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Bag setup: More wedges or more woods/hybrids... what do you carry... and why?

SuperStroke
p3ga said:
It really is ok to play with less than a full rack of 14 in your bag.
Click to expand...
But why would you?

For me, I have either 1 (or 2) FW and 3 hybrids in my bag and I carry only two wedges (I don't consider the PW and AW as wedges, though I do use them in that capacity from time to time).
 
I carry a 3 and 4 hybo, then pw, gw, sw, lw and 64 lob wedge.

I am decently long off the tee and my course is short so i dont carry a 3 wood. Plus I dont hit 3 woods particulary well so why take up a spot. Most scoring happens 100 yards and in so why not have the most clubs in that range
 
I changed my bag a bit at the top end. Now I go 3 woods, 4 wedges.

Driver, 4 wood, 7 wood

G25 P and U wedge, 54, 58
 
I prefer more wedges over long clubs. I have a driver, 3-wood, and a 3-hybrid and 4 wedges. I'd much rather have the scoring clubs for options for two reasons. One, I use them more so it's good to have options. Two, once you get over 200 yards, the chance for success is greatly reduced, so I'll just take what I hit. I'm not worried about having a 210 yard club and a 225 yard club. Comes up maybe once or twice a round.
 
For me I guess I have a pretty good balance:

3w/3h/4h
50*/54*/58*

I've experimented with more woods and less wedges, and more wedges and less woods, but I keep landing back on this setup because it seems to work fairly well for me.

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I go with 3W, 16 deg Hyb, 20 deg hyb, 4i... at the top and just PW, 50 and 56 at the bottom. I played a 60 for a while in place of the 16 deg Hyb but just didn't use it enough. Since I grew up with just a 56ish at the bottom (SW back in those days) it's easier for me to adjust it to the range of shorter yardages then to try to fit it with a 3W.
 
Bag setup: More wedges or more woods/hybrids... what do you carry... and why?

I venture to assume that if you are more accurate from 210 yds than inside 90 yds, then the way your bag is set up, OP, you are good w your current set up.
I would guess that most golfers want more accuracy inside 100 yds, and more wedges would be better at that than more fairway woods or hybrids.
Just my $.02.


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A 56 degree is now my most lofted wedge. I just learned to hit more/different shots with it. No need for me loft. Subjective like everything in golf.
 
Currently I have 4 woods and 4 wedges. It used to be 3 wedges and 4 woods.
 
tahoebum said:
I'm carrying 2 fairway woods for the first time in 20 years. It's all about the gaps. Normal carry distances.

Driver - 260
3+ Wood - 250
4 wood -234
4 iron - 205
5 iron - 192
6 iron - 180
7 iron - 169
8 iron - 158
9 iron - 148
wedge -138
Gap -127
SW - 112
60* - 91
Click to expand...

Your carry numbers are scary similar to mine. I mean within a yard on every single one. However I carry a 5 wood at 240 Carry and 3 driving iron or 3 hybo depending on the course and that carry distance is about 220. A lot of times if I have more than a 4 iron out on a par 5 unless there's no trouble I'll play to a comfortable wedge distance in.
 
I game driver, 4w and pw, 50, 54, and 58
 
I carry a 5w, 3h, 4h and then pw, 50, 54, 58. I could honestly take the 58 out of the bag but I wouldnt add a club at the top but rather add a different grind 54 or maybe a 56
 
p3ga said:
It really is ok to play with less than a full rack of 14 in your bag.

I'm starting the year with a minimalist setup of 7 clubs - scores haven't varied much (from the Senior Player's tees the course is 6336 / 70.2 / 133), I can throw the bag over my shoulder and walk without killing myself, & I'm really enjoying it. Not everyone's cup of tea, but I really believe we overthink this stuff.

Best wishes for a great season.
Click to expand...

deuce said:
But why would you?

