The golf shaft is often described as the engine of the golf club.
During a swing, the shaft loads up during the backswing and unloads in the downswing, helping to deliver power to the clubhead.
Getting the correct shaft for our golf clubs is vital to obtaining our maximum carry distances, launch, and spin rates, and can even play a role in helping us strike the ball more consistently.
We’ve covered important aspects of the golf shaft, such as choosing the correct weight of shaft for the average driver swing speed and shaft profiles, in previous posts.
It’s time to take a deeper dive into the most common aspect of the golf shaft, the shaft flex.
We think we know what the right shaft flex is for us, but it’s a little more in-depth than first anticipated, and many golfers are unwittingly using clubs that have the wrong flex for their swing.
Shaft flex is correlated to our swing speed. When the shaft is fitted correctly, it maximises the transfer of energy from the shaft into the ball. With optimal conditions, we can launch the ball correctly with the correct spin and achieve our fastest ball speeds.
Get the shaft flex wrong, and we are in for a world of mis-queued swings, poor ball striking, inconsistent ball flight, and poor launch and spin numbers. Under these circumstances, knowing how a shot will turn out becomes pure guesswork, not ideal for playing consistently good golf.
To help you understand the importance of marrying up the correct shaft flex, we’ll break things down into four areas, which are:
- What Shaft Flex Really Means?
- How Swing Speed Affects Flex Choice
- Why The Right Flex Makes A Difference
- How Custom-Built Golf Clubs Ensure You Have The Right Flex For Your Game
What Shaft Flex Really Means?
Every golf shaft bends.
If you take a club and apply pressure to the butt end of the grip, you’ll see the shaft bend. The stiffer the shaft, the more pressure you have to apply, but it will bend.
When we swing the club, the shaft is bending, or loading, to use the correct terminology.
As mentioned, if the shaft flex is perfectly tuned to our swing speed, the shaft unloads at the right point in the downswing to deliver maximum clubhead speed into the ball.
The problem that we face is that it can be very difficult to know if we are playing the wrong flex in any of our golf clubs, because a lot of the time, we are creatures of habit and buy the same flex we have used for a number of years.
We do this because we feel comfortable that it’s the right choice for us, but we never stop to consider whether or not we have the swing speed to really get the maximum benefit from the shaft.
As we get older, we naturally start to lose speed, so that stiff flex shaft we always opt for in our driver might no longer deliver the results we want if we are swinging it slower.
Wedges can be another area where we can make major mistakes. We opt for the same shafts that are in our golf irons because we think the feel and performance will be the same. Often they’re not.
Professionals often opt for different golf shafts and even different flexes in their wedges because they want maximum feel from their scoring clubs.
Look at any “What’s In The Bag?” of any top professional, and their wedge shafts will be softer than the rest of their irons.
World number one, Scottie Scheffler, is a great example of this. Scheffler opts for True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100 in his irons, but switches to Dynamic Gold S400 shafts in his wedges.
The ego plays a big part in why we are using the wrong flex of shafts in our clubs.
We often don’t want to admit that we need to play a softer shaft, so we continue to convince ourselves that the next new club we have just bought with the same flex of shaft we normally use will produce different results.
The problem that we can find is that we fall further down the rabbit hole because off-the-shelf clubs will be fitted with shafts that have different tolerances: one manufacturer’s regular flex could be classed as a stiff flex with another manufacturer, which makes getting the correct shaft for your swing speed a lottery.
Club manufacturers won’t worry about this because they will argue that they are offering the consumer more choices in providing a variety of different shafts as part of the standard options.
How Swing Speed Affects Flex Choice
Swing speed correlates the closest to understanding which shaft flex is ideal for your game, so we’ll start with what happens if your swing speed is too fast for the shaft you are using.
When your swing speed is too high for the shaft’s flex, the shaft loads (bends) more than it’s designed to, causing it to lag behind your hands at impact. Because the shaft can’t recover or straighten quickly enough, the clubface often closes too early. The result is inconsistent contact, ballooning shots, hooks, and manipulating your golf swing to produce more consistent shots.
When the golf shaft is too stiff for your swing speed, it doesn’t load enough during the swing, which means it can’t store and release energy properly. Because the shaft stays rigid instead of loading, the clubhead never fully releases through the ball.
The resultant shot pattern often tends to be low and to the right (for a right-handed golfer) as a result of the clubface being open at the point of impact.
