Higher handicaps should be practicing the short game more [mygolfspy]

[nevets88]

Put Down That Driver, Grab a Wedge

So practice the short game more. Imho, the assumption this piece makes is that you're not going to improve your long game, it's too hard. This has some truth to it, but there are those whose time is limited who have the drive (no pun intended) and can improve the long game given good instruction. Imho, it's the overall level of instruction that's the limiting factor. I almost sense a throw up the hands attitude in the piece.

I've yet to read this, but here's Richie3jack's rebuttal.

And I think the reason for the chart below for lower handicaps spending more time on the short game is that they "figured" out the steep learning curve portion of the full swing already. They already "gotten" the portion of the long game that gets them to a 0-5 handicap.

Quote

Broadie concludes that the long game is immensely important.

...

Don’t Abandon The Short Game

My theory has always been that higher-handicapped golfers spend way too much time practicing their long game at the expense of their wedge and putter play.

...

Improving your long game means fixing your swing. For most, that’s an extremely time-consuming process that offers no guarantees of improvement. How many golfers have you known who have spent hours trying to re-tool their swings, only to finish worse off than when they started?

While the stats say hitting the ball farther with more accuracy is the path to lower scores, for many of us, it’s just not feasible to put in the time necessary to turn statistical probability into reality.

...

I’m not arguing against Mark Broadie’s data that suggests improving your long game is the key to lowering your scores,  but we have to be realistic. We have to be practical.

Conquering the long game is inherently more difficult, and it takes significantly more time. Most of us just don’t have a ton of that precious resource.

The data Swingbyte provided us shows that better golfers are spending more of their practice time on the short game, and it’s working for them. I believe this is clear evidence that the short game still offers the best bang for your buck in terms of the amount of time you invest versus the impact on your actual scores.

http://www.mygolfspy.com/practice-your-short-game/

Here's the first comment:

Quote

This is a ridiculous and stupid article ,misleading with that .
I’m over 81 ,I still play to a handicap of 7 ;despite my age ,I play 18 rounds 3/4 times a week (I live on the FRENCH RIVIERA where you can play all year around without so called “winter greens “)
I use to be scratch ,but my explosiveness has faded with the years taking their toll..
Before playing the short game ,you have to be there ,meaning close to the green !
My short game is outstanding ,but I experience great difficulties to get on the greens in regulation .
My drives and fairway woods are straight as arrows ,but much too short .
All great players are long off the tee .
BEN HOGAN used to say that the drive was the most important shot on any given hole.
He would pace up to where he wanted his drive to land ,always a flat surface .
So stop misleading good golfers with your biased comments .
How many times did PAULRUNYAN ,an artist in the short game ,beat long hitters like SAM SNEAD ?

 

[Dave325]

I am not anywhere close to a single-digit handicapper, but could it be that the mid-irons at 40% due to the fact that it has the highest O factor (opportunity for the other swings)? (shrug). Not sure here. I know my short game seems to be the weaker part of game lately since I have been working more on the driver and long irons.

[iacas]

A few little things from this video:

• Putting is not #1. Sorry, Dave. You can't just say it and make it true.
• No, none of us will get as good as Rory McIlroy. But the fact still remains that if we can close the gap by 1/3 - if we can get from where we are to where Rory is (or Spieth, etc.) by only 30% or so - that will have a larger impact on our scores than if we can putt as well as they can/do. Additionally, you can close the gap to 75% or so putting significantly easier than you can closing the gap even 10% driving.

Now obviously for the second I'm speaking very generally, but the point is that in that video Pelz presents a sort of false dichotomy. He's proposing only 100% solutions: you have the "choice" between becoming 100% as good as Rory at driving (which you can't do) or becoming 100% as good a putter as he is (which you probably could do).

@david_wedzik and I also disagree with Richie that putting is second most important. Though we do list green reading high on the SV charts.

And don't be fooled by the 65/20/15 ratios… That 15% is the lowest total there, of course, but putting is relatively simple, even compared to the short game, so that 15% represents a higher amount of practice time on fewer things. Putting is just putting: the short game uses different clubs, different lies, different amounts of spin, grass/sand/fairway/rough, etc.

