Golf Thread

Good luck @MarkA

Had my putter fitting earlier and came out several hundred £££ lighter :p

Very interesting how much a SAM PuttLab can tell you about your stroke. With my existing putter I was very straight taking the club back with more arc on the follow through, which was very long. Strike consistently in the toe and face a touch closed at impact. The overall outcome wasn't bad but the numbers for consistency were down in the 50% range. I was presented with an array blade and mallet style putters, within the price range I'd discussed at the start, and asked to pick the one I liked the look of best. We then calibrated that one and I made some more strokes.

The difference in the numbers and the graphs was very noticeable. An arc became visible on the take away and my consistency numbers moved up into the 80% range :) Strike still a little in the toe and face still a touch closed at impact. Follow through shorter as the ball was more reactive off the face. The pro made a couple of recommendations about my posture and tempo. I couldn't believe how quick the average tempo was of tour players, 90 beats per minute. Felt very weird when he setup a metronome and asked me to make some strokes at that speed. I then tried one of the other putters I liked the look of, we didn't set this one up. Roll was better but I could see for myself my stroke had reverted to that I have with my existing putter, this one was also a blade.

Plenty to work on that's for sure. I've never had a putting lesson, might be something to book in the diary with my local pro. The fitting fee of £50 was effectively scrapped as I did end up buying. Made the price more than competitive with that I'd seen online. Bonus that they had the model in the 35" shaft, I'm 6ft 2", and in the colour I preferred. I'm now the proud owner of a TaylorMade Spider GT :D Which is now about to get thrown in at the deep end as I've got my first official comp tomorrow, a stableford off the yellows 8:22am tee time!
 
Warning - long post incoming.

Mixed feelings about this mornings round :( Both in how I played and on the back nine being asked by my playing partners to speed up! I'll address the later first.

This threw me. We got round in 4 hours, no group in front of us so we didn't have to wait at any stage. Pace of play guidelines for the course are that it should take no more than 4hr 20min to get round. It was the elder of my playing partners who approached me saying he'd had a chat with the other member in our group and they'd both like it if I sped up. He then proceeded to try and provide encouragement by letting me know he thought I was playing better when I spent less time over my shots ;) I would have been happy to pick up the pace from tee to green, I could have walked a lot faster between shots, but I didn't want to be rude and race of into the distance and leave my playing partners behind. Ironically it was the gentleman that approached me who was the slowest walker in our group, even with a powered trolley. Which is fair enough, we all have different levels of mobility and that could be me one day!

I didn't ask where they thought I was slow but smiled politely, thanked them for the heads up and carried on. I've got a pre shot routine which I like to stick to and when I had my on course lesson with the pro this was something that came up in conversation. He liked how I approached things and like me couldn't understand people who's sole mission seemed to be to get round as quickly as possible. If I had to speculate I suspect it was on and around the greens. I've noticed that among everyone I've played with so far I seem to be the only player that will always mark the ball to line it up, unless its a tap in. I've also noticed many players don't even make a practice stroke or remove their glove - which on a hot day like today (note I'd always removed my glove by the time I'd got to the green)! I get the impression a lot of people view putting as secondary to all the other facets of the game?

If most people in the roll up, as intimated to me, are going in with the mindset of getting around as quickly as possible then I'm not sure its for me. At least in stableford format. Maybe in the monthly medal which is stoke play people will be a little more concentrated. I should say to provide some balance in other weeks people have told me to relax and take my time if I'd just played a succession of bad shots.

As to how I played I scored 24 pts, towards the bottom of the leader board. Winner today scored 40 pts off 25 H'cap. My driving was spot on, didn't lose one ball and hit every fairway or first cut :) Unfortunately my iron play was very hit and miss and atrocious of the tee where I found the water at each of the first two par threes, the greenside bunker at the third and fringe at the fourth. Putting was hard to say given I picked up on a number of holes but visually I could see my stroke looked OK and I was getting some good rolls. Did notice I had a tendency to overread the breaks.
 
Well today's round was a complete turn around since a week ago.

The work at the driving range has paid off. Managed to break 100 equaling my lowest score to date and 38 points on stableford to beat my playing partner by 7 points..

Whilst the driver was on fire with my longest drive to date there was plenty to work on. Putting wasn't great and my distances were inconsistent at times putting me in awkward places on the course, plenty to work on.

