Distances That Were Supposed To Level Off Are Growing At A Steady Rate

From the R&A/USGA 2021 Distance Report

No kidding, right? But there are also numbers showing the PGA Tour’s longest have leveled off again. So Mike Stachura considered the USGA/R&A distance report and boiled a key number that might justify not only a hard stand but the dreaded “r” word.

Then again, there is a fundamental difference between looking at the rate of growth in distance compared to the actual growth. In the last five years, distance on the PGA Tour is increasing at a rate of about a yard per year. That’s less than half what it was in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but more than double the rate from 1980-95. And when those increases are coming on top of a driving distance average that is in the mid-290s now compared to the low 260s then, that’s what has the ruling bodies concerned. It’s not the size of the distance gains, it’s that, at least to the ruling bodies, they don’t appear to be leveling off, despite all the equipment regulations. That’s especially concerning to them at a time almost two decades removed from their Joint Statement of Principles that declared “any further significant increases in hitting distances at the highest level are undesirable.”