Pelz Wedge Setup

[dthrog00]

Does anyone use the Dave Pelz approach to wedges? Recently I've observed that after buying 718 AP1 irons that with the cranked lofts my *54, *58 wedge setup appeared to have too big of gaps. I watched the Dave Pelz appearance on School of Golf a while back and he said that his 10:30 backswing went 90% full distance, 9:00 backswing 75% full distance, and 7:30 backswing 50% full distance.

I'm not 100% sure of these full shot distances and will fine tune this with a rangefinder I just picked up, but if I apply the math per Dave's instruction then yardage per club and swing type is roughly:

	43*	48*	54*	58*
1/4 _ 7:30	not used	50	40	34
1/2 _ 9:00	not used	75	60	50
3/4 _ 10:30	101	90	72	60
Full	112	100	no full shot	no full shot

This shows that my 48*, 54*, 58* gapping is not as far off as I thought it may be. If true this gives me high and low trajectory options for: 50, 60, and 75 yards even without having full shots with the 54* and 58*.

Thoughts/comments? I was ok chipping last year, but pitching was a horror show at times in the 50 or 60 yard range.

Dave

 

[Daddio]

I think they should come out pretty close. I'm 100 carry with my 48* full too and I get about the same as your 'projections' on the two wedges I have that are lofted the same, (48* and 54*) I don't use the Pelz clock to the letter but do something similar by 'feeling' 3/4 and 1/2 swings. With my 48* I'm 100 yards full, 88 at 3/4 swing and 74 at 1/2 swing. With my 54* I'm 88 yards full, 76 at 3/4 swing, and 63 at 1/2 swing.

 

[mancest]

I use Pelz and have recently switched to AP3s. I don't use his formula for calculating distance, I just go to an area and get distances for each shot with each club.

I need to revisit it because my yardages with the 9 and 10:30 are inconsistent.

58*
1/4 - 44
1/2 - 60
3/4 - 70

53*
1/4 - 52
1/2 - 68
3/4 - 85

48*
1/4 -58
1/2 - 75
3/4 - 97

43*
1/4 - 65
1/2 - 82
3/4 - 106

These are from one session and I only hit a few of each on the 1/2 & 3/4 swing. Need to get some practice in with both of those and get yardages dialed.

For me this gets yardages covered from 35 to 125 or so with just those 4 clubs.

 

[darthweasel]

I mostly use it. I don't do full swings on wedges as for me, at least, going up a club and dialing back to 3/4 swing has far greater accuracy. I believe I am in the minority in that regard, though, most people seem to prefer full swings

 

[dthrog00]

Thanks, I'll give it a try and see if it makes sense.

Dave

 

[jshuff]

I mostly use it. I don't do full swings on wedges as for me, at least, going up a club and dialing back to 3/4 swing has far greater accuracy. I believe I am in the minority in that regard, though, most people seem to prefer full swings

I don’t do full shots with my 60 or 64 but do with lower lofted wedges. The 60 and 64 both balloon on me with full shots.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Tee/Ski]

When I began my search for a Pelz thread I assumed it would be quite large. I'm committed to getting better at using my wedges this year. In addition to Pelz is there another popular style/method/person people use? Just trying to gather data as once I commit to a system/person I want to stick with it.

 

[dthrog00]

When I began my search for a Pelz thread I assumed it would be quite large. I'm committed to getting better at using my wedges this year. In addition to Pelz is there another popular style/method/person people use? Just trying to gather data as once I commit to a system/person I want to stick with it.

I plan to use it this year, but Illinois is still frozen

Dave

 

[tanker337]

I have full swing, shoulder high(9 oclock), and hip high distances for my wedges.
But I use my normal swing for those distances, not Pelz's thoughts on a short game swing. Just seems more repeatable to me.

 

[dthrog00]

Given the coronavirus shut down I didn't have much else to do today so I setup my backyard net and tried the Pelz wedge using my 48* PW and Mevo.

Dave's system says that a 7:30 swing should go 50% of full, 9:00 swing should be 75% of full, and 10:30 swing should go 90% of full. I can't get my head wrapped around Dave's clock faces. When I do his "7:30 swing" to me it is 9:00. My 10:00 is his 9:00 and my 11:00 is his 10:30.



