Fairway Woods

Fairway Woods: They’re built to work.

By: Bruce Munch

Head Professional, White River Golf Club, Rochester, Vt.

Have you ever wondered why a set of clubs has irons and woods? Why didn’t they just take a longer club shaft and put an iron head on it? The answer is that the woods and especially the fairway woods were built for a special purpose. The longer shaft, the larger head, the different lie angle (the angle between the club head and the club shaft) and especially the large base or bounce are characteristics of woods. All clubs have bounce, some, such as the sand wedge, have a more pronounced bounce than others irons. The woods have bounce in the form of a large, relatively flat base on the club head.

When most players attempt to hit a wood off the fairway, they tend to try to pick the ball off the surface of the grass. In attempting to do so they make a very flat swing and often end up topping the ball. Has this ever happened to you?

An important thing to remember about the golf swing is that it more closely resembles a Ferris Wheel rather than a Carousel. In other words the swing must exist more in the vertical plane than the horizontal. One of the reasons that we play the ball further forward with the woods than the irons, is to ensure that the bottom of the club strikes the grass at the same time the face strikes the ball. The bounce translates the downward momentum of the swing into horizontal momentum and the club slides cleanly through the grass. There are a few things that will prevent the bounce from doing its job. First, leaving your weight back on the forward swing will cause the leading edge to strike the ground well behind the ball, before the bounce of the club can do its job. Second, an outside in swing path that causes the ball to slice will also cause the leading edge to hit before the bounce and thus dig into the turf. Finally, if you are a slicer and your well meaning friends tell you to hood or close the face you will have removed all the bounce and the club will dig.

Try this drill the next time you are at the range. Find a nice flat patch of grass and place a tee in the ground instead of a ball and address it so it is approximately one inch inside of the left heel. Execute a swing that is steeper than you normally would and hit the ground just behind the tee. The bottom of the club will hit the grass and the club will slide through the tee to a high finish. Try it again a little steeper this time. You might scrape off some grass but the club should not dig in. This will give you the confidence to hit down with your fairway woods. If this does not work for you there is a problem in your swing that must be fixed. It is probably time to take a lesson.

You will find that once you learn to trust it, the club will do what it was designed to do, you will have more confidence with your fairway woods. Remember, we must hit down on the ball to make it go up, even with the woods.