The first gutta-percha golf balls, from the 1840s, were smooth, and players noticed something odd about them: an old ball, nicked and scuffed from a season of use, flew farther than a new one. Ball makers started hammering patterns into new balls on purpose, and dimples grew out of that. Physics took longer to explain why. Air flowing over a smooth ball peels away early and leaves a wide wake of low pressure that pulls the ball back. Dimples churn the thin layer of air nearest the surface into turbulence, and turbulent air clings to the curve longer before it lets go, so the wake is narrower and the drag falls by about half. The damage was the design all along. Someone just had to notice the ball flying better for being worn.