Fairways hit, Putts/hole, and GIR goals for a mid handicapper? - Page 2

Let me speak one more time on stats. I said fairways hit and GIR are less useful stats than we think, but I didn’t say they’re useless. Bump-n-MI is a low handicapper, probably breaks par a lot, and these stats are entirely appropriate for him. We expect him to hit fairways and greens, so we should measure that. But we don’t expect most recreational golfers to, so we should measure what they can reasonably be expected to do, for three reasons.

First, we’re still trying to learn a swing that leads us to expect a straight shot. All these two stats show is that we don’t do that very well. But then we already know that.

Second, when I break 80, which I do several times a year, it’s because I’m hitting lots more fairways than usual, and hitting more greens or missing close to the pin for an easy up-an-down. When I shoot my average score, I don’t hit the ball that well. The correlation is so direct that I don’t have to keep track of the details. Once (if ever) I start moving into single-digit handicaps (mine is 11-12), then I’ll need to move on to a more discerning set of stats.

Finally, measuring our game by goals that are set too high can hide the true progress we are making. A lot of improvement can be made between beginner and mid-level player without the GIR budging very much. We need stats that measure the beginning and intermediate states of our game - more forgiving stats. When my son, who is just taking up the game at age 33, hits a few greens in regulation, they’re lucky accidents. Why start counting them when we have no expectation yet that he’ll get any?

I keep track of three things when I play: on each hole, number of full swings, number of short shots into the green, and number of putts. With a little thought, you can pull a lot of information (including GIR) out of the interactions between these three numbers. I spent my career in data analysis and know that even the best descriptive statistics hide important details. That’s why I write down every shot when I get home and evaluate it, so I know where I need to improve. If you truly want to analyze your game, that’s the best way.

If someone plays golf just for the exercise and doesn't care whether he improves, there is no reasn to keep stats, or even to keep score. But I think most, if not all, people on this forum want to improve their game, whether they play off a 30 or a +. To imply that beginner golfers won't see a benefit in tracking their progress is doing them a disservice. Golf lends itself to statistical analysis. Data points such as Fairways Hit, Green in Regulation, Up & Down Percentage and Putts per GIR are excellent indications of a golfer's game, for good or bad. They won't make you a better player, but they will let you know what part(s) of your game you should be working on. Surely the data analyst in you can see that.

A round of golf, or even four rounds of golf, is a tiny data set. Tiny. You can record a description of your round on one sheet of paper, describing each shot with letters, numbers, symbols and colors. You could say a black 5 means you hit the green with your 5-iron, a red 5 means you missed right, and a green 5 means you missed left. Be creative.

Design it right and you can put four sheets of paper on a table in front of you, one for each of your last four rounds, and se at a glance exactly what your weaknesses are and what skills you need to develop or shore up.
So you can count greens in regulation if you want to, but better if you have a visual description that shows you’re missing a lot of greens left. THAT’S what you need to know--not that you’re missing greens, but WHY you’re missing them. Summary statistics don’t reveal that.

Or for your short game, you don’t want to count up-and-downs and stop there. You want to dig deeper and find which shots you’re not getting up and down. Then you can work on those shots.

To assess and describe the state of your game, summary stats are just fine. Game improvement requires a more detailed set of information.