---

From the MGS article:

Quote

For most of you reading this, the amount of time you devote to improving your golf game is limited. Between work, family obligations, and all the other things that get in the way of golf, we just don’t have as much time as the pros do to work on our games.

Improving your long game means fixing your swing. For most, that’s an extremely time-consuming process that offers no guarantees of improvement. How many golfers have you known who have spent hours trying to re-tool their swings, only to finish worse off than when they started?

While the stats say hitting the ball farther with more accuracy is the path to lower scores, for many of us, it’s just not feasible to put in the time necessary to turn statistical probability into reality.

 

We said in LSW that practicing your short game, even if it's not a glaring weakness, is the fastest way to shot lower scores, but practicing your long game is the best way to shoot even lower scores. In other words, practice your short game to shave 3 or 4 strokes quickly, then practice your long game to shave 7 or 8 strokes. The latter takes more effort, but results in bigger gains.

The above advice is probably fine for a golfer that… plays once a week and practices once a month. It's a way to keep trying to achieve the "fast gains" of working on your short game. With so long between practice sessions, I could see telling him to practice it a bit more so that he can basically keep getting those "fast gains" each time. With a month between practice sessions, backsliding is easy.

[natureboy]

1 hour ago, nevets88 said:

 

 

The long to short game ratios Broadie talks about are pretty much reflected in the chart on the left. 6 through 9 irons (~ the 40% mid irons slice on the left) are missing on the right chart, but would probably show a similar slight downward trend toward low handicap, but at a % Time level well above the driver and even above the total short game.

Long game still wins. It has to, because as Hogan and the commenter on the article wrote, long game shots are the foundation on which you build your path to the hole. Short game helps you take advantage of a good long shot series or recover from a poor one, but it's the sequential long shots that put you close or left you in trouble. Nothing in these views invalidate the importance of short game shots as well. Broadie always asserted all shots matter...they simply differ in relative contribution to scoring.

So to me what the charts really show is that as you develop a better full swing with technique and experience it takes a bit less 'maintenance' to stay sharp, while keeping short game touch sharp or squeezing out that extra bit of scoring potential from shorter clubs takes a bit more effort.

Maybe Michael Breed actually did know what he was talking about when he made the claim that pros spend relatively more time on short game, but with a sound grooved swing they are not having to work as hard to maintain the same performance level as Rich Hunt emphasized.

Edited November 25, 2015 by natureboy

[iacas]

13 minutes ago, natureboy said:

So to me what this is really showing that as you develop a better full swing with technique and experience it takes a bit less 'maintenance' to stay sharp, while keeping short game touch sharp or squeezing out that extra bit of scoring potential from shorter clubs takes a bit more effort.

Possibly.

Also, it's important to note that even if higher handicappers are practicing their driving a lot, concluding that it's not helping them play better means you've assumed two things:

1. That they're not getting better. Maybe they were even worse, and six months from now, they'll be even better?
2. That they have a clue what they're doing and aren't just enjoying their time practicing by making the ball fly as far as they can.

It's a lousy chart in a number of ways… on that I agree with Richie.

13 minutes ago, natureboy said:

Maybe Michael Breed actually did know what he was talking about when he made the claim that pros spend more relative time on short game, but with a grooved good swing they probably don't have to to work as hard to maintain the same performance level as Rich Hunt emphasized.

They practice their full swing a lot more than their short game. They practice their full swing more than their short game and putting combined, in fact.

[collapse]

Higher handicappers can't hit the ball.Learning how to hit the ball is job one.Why there is any concern about scoring as a high handicapper who can't hit the ball is beyond me.Learn to hit the ball then worry about the fine tuning.

[natureboy]

45 minutes ago, iacas said:

Also, it's important to note that even if higher handicappers are practicing their driving a lot, concluding that it's not helping them play better means you've assumed two things:

1. That they're not getting better. Maybe they were even worse, and six months from now, they'll be even better?
2. That they have a clue what they're doing and aren't just enjoying their time practicing by making the ball fly as far as they can.

