Average Amateur Driver Swingspeeds By Age, Handicap vs. LPGA & PGA Tours!
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- čas přidán 31. 07. 2024
- In modern golf, swing speed stats seem almost as important to golfers as the actual yardages they drive the ball.
So in this video we look at the topic of driver swingspeed in its entirety and do a deep dive into the numbers of how fast the average golfer should swing their driver broken down by handicap, age and gender.
And based on those numbers, we then answer the question of what is a GOOD, FAST or SLOW swingspeed before finally looking at how this all stacks up against the best pros on the PGA and LPGA Tours!
Chapters
0:00 Introduction
1:04 Swingspeed by Handicap
3:23 Swingspeed by Age
5:52 PGA / LPGA Tour Swingspeeds
7:23 'Good' swingspeed
Complete details of the information we talk about in this video:
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➡Complete details of the information we talk about in this video can be found here: golfingfocus.com/average-driver-swingspeeds-complete-guide-by-age-handicap-etc/
I'm 72. 2 hdcp. 95 mph clubhead speed. Hit it around 250 total.
Brilliant stuff David. 👍
I was quite surprised that 20 yards extra distance didn’t yield a bit better scores than say 1.6 for the 90s golfer.
I don't keep a handicap index right now, because I only play about twice a month, but I hit balls at least once a week and shoot for twice a week. I average around 80-85 for scores, and still consistently hit 245 yds to 265 yds with my driver and around 220 with the 3 wood. I am 64, and while I've lost distance in the past 5 yrs, I am still happy with my distance and scores. At my best in my early 40's, I was a 4 hdcp and averaged around 295 to 305 consistently off the tee.
That's great playing at any age. I was on the range the other day and I was watching an older guy hit balls. He was pretty tall and had a beautifully rhythmic swing. He was poking the driver out there about 290. I asked him how old he was and he said 72. Needless to say, I was impressed.
Again wonderfully informative-my 1 iron is now in for punishment for distance after this video and im 50!! Saw 270 yards by a 28 yr old with my 1 iron,tremendous speed,really cut the air. Well done again
Many thanks again Oliver. Delighted you enjoyed this video 👍
I’m 60 with a 15 handicap and my drives typically carry 240-260…until recently it was my short game and putting that let me down but after some lessons and intense practice I shot 79 for the first time ever on New Year’s Eve! Onwards with strength and speed training to maintain my distance!
Awesome stuff Doug. And think you are spot on with your focus on strength and speed training. Would definitely recommend Mike Carroll's Fit for Golf program to help with this.
you dont carry it far it rolls that far.
my swing speed is 89 to 92; i carry t about 200 and it ro;es out 30 to 40 yds depending on conditions;
No, that’s what I carry it actually, I do know the difference!
Nearly 59. 5 foot 5 inches tall. Very short arms. Swing speed now is 96mph. 20 years ago it was 99mph. My index is 5.2 at the moment. What I see is people with high swing speeds don't hit many fairways. I outplay them by being straight and getting it in the hole.
Distance is useless when you hit it into the trees. I’m 6 ft 4” swing about 115mph but play most of my approach shots from the trees 😂 handicap is 10.1 to lower my handicap I need more fairways not distance. Higher swing speed means smaller margins. Drive it straight first then work on speed.
@@grahamstewart447 2 schools of thought. One says hit it hard and we will straighten it up later. Not a bad idea, find a good coach and work hard to straighten it which could well mean being smooth with your speed. Smooth rather than trying to knock the cover off the ball might well be the answer.
The second thought is with your power you can certainly get into the hitting of a 3 iron or 2 iron like Golf Sidekick and rarely using the driver.
Power is a wonderful thing to have, please don't waste it as I never had it. Best of luck, you can get down to 3 with ease.
6.2 handicap, 116 mph swing speed. Leads to some long drives, but I also hit more alternate fairways than I’d like to admit. Great when it’s straight, but definitely gets me in trouble.
I’m also 6’ 2”, so the height helps with swing speed
Great stuff. With such a fast swingspeed do you find swinging a bit slower helps at all with accuracy or is no difference?
Great for putting things into perspective. Can you show iron swings speeds in a future session. Please keep these coming as I find them really insightful and helps in what is average and what one should be aspiring to without be distracted by what the pros are doing particularly someone who is in his late 50s and plays off 8.
Many thanks Charles and delighted you found the video helpful. Will for sure look and see what we can find on iron swing speeds also 👍
What would also be useful is the gradation of swing speeds from driver through to wedge. So for an X mph driver speed, the 7 iron ss will be Y mph and the wedge ss will be Z mph.
