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Golfer? You're likely playing with the wrong clubs

Master club fitter says a proper fitting will help lower your score
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Rene Grandmaison, owner and operator of Grand Lynx Golf Centre and Mulligan's Indoor Golf Centre on Municipal Road 35, is a master club fitter. He says if golfers want to lower their scores, they need to have their clubs fitted and their swing analyzed. (Arron Pickard/Sudbury.com)

It's a known fact among club fitters worldwide that 92 per cent of golfers are playing with the wrong clubs, said master club fitter Rene Grandmaison.

Grandmaison, a certified master club fitter since 2006 and owner/operator of Grand Lynx Golf Centre and Mulligan's Indoor Golf Centre on Municipal Road 35. He's a founding member of International Professional Association of Club fitters, and is rated among the world's top 100 club fitters. He offers custom-made golf clubs from KZG Golf.

So, it's safe to say Grandmaison knows a thing or two about fitting a person's golf clubs to their particular playing style. Starting from the ground up — literally — he cab help a golfer shoot lower scores. 

If a shaft is too stiff or too flexible for your swing, you'll likely lose more golf balls than you will sink birdie putts. Likewise, if the length of the shaft or the lie angle of the club head are off, then a golfer won't be able to optimize distance and accuracy.

One of the biggest mistakes golfers make, Grandmaison said, is they purchase their clubs from box stores. It's a factory-made set of clubs from companies focused more on quantity than quality. 

As a master fitter, Grandmaison sees it all the time. Golfers bring in a variety of clubs, some of which they can hit rather well, while others they couldn't hit the broad side of a barn 10 yards in front of them. 

What the average golfer doesn't know is the shafts of a golf club are built with different frequencies of flex. If the clubs in your bag have different degrees of flex, and you play one better than the other, then chances are the other clubs won't play well into your game.

“It happens all the time,” Grandmaison said.

As a master club fitter, he's able to test every club and better suit them to your specific style of play. But it's not just the flex of the shaft that can result in a poor golf swing. A golfer's clubs need to be built around the type of game they play, he said. 

There are many different swing types in the golfing world, and if you want low scores, then having the right club for the right person is paramount.

“I won't make a club for someone unless I test a number of things, because I want to make sure the club matches the golfer,” he said. “I look (at a golfer's) swing, I look at their grip, I look at their stance, because I can tell right away what's making them slice the ball, or why they're pushing it left. Then I fix them up.

Golf is a game no one can master, Grandmaison said. Even the world's best players on the Professional Golfer's Association tour have their faults. And while they've spent countless hours hitting countless golf balls to hone their skills, there's no such thing as the perfect swing."

That being said, golfers can be trained to swing a club as close to perfect as possible. Grandmaison just so happens to be able to do that, too.

He's one of two people in Canada who teaches A Perfect Swing, designed by Mike Austin. 

Austin recorded the longest drive in a professional tour event at 515 yards. Austin was an engineer, and he based his swing on the principle of leverage, using the joints of the body in the way they are designed. He taught the method to Dan Shauger, who passed down the knowledge to others like Grandmaison.

“I've been golfing since 1957, and taken lessons from the top 100 instructors in the world," he said, but nothing came close to sticking with him like A Perfect Swing.

A Perfect Swing is taught over two to three golf lessons, with each lesson focusing on a different power source, he said. The first two lessons focus on the hands and the arms and what they do through the golf swing, Grandmaison said. The weight shift is the final lesson.

“It doesn't take much to get it down, as long as they practise,” Grandmaison said.

Interested in learning more about A Perfect Swing, or a club fitting? Phone 705-983-0888 to schedule an appointment.


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Arron Pickard

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