TST Explores the ShotScope H4 (Stats Tracking Device) and Pro LX Rangefinder

[RFKFREAK]

2 minutes ago, iacas said:

All that really matters is the distance of your first putt. I’ve also seen that it will tell you what percentage of putts you leave short or long but I don’t really care about that.

Correct me if I'm wrong but GG used to leave the pin like a foot or two away from your second/last putt, right?  Any idea if the H4 does that, too?

[billchao]

Since I'm home now and I can type out more detailed responses...

10 hours ago, ChetlovesMer said:

Question: How do I (and should I) remove shots from the stats that are "not normal"? Here's what I mean. If my drive hits a tree, should I count it toward my stats? If I use a hybrid to punch out from under a tree should I count that toward my stats? If not, how do you have the system ignore a shot for stats? I saw that you can have the system ignore the round, but how about just a shot or two here and there? Or should I not worry about it as it will all come out in the wash in the long run? Or maybe its good just to leave them in as that is a "truer" representation of what I actually hit. 

Your drive is not positional. You hit a bad drive, it happens. I hit a tree with my 9i two rounds in a row on approach shots. They count. Now maybe it doesn't truly represent your miss (you pulled it or something, but on Shot Scope it just looks like you hit it way short), but it accurately reflects your ability with the club in terms of % of fairways or greens hit, etc. Otherwise you'd get really skewed stats that suggest you're a better golfer than you actually are (well I hit the green with my 9i 75% of the time if I hit it properly...).

The hybrid shot is positional, but I think you get the idea behind positional shots a little more, now.

7 hours ago, Shindig said:

Here's how GG worked (my first round with ShotScope is later today) for the "not normal" thing.

Shot Scope has what they call P-AVG (Performance Average) to determine how far you hit a club under "normal" conditions, similar to Game Golf.

https://support.shotscope.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000810145-What-is-the-P-AVG-Performance-Average-Distance-

7 hours ago, Shindig said:

One of the nice things about driving distance average in GG, and I assume ShotScope too, is that I can't say "let's only measure the good ones."

According to Shot Scope, their P-AVG algorithm discards outliers from both ends.

They also do provide you with your true average distance by club. Not including short game shots, of course.

7 hours ago, Friz said:

.so if I'm not specifically marking my second shot on par 5's as positional, will that screw up my approach data?

I would assume so, yes.

7 hours ago, Friz said:

My most common scenario on a par 5 is to have a full shot on my second shot, but not going for the green.  I'd like that data to count towards club data, but obviously don't want it to be seen negatively on approach data.  It sounds like I either need to mark it as positional and lose the club data for that shot, or have inaccurate approach stats?

I don't think it's going to matter in the long run if you have enough shots in your databank.

7 hours ago, Friz said:

Or how about this specific situation from my 9-hole round.  I smacked the top of a tree on my tee shot on a par 4 and it dropped straight down.  Rather than going for the green on my next shot, I used a full wedge to lay up short of the water.  Is this the same as playing out sideways when my drive goes in trouble, even though I used a full swing, because I didn't attempt to go for the green?  I did mark this one as positional, I guess I didn't realize I'd lose club data even on full swings in these scenarios....is what it is I guess, but at least want to make sure I'm using it properly.

If you weren't going for the green on your 2nd shot on a par 4, it's not an approach shot so you need to mark it as positional.

5 hours ago, Friz said:

One more question after going through my stats....is it normal to have multiple "up and down" attempts per hole if I screw up a chip?  There were a couple holes that I did not land my pitch or chip on the green, and had to follow up with another one.  It appears it took both strokes as an "up and down" attempt statistically.  Right now my greens in regulation plus up-and-down attempts equals 12 through 9 holes played.  Maybe I'm not understanding this stat properly, is this a per shot statistic instead of a per hole statistic?  I know its generally recorded as getting down in 2 shots from not being on the green, but I also always thought this could only be done a maximum once per hole, from your first shot around the green after missing GIR.  Does every single chip create its own unique up and down attempt?