I am 68yo, h'cap gone up from 8 to 11 over last 4 years. Just had a fitting for a new driver with same fitter who fitted me for my last driver which coincidentally was 5 years ago.
At the end of the fitting we compared the trackman data from my last fitting to the new fitting. Most of the data analysis in your video corresponds to my data.
Swing speed has dropped from 97mph to 84mph. Old driver distance 228yds, new driver distance 210yds.Still a 9 degree driver.
Some other data from my new fitting: ball speed - 118, spin - 1830, attack angle +2.8
The one piece of data I should have enquired about was the height of my ball at the apex of it's flight. I am now hitting the ball very high, whereas my ball flight used to be lower. My pitching wedge doesn't go as high as my driver. I live in Scotland, it's always windy, my high ball flight doesn't penetrate into the wind, so wanted a slightly lower ball flight, I tried bringing the ball back about 2 inches in my setup but I then just block my drives to the right, obviously not getting clubface square at impact.
Any suggestions to lower my ball flight with my driver?
So the most illuminating statistic from Mark Broadie is that for a player such as myself who is close to scratch, an extra 20 yards will yield me 1 stroke less on average. It seems I should use my time on avoiding more bogeys, and getting better with my putting, chipping and short irons. All this emphasis on increasing swing speed is the wrong direction in my opinion. I'm 68, not a strong guy, SS around 93 with about 225 carry and 245 avg drive, yet I beat 97% of players who drive it 25-40 yards past me (in my club tournaments and provincial tournaments). Saying this I am trying to drive longer through gym work and swing training, to at least maintain as long as I can, and for the 3 or 4 longer holes on courses. Obviously I'm not going to maintain my 2.8 current cap from 7,000 yards. But I am very accurate with my driver and rarely get more than a bogey.
Bogey and big number avoidance is absolutely the best strategy when it comes to scoring well. Spot on thing to focus on 👍
Its great to be healthy with flexibiity and have some strength. Sucks for us people that have heatlh issues where we cannot generate those swing speeds for our age. Funny thing is that we still play fast and score well. You all need a good C or D player in your scramble foursome.
In 1997 John Daly became the first pro to ever average over 300yds per drive for the whole tour.
In 2003 (6 years later) one single golfer matched him to become the only 2 golfers on the entire tour to average 300yds per drive.
In 2023, the tour average for a drive was 299.73 yards across the entire tour.
That, is how important distance is....
I would love to know how far John D would hit the ball in today's game!!
That's how important technology is.
Great summary! Thanks
Much appreciated. Delighted you found the video helpful 👍
I'm 58, and my average on course swing is around 115. I can step on it a bit and get over 120. I have the PRGR radar unit that I use to track SS. I recommend Dr. Kwon's drills to increase swing speed.
That’s superb speed. 120 puts you in the top 20 on the PGA tour which is incredible 👍
@@GolfingFocus I used to train for long drive competitions, I was going to enter this year, but a knee surgery has set me back a bit, and there's no more 55+ division. When I was younger, I was hitting around 135mph or so, so I've lost speed, but hanging in there.
@@rickhammel9541 I'd still take your current speed in a heartbeat! 👍
@@GolfingFocus I suggest watching Dr. Kwon's videos on CZcams. I've trained a few friends, and one went from around 82mph to 94 in one session on the range, and a female beginner in her 50's went from 74 to 81 in one session.
@@rickhammel9541 Awesome, thanks for the tip. This better than The Stack System and Superspeed do you think?
interesting I am 59 years old and have a swing speed of only 92 mph and handicap of 7 i have a pretty good short game cheers from Vulcan Canada
Drive for show, putt for dough. Pros spend a lot of time on hitting driver, but even more time on their short game. They go hand-in-hand.
Great stuff. Suspect your short game is pretty sharp based on those numbers 👍
@@ArthurDentZaphodBeeb Can't agree with you there Arthur unfortunately. Drive for show, putt for dough is a myth unfortunately and one the pros are well aware of hence their ever increasing focus on distance in recent times.
are u a sutter lol
Surely consistency and accuracy is the most important thing rather than boasting I swing at 110 mph but God only knows where my ball just went??? We are amateurs, we're not on tour and never will be so keep it real and be happy you're out there playing
Male 47yrs 8.4 hdc. Average carry 260. Probably the best part of my game. I hardly lose any shots. My irons game kills my score in the past 2 years.
With that average carry distance you have loads of potential to get that handicap down which is great. Hope you can get the irons sorted this season 👍
My index is 4.8 and my driver speed is 93mph.
What tees/yardage do you play?
Awesome, that suggests you've got a great short game in there 👍
That is great, how fast does your husband swing?
My handicap is 2 and my driver speed is 85 mph. Worry more about compression than speed, be a good ball striker.
In this offseason I've been going to a place that has simulators which provide data on ball speed but not swing speed. I've noticed that ball speed is several notches higher than swing speed, thus if your ball speed is in the 110-115 range for example, the swing speed is most likely in the 90s; that's my quick-and-dirty take on the matter. I think I'm pretty well in the average range for my age group of 60 and over...cheers!
Ball speed is 1.25 to 1.49 x driver swing speed (called smash factor), depending on if you hit it on sweet spot and with ascending angle of attack. I usually see 1.38 - 1.44 smash factor with 145-155 mph ball speed with my 105 mph swing speed when I test on a trackman. If you hit down on the ball with driver, your smash factor will be under 1.38.
110-115 ball speed is roughly mid-70s swing speed. You can find charts online.
Ball speed is one of the 3 key factors that determine driver distance alongside launch angle and spin rate. The optimal mix of these is different for each golfer and is dictated by their swing speed and ‘attack angle’ at impact but in short for most distance a golfer must get the ball up in the air as quickly as possible and not have much spin on it. We've done another video on how far your ball speed should go here which hopefully helps also - czcams.com/video/4ryf0n7ooeE/video.html 👍
@@ArthurDentZaphodBeebaccording to the numbers it’s probably closer to mid 80’s. Take 113 and divide by 1.35 and that’ll give you an approximate number. 83.7 mph..
@@pdriver870 1.35 is a very low smash factor for a driver - should be 1.45-1.50, which places 110 ball speed in mid-70s swing speed
Thank you for very interesting data, though some puzzles me. From ShotScope, my actual average driving distance last year was 221 yards, not bad for age 69, but I never knew my swing speed. I used an indoor range for the first time last Sunday, and it showed a driver swing speed of about 86 mph and a smash factor of about 1.36. My distance seems to match up with players with a swing speed of 98, much higher than what I recorded in the studio. Maybe I felt constrained indoors, and subconsciously slowed my swing down?
Either way, I guess that to get my drives up to 240, I'll need more swing speed and/or a higher smash factor, and that simply updating my driver with a modern one is probably not going to boost distance much without faster swing speed.
You're probably right Carl that a new driver is likely not going to make much difference but you never know until you test out with a good fitter to see what they think. Without more swing speed though reackon you can definitely find some more distance with a better strike and higher smash factor than 1.36. The LPGA driving distance stats vs. the average male amateur (AMA) prove how important a good strike is when it comes to distance as the women pros hit the ball a lot further than the AMA with essentially the same swingspeed. More info which you may find helpful on this is another on our videos - czcams.com/video/-P-lgkXFKps/video.html
Newer gear can make a difference, I'm 42 and couldn't get over 180-190 yards with my old Lynx driver. I got fitted for my first new driver and I'm now smashing over 200 yards fairly regularly (note I'm not a great player at all, I'm just beginning to get back into golf after a long hiatus and several injuries that slow my swing down quite alot). The shaft weight and flex also makes a pretty big difference to the feel and hit so don't ignore it and always get fitted.
@@RogueWraith909 I have a fitting scheduled in a couple of weeks, and we'll see how that goes. Still, the fact that my real life drives are higher than you would expect from my swing speed doesn't seem to point to an equipment issue.
@@carlr2837 True, it's a nice thing to have happen though :)
I have ball speeds in the 160’s and I’d gladly give up yardage if it meant I chipped and putted better. Distance is not everything, you still gotta get the ball in the hole somehow 😂
Absolutely Jeff and 100% agree. Being a lot closer to the green off the tee though definitely helps with that 👍 😂
49 years old. 6.4 handicap. 98-99 mph swing speed
I’m 53, my swing speed is around 108-112, depends on day, my handicap is 11 or 12………got lots of problems 😂
Great stuff. Good news with those swingspeeds also is there is loads of potential to hit the ball a long way and with that shot very low. As you say though that's only part of the puzzle 👍
I float between 5-8 handicap generally. On my best days I can barely scrape 100mph. I'm consistently the shortest hitter in groups of my peers. Id guess the average single digit swing speed is around 105 but could be way off.
Probably right but it depends on the length of courses you play. I’m a 5.6 handicap with a 105 club head speed avg. I play with a guy who is probably a 1 or less handicap. I don’t know what his club speed is but I probably avg at least 20 yards farther off the tee than him. The thing is we play in a golf league where the courses usually plays 6500 yds or less. I think if I got him on a 7000 yard course I might actually have a chance to beat him.