For me, I have either 1 (or 2) FW and 3 hybrids in my bag and I carry only two wedges (I don't consider the PW and AW as wedges, though I do use them in that capacity from time to time).
Click to expand...

I'm not smart nor talented enough to be able to use 14 clubs effectively.
 
BluesManDan said:
Yeah, I have noticed that the gap between the 4i and the 5hl is only 5 yds. I have considered shortening the 5hl a little bit, to make it more accurate, and just removing the 4i from the bag... and then carry 3 wedges and 3 woods/hybrids. I also have a 19* hybrid that i hit about 210, and it could be useful too at times. The problem that I see with carrying lots of woods/hybrids is the tradeoff in accuracy... that is, at 220 yards out, I'm fairly likely to miss the green short or left or right or long. So I could just as well hit a 200 yard club, since I'm most likely going to have to pitch it on anyway. It's not playing the odds to think you're gonna hit the green with that particular yardage, so having wider gaps in your yardages over 180yds probably doesn't matter much.
Click to expand...

This is my oppinion also.
 
3 woods, 2 hybrids, 4 wedges. #gapping
 
D,4W,4H at the top. When I played more traditional irons, I had only PW, SW. When my set has a 44 "PW", I find myself now loading up on wedges: 44, 49, 54, 60.
 
I just made a change to my wedges going from a 54 and 60 Callaway Jaws with a PM Grind 64 to a full PM Grind set of 56, 60 and 64. I'm not sure of the yardage yet but I err on the side of more wedges because I lose strokes with my short game. The three iron saw very little use and I'm very happy with my spacing of my current set-up.

10 degree driver - 275 yards
14 degree 13 wood - 260 yards
19 degree hybrid - 245 yards
23 degree 4 iron - 220 yards (bent a degree strong)
27 degree 5 iron - 205 yards
30 degree 6 iron - 190 yards
34 degree 7 iron - 175 yards
38 degree 8 iron - 160 yards
42 degree 9 iron - 145 yards
46 degree PW - 130 yards
54 degree SW - 120 yards
60 degree LW - 105 yards
64 degree LW - 85 yards

Looking at it I imagine the 56 should be a 115 club?
 
14 sticks : 2 drivers ( I use alternatively for fun or enjoyment reasons ) ..... 1 fairway wood #5 ...... 1 hybrid #5 ...... 9 irons ( 5,6,7,8,9,P,G,54,60 ) ...... 1 putter.
 
My gamer bag just sort of came to be on its own with the gapping. Driver, 3 and 5 wood, 4 and 5 hybrid, 6 to 9 iron, PW, 54 and 48 wedges.

I'm also a big fan of partial shots, I use the 7 iron upwards for an easy pitch or running punch. I have gappings for 110, 105, 100, 95, 90, 85, 80 and so on down to 10 yards. Partial shots aren't easy but they're great when I pull them off successfully.
 
Driver 270
3W 240
3H 210
4H 200
5I 175
6I 165
7I 155
8I 145
9I 135
P 125
50* 115
56* 95
60* 70
 
I haven't updated the shafts in my WITB but it's pretty much the same.

D
3W
2i
4i
5i
6i
7i
8i
9i
Pw
50
54
58
Putter

I don't really know my distances right now as I've put a lot of time in the gym and it's still cold out. I've always wondered about taking my 50 out but I remember as as child being upset with 100 yard shots because my Pw would go too far and my Sw would be too short. The yardage is slightly different now but the same idea applies.

The top of my bag is interesting and changes a lot. If I'm playing a course under 7100 yards (longer if the fairways are tight) and the course is heavily wooded, I will take out my driver and put in a 3 iron. Gives me another club for longer par 3s and another punch out tool. I've never ran into another player who has done this, especially in competition. If I'm hitting my 3W correctly, it goes a very long way and I hit a lot of fairways.

Overall my accuracy isn't very good with my longer shots, so I need all the tools I can get when around the green.

