You Hit Your 5-Iron How Far?

The Importance of Knowing Your Yardages

Arnold Palmer stood on the tee of a 200-yard par-3 during an exhibition. He told the people standing around the tee box he was going to hit a high cut 3-iron which would land about fifteen feet from the hole, take a hop or two and stop about ten feet from the hole. To the crowd’s delight, Palmer hit the shot exactly as described. One of people in the crowd yelled, “Mr. Palmer, how do you get a 3-iron to stop like that?’

Arnie rubbed his chin. “Let me ask you a question first. How far do you hit your 3-iron?”

“About 160 yards.”

Palmer smiled. “Why do you want it to stop?”

The crowd burst into laughter.

All joking aside, most people exaggerate how far they hit the ball. Usually, ego plays a big role in the exaggeration of distance. The reality is, they have no idea how far they actually hit the ball.

I learned a long time ago to put ego aside in golf. There has always been someone better than me. There has always been someone who could hit the ball farther than me. There has always been someone who could strike the ball better than me. And there always will be. It sounds defeatist in some ways, but it is actually very freeing. Accepting these things allowed me to tune out what a playing partner was doing and play my game. I stopped trying to out drive players I couldn’t out drive. I stopped trying to hit shots I wasn’t comfortable hitting. As a result, I became a better player.

True ego, as I call it, is a good thing to have. It is internal confidence. It isn’t just a belief, it’s the knowledge you can hit a shot. True ego comes from knowing and understanding. It allows the mind to make clear and concise decisions and frees the body to perform the way it is capable of performing.

But false ego…well, that’s what we’re going to talk about today.

False ego actually destroys the ability of the player to reach their potential. How far they think they hit the ball vs. how far they actually hit the ball. Believing they can hit a shot they hardly ever practice rather than playing their shot.

Distance in golf is important. I wrote in a previous post about why it is so important. But I’m not talking about adding ten or twenty yards to a drive here. I’m talking about how far the ball goes right now.

One of the first golf lessons I ever gave was to a man in his mid-thirties. We had never met before. I began by asking him some basic questions about his game. He claimed, when he was playing well, he could hit his 5-iron 200 yards. This was in the days of the balata ball and 5-irons were the 6 or 7-irons loft wise of today. Jack Nicklaus couldn’t hit a 5-iron 200 yards!

I just nodded and said let’s get started.

As I suspected, this gentleman could not hit his 5-iron 200 yards. The reality was more like 170 yards which was good in those days. He believed his struggles with scoring were swing related. The reality existed in false ego. His swing was solid. His ego was not.

Most golfers have no idea how far they actually hit the ball. Even on the rare occasion the ball travels as far as they claim, those shots are outliers.

Rule number one for me to play good golf is: know your carry distances with each club. Notice I said carry distances. You need to know how far the ball carries in the air with each club. And you need to put your ego aside and be honest about it. If your carry distance with a 5-iron is 150 yards, then that’s what it is. The sooner you know and accept this, the better you will be for it. If you want to hit it farther, you need to work on increasing clubhead speed. But until you do, accept where you are and play your game.

Why is this important?

Besides the obvious of always being short of your intended target, let me get specific. Using the above carry distance for a 5-iron, you are standing in the fairway hitting a shot to the green. A bunker guards the front of the green. It’s 145 yards to carry the bunker. The 5-iron will give you room to spare to clear the bunker. It frees you up to make a confident swing knowing you can carry the bunker easily without forcing the shot.

But you can’t do that if you don’t know the actual carry distances of your clubs.

Today, this information is easy to attain. There are indoor golf facilities with great technology that will help you get a handle on your carry distances. There are also tracking devices like Arccos which gather data over time and give you accurate yardages for your clubs. There are even inexpensive radar devices like PRGR which provide pretty accurate distance information. You don’t have any excuses for not knowing how far each club in your bag carries.

Here’s another reason to know your carry distances. I use GPS when I play more than a rangefinder. I do this for one big reason: GPS will show me how far it is to carry a bunker, how far it is to the front, middle and back of a green, how far it is to a hazard. In other words, I know how far I have to carry the ball or how far not to carry the ball. Since I know my carry distances, I can make correct decisions on which club to hit.

How do you apply this when playing? Let’s talk about an approach shot. We’ll use the same 5-iron 150-yard scenario. It’s 150 yards to the front edge of the green. It’s 160 yards to the middle of the green and 170 to the back of the green. The pin is 15 feet on the front. What club are you hitting? If you chose 5-iron, you chose poorly. Perfectly struck, it would be a good shot. But it needs to be perfectly struck. If not, it could be at least 10 yards short. The right choice would be a 4-iron. Perfectly struck it will be middle of the green. Mishit a little, it will be just right. Smashed, it will be on the back of the green but still on the green.

How about driver? Let’s say your carry distance with a driver is 200 yards. Not total distance but carry distance. There is a creek which crosses the fairway. It’s 190-yards to the creek and 200-yards to carry the creek. Driver would be a poor choice. Most people would be tempted to just grab 3-wood. Your 3-wood has a carry distance of 185 but is probably not a wise choice either as total distance likely has you bouncing into the creek. 5-wood or whatever the next club in your bag is would be the best choice. It gets you far enough down the fairway without bringing the creek into play.

Now imagine the disaster of a score which would occur if you thought your carry distance was 220 yards. Easy carry, right? You hit it well and…the ball lands on the bank of the creek and hops backwards into the water. Double bogey is now in play. If you’ve been reading me for a while, you know double bogeys are score killers. They need to be avoided. Knowing the real carry distance for your driver in this scenario helps avoid a double bogey.

Take some time and find out the carry distance for each club in your bag. It simplifies an already difficult and complex game and helps free up the entirety of your game.

You’ll see scores improve, and the game will be much more fun.

As always, be grateful for the chance to play when it arrives. Enjoy every moment of the round. Soak in the peacefulness of the course. Be thankful for every shot taken. So, what are you waiting for? Go golf!