Honing in your distances.

[tbart1]

As a new golf season rolls around, one may have gained muscle through work in the gym or improvements in form. On the other hand, some may have lost muscle and technique over the long winter. Regardless of which end of the totem pole you reside, an important question is posed when the golf season begins: How far is the ball going to go with this club?

As for me, I have gained a little bit of muscle and improved my swing greatly. Now, I'm unsure how far I hit some of my clubs. I have numbers set in my head, but sometimes the results on the course don't match up. In the past, my 4 iron has carried about 200 yards. Today, on the Par 3 12th at my home course, it was 208 yards to the back of the green and my ball had landed 10 yards too far. Also, I notice that I come up a few yards short of a pin at 100 yards with my 56 degree wedge. 

What are your best methods to obtain accurate numbers to use for the season? At my local range, we have TopTracer installed which provides statistics on the previous shot. I just didn't know how accurate these numbers would be while hitting off of mats. I feel like yardages may be different when hitting off of the ground, as mats seem to be somewhat forgiving when you don't strike the ball first. If anyone could share their ideas on how they prepare their distances for the season, I would be greatly appreciative of any insight provided.

 

Best of luck to you all this summer on the course! Thank you in advance. 

 

[David in FL]

Welcome to TST!  

With those yardages, you’re a good player.  Hit ball.  Observe distance.  Rinse and repeat.  You’ll have your yardages dialed in to a reasonable degree before you finish 9 holes.  Realize that there will always be the occasional “how the hell did that happen?!” outlier...

[dennyjones]

If you have a range finder, use it to measure the distance.   Grab each club, hit 10 balls and take the average.    Eliminate outliers which could include fat, or excessively thin shots.  Do that with each club .

 

BTW...check out Lowest Score Wins :LSW

[TN94z]

1 hour ago, dennyjones said:

If you have a range finder, use it to measure the distance.   Grab each club, hit 10 balls and take the average.    Eliminate outliers which could include fat, or excessively thin shots.  Do that with each club .

 

BTW...check out Lowest Score Wins :LSW

Agreed. I need to do this again, but we used to go to a pretty flat par 5 and drop 10 balls or so at a specific distance to the flag and take the average.

[Patch]

I think golfers interested in their distances should be more concerned about their carry yardages. I say this because on any given day, on any course, the roll, after the carry is going to be different.

Perhaps the turf is drier, or wetter.  Firmer or softer. Maybe the turf is freshly mowed....or not. Too many vaiables can have an effect on the after carry roll. 

If the golfer has a good grasp of their carry yardages, they can then anticipate over all yardages by factoring in the couse conditions for that round. 

The only thing that can effect one's carry yardage is the weather. Most golfers can account for different weather conditions with swing, and/or club selection.

I am fortunate enough to live by an open area that has very soft sand I can use for a landing area. The ball will usually just sort of plug in the sand. There is very little roll, if any. I get reliable carry yardages using the sand, gps, and my range finder.  

 

[p1n9183]

Go out to play 9 alone. On each hole hit 4..5 balls with different Irons. Keep track of the yardages with each club and at the end of the round you will have a good idea. I normally round up irons distances in numbers divisible by 5. After that each club hit 10 yards more or less than the other. Remember than even a pro have from the fairway around a 15 yards gap between a perfect shot and a little mishit with the same club. Don´t bother remembering that a 6I carry 161 and a 7I carry 152. Just remember... 6I 160 and 7I 150 average carry.  
Do the same for each wedge and wood. 

That´s it!