Is cleaning your golf clubs necessary? The answer is yes. Actually, professional players clean their golf clubs after every shot, ensuring no dirt or debris clogs the vital grooves. Furthermore, keeping your clubs clean is vital to maximize spin control and consistency.
How often should you clean your clubs?
To maximize your club’s performance, you should clean it at least once every few rounds. When playing from a muddy lie, you should clean it after the shot and use a golf towel to wipe the dirt away too.
We also recommend you to scrub your clubs before storing them away at the end of the season.
What you will need to clean your clubs
First of all, let’s prepare ourselves with the stuff we will need for cleaning the clubs. Here’s the list:
- • A plastic bucket
- • Warm water
- • Light dish soap
- • A soft-bristled brush
- • Towel
Cleaning your golf clubs in 5 easy steps
Step 1, fill your bucket with water and squirt just a little light dish soap into the bottom. Add warm water to cover the heads of your clubs without the water coming up over the ferrules. Make sure the water is not too hot, as it could loosen the ferrule on golf clubs.
Step 2, submerge your dirty golf club heads of irons and wedges into the soapy, warm water for a few minutes to loosen any dirt, oils and golf course chemicals in the grooves.
Step 3, after a few minutes of soaking time, take each club one by one, and get an old toothbrush or a soft-bristle brush to scrub the remaining dirt from each club head. This is the key step in cleaning your golf clubs – removing all dirt and debris from the grooves. Make sure that you scrub all areas of your club heads and remove all the dirt, grass and other debris – the back, front and bottom, including each individual groove.
Step 4, time to rinse off the clubhead. Run the brush across the sole of the iron and over the back of the clubhead to remove any mud, sand and grass off it. Check the removal of any suds carefully to make sure all dirt is removed from the grooves.
Step 5, this is our last step of cleaning the clubs. Use your towel to dry off the clubhead, and clean the shaft by wiping it down – make sure they are not left damp as they can easily get rusty.
How to clean driver, fairway, hybrid and putter
Unlike your irons and wedges, remember that you should never submerge driver, fairway, hybrid or putter in water.
What you should do is, quickly dip them into the sudsy water, rub with a damp cloth, making sure that it doesn’t get too wet. And then wipe them over with a dry cloth or towel.
Remember not to immediately put it back in your bag. Set it to the side until it’s completely dry.
How to clean golf shafts and grips
It’s very important that you don’t forget to clean the shafts and the grips, because they are just as important to the long-term performance of your clubs. Golf club shafts can be very dirty too. To remove the dirt, use a small towel slightly moist and wipe them down. And then dry it thoroughly with another dry towel.
To clean rust off your golf clubs – just apply some vinegar on the shaft with a cloth and slowly remove any residue, make sure that you don’t scratch the shaft. And then dry the shaft thoroughly. You can also use a brush to remove the rust.
Now let’s talk about cleaning the grips. Why do you need to clean them? Well, things you leave on your grips, like sun cream and sweat, will over time reduce the amount of traction. An easy way we recommend to clean your golf grips is to wipe them down with a damp cloth, then dry them completely with a towel and then check whether any water has got onto the shaft – if so, dry that too.
Remember to always clean your grips a couple times before you regrip your clubs (Tips: How To Regrip Golf Clubs At Home) to extend its longest life.