Tadd Fujikawa driving distance

[bowilbury8]

I came across a story on Fugikama on YouTube from a few years back. Was amazed to see he's only 5' 1.'' I looked up his driving distance stats and he averages about 280. How is that physically possible?

[SUPERG]

rotation

[tonytrue]

He is not tall enough to pick the ball up for distance with a regular swing and club. With a cut down matrix shaft (stiff) and a swing that goes from top to bottom straight up and down instead of around.  I'm 5'6 and studied his swing for a long time.  I have it down.   Sadly my putting sucks.

[mat562]

Old videos of Ian Woosnam will blow your mind.

[straightshot7]

280 with today's equipment and firm fairways is pretty short (no pun intended). 

 

He has very good mechanics and he probably hits the (high) center of the face almost every time.

 

Plenty of high school golfers under 5'2' and 140 lbs can also drive it 280. You just have to use the ground and have a good swing. 

[bscinstnct]

I saw JB Holmes on Playing Lessons hit one 300 yards….on his knees.

 

So figure he like, 4’9”?

 

🤣

[TiScape]

On 8/15/2021 at 6:26 PM, tonytrue said:

He is not tall enough to pick the ball up for distance with a regular swing and club. With a cut down Matrix shaft (stiff) and a swing that goes from top to bottom straight up and down instead of around.  I'm 5'6 and studied his swing for a long time.  I have it down.   Sadly my putting sucks.

I would have thought Fujikawa would use a Fujikura 🤣

[TiScape]

Hit this shot and then hid his pot of gold! 😂 

* That’s a legit rainbow 🌈 Can totally make out Roy G Biv!

Edited August 17, 2021 by TiScape

[mosesgolf]

Emanuel Canonica 5'5" was once longest player on European Tour  Jamie Sladlowski 5'10" won the Remax.   Perhaps height isnt the end all be all to length off the tee.

[grm24]

29 minutes ago, mosesgolf said:

Emanuel Canonica 5'5" was once longest player on European Tour  Jamie Sladlowski 5'10" won the Remax.   Perhaps height isnt the end all be all to length off the tee.

Jason Zuback also won multiple (5) world long drive championships. Think he was 5'9". 5'4" Ian Woosnam was also a very long driver of the ball back in his heyday.

[Rosco1216]

Height isn’t the common variable with natural anatomically given speed. It’s length of levers. Take a 6’4” guy with a 5’9” wingspan against a 5’9” guy with a 6’4” wingspan. All other things abilities/strength/variables are equal, the 5’9” guy with 6’4” wingspan and long arms will generate more speed. 

[iBanesto]

On 3/10/2020 at 4:40 AM, bowilbury8 said:

I came across a story on Fugikama on YouTube from a few years back. Was amazed to see he's only 5' 1.'' I looked up his driving distance stats and he averages about 280. How is that physically possible?

 

Umm... he's a good golfer.

[jt2gt]

These days everyone hits it far....I see 20 handicappers with semi- athletic backgrounds smokin it 300 at my course.  It ain't like it used to be.  

[Ole3wiggle]

55 minutes ago, jt2gt said:

These days everyone hits it far....I see 20 handicappers with semi- athletic backgrounds smokin it 300 at my course.  It ain't like it used to be.  

 

This, I have friends who grew up playing other sports besides golf so they're semi athletic. They barely played golf, if at all, when they were younger but now that they're older they've gotten into it as a casual thing to do with buddies on the weekends. They're not good at the game by any means but whenever they are able to catch one off the tee they can easily hit it 280+. They're physically able to do it but they just aren't consistent at it/swings aren't repeatable. 

[SlickT73]

Distance isn’t (and if you really want to get into it, hasn’t ever really been) difficult. Distance consistently within a controlled range and on a repeating line is difficult.

 

I’ve been demoing recently and can hit a Mizuno 921 Forged 8-iron over 200 yards if I want to…doesn’t mean a damn thing with regard to shooting 65.

 

Athletes playing golf will hit it far…but this doesn’t matter if you can’t control and repeat.

[gvogel]

On 8/17/2021 at 1:07 AM, Rosco1216 said:

Height isn’t the common variable with natural anatomically given speed. It’s length of levers. Take a 6’4” guy with a 5’9” wingspan against a 5’9” guy with a 6’4” wingspan. All other things abilities/strength/variables are equal, the 5’9” guy with 6’4” wingspan and long arms will generate more speed. 

