placed with different clubs. Now the ball needs to move around with different clubs slightly, because the ball or the swing is trying to do a different job with that club. With a pitching shot we’re not trying to hit it massive distance but we are just trying to get a really good contact. And quite often when we’re pitching the ball it would be in a, in a lie that’s not brilliant around the side of a green. As we move through the irons we’re thinking more about the right trajectory and the right strike and as we move through to the driver the strike becomes an awful lot easier because it’s way upon a big tee peg, so with the driver we’re talking much more about for long distance.

So I’m an advocate of a moving ball position, so the ball position changes depending on the club or the shot that you are having. So if we just work on this principal here and I setup to this ball here, this ball is going to be my pitching wedge, and I’m going to play the ball nicely from the center of my feet; so I play the ball exactly out of the center of my stance with a pitching wedge. Then these balls move forwards a little bit. This is now a 6-iron ball position that sits slightly more ahead of center; and then my driver sits way up here on my left instep my front instep for my biggest shots. And having the ball position moving around like that is going to give me the right angle of attack, the right feeling of moving through or ahead of the ball to produce the right shots. But the other consideration here is the width of the stance will move slightly as well. So if I was playing my pitching wedge and I’m going to play this ball from the center of my feet, I would have a relatively narrow stance. Balls played in the center I feel like I’m going to move ahead of the ball and I hit downwards. And I hit downwards quite firmly and I take quite a strong divot into the back of the ball and ahead of the ball. As I go to a 6-iron now, I’m going to keep it all on this line so you can see the ball position change. I would now setup with a little bit more of my right foot back behind the ball on the line nearest my front leg. This produces again a slightly downwards angle but my divot would not be as deep as it was with a pitching wedge the feeling of thumping down and getting ahead of the ball is not quite the same, it’s a slightly more level approach as I hit the ball, small divot not too big. Clipping it off the surface there. Now as I change again to the driver. The ball position this time goes a lot further forwards; I play the ball way up on my left instep. Nice wide stance with my right foot, but a wider stance I would have of all. Because a lot of my body weight now sits behind the golf ball, the lowest part of my ark would be in the middle of my feet here, therefore the club is actually on the rise as it hits the ball, it’s not hitting down like it was with the wedge, it’s hitting level or even up, hence why I need a tee peg and I can sweep the ball into the air, and the drive is practically impossible to hit from the ground unless you change the technique a lot. So we play the ball much more forwards than the stance and we learn to hit up on the golf ball and sweep it up into the air. So if you can understand how the ball position changes with different golf clubs and how that affects the height and the flight of the golf shot, that should help you improve your golf no end. 2014-08-14

Really important part of addressing the golf ball correctly is understanding where the ball should be placed with different clubs. Now the ball needs to move around with different clubs slightly, because the ball or the swing is trying to do a different job with that club. With a pitching shot we’re not trying to hit it massive distance but we are just trying to get a really good contact. And quite often when we’re pitching the ball it would be in a, in a lie that’s not brilliant around the side of a green. As we move through the irons we’re thinking more about the right trajectory and the right strike and as we move through to the driver the strike becomes an awful lot easier because it’s way upon a big tee peg, so with the driver we’re talking much more about for long distance.

So I’m an advocate of a moving ball position, so the ball position changes depending on the club or the shot that you are having. So if we just work on this principal here and I setup to this ball here, this ball is going to be my pitching wedge, and I’m going to play the ball nicely from the center of my feet; so I play the ball exactly out of the center of my stance with a pitching wedge. Then these balls move forwards a little bit. This is now a 6-iron ball position that sits slightly more ahead of center; and then my driver sits way up here on my left instep my front instep for my biggest shots.

And having the ball position moving around like that is going to give me the right angle of attack, the right feeling of moving through or ahead of the ball to produce the right shots. But the other consideration here is the width of the stance will move slightly as well. So if I was playing my pitching wedge and I’m going to play this ball from the center of my feet, I would have a relatively narrow stance. Balls played in the center I feel like I’m going to move ahead of the ball and I hit downwards. And I hit downwards quite firmly and I take quite a strong divot into the back of the ball and ahead of the ball.

As I go to a 6-iron now, I’m going to keep it all on this line so you can see the ball position change. I would now setup with a little bit more of my right foot back behind the ball on the line nearest my front leg. This produces again a slightly downwards angle but my divot would not be as deep as it was with a pitching wedge the feeling of thumping down and getting ahead of the ball is not quite the same, it’s a slightly more level approach as I hit the ball, small divot not too big. Clipping it off the surface there. Now as I change again to the driver. The ball position this time goes a lot further forwards; I play the ball way up on my left instep. Nice wide stance with my right foot, but a wider stance I would have of all.

Because a lot of my body weight now sits behind the golf ball, the lowest part of my ark would be in the middle of my feet here, therefore the club is actually on the rise as it hits the ball, it’s not hitting down like it was with the wedge, it’s hitting level or even up, hence why I need a tee peg and I can sweep the ball into the air, and the drive is practically impossible to hit from the ground unless you change the technique a lot. So we play the ball much more forwards than the stance and we learn to hit up on the golf ball and sweep it up into the air.

So if you can understand how the ball position changes with different golf clubs and how that affects the height and the flight of the golf shot, that should help you improve your golf no end.