Test vs. Trackman

[AACNINI]

Brought Skytrak to the teaching center at club today and had it set up simultaneously with their Trackman.

I set up the Skytrak on some tiles next to the mat like I do at home. I hit 7i and then PW. Didn't do driver.

Happy to report carry distance was within 2yds on each shot. Ball speed was within a couple mph on each shot. Spin, I believe, was within 500 on each shot.

I'm super happy, as I could verify vs. the industry leader with my own eyes. I feel the purchase is justified and I can confidently work on my game at home.

Lastly, although I never felt I got driver distance right I did feel I was getting pretty accurate ball flight and spin on Skytrak at home. Made adjustments to driver based on that. Driver looked like a new piece of equipment on the range today folks!

Just thought I'd share the experience with the community.

[Gashirk]

I did the same comparison at a local club fitter, Club Champion. Great guys and they were interested in my Skytrak vs. their Trackman. Numbers were really close and for the home simulator application it's a no brainer. 1/10th the cost and very little metric differentiation, winner!!

[TaS]

The real test would be outdoor trackman vs the skytrak. Not sure if that is what you did, but it sounded like indoor.

On an indoor basis, they are both doing calcs and estimations, right?

[wbond]

Semantics i guess. Skytrak measures the ball. Then it goes into their flight algorithm, no different than gc2 and trackman indoors. Of course it's different than outside when trackman measures the full flight. Also depends on how far trackman is able to measure indoors. Longer the better.

[TorchRedRob]

The real test would be outdoor trackman vs the skytrak. Not sure if that is what you did, but it sounded like indoor.

On an indoor basis, they are both doing calcs and estimations, right?

If it's at the AAC, I'm thinking it was inside a building with a bay door (with full outdoor flight). AACNINI will have to confirm though.

[AACNINI]

We did inside and outside. When we were inside I was told the trackman was getting the necessary 16' minimum to calculate.
We went outside and unfortunately due to angle of sun, I'm guessing, the Skytrak wasn't picking up all my shots. I tried casting a shadow over the hitting area but that didn't help. Out of 10 shots outside it gave me a calculation on 3 and they were still very close to trackman numbers. Biggest difference was ball flight. Trackman replicated exactly what happened. Skytrak showed a fade on a shot that was dead straight.

[MrHogan]

the fade could be down to ST alignment.

[m3w]

I would suspect it has more to do with the dimples being washed out, causing incorrect spin readings. If it was alignment, then it would have been off-line, but dead straight.

[TaS]

Would be interesting to link up skytrak, cg2, and outdoor TM and hit a ton of shots. Would probably have to use a bay setup with the right light conditions. Maybe at night?

[Smudge_si]

I did the same test against trackman down at the local range when my unit arrived, had very similar numbers and accuracy to the trackman so was very pleased.
Gave me full confidence when I'm using at home in the garage.

The PGA pro was impressed considering the vast price difference of the units.

[m3w]

Has anyone compared Skytrak driver distances to Trackman? That's the club most people have been having distance issues with.

@AANCINI - Why didn't you try driver when you had yours setup against Trackman?

[AACNINI]

I didn't want to waste time with pro comparing the Skytrack to Trackman with Driver as I was 99% sure it wouldn't be close. The best carry distance I've ever had on Skytrack is like 251with driver. Ball speed and club speed never very high. I've done Trackman with driver before and carried 270+ numerous times with club speed 107-117 and ball speeds upwards of 150. That's one reason.
While hitting driver on range before the comparison I carried past 260 on a few, so that was another reason not to be confident with driver + ST.
If time wasn't of the e$$ence I would have been more than happy to play around, but I didn't want to constantly move ball position, add a tile, remove a tile, etc.
On a day where the sun isn't shining right into the bay I'll hit drives with the Skytrak and see how the distances compare to what I see via laser. If I ever get what I feel is close numbers and flight data I'll do another comparison vs. Trackman. Promise.

[m3w]

Understood. It would just be nice to eventually get some solid proof that Skytrak driver distance is truly way off. When I gave anecdotal distance discrepancies, it was met with more doubt than acceptance.

