What to get - a 52° or a 60°

I'm in some sort of a dilemma here. I went out and bought a Mizuno Raw Black Ox 56° wedge this summer and I am desperately in need of another wedge. So, here's my question: am I better off getting the 52° or the 60° - or both?

My pitching wedge works great for me (hit it between 110 and 100 yards), but I'm quite sure that I'm short a 52°. Between 100 and 75 yards, I just shorten the shaft length of my PW, but I know it's not the correct thing to do. Good players have all three, but I'm not really sure that a 60° would be all that good for me. According to many comments I'va heard, they're quite difficult to hit. So, what do you suggest??

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Cleveland Launcher 400 10.5°
Cleveland Launcher 17° FW
Cleveland CG2 3-PW
Hogan 52°
Mizuno 56°
Hogan 60°

I suggest both. You're talking about scoring clubs here - the more, the better.

If I could only get one, though, I'd buy the 52º to fill the yardage gap. Plus, it would give me another full swing club. (I very rarely use my 60º for a full swing).

What's the bounce on your 60, Ricky?

If your 56 and 60 have similar bounces, then yes, I'd say you've got some duplication. But if your 60 is low bounce, and your 56 is high bounce, then keep them both. The low bounce 60 is great for harder traps and a short-sided pin.

I had a 60 last year and to tell you the truth, I thought it was pretty useless. You can't hit it with a full swing unless you have tour speed through impact. Well, you can - but a full swing will probably go 60 yards.

52, on the other hand, is very useful for short pitches, chipping, etc. Most of your chips and pitches will come up short with a 60. I think it's really a club for elite players.

My 2 cents...

It really depends what your needs are. I have a 60 deg LW and it's extremely useful on the course I play that has fluffy rough surrounding the greens, which themselves are sloping and very slick. The pins are often placed close to the edges of the green so the ability to pop up little chip shots with the LW can save a lot of shots. Like most of the guys have already mentioned, I rarely use my LW for full shots.

If you're looking for a club to hit pitch shots 20 yards shorter than your PW then a 52 wedge is the best solution as with some practice you should find it easy to dial in the right distance.

I appreciate the compliment!

the above quote is a fine example of media distorting the truth

I carry two wedges, a 56 and a 60. I love my 60 degree titleist, and would never consider taking it out of the bag. It is such a versitile club, i can use it for high flop shots around the green or full shots from about 90 yards and in. I would definitly recommend getting a 60 degree because it is an incredible scoring club. The thing with the yardage gap is that you have to learn to adapt to hitting different shots with different clubs, not becoming dependent on the full swing for every situation. Learning the knock down wedge shot or the three quarters pitchen wedge will easily close that up. So i say go with the sixty, you will see how much it can expand your game.

The BEST thing to do is to get both, but if you cant but both then go for the 52. I have a 56 and a 60 and trust me a 60 degree wedge is harder to play and its not really useful.

It all depends on the course requirement. If you can choke up an inch on your PW and get GW distance, then why go out and spend the money on another club. If you are sitting at 13 clubs and can't decide whether to get a GW or LW, review your game and determine where you are losing strokes. If you find yourself in between 75 and 100 yards a lot, then a GW may be beneficial. If you have a gap between those distances but a re rarely ever shooting from that distance, my carry an extra club for no reason? If your home course has a ton of bunkers around the green and you find you are trying to get over them from short distances on a regular basis, then a LW may come in handy. By the way, a LW is not designed to take full shots, it is to be used for getting up and down steeply. Not that it can't be used for full shots (my 60* is my 100 yard club) but should not be used to fill in for a distance club.

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Gord

Quote of the month:
"It's easy to see golf not as a game at all but as some whey-faced, nineteenth-century Presbyterian minister's fever dream of exorcism achieved through ritual and self-mortification." ~Bruce McCall

I am a big fan of 60+ degree wedges these days after buying my own. With a 56 already in the bag, however you should probably get
a 52 degree to bridge the gap down to your PW. If you have space then go with Lowposts suggestion of getting both.

I swore off high lofted wedges a few years ago after an ill fated spell with a lob wedge. With that in mind i used to carry a 54 degree sand iron and a 50 degree gap wedge. However, recently I have made a bit of an about face. I used a 60 degree wedge as my sand iron when I played Muirfield recently and found it to be an excellent club. I ditched my previous set up and went to a 46 degree PW a 53 degree GW and the 60 degree LW/SW. The advantage is that my GW and LW/SW are Cobra Phil Rogers and have a special sole design that lets you alter the bounce angle by simple laying the face open and moving the ball forwards in the stance or closing the face down and playing the ball back in the stance. As a result I have about 6 wedges in my bag now The 53 acts like a 50/53/56 and the 60 like a 57/60/63 depending on how I address the ball. I can use both out of the bunker, depending on how far I want the ball to go. Both can be used from almost any lie.

Best of all they are made by Acushnet (Titleist) and can be got for £40 new some places...half price Vokeys, guys!!!!

D.

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Longniddry Golf Club Champ 2005.

In the Taylor Made Bag:

Callaway FT-3 Tour 9.5 Aldila NV 65S

Callaway Steelhead 3 Wood

Callaway Steelhead 5 Wood

Callaway X-16 3-PW

MacGregor Tourney 52 Degree

Cobra Phil Rodgers 59 Degree Rusty

Odyssey DFX 2-Ball

Callaway Tour iX

I have a sandy andy 57 4" bounce i would never go out with this club not in my bag. You need these clubs to get in the scoring zone. short game clubs are a must have. The more the better.

My SW is like 54º or something close to that, so I use that for those little shots around the green, but to no effect as it is really only good for sand, so club makers design a SW that can be good in the sand and out, but mine is sometimes dreadfull for those tiny shots around the green.

So today I went and brought a 60º LW, I bet it'll be way better from about 60 yards or closer, I tend to not hit my SW big, only about 90-100 yards and my PW is about 120 yards, so if I have a shot about 80 yards I just play a pitch type shot with my SW, they go ok, but not the best and I will have to practice them.

So I will be leaving my SW in the bag from 60 yards out or less, which is where I really tend to stuff up with it.

I think I would try the 52 degree first to close that gap, then if needed work your way to the 60 and 64 degree if needed. Remember, there is always the bump and run shot as you get closer in (but I have trouble hitting wedges).

Here's the deal with wedges in general.

They're clubs just like any other - they have loft and bounce. The thing that tends to make SW's tough outside of bunkers is their large amount of bounce. This brings the leading edge of the club up off the ground.

Where you might find this useful is in a fluffy rough lie, or light fluffy sand.

At my home course, we have pit-run gravel in our bunkers (no, not really, it just seems like that), so I use low bounce clubs in there - my 52º wedge (commonly known as a gap or approach wedge) is 4º, and my 60º is 6º (while my 56º 'sand wedge' is 10º). I rarely use my 56º club in there. But if I miss a green, and the ball is sitting up a bit, I'll often use it to get through the grass, and avoid the dreaded pop up, or the even more dreaded whiff (and the ball falls into the cut you just made).

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True Length Technology Fitter - www.truelengthtechnology.com
It's live! - www.ShipShapeClubs.com
PCS Class 'A' Clubfitter

A new highlight: Golfing the home course on Christmas Day.

I say it too often: If it's golf club shaped, you can play with it.

For the record, I'm a club doctor, not a swing doctor.

Has anyone used (or using) Merit zero bounce wedges?

Much like LowPost the courses that I play never have fluffy sand. This means that the SW is the most useless club in my bag. I have thought about getting these, but I would like to find an independent review first.