Lesson 4a: Lift: What Keeps the Ball Up
When you hit a golf ball into the air, two things keep it flying: the forward force from your swing and a force called lift that pushes it upward.
Lift comes from two sources in golf. First, the loft of the club — the angled face sends the ball upward. Second, the spin of the ball — backspin interacts with the dimples and air to create upward force.
This is the same principle that keeps an airplane in the air. Air flowing faster over the curved top of a wing creates lower pressure above, while slower air below creates higher pressure — pushing the wing upward.
The correct amount of spin produces maximum lift and maximum distance. Too much spin sends the ball too high. Too little and it drops quickly. The right spin is a beautiful balance of forces.
Lift is an upward force created when air moves faster over one surface than another, creating a pressure difference.
Golf ball backspin creates lift — air moves faster over the top of the spinning ball than the bottom.
Lift experiment: hold a strip of paper just below your bottom lip and blow steadily across the TOP of it. The paper rises — that is lift! Fast-moving air above creates lower pressure, and higher-pressure air below pushes the paper up. This is exactly what creates lift on a golf ball. Try it three times and write in your journal: what happened and why?
The paper-blowing lift demonstration is one of the most elegant physics experiments available — simple, immediate, and genuinely surprising. After the experiment ask: ‘What do you think happens to the air going over the curved top of a golf ball in flight?’ The connection to backspin lift follows naturally.