That feels about right to us too Jacob based on these numbers. 👍
The graphic at 3:01, is that per hole or per round?
That is per round.
Nice. Tidy assessment. LPGA here I come........
😂Me too! Thanks for the feedback and delighted you enjoyed the video 👍
I'm 60 with 106 driver speed but I practice for speed once a week. I highly doubt Jack was at 118 mph at 58 years of age. More like 108. I saw him playing in his early 50s and he was hitting it 275 with driver. Jim Dent was longest of the seniors back then and he hit it 285-290.
Well jacks 83 now so 25 years ago he was 58, a couple years before the introduction of the Pro V1, the ball that changed everything. But even so if he only avg 275 of the tee as you say then you’re right he wasn’t swinging 118. I remember playing with my brother back then who swung the club at around 118 and he could easily hit it 300 plus.
I would have to say jack never seen that speed at any age
I can say for a fact in the middle late seventies that I was driving the ball in the 390-400 yard range with a laminated head driver with a two -x shaft and never tried to kill it. I was very fortunate to get to workout with a group of powerlifting buddies and I got very strong and very flexible. I learned that you get your power from your lower body not from the upper. I have an unusual ability to fix a swing from watching someone hit one or two balls. I have showed a lot of PGA pros how to do it. I wanted to try the tour but I had some family problems that keep me from doing it. When you learn to use your body right you can be very accurate with your swing. I have never seen a swing that I would trade mind for
Interesting. 118mph for a one off swing speed for Jack Nicklaus doesn't feel that much of a stretch to believe with that distance and using the balata ball at that time. Saying that you may be right that it was slightly high and who knows how accurate the launch monitors were then compared to now. What I do think though for sure is that he was always one of the longer hitters over the main part of his career and that played a big big role in his overall success.
It's just not possible. I followed Jack at a couple different tournaments his first years on senior tour 1990-1991 at age 50 and he was getting outdriven 20 yards by Jim Dent, Arnold Palmer and many others. I know he was very long in his PGA days but not so much when he was in his 50s. His online driving distance stats for 1986 when he won Masters were 264 yards. Age 58 is 1998 and he averaged 254 yards. That equates to 105 mph max. @@GolfingFocus
Distance or fairway finder.....
I can swing 108 wish I was a 5 handicap lol
Great news though Rich is with that swingspeed you have the potential with room to spare to get your handicap way down. Those with much slower swingspeeds won't ever be able to get there unfortunately just because they won't be able to hit the ball far enough 👍
0.1hcap, 104mph driver speed. If I only lose 0.8 shots by gaining 20 yards I'll keep playing my pat-pat golf
Fair enough. 👍Out of interest where do you focus your own targets on gaining strokes per round (i.e. not reducing mistakes) if it's not distance?
@@GolfingFocus doing fundamentals / controlling variables better. Loads of room to tighten dispersion, and chip and putt better. Even at 104mph (average drive around 270) you have to spray it around a bit to be off scratch as opposed to say +3
average drive aint 270 carry.@@fraserh3716
Interesting@@fraserh3716 and thanks for sharing. Mark Broadie talks a lot in his statistical modelling from amateurs and pros about there being a clear ceiling regarding potential scoring gains when you don't increase distance but there are of course always exceptions. Would be great to find out during the season ahead though where you find the most gains without any distance gain and share back with us 👍
3:25 disagree with this. Short game short game short game. The same people that are being used to "prove" that assertion are exactly the same people that don't practice their putting, pitching, and chipping nearly enough. The better players (higher swing speeds) are the ones who know the importance of short game and practice it more, in general. Swing speed, at a certain level, isn't that important for scoring. The average male golfer has relatively the same swing speed as an LPGA tour pro. But they aren't low handicap players because of swing flaws, mental "deficiencies," and short game.
Always cracks me up how different things in golf is measured by handicap. Handicap means nothing in swing speed.
You’re right, I knew a guy that had an 8 handicap but his swing speed was in the low 40’s ;-)
i think that is what these comments were for; dont have to be real long to have a good game
127 mph here
That would have put you top of the pile on the PGA Tour last year!
Age has nothing to do with swing speed.
if you want to proceed in making videos you need to invest in a microphone that doesnt sound like a tin can
Handicapp HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH CLUBHEAD SPEED SORRY.
That’s not what the stats say!
Can't help but agree Anthony. The stats couldn't be much clearer on this.