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This has been very interesting to read everyone's responses, and see their yardages, gaps, and choices. Most are opting for more wedges.

When I was a kid, I played D, 3w, 4w, 3-PW, SW, P. I only hit my 5 iron 150 yards, heh. So for the wedges, it was just PW, SW... and SW was ONLY for the sand. But that was back when irons had different lofts than today. Yesterday's PW is today's GW.

But I did everything with that PW. Not by choice, but because my dad was cheap and wouldn't let me have another wedge. So one wedge... for every chip, pitch, lob. Just open it up, or move it around in your stance, whatever to change trajectory and roll. I still like the apparent simpleness of that approach (even though it's actually more complex, not more simple). I remember when I got my first lob wedge... I could never hit it hard enough to get to the hole, because I was so used to doing everything with the lower lofted PW. Took me a long time to get used to using a higher lofted club... like literally several years... and now, all these many years later, I find myself nixing the LW and the GW and going back to a one-wedge-to-do-it-all approach. Though the wedge of choice has been the low bounce SW. (My dad uses his GW for most pitches and chips....)

Back several years ago, I took some advice on chips to use lots of different clubs, from 6 iron on up, depending on how far you were from the pin... get the ball rolling as quick as you could and let it roll to the hole like a putt. And that worked WHEN I had LOTS of time to practice those things. Now, not so much. Especially now that EVERY STINKING COURSE AROUND has posted "NO CHIPPING ALLOWED" on all the practice greens. What the heck?! When did that happen? Outta nowhere suddenly there's no place to practice chipping and pitching! Somehow that coincided with the "NO SPIKES ALLOWED" signs, but I'm not sure what the connection was. So, no practicing chipping anymore? Sure, you can practice the carry by chipping into a bucket in your back yard, but what about the roll? I know of one course about 35 minutes away that has a pitching green, but it's got wacky slopes and such so it isn't even all that useful... as if I want to drive that far just to practice chipping anyway. So that's part of my shift to fewer wedges... can't practice chipping with everything, so just use one or two to cover it all.

My chipping and pitching has been KILLING me around the greens. My scrambling % is really bad. So some are saying use MORE wedges to help your short game... but I don't know... maybe it's better to have ONE club that you KNOW what it's gonna do than 5 and you don't know what any of them are gonna do.

Y'all know what a Texas Wedge is, right?
Yeehaw.
Gotta find a practice green that says "Chipping Allowed"
 
Dan, I think you should go with what you have found works best for you and what feels most natural. I'm just a wedge ho that loves the wedge game and I can practice somewhat in my yard (sometimes extending into neighbor's yard:beat-up:). I usually carry 5 or 6 wedges, no hybrids and with the 6th wedge no fairway wood.
 
I go 4&4 as well.

Driver
3W
3H
4H
5I-9I
PW
GW
54˚
60˚

The PW and GW are mostly my 10 & 11 irons with some time shared for chipping. Almost all of my pitching/sand/high shots around the green are with the 54/60 combo. No gap issues from 54 to 60 as I don't use the 60 for full swings generally. If I'm at an in between distance, I'm usually taking a partial swing with my 54 these days.
 
I love my MD3s so if you want to take either of them outta my bag you will have to pry it from my cold, dead fingers. I use the 58 the most around the greens. The 54 I use out of normal sand (not hardpack) and if I am in the rough. I also use them with full swings. My gaps are a bit in flux still but I don't know why I would need more at the top of my bag that the bottom. My largest gap would be between my Hybrid and 3W but I can choke down on the 3 wood if I need to. I don't really have a lot of confidence in my ability to hit greens from 200 yards out or more.

Driver: 230-270 (Avg would be in the 240-245 range)
3W: 215-220
H: 195-200
4I: 180-185
5I: 170-175
6I: 160-165
7I: 150-155
8I: 140-155
9I: 130-135
PW: 115-120
AW: 100-105
SW: 85-90
LW: 70-75
 
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