[Vjwkvkoy]

I've seen many references to "hitting down" on irons, and taking a divot after the ball. The better players that I've played with seem to do this, they get a definite "thump" at impact and seem to have their hands in front of the clubhead. Their ball starts low, climbs, then drops.

I currently hit a ridiculously high ball. I play MX-23s with stock TT Dynalite S300s, and recently picked up MP-52 with PX5.5s. Both sets, hit the ball very high. I've hit MP60s with DG S300s, same thing, very high although my understanding is the DGs are supposedly low launch. In many cases this fall when the greens were a little softer, I would hit a ball that would crater into the green and not pop out of the ballmark because it's falling straight down, anything from a 7iron down. I've never seen anyone else do this on normal (no recent rain) greens and I was doing it 2-3 times a round.

I'm working on my swing, taking the ball more down the line on the backswing versus inside. I still miss easy shots from the fairway more then I'd like. I'm not looking for distance right now, my stock yardages are PW-140, 9i 155, 8i 165, 7i 175, 6i 185, 5i 200. My understanding is that if I were "flipping" my wrists, I'd have distance issues, so I'm not sure if that's the cause of the shot height. The ball doesn't appear to ever balloon (trajectory is somewhat like a rainbow shape versus the "ski jump" type trajectory I associate with ballooning). It just starts off the club high, carries, and seems to drop vertically. I setup with all irons right in the middle of my stance.

I don't take any divot, just a light skim of the grass. The height is nice in some ways because I can shoot directly at the pin in most cases. Standard shot hits with a deep ballmark and spin back maybe 2-3ft. Odd thing is I spin a PW or 9i roughly the same as my 6i, last weekend I hit a normal 6iron that had a bit of draw but spun back 3ft on a relatively flat green, but that's about all the spin I get out of a 9i as well.

So, what I'd like to know is if the "hands ahead" impact position is suggested to help spin the ball more, or does it somehow contribute to better accuracy, or is it intended to "deloft" the club to help with distance? Basically, I'm trying to determine if the ball flight indicates a flaw in my swing, or if I shouldn't worry about it and keep working on other facets of the swing to improve accuracy. Right now, I'm hitting roughly 33% of Fairways, but GIR is still only 30%. I realize video would provide a quick answer, but I don't have a quick way to get one right now.