Trajectory Gate

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In this video, we're going to cover the trajectory gate.

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Now the trajectory gate can be one of the helpful ways for working on your

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trajectory

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control, which is one of the hallmarks of really good wedge players.

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Most good wedge players are able to launch the ball at about half the loft of

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the club,

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which for their most lofted clubs is usually around 30 down to 25, somewhere in

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that zone.

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So we're going to use a little bit of trigonometry to help us figure out how to

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set up a little

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station so that we can practice launching our wedges on a consistent trajectory

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in the

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upper 20s to around 30.

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So if we're using simple trigonometry, we've got a 30, 60, 90 triangle.

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So there's the 90 degree angle and there's the 60.

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So if you look at the basic formula, we're going to set up a gate that's going

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to be

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X height.

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So we're going to use an alignment stick.

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So if we have an alignment stick as our indicator of helping us with the height

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, what we have

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to do is we have to figure out how far away do we put it.

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In order to get about a 30 degree launch angle, this side is going to be the

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square root of

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3 times that height, so basically it's going to be 1.73, I rounded up to 1.75

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or 3/4 of

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a alignment stick away from you.

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So the way that you can check it is the hypotenuse is going to be about two

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alignment sticks.

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So if you do that, then we're launching it pretty close to a 30 degree angle.

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And I don't think it has to be too precise.

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If you're using Trackman, you can aim for around 30 or even in the upper 20s if

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you have more

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of a 58 instead of 60, but this is a good trajectory to kind of train.

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When you're hitting your wedge shots, you want them to basically all come out

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of the

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same trajectory window and then depending on how far you're hitting it, it'll

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kind of

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drop off along the way.

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So the harder you hit it, the further it's going to go, but it's all going to

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take off

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at around the same angle.

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So keep this in mind when you're setting up the station or when we're going out

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and

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I'm going through the demonstration here in a second.

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Okay, so we've got the distance wedge trajectory gate set up.

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We went over the theory kind of in the classroom.

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Now here's how I set it up.

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There's a little bit of like, it's not quite perfect.

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If you make a PVC version that sits on the ground, you can be a little bit more

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precise.

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But unfortunately, you've got to stick the stick in the ground, so that takes

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away some

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of the depth.

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And then I'm using a pool noodle, so the pool noodle sits on top of it.

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So the bottom of the pool noodle is not quite at the top of the stick.

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So some of the math gets a little bit thrown out the window, but we know we

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want it to

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be about one in three quarters.

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So I use this alignment stick where I have yellow tape, where I've basically

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just divided

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the stick into four segments and then ends up being, there's a 39 inch

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alignment stick.

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So it ends up being about 10 inches.

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So if I put 10 inches from the golf ball and then do one and three quarter,

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that gets

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us right in the middle of those two sticks.

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And then if I bring it an inch or two closer, that tends to balance out for the

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height of

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the pool noodle.

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So this is, I often go back and forth between using this or using just the half

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the loft

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station, just to kind of give someone a visual.

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This can be a little bit more challenging and frustrating.

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So I like it as a good test, you know, how many can I get underneath it?

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You know, give you 10 shots, you can get six or eight underneath it, where if

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you're just

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doing general training, I think having the alignment stick in the ground, which

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I've still

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got the six iron here from the half the loft.

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If I put that in the ground, kind of the same, this should pretty much point at

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the pool noodle

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there.

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And I've got a towel here for this one because friction has such an important

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role on getting

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the ball to launch low that if you're going to do this, you pretty much have to

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wipe the

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face clean after every shot.

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Make sure that it's, there's no extra water, debris, and you also have to make

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sure that

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the grass that you're practicing off of is fairly tight.

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If it's too fluffy, like at the driving range I was at at Denver, it was almost

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impossible

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to do this because the grass was a little bit longer.

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And so it was really hard to get clean, clean ball first contact.

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You kind of caught a little bit of a flyer every time, so it launched a little

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bit higher.

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But this is the basic for the station, and then you can just challenge yourself

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with

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how many you can get in front of it working on different length swings.

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Okay, so if we get nice and stacked, let's see how we can do on our first

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couple, I think

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that just went underneath it.

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It'll be pretty close sometimes.

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I'll have to check on video.

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Now the one downside to this is if you're at a driving range where they like

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you to do

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aggressive divot patterns as opposed to doing more of a box, this can be

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challenged because

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every time you move it back you change the angle so you have to move the

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station or start

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close enough and kind of challenge the difficulty to see how far away you could

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get.

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So potentially I'll have to look at the math, but see how much the angle

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changes for every

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inch you move the ball back, that could be interesting for helping you figure

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out how

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to work this station into more of a progressive challenge.

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Okay, so now we'll try a little bit bigger, and that launched right at about 30

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because

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we can tell we just caught right in the 30 degree gate.

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Now this is one of the challenges of this setup is because I hit it, now I have

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to take

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a second and set it back up.

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But that can also be really strong reinforcement if you're kind of, you don't

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like taking breaks

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in the middle of your practice.

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Okay, back up and running, usually if you just clip it like that it doesn't

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take too

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long to set it up.

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Now let's see if we can get one, that was a little bit better, had to kind of

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fight to

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get it underneath it, but it launched pretty low, could feel it had some good

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spin to it.

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Again, gotta make sure that we clean the face after each one.

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So this is the trajectory gate, it's a great way for kind of giving you some

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solid feedback

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as far as your trajectory, if you don't have access to a track man or quad or a

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flight

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scope or something like that.

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If you do have access to one of those, and as they get, or I should say the

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full swing

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is getting really good, I've used one of those as well.

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If you do have access to that, then we're simply trying to train our launch to

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be less

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than 30, 30 with a 60 degree wedge or less with a 58, basically about half the

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loft or

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less.

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If we do that, it's a good sign that we're getting into some solid impact align

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ments,

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and that's controlling the loft has a bigger impact on controlling distance on

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your distance

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wedge swings than it does on your full swing.

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So we really want to get in the habit of training the solid contact and loft

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and the trajectory

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gate or the half the loft or using a launch monitor are the best ways to work

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on it.