Golf certainly is a roller coaster.
 
Awful today. I watched a video this morning about how not to hook my hybrid so today I hooked my driver, 3W and 5W instead. Mind you, the course was so dry that my 5i off the tee was going 200 yards. Any wood from the tee was running so far that unless hit perfectly straight it was off into the rough and the trees. I must've lost four balls today from tee shots that landed in the fairway :rolleyes:
 
Superb day yesterday, Sunday medal comp and posted 4 over gross, so nett 63 with handicap off. My best previous round was 78 mid last year, usually end up low 80s. Been working hard last few months on consistency and focusing on repetition with a few key swing points, seems to be working now and avoiding any disaster shots.......I think a key thing with scoring low is ensuring you hit good bad shots (if that makes sense lol).

Was down to 9 last year, crept up to 11 recently and now down to 10 so heading back in right direction.
 
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I tend to need 10 drives minimum to be able to swing well at the range. But then if I pause for a minute then go back, I'll hit a bad one. I find it very hard to just walk up to a tee and hit a good drive first time. I need to work on being able to do that. So like with Putting, I've tried to make a little routine which has improved my long putts. But with driving off the tee, do you guys also have a routine? Any tips? I sometimes feel the longer I take on settling for a drive, the worse it is.
 
jaybee said:
I tend to need 10 drives minimum to be able to swing well at the range. But then if I pause for a minute then go back, I'll hit a bad one. I find it very hard to just walk up to a tee and hit a good drive first time. I need to work on being able to do that. So like with Putting, I've tried to make a little routine which has improved my long putts. But with driving off the tee, do you guys also have a routine? Any tips? I sometimes feel the longer I take on settling for a drive, the worse it is.
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With driving or any tee shot my routine is the same. Teacher has pretty much told me to repeat Fleetwoods routine verbatim on the tee box. Practice swing, find stance, club head back in line with spine, then swing. Only swing thought I have is not picking the club up on the backswing. He told me clearing the mind before a swing is twaddle, that you'll always find something to think of so just make sure it's something simple and necessary.
 
ArcticHeron said:
With driving or any tee shot my routine is the same. Teacher has pretty much told me to repeat Fleetwoods routine verbatim on the tee box. Practice swing, find stance, club head back in line with spine, then swing. Only swing thought I have is not picking the club up on the backswing. He told me clearing the mind before a swing is twaddle, that you'll always find something to think of so just make sure it's something simple and necessary.
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What do you mean in line with spine? At what part of the swing? What does picking the club up mean?

I tend to take a few practice swings close to the ball - like people do when putting - and then I step in closer to the ball and try to repeat the practice swings. However, I notice most people don't tend to do this and rather take practice swings a few yards away and back from the ball, then they walk up and get straight into stance and then hit it. I feel like I want the least amount of movement between practice and actual swing, so I try to practice swing super close to the ball then do a tiny shuffle up to it and try to repeat. Not sure if this is good.
 
jaybee said:
What do you mean in line with spine? At what part of the swing? What does picking the club up mean?

I tend to take a few practice swings close to the ball - like people do when putting - and then I step in closer to the ball and try to repeat the practice swings. However, I notice most people don't tend to do this and rather take practice swings a few yards away and back from the ball, then they walk up and get straight into stance and then hit it. I feel like I want the least amount of movement between practice and actual swing, so I try to practice swing super close to the ball then do a tiny shuffle up to it and try to repeat. Not sure if this is good.
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I wouldn't copy my routine exactly. The point I was getting at is that a pre shot routine can often get you to the right headspace before the shot itself. It's more of a grounding technique then anything. Look at Matthew Wolffs movements before he swings. It's likely that his knee jerk serves no purpose other then ticking a mental box. It's a tick that preempts the movement. It's the first domino that starts a chain of technique he's hammered home when practicing. It almost doesn't matter what the routine is so long as it's the same every time.
 
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stephenb said:
Warning - long post incoming.

Mixed feelings about this mornings round :( Both in how I played and on the back nine being asked by my playing partners to speed up! I'll address the later first.

"Snip"
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Hmm - that's a tough one to take.

I've played a lot of golf over many years and never thought it was my place to tell anyone to speed up etc. I've got a mate who needs prompting with the basics sometimes about leaving his trolley in better places, or taking putter and wedge with him to the far side of the green etc, but another decent player, never would I approach them to tell them to speed up.

