There has never been a shortage of options at the top of the bag. Hybrids, utility irons, fairway woods, and 7-woods and 9-woods they replace the traditional long iron. Some pros also use 7- and 9-woods.
The usual explanation is that long irons are just hard to hit and swing speed is often to blame. The thinking is that less speed means less launch, less spin and less stopping power. We wanted to know if our own test data could show us where that starts to matter.
We test each player with a 5 iron, 7 iron and pitching wedge which gives us a neat way to see how a player’s longest iron performs compared to the rest of their set. For these results, we looked through the tests from 2017 to 2026 to see if there is a swing speed where the long iron stops gaining its place. What we found was not exactly what we expected.
What the data covers
The sample was 495 years of testing (one player tested in one season). The median 7 iron club speed was 82.6 mph with the fifth to 95th percentile ranging from 68 to 93 mph. Of those, 118 tester-years (48 different testers) swing the 7-iron under 75 mph and 50 were under 70. This is a deep enough slow end to draw real conclusions.
Because the speed of the iron 7 converts cleanly to the speed of the driver (driver ≈ 1.33 × 7-speed iron – 10), you can translate everything under your numbers. A 70-mph 7-iron is about an 83-mph driver, 75 mph is about 90 and 83 mph is about 100.
Swing speed is not what makes long irons hard to hit
If slower players struggle more with the long irons, we expect the quality and consistency of the attack to drop as speed drops. I do not know.
- The 5 iron’s carry is about a yard less consistent than the 7 iron (its shots land in a slightly wider window) and that difference is the same at any swing speed.
- The quality of the strike and the smash factor (how effectively the club transfers speed to the ball) do not get worse as the speed drops.
- The “don’t keep the green” complaint is true, but it applies to every club. Slower swings produce a shallower landing angle throughout the bag and the 5-iron still lands about 4.6 degrees flatter than the 7-iron, no matter the speed. In our data, the average descent angle of the 5-iron drops below 40 degrees below about 84 mph, while the 7-iron does so below about 75 mph. The difference between the two clubs remains the same. It only changes the speed at which each descent angle crosses 40 degrees.
The 5-iron is a little harder to hit than the 7-iron for everyone, but a slower swing doesn’t make it any worse. So if “hitability” isn’t the problem, what is?
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The real problem is gapping
The distance between a player’s 5-iron and 7-iron shrinks as swing speed drops by an average of about 0.39 yards for every mph lost. That goes in every iron category and goes for the same player when his speed changes from one year to another.
In practical terms, our data puts the average gap at about 20 yards for a player with a 90-mph 7-iron, about 15 yards at 75 mph and only about 11 yards at 65 mph. The table below shows how often a 5 iron drops which is slightly different from a 7 iron.
| 7-speed of the iron club (about the speed of the driver) | Part of testers whose 5 iron carries less than 10 yds beyond their 7 iron |
|---|---|
| Under 70 mph (under ~83 mph) | 42% |
| 70-75 mph (~83-90 mph) | 31% |
| 75-80 mph (~90-96 mph) | 18% |
| Over 80 mph (over ~96 mph) | ~2% |
Under 10 yards of separation, your 5 iron is essentially duplicating your 7 iron. Under 15 yards is a warning sign that there might be better options for you.
That 0.39 is an average and the rate is not constant. Above about 83 mph with the 7-iron (about 100 mph with the driver), every 10 mph loss costs about 2.5 yards of distance. Below that, the same 10 mph costs about five yards, so the problem is speeding up as you slow down. That’s close to half of our testers (the median was 82.6 mph) so treat 83 as a rough guide, not a hard line.
The super game-improved (SGI) irons are built and marketed for slower swingers, but they had the smallest gaps of any iron category we tested. Across all players testing SGI irons, the 5 iron carried an average of just 12.9 yards beyond the 7 iron. For SGI testers swinging the 7 iron below 75 mph, it was just 11.5 yards. So the clubs designed to help slower players are the ones where the 5 iron is more likely to duplicate the 7 iron.
How to apply this to your game
- Over 83 mph with the 7-iron (about 100+ mph driver): Your long irons probably also have healthy spaces. Keep it if you like it.
- 75 to 83 mph: This is a gray area. Hit your 5-iron and 7-iron on a launch monitor and check the difference in carry.
- Below 75 mph (about 90 mph driver): It is worth seriously considering trading the 5 iron for a different club that will improve your gapping.
- Below 70 mph (about 83 mph driver): The 5-iron is probably redundant. In our data, 42 percent of the shots on this range had less than 10 yards between their 5-iron and 7-iron.
The simplest control is your own gap. If your 5-iron doesn’t carry at least 15 yards past your 7-iron, it can’t earn its spot and a hybrid or taller fairway wood is worth trying in its place.
The place At what swing speed do long irons stop making sense? appeared first MyGolfSpy.
