Golf Shot- Art or Science?

The essence of golf is getting the ball from one place to the other; with a varied power and precision, from a general area to a specific target. Since a distant drive gives a big hitter a head start on most holes, it is easy to develop a false sense of security and be complacent about improving the precision game.

Whether you leave the ball 20 yards or 50 yards from the green, it still requires excellent touch to get the ball where you want it to go. As long as the rules of golf prize dropping a ball in a cup in the fewest strokes possible, the probability for success will favor those who master the short game.

Flight, Bounce and Roll

Since golf is a target game, the ball must travel from tee to hole through some combination of flying, bouncing and rolling. The greater your skill, the higher your options. Also, if you lack the confidence or skill to hit a bump-and-run chip shot, you should not even try doing it.

A well executed lofted shot that you are confident in will usually give you better results than a poorly executed bump and run shot even when the latter is strategically superior.

Ball flight

The forces that determine how a golf ball will travel while airborne are the initial velocity, launch angle, gravity and air resistance. The forces which determine the golf ball flight are all highly dependent on environmental conditions.

Gravity is the most important factor that decides the golf ball flight. As kids, while we play cricket or similar games, we learn to work with gravity, deciding how to catch the ball, judging the way gravity affects its flight. In golf, we do not have to catch the ball but we need to estimate how gravity will effect the ball's flight.

Another interesting aspect is the terminal velocity- the limiting speed of the object in free fall, determined by the ball's weight and diameter. The small and fairly dense ball takes twice as much time to reach its terminal velocity,

This is the reason why good golfers usually opt for a lower trajectory approach shot with more backspin when the green is extremely hard. A high trajectory shot would be a disaster as it would cause the ball to bounce off the green.

Getting the golf ball to go where you want is equal parts of science and art. A professional golfer masters mind, body and club that is akin to an artist's exquisite control of a paintbrush on a canvas. Even a professional golfer often faces difficulty in explaining the theory for a shot-making decision. These skills are developed through observation, experimentation and experience.

By improving the golf ball striking skills, one would get a hand of working with environmental forces that affect the golf ball's flight.