The only assumption I made is that a rational player who is practicing to improve from where they are is focusing on what they perceive as a something that needs work. So the only conclusion on a trend I see from the chart is that all shots need practice no matter your handicap (none of the lines track down to zero), but higher handicappers need a bit more long game focus to improve long-term.

With a sound grooved swing established, perhaps lack of time slightly shifts a lower handicap player's focus to the lower hanging fruit of further short game improvements. Long game is hugely important, but maybe lower handicaps experience some diminishing returns on time invested in long game practice to make significant gains and shift focus a bit toward the 'maintenance' side. Maybe it takes more relative practice time to keep high level short game skills sharp relative to a firmly established, sound, grooved swing?

Quote

They practice their full swing a lot more than their short game. They practice their full swing more than their short game and putting combined, in fact.

Don't remember if Breed talked about total time or percentage, but nothing in what I wrote says they spend more total time on short game. If you projected the curves out to pro levels, bulk of total time would still be on long game with a modest percentage shift to short game. This makes some intuitive sense to me in that just the frequent switching between courses, with different green speeds and grass types requires at least a bit more relative time (vs. a higher HCP playing their home course) in pre-round practice to get the speed touch and release visualization right for that week / day on putting and short game shots.

Not sure that projecting the article curves to pro level would be correct. It seems likely that the relationship from scratch to Tour Pro changes: My read of curves of Broadie's numbers on SG value for the different aspects of the game by HCP there often seems to be a general trend (small changes) from high HCP to scratch and then a shifting trend (also smal changes) from around scratch up to pro levels.

Edited November 25, 2015 by natureboy

[iacas]

I was not referring to you. I was using the general "you." I'm driving but I wanted to at least dictate that out. 

[Dave2512]

From what I see out there it's not really problem of time allocation as much as higher handicap golfers really don't have a solid practice plan. Lot's of self taught golfers that just hit balls on the range without purpose. I don't think moving them to the chipping green changes much.

[iacas]

15 minutes ago, natureboy said:

The only assumption I made is that a rational player who is practicing to improve from where they are is focusing on what they perceive as a something that needs work.

Again, I was talking about those who would draw the types of conclusions from the graph as was done by the author. I was using the general "you" in this case. I could have used "one" or something, but that always feels overly stuffy.

15 minutes ago, natureboy said:

With a sound grooved swing established, perhaps lack of time slightly shifts a lower handicap player's focus to the lower hanging fruit of further short game improvements. Long game is hugely important, but maybe lower handicaps experience some diminishing returns on time invested in long game practice to make significant gains and shift focus a bit toward the 'maintenance' side.

IMO they always see diminished returns. It's tougher.

65/20/15 is not just an "improvement" schedule but, if you lack the time, a maintenance schedule as well. Now, again, it's general, but still… Even if you just want to maintain your current level of play, we recommend 65/20/15.

Short game has the benefit of being something you can do anywhere, particularly the putter. Perhaps one way to read the graphs (since they're relative and not a cumulative total of time spent practicing) is that lower handicappers tend to be more obsessed, so they hit putts at home in their living room or at their offices at work far more often. They can't swing drivers, so to scratch the itch they chip balls toward a waste bin or putt on their carpet.

That could also throw the ratios off.

15 minutes ago, natureboy said:

Also, based on Broadie's curves on SG value for the different aspects of the game by HCP there often seems to be a general trend (small changes) from high HCP to scratch and then a shifting trend (also smal changes) from around scratch up to pro levels.

The changes as you seem to note are pretty small. Broadie is also looking at things after the fact, not saying at all where golfers should spend their time (nor how much). He simply says things like "the short game is 18% of the difference between players of any two levels, while shots from outside 100 yards is responsible for 67%" (or whatever it is).

Some good players have a good all-around game and so they spend 15 minutes before some rounds putting and chipping to warm up, but don't otherwise practice. So they'd be in the "100% short game" category.

Any way you look at it, the chart is severely flawed, as are any conclusions drawn from it.

15 minutes ago, natureboy said:

Don't remember if Breed talked about total time or percentage, but nothing in what I wrote says they spend more total time on short game.

