Bounce (golf)

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In a golf club, bounce is the angle in degrees between the front edge of the club head in the direction of play and the point where the sole touches the ground in the address position. Usual values ​​are between 2 ° (long iron) and 12 ° ( sand wedge ).

Every golf club can have a bounce, but it is only relevant to the game with irons and wedges. Because only there is the goal of ball-ground contact, ie the club head hits the ball first, transports it into the air and then penetrates the ground.

In historical club heads, the foremost and the lowest point of the club head coincide, resulting in a bounce of 0 °, which is also known as no bounce . Because of its wedge shape, the leading edge then cuts unhindered into the ground, which is not a problem with clean ball-ground contact, since the ball is hit first. A side effect is the maximum rotation (spin) of the ball due to the sharp edge, which is often desired when hitting the green.

However, the lack of a bounce has a disadvantageous effect in the case of an imprecise shot in the sense of ground-ball contact. The leading edge immediately cuts into the ground and most of the energy dissipates there, so the ball only flies a fraction of the actual distance. At such an impact moment, the bounce causes the lowest point of the sole to hit the ground in front of the sharp leading edge and, due to its bead shape, slide along in the direction of the ball. The racket penetrates the ground later and the flight of the ball will be only slightly shorter despite the bad hit.

Bouncing on hard ground is problematic because the sole no longer glides along the ground, but ricochets off. So the leading edge will hit the ball too high, often above the equator. The result is an extremely flat and uncontrollable flight of the ball. For this reason, many links courses are played with little bounce, whereas the golfer benefits from a high bounce on the otherwise usual, rather soft fairways. The sand wedge usually has the highest bounce, as the bunker sand is a particularly soft surface in terms of playing technique.