Double-Hit

A double-hit happens when the clubhead strikes the ball, then contacts it a second time within the same continuous swing. Either the ball hasn't traveled far enough from the clubhead fast enough, or the swing continues through roughly the same space the ball occupied. It is most common on slow, soft, finesse shots near the green (chips, pitches, and delicate bunker shots). On those shots, clubhead speed is low. The ball's initial speed off the face may not clear the clubhead's path before the follow-through catches up to it.

The root cause is usually deceleration, or an unusually soft, "babied" swing. The golfer tries to control distance by slowing the club down sharply, instead of making a shorter but still smoothly accelerating motion. At very low clubhead speeds, the ball simply doesn't get away from the club fast enough. That raises the odds that the follow-through path meets the ball a second time. It can also occur around uphill lies or thick greenside rough, where the ball's initial reaction off the face is hard to predict and slow.

Under the rules of golf, a double-hit within a single stroke counts as a single stroke plus a penalty stroke under most rule sets. The exact treatment has been simplified in recent rules revisions, but a double-hit is still not free of consequence. That makes it costly beyond the mediocre contact itself. The most reliable prevention is committing to a shorter but smoothly accelerating swing, rather than an artificially slow, decelerating one. It is the same underlying fix that helps prevent a chili-dip. Both misses stem from a similar instinct to overcontrol delicate shots. The golfer takes speed out of the swing instead of shortening its length while maintaining rhythm.