"One" could easily take "spend more relative time" to mean "relative to the full swing." You were unclear. But anyway…

15 minutes ago, natureboy said:

Don't remember if Breed talked about total time or percentage, but nothing in what I wrote says they spend more total time on short game. If you project the curves out to pro levels, bulk of total time would still be on long game with a modest percentage shift to short game. This makes a bit of sense to me in that just the frequent switching between courses, with different green speeds and grass types requires at least a bit more relative time (vs. a higher HCP playing their home course) in pre-round practice to get the speed touch and release visualization right for that week / day on putting and short game shots.

You're guessing, though, or extrapolating from an already flawed chart. PGA Tour pros pretty much follow the 65/20/15 ratios in all that I've experienced. This includes talking with them or their instructors, being one of their instructors, observing how they practice both at the course and away from the course, etc.

3 minutes ago, Dave2512 said:

From what I see out there it's not really problem of time allocation as much as higher handicap golfers really don't have a solid practice plan. Lot's of self taught golfers that just hit balls on the range without purpose. I don't think moving them to the chipping green changes much.

That is a big issue, no doubt.

[Rainmaker]

I dunno . .maybe it depends on the golfer but, for me . .I started playing golf regularly and trying to improve about 5 years ago - at age 36.  From the very beginning, I was a decent chipper and putter and terrible in all other areas.  

In the last 5 years I have spent countless hours working on my full swing.  I have also spent a decent amount of time working on longer pitches.  I have spent no more than 6 total hours on my short game.  My short game is still better than my long game. 

[collapse]

11 minutes ago, Rainmaker said:

I dunno . .maybe it depends on the golfer but, for me . .I started playing golf regularly and trying to improve about 5 years ago - at age 36.  From the very beginning, I was a decent chipper and putter and terrible in all other areas.  

In the last 5 years I have spent countless hours working on my full swing.  I have also spent a decent amount of time working on longer pitches.  I have spent no more than 6 total hours on my short game.  My short game is still better than my long game. 

The full swing is where all hell breaks loose.The short game not having the full violent range of arm/wrist/body action is easier to control .Once you get past the 10 o'clock position,improperly pre-set arm/wrist/body conditions do what they want.

Edited November 25, 2015 by collapse

[Patch]

I practice my short game more than my long game.  I even practice my longer approach game than my longer, or off the tee game.

I practice the shorter stuff more because it'easier.  I get my shag stick out, and use the practice area at my liesure.  At the short game area, there are a multitude of shots I can work on with out getting bored.

I do use the driving range from time to time for the long stuff as long it's not a mats only day. Truth is my long game is as good as it's going to get as far as distance is concerned. My accuracy is not that bad either. The fact that I am some what distance challenged requires me to depend on a good short game to score well.

[pganapathy]

I remember reading an article a couple of years back about some older pro who essentially never practiced his long game.  Whenever he came for a tournament a few days prior he would work on his short game only and maybe hit one bucket of balls for all long clubs together.  His theory was the swing was grooved and muscle memory was good enough that he didn't need to spend any time on the long game.  All practice time was short game only where it is easy to get out of touch and he reckons that lack of practice in a short game cost him more shots than anything else.

For amateurs our swings are not grooved enough but the same basic logic applies.  Provided we hit one or two buckets of balls a week, we should be able to maintain our long game well enough to get to or around the green in a max of 1 over GIR.  From there if we can get up and down in two or max three we should never exceed a double bogey at worst, unless you have a lost ball, hazard, OB etc.

We need to remember that of a par of 72, 36 strokes are on the green so if we improve putting to a max of two strokes per green, we should always be at par or bogey golf provided we hit reasonably well.  Even hitting every green in 1 over GIR will only lead to a bogey at most.  Short game is truly the more important part of the game and of scoring

[natureboy]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

You're guessing, though, or extrapolating from an already flawed chart.

No, I said that extrapolating the chart for pros was probably not right per the approximate relationships in the chart below. Broadie's 2/3 to long game and 1/3 to short game is a rough approximation that's easy to remember. His simulation numbers (perhaps refined since) depict some shifts per HCP, but he has said that for higher HCP players long game matters even more. I suspect that the bulk of his writing emphasis has been aimed at lower HCP's who would be the more likely readers.

