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What does a forgiving wood mean exactly?

  • 31-12-2011 8:09am
    #1
    MyKeyG
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,282 ✭✭✭


    I've been playing about six months and I'm happy with my overall development except that my wood play is dire. I went out with a friend who's been playing for years and when I asked him about my HY club he said I'd be better off bringing a shovel in my bag. I've read up on hybrids and the general rule of thumb seems to be that you get the best of an iron with the forgiving nature of a wood. So my question is what exactly does a forgiving wood mean? Because mine certainly don't forgive anything.


Comments

  • #2
    Benny Cake
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,144 ✭✭✭Benny Cake


    I guess the thinking is that a hybrid is "relatively" forgiving, say compared to a 3 iron which many beginners (and non-beginners like myself!!) struggle with. With practice, a decent hybrid can become your best friend really. It is far easier hit from the rough than a long iron, gets the ball airborne easily & can be used from the tee until you become proficient with a 3-wood or driver...

    The key for me with the hybrid is to play it like you would a 6 iron. Ball in the middle of the stance, and hit down into the back of the ball.

    Out of interest, what make, model, flex & loft is you current hybrid?


  • #3
    stockdam
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,472 ✭✭✭stockdam


    As far as I remember, the word "forgiving" was brought in when cavity backed irons became popular. They were "more forgiving" as they had a bigger "sweetspot" than traditional blades. This was due to "perimeter weighting" - weight was concentrated around the edges of the back of the clubface. This meant that an off centre shot still went quite far compared to an off centre shot with a blade iron.

    The term "forgiving" then was used when the first metal headed "woods" came out. Once again the weight is around the perimeter of the face (due to the hollow head" and they were more forgiving than traditional woods. The metals became bigger and thus "more forgiving".

    So the word forgiving means you can hit an off centre shot and still get a decent result. A hybrid will also help if you hit slightly behind the ball - an iron will tend to dig in whereas a hybrid will tend to skip over the ground.


  • #4
    MyKeyG
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,282 ✭✭✭MyKeyG


    Benny Cake wrote: »
    Out of interest, what make, model, flex & loft is you current hybrid?
    It's a Dunlop Tour Graphite club. It has 21 on the head if that means anything. It's not the most advanced set by a long shot (no pun intended) but as I said I'm a beginner and didn't want to shell out too much in case I didn't take to it, which I did, so I dare say I'll be looking for a better set next year.

    It did occur to me looking at some instructional videos that I may have had the ball too far back in my stance so I'll try to rectify that in the new year.


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