[Willymakit]

I can honestly say from testing and comparison that Skytrak is at least 20-30 yards shorter then being on the range and comparing with gc2. When I first had my Skytrak I could not hit a driver over 246 and rolling out to roughly 253-255. Since I have my gc2 I been hitting around 300 and on our tour I'm averaging in the 280. So for me that 25-30 yards From day one I always thought irons were really close.

[m3w]

SkyTrak_Seth - Is Skytrak currently working on correcting this driver distance issue? Or are they considering it to be fixed with the 4% increase in the latest app version? Because I can attest to the fact that it was not solved with that app update. Will it ever be truly accurate across all clubs?

[wbond]

Hopefully they look at this, and when they do, it would probably be helpful for all of us to list our launch conditions and hopefully measurements from another device. I believe it's worse with you longer hitters. For me, i think the last update put it to where i cannot definitively say it's shorter than usual. Haven't had a chance to do any testing recently against another machine or outdoors.

[AACNINI]

Inspired by m3w I went back this afternoon. Today there was no sun to shine on unit as you'll see in picture below (32F and raining). I decided to try to get the Skytrack dialed in with Driver. I set 4 tiles under the unit next to the mat which was same height as mat. I put the tee right on the red dot. I took aim at a flag lasered at 252yds.

I'M SO PERPLEXED!!! The Skytrack was dead on with what I was seeing (ball flight and carry). Balls short of the flag never showed total distance more than 252 (usually the beat up range balls). Balls that flew over flag hit carry numbers over 260. I even had some ball speeds measured over 150 (see photo). None of this I've had happen indoors, and I swear I'm making same swing speeds and contact.

I'm so confused. Is my mat at home moving slightly when swinging......? Does the Skytrak need more distance to measure from net.......? Is there something else?

[doublebogey]

Thanks for doing this AACNINI. Gives me (and I think a lot of us) a lot of comfort about accuracy of ST (even for the driver).

However I'm just still wondering why placing ST slightly above mat level will give longer driver distances (as someone had mentioned in another thread)?

[wilson]

Guest - I think this is an important point. I know several times a round i'll look skyward and comment 'short' or 'gah, get left'. And playing E6 with my ST i do the exact same things. When I hit it on ST with E6 currently and wait the 2-3 seconds, i see, and say the same things - 'short' 'gah, get left'.
Toe hits are 5-10 yards short, heel side pulls are fades, i know my tendencies and they all show up on the ST.

[N54TT]

This is exactly why everyone that is concerned with the accuracy of their skytrak should take it to the range. At least you can now work on your swing at home without wondering if your numbers are accurate.

The skytrak doesn't know if you're outdoors, indoors, at the range or home in your garage. There is something at home that is effecting your swing...or just not swinging as freely. The distance from the net doesn't matter to the skytrak either as it only sees the first few inches of ball flight. If anything having a net infront of your face could effect how freely you swing.

[MrHogan]

I know my mat moves. To the extent that after 10 shots or so I have to move it back to its original position as it will have moved an inch or two away from the screen and also toward the ST. BTW my mat is ex-driving range it would be fine on concrete but it's sat on top of thin fake grass which I guess is slidey.

I wouldn't be surprised if that small amount of movement which equates to reduced resistance from the ground up in turn robs a few mph of club head speed.

[TorchRedRob]

A while ago, I also learned that I was losing a lot of ball speed because my feet squished and turned in the mat quite a bit, which significantly sapped the transfer of energy to the club head.

Edit: I know this because I experimented hitting while standing on a 2x12 I had lying around. Immediate improvement in ball speed.

[ernie18]

yup went to golf galaxy today and tested my data against the data from the gc2, and they are dead on with the driver... carry distance, ball speed and launch all were very close to what im seeing on my skytrak at home............ roll out is another story but thats been discussed its all software base/ algorithms

i truly think most people dont realize their actual carry distances vs oh i hit a 280 yard drive all the time.