Explore Why Custom-Fitted Golf Irons Are So Crucial

Have you ever pondered on the traits that the best iron players in the world might share?

What would you personally identify as their defining characteristics?

It’s an interesting question, as you can have many different views on what it takes to be a great golf iron player.

Most of us will come up with the following four traits that would link all the best iron players the game has ever seen:

• Consistency of ball striking
• Distance control
• Controlling shot trajectory
• Shot shaping abilities

Take a moment to reflect on your golf iron play. How many of the above traits would you be able to demonstrate regularly?

Being consistently good with your irons is a crucial component to better scores on the golf course, and one way you can achieve higher levels of consistency is through custom-fitted golf irons.

Join us as we guide you through what we believe are the fundamental principles behind why a golf iron fitting will see you shooting lower scores and give you more confidence on the course.

Our four fundamental principles are:

• The Process Toward Custom Fitted Irons
• The Small Details That Can Make A Big Difference
• Understanding The Different Types of Irons
• The Benefits of Custom-Fitted Irons

The Process Toward Custom Fitted Irons

The first step to understanding how your golf iron game can be improved is to conduct some basic statistical analysis of your iron game. The criteria are simple: focus on the following areas:

• Number of times you hit the par threes with your tee shot
• Number of times you hit par fours in two shots when you have an iron shot for your second
• What is the pattern of your bad shots? Do you come up short or long? Do you miss left or right?
• When you miss-hit an iron shot, is the strike out the heel or the toe area?

The greens in regulation stats are interesting because not every par three is the same length. Therefore, you will likely be playing different golf clubs. You’ll also play a mix of long par fours and short par fours; one hole may need a 5-iron for your approach, while the following approach is a 9-iron shot. This variety of shots with different irons puts a real onus on how vital our iron play is.

If you consistently miss your iron shots left or right of the target, it can be a clue to an iron poorly fitted for your game. A big front-to-back shot dispersion pattern can also give us clues about how forgiving your existing irons are.

After collating your stats over a period of time, you might conclude that you need to invest in a new set of golf irons; you’re in luck because the range and quality of golf irons available on the market today are second to none.

But remember that investing in a new set of golf irons can be a costly commitment. The best option is to have them custom-fitted if you want to spend your money wisely.

We’ll demonstrate precisely why custom-fitting will work best for your game, and you’ll start to understand this when you book a fitting session.

The Small Details That Can Make A Big Difference

Having the wrong lie angle and length in your golf irons can really do damage to your game.

Lie angle is simply the angle between the hosel of the iron and the ground when the clubhead is in the address position.

For a right-handed golfer, if your irons are too upright, you will likely see shots miss left of your target; the opposite is true; if your irons are too flat, those shots will generally miss right of the target.

Knowing that your golf irons aren’t the correct lie for you can lead to you manipulating your address position, which means you are making compensations in your swing for your irons not being the correct lie.

The same can be said if the shafts are too long or too short; you have to make compensations in your setup for the fact that the golf club is wrong.

Having the wrong lie angle or shaft length inhibits your ability to strike the ball consistently, so you’re making a lot of guesswork on the golf course about whether or not you’ll hit your intended target.

Grip thickness can also cause problems with clubhead control, crucial to consistently delivering the head into the ball.

Grips that are too thin typically mean the hands can become too active and shut the clubface down at impact. Grips that are too thick mean the clubhead is likely to open, leading to weak shots out to the right if you are a right-handed golfer.

All these details can be addressed if you come for a custom-fitting session. You should never make any compensations in your address or swing for a golf club that is poorly fitted to your game.

Understanding The Different Types of Irons

Various golf iron types are available in the marketplace. Having variety is good, but it’s important to understand that different types are better suited to some golfers than others.

Iron head design falls into one of the following categories:

• Blades
• Player’s Cavity Backs
• Player’s Performance Irons
• Game Improvement Irons

Blades

Blades are the purest form of iron design available. They feature small head shapes with thin top lines and are forged from the softest steel. They are designed for the best ball strikers who are looking for workability and feel. Models like the Miura MB-101 or Mizuno’s Pro 221 blades are great examples of how beautifully crafted blades can be.

Player’s Cavity Backs

Similar in appearance to a blade model at address, player’s cavity backs also tend to be forged from soft steel to provide maximum feedback on strikes. A small cavity is positioned in the rear, offering some forgiveness on off-centre hits, which opens these types of irons up to a broader range of golfers. This iron style is seen in the Titleist T100, Callaway Apex CB 24, or the ProtoConcept CO51TP irons.

Player’s Performance Irons

A relatively new category, the player’s performance iron is best summed up by the TaylorMade P770 iron. The profile of the P770 is very close to a blade, but this iron is packed with technology. The hollow head design features an ultra-thin face and speed foam placed in the hollow behind the face to provide explosive power. Applying tungsten weighting creates the perfect centre of gravity for each iron.

Irons like the P770 or Cobra’s King Forged Tec X irons are suited to golfers of low and mid handicap golfers.

