Is Club Head Speed Overhyped in Modern Golf Training?

While parts of golf are always so focused on club head speed (CHS), are there factors that play a role in a detrimental way by only focusing on CHS as a parameter for speed and distance gained? For many years since 2008, I've been involved in the sport of Long Drive Golf, starting out from very humble beginnings just knowing I hit it further than anyone in my area by gauging the distance the ball traveled, how far I'd hit certain clubs, and well, that was about it. No extra data needed; the hole's 500 yards, I have 150 left, I must have driven it 350. Somewhat easy to understand, right? Well, let's now advance ahead to the 2020s. We have so many radar devices allowing us to "gauge" how far the ball went into a screen or on the range. Some are considered the gold standard, while some are more affordable, giving the everyday golfer a good general idea.

How General Speed training is done. Small variance in CHS leading to consistent strikes

So where does that leave us today? Well, there was this cool idea that came about in the time frame of around 2010-2012. Golfers started calling it "Speed training," using sticks weighted similarly to golf clubs, some a little less and some a little more, that came with programs to follow on how you can increase CHS. Although none of them truly trained you into a better position of a fundamentally better golf swing, they did teach you how to potentially move faster with a stick in your hand and a little box radar to determine if it was working or not. Now, these were endorsed by many professionals as well as the longest hitters on the planet, but oddly enough, there seemed to be a "CAP" or limit to how fast you eventually could swing. No matter what, if all the claims being made were true, someone should be able to gain swing speed year over year continually, which I never did see even in the professional ranks and with the very longest hitters on tour (including Long Drive). They seem to work for a very short duration and then fizzle off. Now, this is only speculation, but the amount of force needed to continue to progress was likely limited by a few factors, including neurological response and the person's willingness to train outside of the prescribed program. Over time, the body wears down, and pushing limits over and over becomes more strenuous on the system.

A simple way to explain it that I've used in the past is if I can swing 155 mph at my top end for, say, 50 swings, the amount of energy that it requires from me is much more than if I were swinging at 140 mph. Similarly, in weightlifting, the strongest in the world, because they lift much heavier weights, it takes a larger toll on their system than someone just in the general public doing their basic routine in the gym. But nonetheless, a toll is taken, and now here is where it starts to become very interesting (at least to me).

If an individual reaches that point of fatigue and they are adamant about keeping going with the ego in full blast, there are so many negatives that can happen. First, your swing and kinematics can fall apart, throwing off your club head path and angle of attack because certain muscles are fatigued over others and compensations are being made in order to try and achieve the previous numbers achieved while speed training. Now, some try to call this conditioning, but truly it's not; it's not how the system works or how the body functions. All you are doing is ingraining poor habits.

When I see individuals training specific swing speed, I feel they are doing far too much than they actually need to do. The all-or-nothing mentality is still strong in the ego of the general golfer (generally worse in the Long Drive golfer) when realistically less is generally more, and patience is something very much needed. What I end up seeing is swings getting all out of whack, swing paths getting way over the top, proper contact going out the window, and all the other parameters which allow a ball to actually travel through space properly to achieve more distance. It seems like the club head speeds have been going up and up, but the ball isn't traveling any further. Not to mention those being endorsed to promote certain products speaking as if they know the complete fundamentals of how it all works. Guys and girls, these individuals are being paid to promote a product, plain and simple. A partnership was made, and financials exchanged hands, no different than every OEM golf company that has promised 20 more yards year over year for two decades in their marketing campaigns. You are being sold. My advice: be very wary of individuals who are trying to coach speed and distance who only post the big club head speed numbers on the screen. Sure, it's cool, but at the end of the day, it's only part of the picture. If you were to ask the real data scientists out there, you are likely better off being 5-10 mph slower and finding the center of the face 9/10 times with proper swing dynamics like spin, angle of attack, spin loft, dynamic loft, and many other factors that actually determine how far a ball travels through space. As far as I know, there isn't a single competition on this planet that you can win for just swinging as fast as possible and hitting it like crap.

At minimal these numbers should be taken into consideration in order to make improvements in speed

The true focus should be on consistency while moving faster than you previously have, while maintaining at least good smash factors on average above 1.45 on Trackman, or around 1.42 on GC Quad. Now, to include in this, focus on a consistent path number, consistent angle of attack, spin loft, dynamic loft, and spin rates with the proper launch angle. Now, obviously, there are some caveats to this. If you are already an elite long driver and can bounce back and forth between certain shot types or launch angles (someone like Scottie Pearman, who can speed train into his net and lower his launch angle below 10 degrees to create some of the fastest ball speeds in the world, and then jump into competition and alter his swing to the conditions properly for that specific day and launch it at 20 degrees while still retaining a great portion of that speed and consistency), if you are not one of the best players/hitters in the world, you should likely stick to the fundamentals before just recklessly going out and doing pure speed training.

To be fair and honest, the best of the best in the sport of long drive (the longest hitters on earth) have never once bragged or boasted about just their club head speed. They focus on the total picture, and how far the ball actually goes in competition since that is what they truly train for: to win competitions. And yes, this is coming from an individual who has gone down the speed rabbit hole and held a world record ball speed for a very short period, without any gimmicks or shady camera work, no validation needed, and just happy to attain a feat that only so many can say they have done honestly and backed it up in competition. Would I have rather had the wins on tour as accolades? Absolutely. Has anyone ever once questioned me if it was real or actually happened? Not once. The best hitter in the world at this moment hasn't broken 230 mph, but if you ask him if his five tour wins and a World Championship title are more or less important than achieving that milestone, I know I'd take those paychecks and accolades over my once-held ball speed record.

To finish this off, I'll keep it short and sweet. Speed is great if it's utilized properly, and it's absolutely useless if it isn't! Distance is like baking a cake; all the ingredients require a specific amount to achieve the best final result. If one ingredient is way off, it could very well spoil the whole cake.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, until Next time.

RG