You likely read it in just about every new club design description going back twenty years, but what does ‘center of gravity’ exactly mean? And how does it affect your golf game? Well, in a nutshell, center of gravity is important for your trajectory, spin and for keeping off-center shots on line, and on target. In this post we’ll dive a little deeper into center of gravity and how it plays a role in your golf game.
Let’s start with Trajectory
Now on to Spin
While loft plays the biggest role, the position of a clubs center of gravity can affect a shots trajectory and thusly affect the amount of spin on the ball.
Most importantly we come to Side-Spin
This is where center of gravity plays its biggest role. You’ve likely hear the term MOI or moment of inertia before in reference to golf club design. Well, manufacturers have consistently tried to increase a clubs MOI by moving a clubs center of gravity far away from the clubface. By adding in heel and toe eights (technology you’ve seen in irons and woods for decades), the engineers have been pushing and pushing to move the center of gravity back from the face (much like the image to the right). By doing so, they significantly have changed how a club reacts on off-center hits. Golf clubs designed with a much higher MOI will not twist nearly as much as one’s without on off-center hits. This helps the average golfer keep their ball in play, even when their swing is not up to snuff.
Off-center hits are also helped by the bulge and roll effect with drivers and woods, but thats a topic we’ve already covered in another post.
We hope that makes more sense, and before we hear about it in the comments, and because we have a whole post coming out on it in a few days time, I want to be very clear – center of gravity IS NOT a clubs sweet spot.
Great article, I really love the articles you are writing on this blog.
Great article, I really love the articles you are writing on this blog.
Thanks this blog is very informative and have helped me understand golf on a whole new different level. This have so helped me save lots of time in my research for my university preparation. ๐
Thanks this blog is very informative and have helped me understand golf on a whole new different level. This have so helped me save lots of time in my research for my university preparation. ๐