The flexibility in the wrists is also a huge factor.  Ben Hogan, little guy, just about laid the club on this right shoulder in his backswing, as his hands were strong and flexible.  Jamie Sadlowski has hand action like Hogan's.

[Ascii Bhatt]

Does anyone know what's the make and length of his driver?

[DON SVO]

Good mechanics, thousands upon thousands of hours to groove the swing, lots of tournament testing to make sure the swing and mechanics hold up well under pressure. Scary part: that's the on-course driver swing and he can notch it up a bit if needed.

 

The guy I used to play a lot with who was a +4hdcp in high school and college was maybe 5'5" and averaged 290+ with ease. 

 

I'm not tall by any means, I'm barely 5'6" and that's only if there's enough humidity in the air that day. When I was playing a lot, my fairway-finder drive SS was in the 114-117 range and I've put together strings of 121-123 on a Trackman stepping on it for fun. Good mechanics, lots of seat time. 

[oikos1]

Well, here ya go.  Ian Woosnam's Power Game.  The intro music is fantastic and worth the price of admission:

 

 

[Dave230]

Rory is listed on PGA Tour website as 5 foot 10, but that's very generous, I'd say 5 foot 8-ish. Looks small in person. Not quite 5 foot 1 small, but averages 320 off the tee, so height isn't everything.

[smashdn]

It's speed.  How you create the speed (velocity) is up to you but at the end of the day it is speed.  You can't fake the physics of it.

 

Read this (not promoting this but it boiled it down to a number which is what I was looking for) > https://swingmangolf.com/what-is-a-mph-of-clubhead-speed-worth/

 

I am not stats savvy enough to go into the calc behind this but the curve is a binomial cumulative distribution.  In golf lay terms, if you have a ridiculously slow swing speed, increases in speed don't move the distance needle much.  And conversely on the very upper end of the spectrum you start to lose the amount of gain (the curve flattens) so that at a little slower speed a 1 mph increase gained you 3ish yards, up above 120mph that 1 mph swing speed gain may only you gain you 2ish yards.  Diminishing returns after a point (but still some returns).

[Ferguson]

On 8/17/2021 at 10:06 AM, jt2gt said:

These days everyone hits it far....I see 20 handicappers with semi- athletic backgrounds smokin it 300 at my course.  It ain't like it used to be.  

 

And 300-yarders are now commonplace here at WRX.   

 

 

 

We begin finding our men.  We found them sometimes without their gloves... and sometimes much, much worst.

"El que hace trofeos de los compo de golf" means "the demon who makes trophies of golf courses". 

We call them "tres hundos." 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[stingerfade]

On 8/17/2021 at 1:07 AM, Rosco1216 said:

Height isn’t the common variable with natural anatomically given speed. It’s length of levers. Take a 6’4” guy with a 5’9” wingspan against a 5’9” guy with a 6’4” wingspan. All other things abilities/strength/variables are equal, the 5’9” guy with 6’4” wingspan and long arms will generate more speed. 

Yea but I’m a 5’7” guy with 5’7” wingspan. HELP!!! Ha

[m d g]

On 8/16/2021 at 10:07 PM, Rosco1216 said:

Take a 6’4” guy with a 5’9” wingspan against a 5’9” guy with a 6’4” wingspan.

Except the tall guy would be deformed, and the short guy would be a gorilla : )

[m d g]

5 hours ago, oikos1 said:

Well, here ya go.  Ian Woosnam's Power Game.  The intro music is fantastic and worth the price of admission:

 

 

I love how (near the end) they talk about the 'sophisticated' club manufacturing) : )

[Rosco1216]

1 hour ago, stingerfade said:

Yea but I’m a 5’7” guy with 5’7” wingspan. HELP!!! Ha

Stronger and faster!

[DON SVO]

50 minutes ago, m d g said:

Except the tall guy would be deformed, and the short guy would be a gorilla : )

 

The tall guy would be a Tyrannosaurus.

Edited October 19, 2021 by DON SVO

[m d g]

2 hours ago, DON SVO said:

 

The tall guy would be a Tyrannosaurus.

Yes! Of course, I thought of that the second after I hit 'Submit.' : )

[jobin]

I've always thought that a trained Orangutan would make an excellent driver of the golf ball.  Really long and immensely strong arms.

But you would need to do the putting.

[Go Cougs]

2 hours ago, jobin said:

I've always thought that a trained Orangutan would make an excellent driver of the golf ball.  Really long and immensely strong arms.

But you would need to do the putting.

I don't know man, that sounds a little off base to me.

 

If you can teach him to hit driver I'd think you could teach him to putt as well.