Game Improvement Irons

These golf irons typically feature thicker soles and top lines, giving them a much friendlier look than blade irons.

Game improvement irons can also be multi-material designs to maximise performance and forgiveness. They also generally have stronger lofts to help higher-handicap golfers gain more distance without sacrificing the ability to get the ball launching well from the clubface.

Game improvement irons are more suited to higher handicap golfers who generally struggle for striking consistency and distance with their iron shots.

TaylorMade’s QI iron series, Titleist’s T350, and Srixon’s ZX4 Mk II irons are great examples of current game improvement irons.

The Benefits of Custom-Fitted Irons

When you come for a custom fitting session, you’ll experience a blend of technical and human analysis in an identical process that the game’s best players go through.

At Nine By Nine Golf, we use the GC Quad launch monitor because we believe it provides the most accurate data and, therefore, the most accurate insight into how the golf ball reacts to how the clubface is delivered at impact. We’ll ask you to hit a series of shots with a selection of your irons. GC Quad will provide carry distances, spin rates, launch angles, and shot dispersion data.

Our expert fitters will also be getting feedback from you on what you experience on the course (this is where your stat keeping can come in handy). They’ll also want to understand what you like and don’t like about your existing irons and what you are looking for from a new set of irons.

Once a number of shots have been hit, an accurate picture of your iron game will emerge. We can then pinpoint the areas of focus where we can improve your iron game.

From this point, a selection of iron heads and shaft combinations can be tried to narrow down the best iron set makeup. The data from GC Quad will signpost where improvements are being made. Still, your feedback is vital in areas such as how the sample iron feels and looks while you are testing it.

The custom-fitting session ultimately reaches a winning combination. That choice is backed by the GC Quad data and your preferences for looks and feel.

Looking a little deeper into the custom-fitting process draws out four additional benefits that buying a set of irons off the shelf can’t achieve; these are:

• Blended Set Options
• Shaft Selection
• Lie and Length Adjustment
• Grip Selection

Blended Set Options

We are increasingly fitting golfers into blended iron sets through custom-fitting sessions.

If you are unfamiliar with the concept of a blended set of irons, we’ll use the Mizuno Pro Series range as an example.

Many golfers find long irons difficult to hit, regardless of their handicap. The Mizuno Pro 245 is a hollow-body iron that helps get the ball airborne, provides forgiveness on off-centre hits, and gives higher ball speeds across the face.

We can, therefore, fit a golfer for the Mizuno Pro 245s in the long iron department. Moving into the shorter irons, the golfer might need more feel and control from their irons, so either the Mizuno Pro 241 blade or the Pro 243 player’s cavity head could be selected.

Mizuno has engineered these golf irons to look relatively similar at address, even though they might have different technology within the heads, creating a consistent look and feel throughout their set.

Shaft Selection

Being fitted for the correct golf shaft isn’t just about potentially adding more distance to your iron shots.

The correct shaft can improve shot dispersion and help create the proper launch and spin figures to provide a consistent ball flight.

Traditional steel shafts such as True Temper’s Dynamic Gold, Project X, and KBS Tour come in various weights and flexes, making it easier for the fitter to fit the correct shaft based on the information gained from GC Quad.

It’s worth noting that there is now a great range of graphite shafts, such as Fujikura’s AXIOM or Mitsubishi Chemical’s MMT shaft for golf irons. Graphite shafts were traditionally aimed more at senior or lady golfers. Still, graphite shafts are now built for every type of golfer. The mandate in opting for a graphite shaft is just the same as for a steel shaft: Can we tighten up shot dispersion, add more distance, improve ball-striking, and create consistent trajectory on shots?

Lie and Length Adjustment

We talked earlier about the impact of having irons that aren’t the correct lie or length and the effect that can have on shot discrepancy and your golf swing.

The custom-fitting process records the correct lie and length for your recommended irons.

Custom-built golf irons are built in-house here at Nine By Nine Golf, which means that the club builder has direct access to the fitter if there are any questions surrounding the correct lie and length for the iron build.

Grip Selection

Having the correct grip thickness will also help control the clubhead. During the fitting process, we can ascertain whether or not any additional layers of tape should be added and, if so, how many layers are required.

You can choose the type of golf grip you want from the extensive range available.

The benefits of being custom-fitted golf irons are seen when you are out on the golf course. You’ll see an improvement in your greens in regulation stats as you understand more about how far you hit your irons. You’ll also see better results when you don’t quite hit your iron shot out the middle due to improved shot dispersion.

We ask a lot of our iron game; we hit more iron shots over a round of golf than a driver, so it’s essential that we have complete trust in how our irons perform.

A custom-fitting process will unlock the ideal iron set makeup, so if you are looking to make a change, book a custom-fitting session with one of our experienced club fitters here at Nine By Nine Golf.

You can book your fitting session through the Nine by Nine Golf website, where you can also view our latest range of golf irons and all the customisable options we offer.

If you already know what you want, you can build your ideal iron set and order it directly from the Nine by Nine Golf website.

We’d be happy to help if you have any further questions about golf iron custom fitting and its benefits for your game.