The key to hitting any fairway wood is sweeping the ball. Play the ball slightly behind your front foot. Keep your head behind the ball through impact. The reason you top the ball is you're not shifting your weight properly to your front foot and you swing up. You should also be barely teeing your ball up with a 3 wood. A 3 wood, in general, is not easy to hit off the fairway unless the ball is sitting up a little. If you are taking the big 90 degree backswing, that makes it harder to shift your weight. Try planting your front foot and taking a shorter backswing with minimal weight shift to the back foot (and keep your eye on the ball through contact). Try swinging a little easier on fairway shots - you may be surprised how far you hit it! Paul Wilson (of Revolution Golf) has some nice tips.

I might add that I experienced a similar thing..... In the good old days of Golf, I could hit a persimmon 3 wood 250+ off the tee (I hit my two longest drives, 325 and 290 yards, with one) because I couldn't hit a driver. My longer tee shots would have a very low trajectory compared to today's woods. I couldn't hit a wood on the fairway back then and often used a 3 or 4 iron (but could hit the latter about 200 yards). In the old days, they taught to have level shoulders, hands ahead of the ball at address (with it a little further back), and head tilted where one is looking at the ball via the left (right for lefties). This de-lofts the club a little. My problem, up until recently, with a 3 wood was either a power fade (if I hit the right trajectory) or a high "airmail" shot if dead straight. I could smash a 980F on the fairway but tended it to "airmail" it off the tee. The 3 wood that works very well for me is a Taylor Made R7 (has draw weighting) - I hit it dead straight about 200-210 (gotta remember I am a bit of an old fart) and no "airmail" shots off the tee. About probably 90 percent of the time I use a 7 wood on the fairway (I can launch it off some of the worst lies) and there is only a 15 yard difference in distance between it and a 3 wood. To use a 3 wood off the fairway, it has to be on a really good lie or even uphill. I can hit a 3 wood from the rough.

Nah! I've discovered that a 21 degree 7 wood can launch off just about anything. And if it is too tight of a lie, time for the 5 hybrid. I rarely use a 3 wood on the fairway and carry it only if the course has par 3s between 185-200 yards. I find a 7 wood much easier to hit than a 3H and it goes farther.