# taking a divot



## silver77 (Apr 10, 2007)

I'm new to golf for the past 3 months, when taking a shot from the fairway or even a pitch shot should I be taking a divot ?


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## Lead Tape (Apr 16, 2007)

silver77 said:


> I'm new to golf for the past 3 months, when taking a shot from the fairway or even a pitch shot should I be taking a divot ?



When you watch a PGA tournament on TV and they have an overhead shot of the extended landing area of the fairway from the blimp and it looks like a mine field down below with all of the discoloration, that should give the answer to you. What do you think made that happen?


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## 300Yards (Jan 23, 2007)

It depends on what clubs your speaking of..for irons, I'd say yes, you should take a divot, although it is not always required. Woods, in general, you shouldn't take a divot..although sometimes it is necessary to do so. Seeing as your just beginning, leave all this divot stuff for later..for now, just focus on making clean contact, then start working on specialty shots.


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## white_tiger_137 (Mar 23, 2006)

Just make sure you're not starting your divot before you get to the ball.


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## Golfbum (Oct 14, 2006)

I rarely take divots, then again I am only a 6 handicap. Not a PRO. Freddy Couples rarely takes divots, then again he only won a Masters and some other tournaments. 
Not every touring pro takes divots. Same goes for amateur golfers.
I learned how to play golf on fairways that were like cement as there was no irrigations systems on a lot of courses 25 years ago. So if you took divots you took the risk of injurying your wrists. I learned to pick it clean and basically have done so ever since.
To each his own I say.
But then again, I am not a PRO or a Scratch Golfer, just a lowly single digit guy.


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## 65nlovenit (Dec 8, 2006)

Your just WAY to humble GolfBum, but I have to agree with you, I decided this year that I would start taking a divot, well now I've got to back and learn to use my 5/6/7 irons all over again. Since I started taking divots I've also developed the most horrendous Kamakazi Hook you've ever seen. I know I'm closing the face of the club, but I have this feeling the clubs going to dig and twist, throwing my shot off line. So now I'm cursing the day I decided to take a divot. Have yet to get to a single digit handicap, but I think I'm going to go back to picking it clean.


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## Doby45 (Mar 7, 2007)

I once had a cat named Divot..


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## Golfbum (Oct 14, 2006)

Well I'll tell you one thing for sure. If you were playing my home course today and trying to take divots you would be covered in mud and you would have hit some nasty looking shots.
The course is so wet if a shot was not picked clean off the turf it was a nightmare.
Watch Pro golfers carefully and you will see a lot of guys who do not take divots. LPGA'ers too. Nationwide boys as well.


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## 65nlovenit (Dec 8, 2006)

Was out Saturday, went out to see if the course was open yet, and sure enough there was a couple nuts like me out there slogging along. Our course has a tendency to hold water so the fairways were small ponds. Lost two balls in the middle of the fairway, just could not find them. Found another one and was tempted to use a backhoe to play it. Needless to say the score was less then bragable, but despite the water it was great to get back out there. Had one of the best drives I've ever had and followed it up with a super 3 wood, to bad I blew the approach shot, landed on but rolled off. And your absolutely right about the divots, I would have had to open up an excavation company if I'd tried that.Oh well it will dry up (some day).

Del


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## cbwheeler (Apr 9, 2007)

It depends on the situation. If you want more spin on your shot, you're going to want to take a hard swing with a steep angle of approach and a good sized divot after you hit the ball, creating a high ball flight and lots of spin. If you have some room to play with on the green, the easier shot is a 3/4 swing that will roll a little and check up quickly. This won't require too much of a divot, but you will get a little dirt on the club.

Why take a divot? The ball slides up the clubface at the split second of impact, catching on the grooves of the club imparting a lot of spin.

If you don't take as big of a divot, ceteris peribus, you're going to get less spin.

The simple answer is, with your wedges and short irons, you should at least disturb the grass if you're a "pick it clean" type of player. If not, you're not making very good use of the grooves on your clubs. They are there for a reason! You'll learn to hit all types of shots, some with big divots, some divotless. That's what makes golf such a great game.

Play with it on the course and watch how the ball reacts. Ball spin dynamics is a huge area of golf that most players never even consider. You can really affect your scores bigtime if you learn to control spin.

Good Luck with it.


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## 65nlovenit (Dec 8, 2006)

I just wanted to ask one mundane question, I just came back from 2 1/2 hours of chipping, pitching and putting practice. Our club has a really great practice green, complete with a 60 yard fairway runup, and a reasonable green. Now the question is, I just hit in the neighborhood of 250+ chip/pitch shots, if I'm supposed to take a divot on each of these shots its going to make this practice area look like a mine field. Should I save the divots for the real life playing or when I'm practicing? I have to admit that I was trying my darndest to pick em clean.


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## white_tiger_137 (Mar 23, 2006)

I say go ahead and take the divots. I don't see the point in spending hours practicing if you're not hitting 'real' shots.


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## cbwheeler (Apr 9, 2007)

Practice real life situations; just like the shots you would be faced with on the course. If you practice differently, it does no good.

That said Del, not every pitch shot requires a divot. Experiment with different types of shots, different divots; see how the ball reacts. You'll vastly improve the versatility of your short game if you learn to control ball spin.


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## JPsuff (Jan 9, 2007)

.


I've mentioned before that taking a divot is not a goal but is rather a byproduct. Some shots produce divots and others don't but a divot is not something to "try for".

A divot is the result of the club's swing arc extending beyond the surface on which the ball is resting. When hitting a shot with a short iron, for example, the ball is usually placed a bit farther back in one's stance. When the club is swung, the idea is to contact the ball first which occurs before the club has reached the bottom of its arc of travel so it's just geometry that brings the club through the turf as it reaches the bottom of its arc and the slice of turf that is removed from the ground is just a function of that geometry.

Conversely, if one is using a long iron, the ball position is generally more forward in one's stance and this setup produces an arc in which the ball is still struck first but at the bottom of the arc instead of on the downward portion of it which then causes the clubhead to pick the ball cleanly off the turf resulting in no turf being disturbed and thus no divot taken.

"But the pro's always take a divot!" 

Most of the time that's true. But in the case of tour pros, the current trend of "de-lofting" a club has something to do with that. When de-lofting a club, the ball is placed slightly farther back in one's stance than it would be if the goal were not to take loft "off" of the clubface. De-lofting is a combination of a more rearward ball position along with a delayed release which places the hands a bit ahead of the clubhead at impact which tends to take a degree or two off of the actual loft of the clubface. But again, it's a case of striking the ball before the club's swing arc has reached its bottom and thus the clubhead contacts the turf after impact.

But in either case, a divot is simply a result rather than an objective. Now that's not to say that one can't learn something about one's technique from a divot. The direction in which the turf flies after a shot, the direction in which the divot is pointing and even the depth of the divot itself can all be indicators of how effective one's technique may be for a given shot. But such information is more of a bonus than anything else. If the shot resulted in a divot, then you can enjoy the benefit of some forensic analysis. But if the shot doesn't (or shouldn't) produce a divot, then one will just have to rely on the results of the shot itself to aid in assessing technique.

It isn't "either / or", but simply "whether".


-JP


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## Foster4 (May 2, 2007)

Taking a Divot:

1. Depends on what type of fairways you play on. Pros play on nice watered fairways that are usually softer and better grass. No reason they take big divots. Some ppl play on hard and it would be crzy to try to take one. But even when i play on hard surfaces when i go to soft courses my divots increase in size considerably. 

2. Someone before me explained it perfectly. Divot is a byproduct of your swing. 

3. Not everyone takes huge divots. Some sweep it clean some don't.


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