Routine is perfectly fine, I have one, I stick to it all the time. 4 hours is nothing bad.... 3 ball I presume? Medal tees?? That's standard for our course generally. 4hr 15 even but we play in 4 balls most of the time on a Saturday morning.

When I'm out playing golf, even with good mates, if it's a comp/medal etc - I tend to chat a little but after the tee shots, I'm off to my ball.... Don't do chat unless we are next to each other and get to my ball, assess situation/shot required so that as soon as someone else has played and it's my turn, I've got glove on, already checked gunned the distance, and picked the club, and all I then need to do is my routine (practice swing, line up, last look, go)....

That way - I'm then on the move again fairly quickly after my shot.
 
^ thanks

It was off the yellows, circa 6150 yards and yes it was a three ball.

I think moving up to my ball ahead of my playing partners is possibly something I could do more, I already do if there is plenty of width between the balls. The trouble on Saturday was that one of my playing partners was consistently 25 yards behind off the tee, on his good shots - he wasn't having a good with his driver, and I didn't want to be in their eye line. Don't know what the etiquette is for this, I guess it comes down to judgement at the end of the day.
 
It may also be worth timing yourself on a few of your shots, to see how long your routine is taking you on average? Just do it 3-4 times a round to see how long it's taking, otherwise it's all open to interpretation.

Also, after the weekend's club championship weekend, I officially hate golf. I might quit.
 
It's one thing I've really disliked about Golf since getting into it; having to rush round the course. I hate it. I don't even consider myself slow...like at all. But I'd like to be able to play slower and enjoy it more. The other week we were playing as a 3 ball and on literally hole 1, the group behind had tee'd off and were landing their shots right by us whilst we were about to take our approach shots onto green. Massively off putting and the aggression won't make me allow you to play through, if anything it will make me want to hold you up, the entire round. People that politely catch up or 1 ballers behind, clearly play through. No issues. My son goes round on his own a lot and people are generally pretty good at letting him through. But yeah I hate the whole "no slow play" thing. I personally have never played with anyone I thought was slow. Everything feels rushed to me but then I am a beginner.
 
MarkA said:
It may also be worth timing yourself on a few of your shots, to see how long your routine is taking you on average? Just do it 3-4 times a round to see how long it's taking, otherwise it's all open to interpretation.

Also, after the weekend's club championship weekend, I officially hate golf. I might quit.
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I've had 2 weeks off after "burning" out with competitive golf - back tomorrow playing a tie but it's been lovely having some time off
 
stephenb said:
^ thanks

It was off the yellows, circa 6150 yards and yes it was a three ball.

I think moving up to my ball ahead of my playing partners is possibly something I could do more, I already do if there is plenty of width between the balls. The trouble on Saturday was that one of my playing partners was consistently 25 yards behind off the tee, on his good shots - he wasn't having a good with his driver, and I didn't want to be in their eye line. Don't know what the etiquette is for this, I guess it comes down to judgement at the end of the day.
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yeah - I find it their back is to me when they are at their ball, I'll always be 20/30 yards up the fairway ahead - that way they can't see me from their stance. Obviously If I'm on the other side (their front side) - it's just a judgment how far up I will go before waiting for them....
 
Just gave my bag a modern refresh on the cheap, got a TM M4 driver, cobra F-max superlite 6-SW + GW and an adams gold boxer 3 hybrid for 300 quid in total so pretty pleased with that considering the costs of new equipment. can't wait to get out on the course and play now.
 
Joxeon said:
Just gave my bag a modern refresh on the cheap, got a TM M4 driver, cobra F-max superlite 6-SW + GW and an adams gold boxer 3 hybrid for 300 quid in total so pretty pleased with that considering the costs of new equipment. can't wait to get out on the course and play now.
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How did you manage to bag all of that so cheap!?
 
This morning I played at Royal Ashdown Forest on the West Course. It was hot, waaaay too hot to be walking!

I kinda sucked, I always seem to really struggle when it's the first time at a new course, this one seemed particularly tricky as I swear every fairway was slanted 15 degrees to one side or the other, actally hit a good shot and watch it bounce hard right when it lands and roll into the rough. Over and over and over again :p

Quite a nice course though, definitely one I think you'd get a huge benefit from knowing it better...
 
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