Tom Wishon Shaft Myth #4

[RickyBobby_PR]

Don’t want to link an article from another site so posting some of the interesting myths and his response to them. These are some of the ones that seem to pop up constantly on forums
 

The shaft is a key element for the amount of backspin imparted on a shot

That can be true. . . but only if you are a golfer who unhinges your wrist-**** angle late in the downswing and you have a clubhead speed north of 100 mph with the driver. If you are a golfer with a late release and a clubhead speed in the area of 85mph, the shaft is only going to have a small effect on backspin. And if you are a golfer with an early release, no matter what your clubhead speed, the amount of backspin you put on the shot is purely going to be determined by your clubhead speed, your angle of attack into the ball, the loft of your driver and where on the face you made contact with the ball.

It is very common for companies to market shafts as having spin characteristics – “low, medium or high spin” in their design. The problem is that it takes a very specific type of swing characteristic to even allow the shaft to have any effect whatsoever on the amount of spin imparted on the shot. That swing move is when you unhinge your wrist-**** angle to release the club during the downswing. In short, the later you hold onto the wrist-**** angle on the downswing, and the higher your clubhead speed, the more the shaft could have an effect on the backspin of the shot.

Here’s why, and here’s how shafts may or may not have a bearing on the amount of spin on a shot. First of all, keep in mind that only three things determine the amount of backspin on a shot – clubhead speed, the dynamic loft on the clubface at the point of impact, and the point of impact in relation to the center of gravity of the clubhead. (Angle of attack is a part of the dynamic loft) The higher the clubhead speed, the higher will be the spin for any given loft angle, the higher the loft on the clubhead at the moment of impact, and the lower the point of impact in relation to the CG, the greater will be the amount of backspin. Vice versa applies to these things for less spin.

But let’s talk about how the swing gets involved in all of this to be able to potentially interact with the club to have an effect on spin. Let’s say we’ve all made our backswing and we have the club positioned at the top, ready to swing down to the ball. From the moment the club starts down, for as long as we retain and hold our wrist-**** angle between our arms and the shaft, the arms and the club are accelerating at the same rate and the arms and club are both moving at the same velocity.

The split-second we start to unhinge the wrist-**** angle, the arms begin to slow down while the club begins to accelerate to a higher velocity. Because the arms are slowing down while holding on to the club, the faster moving clubhead starts to push against the shaft that is being held back by the hands and the shaft begins to flex forward. The more flexible the design of the shaft and/or the more tip flexible the design of the shaft, the more the shaft could flex forward at impact and from it, have more of an effect on launch angle, trajectory and spin.

If the golfer happens to hold the wrist-**** angle until very late in the downswing, the forward flexing of the shaft happens right when the clubhead meets the ball. If the shaft comes to impact flexed forward, this forward curve of the shaft increases the loft on the clubhead at impact – which in turn increases the launch angle AND increases the amount of backspin put on the shot. When shaft companies say this or that shaft is a “low spin design”, what they mean is that the shaft is designed to either be stiffer overall, or, stiffer in the tip section of the shaft. Stiffer shaft means less forward bending before impact, which means less of a loft increase at impact on the clubhead. . . but ONLY for a player with a later to very late unhinging of the wrist-**** angle on the downswing.

On the other hand, if the golfer unhinges the wrist-**** angle early on the downswing, all this forward flexing of the shaft happens well before impact. Thus for the early release golfer, by the time the clubhead gets to the ball, the shaft will have had time to flex back to a virtual straight position. That’s why for early release golfers, the shaft cannot have any additional effect on the dynamic loft on the clubhead and the amount of spin on the shot.