Ballooning

What does it mean when a shot is considered to be ballooning?

Rising up to quickly and loosing distance.

So like skying, but with better distance than a sky, right?

What causes it?

Yes. (As we get into yet another term), skying is like a pop-up..where you hit the ball next the top of the club making it go very high and almost no distance. Ballooning is hitting the face ok, but at an angle very steep to cause excessive spin making the ball rise too fast, stalling out in the air and falling straight down. Heavy wind in the face can cause this too.

So teeing the ball too far forward, and too high?

That can cause it too, yes. But in that case you are hitting the ball on the up swing not causing the excessive spin. It will go high, but can have good distance (with no wind in the face). The Balooning comes from a lot of spin. You will see the shape of the shot look like a banana pointing upwards...i.e. a curved line. Teeing the ball high and forward should keep the ball on a straight line because there will be less spin, so it will carry longer and not stall out as much and fall at more of an angle giving it a bit more roll.

Help me out here. Are you trying to defing the word, or are you trying to solve a problem?

Sorry Greg - this thread should actually be split now.

I was curious about the term, initially, having heard it before and wanting to make sure that I understood it.

Now I'm looking to find out why I occasionally balloon a shot - but only off the tee.

So what is it doing? Is it being popped up? Or is it curving up like a banana? Or is it launched up high in a straight line?

Most of the time the mis-hit curves up, with the occasional mis-hit just rocketing up (but with better-than-skyed distance). I tee the ball less than 1/2 above midline (when I 'tee 'er high to let her fly, she skies). I'm assuming there's 2 distinct problems when I mis hit.

The curving rise is caused by your angle of decent on the ball being too steep. Take the club back low and long to the ground, and try to swing up on the ball. This will decrease the angle, and impart less spin on the ball causing a straighter flight.

As for those pop-ups, make sure you are staying constant in you spine angle. Its easy to get a little lazy and start to let that dip and rise which will cause you getting under the ball too much. Create a good base with your back leg to sit on in your takaway. Sometimes if you let that straighten on the takaway, you rise up in your spine and then have to dip back to make contact, going to far will get you under the ball poping it up. So keep that back leg flexed through the top of the swing.