Professional golfers are good at lots of things, but they’re really good at one thing in particular: getting drives in play.
As I wrote about here, this is something that amateurs, to use the technical term, are super-bad at. They end their chances of playing a hole well the moment they start it by blasting their drives out-of-bounds, or making an uncommitted and tentative swing which sends their ball into the trees.
How do pros do this so much better than the rest of us? And what can we learn from them? That was the subject of our most recent Golf Digest Game Plan video, which you can watch here:
To answer that question, I dove down a rabbit hole where I analysed all of Rory McIlroy’s drives since the start of last season. McIlroy is the reigning Masters champion, the favourite to win this week’s PGA Championship at what other pros are calling “Rory McIlroy Country Club”, and one of the greatest drivers in golf history. What clues is he leaving us in his data?
The first is that McIlroy doesn’t vary his swing speed around wildly. There’s an almost negligible difference of just a couple of miles per hour in his clubhead speed from drive to drive, and almost 88 percent of his drives finished with a ball speed of at least 95 percent of his maximum recorded ball speed.
- Key takeaway: He’s swinging with the same intent every time.
But perhaps more interesting is that while McIlroy’s intent doesn’t differ, the shots do.
Specifically, McIlroy has three shots he hits off the tee: a low, a medium and a high drive.
These are all the drives McIlroy has hit so far this season (excluding last week at the Truist Championship), and the Xs denote the average of each grouping.
Notice how his low drive launches at about 7 degrees; his stock about 10.5 degrees; and his max carry closer to 13 degrees.
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How often does he hit them? Glad you asked! Here’s the breakdown.
As for when he hits them? Oversimplified, but basically…
- Low drive on narrow or awkward holes
- Higher max carry drive when he’s trying to fly over something
- Stock drive mostly everywhere else
The main difference in creating these different drives is tee height. Low-teed drives go shorter and straighter; high-teed drives the opposite. It’s true for pros, and it’s true for amateurs.
It’s the combination of matching some basic tools with the right situation that makes a great driver of the ball.
Once again you can learn more from our deep-dive video right here:
