If you are serious about your golf then balls can be an expensive business.
But there are some easy ways of making the buying process more straightforward and more common sense.
It is easy to get carried away by what your playing partners are playing or what you see the pro using on TV but you want to get the right ball for your swing and your skills.
1. What is your price point?
This will be the first considerations for many of us. The leading ball manufacturer have balls that range from £50 a dozen (Pro V1/Pro V1x) to £26 a dozen (TruFeel). There will be other cheaper options so this is dependent on what you want from a ball. If you are a beginner your £50 will soon disappear as you’ll be hitting more wayward shots and losing more balls. If you only play half a dozen times a year then it’s more likely that golf is more of a fun pastime so look for the value option.
If you are playing every weekend and entering competitions then you will want to give yourself the best chance of performing well and that means playing a ball that will complement your game. Many of us haven’t got the swing speed or we don’t hit the ball well enough or hit our chip shots well enough to get a nice level of spin so we don’t need a premium ball – as our game improves, then we can play a ball that is more in line with our skills.
Also, if you are playing a lot over the winter when there isn’t much run or you might lose more balls as they are plugging, then switch to a better value ball. It’s a good chance to test out a cheaper version of a premium offering and you won’t lose out on their benefits as the ball won’t be performing as it should be.
2. What are your strengths?
This is a quick summary of the different types of ball. Distance balls generally have a larger core and a thinner cover to add yardage as the ball comes off the clubface faster. At the other end of the spectrum a softer ball will spin less and not carry as far as they are designed to help reduce the slices and hooks. If you struggle with spin, ie errant shots, then you might want to consider a softer ball but you will lose distance. Then you have the premium ball eg Pro V1, Chrome Tour and TaylorMade TP5 which tick all the boxes and are therefore more expensive. The premium ball features multiple layers – the TP5 has five – which are designed to offer optimal distance, spin and, crucially, feel as, if you don’t like the feel and sound of a ball, then it won’t stay in the bag for very long.
Balls are either two-piece or multi-layer with three, four or five layers. To generalise, two-piece balls are for high handicappers who will benefit from some extra distance while, the faster your swing speed, will maximise every layer down to the core. Needless to say we don’t swing the same speed for every shot so a wedge shot, for example, will only activate the outer layers to add spin to the shot.
3 How is it best to test the balls?
There will be all sorts of promises on the sleeve of ‘exceptional distance combined with premium feel’ but the most useful way of finding the best ball for you is to get out on the course.
Titleist provide a useful guide on their website when we don’t have a spare launch monitor knocking about.
– Start on the putting green as this will give you the best chance of understanding feel. Hit three short putts, three long putts and three downhill putts.
– Then hit three low chips, three high pitches and three half wedges.
– Head to your favourite par 3 on your home course or a short hole that involves a 7-iron and hit some shots and understand what the flight, carry and sound are like.
– Finally, hit some drives as we all want to see how a ball performs with our driver.
By the end of this you should have a sound idea of what ball will work well for you.
4. Have you considered a ball fitting?
We hear a lot about driver fittings and then less so about irons, wedges and putters. But very few of us have had a ball fitting which makes very little sense when it could make any number of differences to our golf. If you love your current driver, the feel, weight, look and sound of it, then you should be finding out what ball best complements it. The same with your irons, wedges and putter. This will take less than an hour and it will put to bed any doubts that you might have when faced with a dozen offerings of premium balls.
This might be the best use of your time in any preparations for the coming months. It is worth mentioning that the best websites offer a ball-fitting tool where you can answer questions about your game and be advised what ball suits you but the best course of action is to have a face-to-face fitting.
5. Does the look matter?
If you go back a decade then you will likely be regarded as something of a maverick if you used a yellow ball. It was generally thought that a yellow ball wasn’t as good from a quality standpoint but this is no longer the case.
These days golf ball design has become a lot more fun and visual and there are plenty of benefits to be gained in terms of their increased visibility, being able to follow them and also to line up and hit your putts. Callaway offer a Triple Track alignment aid that adds a visual aspect as well as working with their Odyssey putters.