For the single digit to higher HCP range that the article with the chart may not be so flawed. Perhaps it is demonstrating some 'wisdom of crowds' effect? The article author's conclusion is probably biased from his point of view as a low HCP player

Remember that the actual numbers (not the interpretation) of the SwingByte chart really only shows a modest shift per HCP level in the percentages. And the total shift from highest HCP to scratch level is about 18% or roughly half a percent per HCP point. This is about double the shift I see in the Broadie numbers but the rough trend is similar. So perhaps many higher HCPs are overdoing the long game work, or as some say not doing their practice smartly / efficiently or the lower HCP's are overdoing the short game work due to time constraints. Also as @Patch stated, most players eventually hit a distance wall in their full swing practice that will be hard to overcome without a lot of work so the attention shifts. The precision pros need with long game to score well is susceptible to very small errors, so it makes sense that practice time would shift back to long game emphasis to remain sharp. Perhaps (assuming the chart below is roughly correct) Michael Breed used a straight line fit between high HCPs and pros to come up with his recommendation to spend more time on short game as I think his target audience tends to be mid to high HCPs?

 

Edited November 25, 2015 by natureboy

[natureboy]

20 minutes ago, natureboy said:

Perhaps (assuming the chart below is roughly correct) Michael Breed used a straight line fit between high HCPs and pros to come up with his <incorrect conclusion> recommendation to spend more time on short game as I think his target audience tends to be mid to high HCPs?

Timed out in edit. Breed may have seen this relationship on practice time and assumed that low HCPs got there by emphasizing the short game rather than it may just reflect the relative contribution to their game where they are due to acquired skill and the types of tees / courses they play. While high HCPs are correctly focusing on their long game a bit more (perhaps a bit too much) because that is where they are in relative scoring ability / golf game development.

[MrDC]

Bad players should be practicing everything more.

i really don't the point in saying one thing should be the focus over the other, it all needs to work, want to get better? practice everything, a lot.

That being said I prefer to the work on the long game more, I think it pays bigger on the course, I would say I spend 70% of my time hitting long irons and driver, because as a poor player if I'm able to get within the green with few strokes I have a great chance at making bogies and maybe a par here and there, that's my focus and what I suggest all poor players do- learn to hit the ball far and straight, and then work on it more.


I think the reason good players concentrate on the short game so much is that's where the scoring happens, that's where they lose strokes the most, they know how to hit the ball a long way, they just need to execute, but the short game has so many variables that it needs constant work.

Edited November 25, 2015 by MrDC

[iacas]

42 minutes ago, pganapathy said:

For amateurs our swings are not grooved enough but the same basic logic applies.  Provided we hit one or two buckets of balls a week, we should be able to maintain our long game well enough to get to or around the green in a max of 1 over GIR.  From there if we can get up and down in two or max three we should never exceed a double bogey at worst, unless you have a lost ball, hazard, OB etc.

And… I would say that's great if you just want to suck at golf forever. Bogeys and doubles, wheee!

42 minutes ago, pganapathy said:

We need to remember that of a par of 72, 36 strokes are on the green so if we improve putting to a max of two strokes per green, we should always be at par or bogey golf provided we hit reasonably well.  Even hitting every green in 1 over GIR will only lead to a bogey at most.  Short game is truly the more important part of the game and of scoring

Please do some reading on the subject. I generally hate bragging, but there's a reason @david_wedzik and I were on stage with Mark Broadie at last year's PGA show. We know a bit about what we're talking about. And unlike Broadie's book, our book (LSW) covers the average golfer.

37 minutes ago, natureboy said:

For the single digit to higher HCP range that the article with the chart may not be so flawed. Perhaps it is demonstrating some 'wisdom of crowds' effect? The article author's conclusion is probably biased from his point of view as a low HCP player.

I don't think the chart demonstrates any wisdom at all.

37 minutes ago, natureboy said:

So perhaps many higher HCPs are overdoing the long game work, or as some say not doing their practice smartly / efficiently or the lower HCP's are overdoing the short game work due to time constraints.

I don't know, and I prefer to avoid idle speculation: about what higher handicappers were doing, about what Michael Breed may have meant, any of it. I prefer to stick to things that aren't speculative.