Golf lessons or Golf Fitting.....which should come first?

Might be a good read to all beginners....including myself as I view myself as one. In summary the sequence recommended is "This is the best approach – practice, lessons, buy clubs, fitting, lessons".....and I do confess, that I only adhere to one of them only, which is 'buy club'.... My goal for rabbit year is practise

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If you’re thinking of getting into golf, or simply wanted to get back into the game after a hiatus, chances are you’re in the hunt for new clubs. You’re starting fresh, so your clubs should be new as well. But before you go down the road of club shopping, fitting and lessons, let me explain a little more about club fitting.

Club fitting is now an essential part of anyone wanting to take up golf. But here’s something to remember about club fitting – it fits the swing you have at the time. If you’re getting back into the game – you’re swing is going to go through a bunch of changes until you “find your swing”. Our advice? Use your existing clubs, or get a demo set to practice with and groove your swing. Next step is lessons.

Once you’ve got your swing working, lessons should be next. Explain to your pro your plans to buy new clubs and get fitted. Your pro will work with you to ensure your posture and address position is in check, and fix any big swing mistakes you’re making. Posture is one of the most important factors that influence how your clubs get fitted to your swing.

After some lessons, hit the range and work on your swing some more. Do some shopping, find the clubs you like, demo them, buy em and then get fitted. Explain to the individual who’s doing the club fitting session what you’ve been working on in your lessons, so he can keep an eye on your posture for you. Finally head back to your pro and take some more lessons with your new sticks.

This is the best approach – practice, lessons, buy clubs, fitting, lessons. Why? Because you want your clubs to fit your swing – not fit your swing to the clubs. To do this well you have to groove your swing and get lessons to ensure your swinging properly.

D, about the last step i.e. buy clubs then get fitted. I learned not to do it this way, unless the reason for buying the clubs is the price (e.g. pre-owned stuff off GR marketplace)

You get fitted when you buy brand new clubs. Bcoz you dont want to end up spending more $ when the fitter said the clubs you just bought (from the internet, off the rack or after hitting into a net) produce more dispersion, less carry and/or less roll than the club he gave you to test in front of trackman or SAM it happened to me more than once hor

or if you have to bend clubhead for proper loft/lie and found the cast heads you just bought can't be bent, or fitter said you'd benefit from a one and a half inch shorter shaft but by doing so the current shaft on your set would be a tad too stiff, so you need to buy new shaft again?

my resolution this year is to average 33 putts per round

i am up to this stage so far...
practice, lessons, buy clubs...
i supposed practice means range?

For a beginner or occassional golfer Lessons+Practics > Club Fitting. If you do not have a consistent swing, then fitting may not help you much.

Practice till you game is consistent, then go in for fitting to improve it to the next level.

i would think it depends..... If your physique is outside the average range, say 170m -190m, you might want to get statically fitted first. maybe fine tune again once swing becomes consistent.

I think that fitting is good for people who have a swing that is repeatable. It will definitely help with consistency, ball striking, and confidence. All which can help lower scores.

I would reccomend spending more on lessons initially. Get the fundamentals down, learn a repeatable swing and work on it. When you see yourself getting better and much more consistent, then it would be a good time to invest in a fitting and some gear that would help improve your game/score.

I think the one area that is overlooked is putter fitting. If there is one place where you can save some strokes it is on the putting green. Having a putter that fits your putting stroke,, alignment tendencies, aim tendencies, lie, length, etc....is very important. I neglected this for most of my career and it cost me big time. I wish that I had a putter fitting way earlier in my career as it might have made a difference.

But back to the question...I agree with the above posters. If you are very tall/short or have a high/slow swingspeed or something out of the norm then a static fitting might help in that it could get some gear in your hands that would not be so far out of wack that it would contribute to the difficulty of getting better at this game.

Getting fitted or going for lessons first, is a chicken and egg question.

If one don't get fitted, then he would groove bad habits into his swing to compensate for an ill fitting set. But if the same player don't have a consistent swing to start off with, how would the custom fitter know if the bad ball striking is due to swing issues, or ill fitting clubs? How far should the custom fitter go to fit the club specs around a person's swing tendencies?

One annoying thing about most game improvement clubs is that these are not very adjustable. At max you can change the lie angle by +/- 1 degree. This is due to fact that most of such clubs are made of cast iron, instead of forge. And forged irons are much more adjustable for lie and loft.

Forge irons generally cost more, which most students are unwilling to pay more for. They would probably get a cheapo set, groove their swing with all the bad habits, then maybe someday they will get a better iron set, hopefully fitted for their swing. In the end it cost a lot more if you add the cost of the cheapo set and the "final" set of iron purchased later on.

So I advocate getting at least static fitted, it's not just about your height. Some people are short, but has long arms, some are tall and has short arms. Get a set of irons that can be adjusted for these factors. Then go for lessons.

a good coach would ideally be able to tell u what changes you should make to your clubs (if any) after going through a few lessons.

golf lessons give u a consistent swing coupled with a sound understanding of the physics of the golf swing.

lets say you have ill-fitted clubs, a consistent swing consistently gives u a pull to the right or left, and you have a consistent trajectory. at least you can rectify it further, or if you have an understanding of the physics behind the swing, you can then proceed to make the changes necessary to improvise on the course should such a problem occur.

however, if you have a bad swing and the best clubs perfectly customised to every body angle possible, only the gods of statistics can help you (1 good shot in every 100 shots)

pushslice wrote:

my resolution this year is to average 33 putts per round

Bro, this one easy. come up soon and I can show you the secrets - - - - - - ->

pushslice wrote:

my resolution this year is to average 33 putts per round

Bro, this one easy. come up soon and I can show you the secrets

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Master wrote:

a good coach would ideally be able to tell u what changes you should make to your clubs (if any) after going through a few lessons.

golf lessons give u a consistent swing coupled with a sound understanding of the physics of the golf swing.

lets say you have ill-fitted clubs, a consistent swing consistently gives u a pull to the right or left, and you have a consistent trajectory. at least you can rectify it further, or if you have an understanding of the physics behind the swing, you can then proceed to make the changes necessary to improvise on the course should such a problem occur.

however, if you have a bad swing and the best clubs perfectly customised to every body angle possible, only the gods of statistics can help you (1 good shot in every 100 shots)

so after fitting should not try to change swing? otherwise the fitted clubs wont be suitable anymore.. right?

Bro Winston, your pic is a local? Looks like more from your camera phone leh. keke