Impact of the Club Face on the Ball – Closed

By January 18, 2019Tips & Tutorials
playing with a closed club face

We have been looking at the impact of the club face on the ball this week.  So far, we have discussed the square club face and the open club face.  Today we will move on to the closed club face, which is the third and final club face position.

As opposed to the open club face, the closed club face sees the line of the face of the club pointing the left of the target for right handed players.  The club face will be pointing to the right of the target for left handed players when closed and to the left of the target for left handed players when open.

As with the open club face position, you should not have the club in the square position and then decide to move the face of the club using the wrists to close it.  Doing this leads to a weaker grip on the golf club and during the swing the hands will reset back to the strongest grip and the result will be a poor shot, not in the direction you intended.

Instead, you should take grip of the club with the face already in the closed position.  By doing this, you will have a strong grip on the club and it will not change during the swing. 

The first change you will see when using a closed face in comparison to a square face is the ball will travel towards the left of the target.  This is true for any position of the club face as it is this which sets the ball on its initial path. 

Playing with a closed face will also reduce the loft of the golf club.  This will see a lower ball flight and that can come in handy when playing in windy conditions.

The higher you hit the ball into the wind, the more impact the wind will have on the flight of the ball which will be damaging to your shot.  Closing the club face means you can use the same club but the loft will be a little lower and that can make all the difference.

While it may be great to know you can turn to a closed club face when in need of a lower shot trajectory it should never be used as a standard golf swing.  If you find you are closing the club face to compensate for something else in your swing, it is probably not a good idea.