My data is below:

Ball Speed (mph)	Carry Distance (yds)	Launch Angle V (°)	Club	Category
44.9​	39.7​	34.3​	PW	9 o'clock
43.6​	37.4​	33​	PW	9 o'clock
48​	44.8​	37.3​	PW	9 o'clock
42​	35.1​	34.6​	PW	9 o'clock
44.6​	39.2​	35.2​	PW	9 o'clock
58.6​	62.1​	34.7​	PW	10 o'clock
60.6​	66​	33.9​	PW	10 o'clock
58​	61.3​	35.7​	PW	10 o'clock
57.4​	60.2​	38​	PW	10 o'clock
46.7​	42.4​	33.2​	PW	9 o'clock
66.3​	73​	41​	PW	11 o'clock
67.4​	76.9​	36.4​	PW	11 o'clock
47.6​	43.9​	34.3​	PW	9 o'clock
55.6​	57​	35.5​	PW	10 o'clock
73.9​	87​	35.9​	PW	Full
68.4​	75.1​	41.2​	PW	11 o'clock
53.9​	54.1​	39.4​	PW	10 o'clock
47.7​	44​	33.2​	PW	9 o'clock
60.6​	65.8​	35.9​	PW	10 o'clock
67.3​	73.5​	39.4​	PW	11 o'clock
75.2​	79.7​	44.7​	PW	11 o'clock
64.7​	72.9​	34.9​	PW	11 o'clock
46.4​	42.1​	33.9​	PW	9 o'clock
61.3​	65.4​	40.5​	PW	10 o'clock
64.7​	71.4​	34.6​	PW	11 o'clock

Finally the averages are below compared to Dave's theory:

	PW theory	PW actual
Full	87​	87​
11 o'clock	78​	75​
10 o'clock	65​	62​
9 o'clock	44​	41​

It actually works! My amateur swing averaged within about 3 yards of what he said it would.

I'm shocked and will try my other wedges to see if it continues to hold true.

Dave

 

[baddog]

Dave's system says that a 7:30 swing should go 50% of full, 9:00 swing should be 75% of full, and 10:30 swing should go 90% of full. I can't get my head wrapped around Dave's clock faces. When I do his "7:30 swing" to me it is 9:00. My 10:00 is his 9:00 and my 11:00 is his 10:30.

Dave

I understand the clock positions, but the amount of wrist hinge I use is completely different from Pelz. He's using his arms as the big hand, but he's getting a full 90° wrist cock on every swing wherther 7:30, 9:00 or 10:30. When I make a 7:30 swing, my wrist cock is minimal and there's no chance I'm going to get anywhere near 50% of full, I'd guess 25%. When I make a 9:00 swing my wrist cock is somewhere around 45° and I might get 1/2 the distance. So my 7:30 swing would be a 1/4 swing not the 1/2 swing of Pelz, and my 9:00 would be a 1/2 swing and not the 3/4 swing of Pelz.

With the 10:30 swing, my wrist cock will be 90° and I would get the same 90% of my full swing. One problem though; the 10:30 swing is my full wedge swing for my SW or LW and I try to never swing past it. Sure I can get the 100%, but only do so if it's the only shot I have, like over a tree, some other trouble or if I just grabbed the wrong wedge and the cart is on the other side of the fairway. How often do you see the Pros make a 100% swing with a high lofted wedge from the middle of the fairway? Hardly ever.

So although I have been interest in doing the Pelz baselining, the only number I'm going to match is the 90% 10:30 swing. How does Pelz address wrist hinge along with some other common setup factors that affect all of the numbers. In my case, I always choke down with a 7:30 swing, sometimes with a 9:00 swing and play from an open stance and an open face almost always. We need someone who has attended a Pelz session in recent history to explain, please

 

[dthrog00]

My clock faces are where my arms are. My 9:00 = hands horizontal to ground with some wrist hinge.

If all of this works I should be quite good at the middle length shots once the season eventually starts.

Dave