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the golf ball spin back

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Art M

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I'm going to show my ignorance here but i am really wondering......Is spinning the ball back on the green a good thing/something to try to do? Today I played for the first round with my clubs that i just reshafted. i went from kbs tour stiff to to AXE tour X graphite shafts. 95 gram in the 5-9 irons and 105 gram in the pw and gw. The greens were wet which is not that odd for me to play on. today, hitting the green with the gw resulted in a 10-12 foot pull back. Each club down to the 8 iron had some amount of pull back on the green. The 7 iron would just roll back out of it's hole. With the kbs i usually get a hop or 2 with the ball and a stop. As silly as this sounds i noticed i had to club up to be near the pin. is this desirable?
 
I think that ball spinning back will change day to day and definitely course to course. Is it desirable? Sure. The key is being able to predict and control it.
 
It depends on one's game. I prefer stopping dead in its tracks, but on full swings usually get a lot of backspin.
Now keep in mind this differs based on geography, meaning grass type, moisture, etc.
 
Backspin is dependent on a bunch of factors. But two things are very important. Urethane ball and receptive greens.


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Depends on your style of golf. I pin hunt and want the ball to stop near where it lands on firm greens, which is one reason I am still playing square grooved wedges and irons. I would not want any shot to roll back or spin back.

With today's v groove clubs, most will get roll out, not a dead stop or any roll back. It is all about technique as much as anything and your desired result.
 
If you typically are shot of the hole, you don't want the ball to spin back. I personally prefer the ball to stay within a few feet of where it lands.
 
As long as you can control it. Most people who "desire" spin on their shots are usually short anyway. Some great teachers of the game have been asked by amateurs, "how do I back the ball up?" The instructors response is "how often are you long or past the hole?" Student .... "well not that often." Instructor ... "well than WHY do you want to back it up?"
Knowing how to put spin on the ball when you need it and when not to is the key. But this requires you to really change your game around since it's not what you are used to previously. If that makes you have longer putts now, maybe spin is not actually desirable. But since you have reshafted them now ... you are stuck with now learning all new distances you hit them and actually have to "play" for the ball backing up with those particular clubs.
Not saying that is a bad thing at all. You just have to learn now to not swing as hard, knowing full well that the clubs are putting a lot more spin on the ball than previously. It will definitely come in handy once you get it under control. You probably gained a few yards in distance too, right?
Good luck! I like the choice of shafts as well.
BTW ... a quick fix is to change the ball you are playing now. More of a harder cover, urethane, distance balls.
 
I remember a couple years ago hammering a PW onto a par 3 green and having the ball land about pin high 118 yds center of the green and watching with dismay as it backed up and rolled all the way off onto the front fringe 25 feet away from the hole. Needless to say I was not happy.
 
all good thoughts. i was playing pro v1x ball, i was hitting slightly lower on the face, i was getting more distance but i was short. i need to work on the club up to be pin high, just a general statement. i will see what happens tomorrow with harder greens
 
Spinning it is cool, or so I've been told. I think either way is fine, the most important thing is to have repeatable and reliable distances so you know how to play shots.
 
I spin the hell out of my wedges and I hate it. Trying to get to a back pin is impossible.

As JB said I would much prefer the hop and stop.
 
Knowing how to control your spin is a good thing to be able to do, other than that there is really nothing "good" about it.
 
Since most of my shots are high, mine usually hope once maybe twice and stop or just barely come back. Definitely not deliberate. You have to be good to execute it on command with predictable results.
 
I'm not a really high spin player. Most of my shots stop very close to where the land. I think that is probably more predictable than a lot of back spin.
 
bmongi1 said:
I'm not a really high spin player. Most of my shots stop very close to where the land. I think that is probably more predictable than a lot of back spin.
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that was the outcome with the kbs tours. i really like the feel of these shafts so i am hoping a bit of Learning" and i should be able to control the ball better.
 
Occasionally, I play with a guy that spins the ball like crazy. He doesn't practice much and often has problems with distance control and consistency. I'm sure once you are really familiar with your new shafts and put on a little practice, you'll be fine. You'll most likely have to rethink how you approach a pin.
 
Spin is good for tight front hole locations with trouble in front. Hit long and spin back to eliminate the short miss. As others have said though, you need to control it. We see tour players spin off the green every week.
 
I like the ball to sit within a few feet of it's pitch mark. At my home course and many other courses with quality, fast greens, certainly some balls will spin too much off a full wedge shot.
 
I hate spin. I have to work hard to control trajectory and keep the ball low so it checks instead of spins. We have soft greens here in VA and it only takes 7500rpm to get the ball backing up.


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The courses I play are receptive greens so I occasionally spin a hybrid back like 4 or 5 feet. In a perfect world I like my wedges to stop where they land and check back maybe a foot, so normally I prefer a less than full wedge on the courses I play. The few times I play hard course with firm greens, especially if they are fairly new and Bermuda I want full wedges so they stop.

The best is if the course is so wet they plug, makes life easy if you can control the distance.
 
The way I control my spin in my wedges is a 3/4 swing. I keep this 3/4 to the Pw. The 9 iron is just about a full swing and then all others are my standard swing. This keeps the wedges from spinning back and they will release forward about a foot. All my clubs stay about 2' from the ball mark unless it's my long irons. When I was younger and swung full on everything I would waste so many pin high shots by zipping back. Looks cool as hell but,,,, that's about it.
 
Spinning off the green isn't nearly the issue it was with wound golf balls.
 
In general, it's a good thing. Means you hit the ball first and likely took a nice divot. Not hit it fat or thin. Controlling it is important so try some different balls till you find one you can control. Some like to throw it deep and spin it back.

Congrats on your swing improving

sent from my Samsoon S5 from the bottom of a mud hole
 
InHartWeTrust said:
Knowing how to control your spin is a good thing to be able to do, other than that there is really nothing "good" about it.
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Couldn't have said it better myself. Would much rather my ball stop within a yard of my pitch mark. Although, spinning a ball back to a front pin protected by water is a special shot.
 
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