2016: PGA Tour Driving Distance Easily En Route To Record High

Nice work by Mike Stachura at GolfDigest.com to notice the increase in 2016 driving distance that has it higher (290.3) than its ever been at this point in a tour season. And with the weather only getting warmer over the next several months and the abdominal workouts really kicking in for the PGA Tour's flatbellies, it is hard to see the number going down.

The 16th at Doral essentially playing as a long par-3 when the tees were at the 305-yard mark got his attention. But it's the big picture info presented by Stachura that will make the claims of the do-nothing governing bodies and their 2002 Statement of Principles look that much worse.

“The R&A and the USGA will consider all of these factors contributing to distance on a regular basis. Should such a situation of meaningful increases in distances arise, the R&A and the USGA would feel it immediately necessary to seek ways of protecting the game.”

That statement was issued in 2002 when the driving distance average was just shy of 277 yards. The rate of increase since the Joint Statement is about a yard per year, or about half what it was in the decade leading up to the Joint Statement. It’s worth noting, as well, that the rate of increase for the last decade is actually about three inches per year. (It was 288.9 in 2006 and increased to 289.7 in 2015.) That's less than the distance of two golf balls placed side by side.

But the possibility exists that the driving-distance average at the end of this year on the PGA Tour will be 16 yards higher than it was the year the Joint Statement was announced.

Significant!