A shaft that is too stiff will make the golf club feel heavier in your hands at address, where the opposite can be said for a shaft that is too weak.
It’s always dangerous to start mucking around with your swing mechanics or try to speed up or slow your swing down to accommodate a shaft that isn’t right for your natural level of clubhead speed.
Trying to alter your swing tempo will make the outcome of your shots even less predictable.
Why The Right Flex Makes A Difference
Golf is a game of confidence. When we understand how our golf clubs can perform regardless of the state of our golf game, we stand a better chance of shooting consistently better scores.
When you are fitted for the correct golf shaft, you have the feeling that you can swing normally at your own natural tempo. You’re also likely to experience more centred strikes and a more neutral clubface through impact, which creates more consistency in your shot outcomes.
You can add more distance to your game by matching the correct shaft flex to your swing speed. The shaft can now load and unload properly, transferring the energy to the ball. You’ll also see improved launch and spin conditions, leading to a more trustworthy ball flight.
Now we understand more about what playing the wrong shafts in our clubs can mean. How do we go about ensuring that any club we buy in the future will have the right flex of shaft for our game?
How Custom-Built Golf Clubs Ensure You Have The Right Flex For Your Game
Making wholesale changes in your golf clubs requires some thought process in order to make the right purchase for your game.
When it comes to changing shafts and shaft flexes, start by doing some self-analysis of what you see in your own game.
What tends to be a typical shot pattern you see? Are shots high and ballooning, or low and to the right? (again, for a right-handed golfer)
How often are you finding the middle of the clubface with your existing club or clubs in question?
When it comes to your swing, do you have to step on it, or do you really have to slow things down to get any form of consistency out of the club or clubs in question?
With your normal swing, do you tend to have a smooth tempo, or do you really like to go after the ball? This question is really good for understanding which shaft profile is also right for you.
There are plenty of golf shaft options on the market nowadays, and if you have the time, many shaft manufacturers will offer comparative tables for shaft flex against clubhead speed.
If you want to save yourself the time and effort, a rough rule of thumb for matching flex to clubhead speed would be:
| Clubhead Speed | Shaft Flex |
|---|---|
| Under 85mph | Ladies/Senior/Lite |
| 85-95mph | Regular |
| 95-105mph | Stiff |
| 105mph plus | Extra Stiff |
The safest option to ensure you get the correct shaft flex fitted to your next golf club or clubs is to go through a custom fitting process.
The fitting process begins by understanding the situation of your current game. An experienced fitter will ask the same questions we’ve outlined in the self-analysis phase above.
Understanding shot profiles leads to collecting data on the launch monitor from hitting your clubs as a starter.
The launch monitor will accurately pick up your clubhead speed, shot shape and dispersion, strike locations, launch and spin rates, and whether or not the clubface is coming into impact open or closed.
Putting the data together with your feedback on what you experience out on the course, will help the fitter make a recommendation of a change in flex being the best option for your game.
The fitter can test some shafts and measure the differences to see where improvements are being found. The fitter will also check in with you on how each test shaft feels when you swing the club and what the impact feels like.
Player input is just as important to getting the right shaft as the launch monitor data, because ultimately, it’s how the clubs will perform on the course that matters the most, where you can’t use launch monitor data to know what’s right and what’s not.
The fitter will also take the time to consider other shaft characteristics, such as shaft weight and launch characteristics, to come up with the perfect golf shaft fit for your golf clubs.
Now that we are entering the winter months, it’s the perfect time to take stock of how your clubs performed during the season just past.
If the self-analysis work leads you to the conclusion that it’s time to make a change, you can start the process by going on to Nine By Nine Golf’s website and exploring the range of customised shafts we have available for all golf clubs.
We stock a full range from the leading manufacturers such as True Temper, KBS, Fujikura, and Mitsubishi Chemical.
Once you have selected the shaft you want, you can customise it to your needs by choosing the flex and the correct length. You can opt to have a grip of your choice fitted or to leave the shaft without a grip if you prefer.
Every custom build is assembled to order with care, precision, and attention to detail, and there’s also a dedicated box to include any additional requirements for the build team.
If you want to test a range of shaft options to get the right flex and get a deeper insight into your golf game, you can book a tailored custom-fitting session with one of our experienced fitters through the Nine By Nine Golf website.