Isn't that generally how up & down works? Every short game attempt is an up & down attempt.

You're thinking of Scrambling, which is the % of time a player misses a GIR but makes par or better.

5 hours ago, Friz said:

If I had messed up my first chip, then chipped again, then one putted, would that correctly be 1 for 2 up and down?

Correct.

27 minutes ago, RFKFREAK said:

Yeah, I just don't remember where the pin is most of the time

Mark it on a blank box on the scorecard. You can get a combination of 9 rough locations through a combination of front/middle/back and left/center/right. And what @iacas mentioned, the distance to first putt is very important. You should be well in the ballpark with that information.

25 minutes ago, iacas said:

All that really matters is the distance of your first putt. I’ve also seen that it will tell you what percentage of putts you leave short or long but I don’t really care about that.

I don't care about the short/long misses either, but it also tells you distance of putts made and make % from different distances, so I like to keep my putting distances pretty accurate. So while a 2-putt from 25' is still two strokes no matter what, it matters to me if the made putt is from 2' or 8'.

22 minutes ago, RFKFREAK said:

Correct me if I'm wrong but GG used to leave the pin like a foot or two away from your second/last putt, right?  Any idea if the H4 does that, too?

Not that I've observed, no. In fact, some of my tags can be way off on the greens. Editing is a must.

Stop trying to be lazy 

[dennyjones]

writing down the distance of your first putt makes editing a whole lot easier!

[RFKFREAK]

13 minutes ago, billchao said:

Stop trying to be lazy 

But it's what I'm best at. 😂

[Shindig]

I just finished my first round with the device and have a few things I need to do.  Some of these are in the "I should have RTFM" category.

What's up with putting?  I tagged it, but it wants me to tell it where the flagstick is.  Once I do that, it goes to the next hole.  I guess I tag the flagstick after I'm done putting.  I do like that there's a way to tag where the stick is.

I realize that positional can be a bit of a judgment call.  240 out on a par-5, I'd need my career best fairway wood plus 30 yards to get to the green.  I hit fairway wood.  I'm judging this as positional, please tell me if you disagree. 

On a related note, I hate having things in my front pockets in general.  Before GG, I had a belt clip thing that had a ballmark repair tool, space for two driver tees, and a magnet-attached ballmarker.  I couldn't keep it and the GG on my belt in comfortable spots, so into the closet it went.  Today, my favorite pocket divot tool's magnet broke (and my gorilla glue is somehow glued to itself so I can't use that to fix this) on like the third tee.  I got home and discovered the belt clip and the ShotScope both work on my belt together.  So back into the bag it is going!   And I think one of the first questions I asked was about the size of the device.

[Shindig]

Okay, I signed my round.  Editing was convenient enough, I'll get used to it.  I struggled with GG at first too.

I had a birdie-par-par streak but no par-par-par streak, and I got credit for 3 pars in a row on the streak meter (I agree with how it defined it here).

  

On 6/28/2022 at 6:12 AM, iacas said:

Please let me know when you've joined our leaderboard.

I have now done so.  I think I needed a round in the system first

Edited July 15, 2022 by Shindig

[iacas]

8 hours ago, Shindig said:

I just finished my first round with the device and have a few things I need to do.  Some of these are in the "I should have RTFM" category.

Many of these questions lately are… 😉 (Not just by you…).

8 hours ago, Shindig said:

What's up with putting?  I tagged it, but it wants me to tell it where the flagstick is.  Once I do that, it goes to the next hole.  I guess I tag the flagstick after I'm done putting.

Yes. Tag when you're taking the ball out of the hole. Or skip it entirely.

8 hours ago, Shindig said:

I realize that positional can be a bit of a judgment call.  240 out on a par-5, I'd need my career best fairway wood plus 30 yards to get to the green.  I hit fairway wood.  I'm judging this as positional, please tell me if you disagree.

Sure.

8 hours ago, Shindig said:

Before GG, I had a belt clip thing that had a ballmark repair tool, space for two driver tees, and a magnet-attached ballmarker.

8 hours ago, Shindig said:

So back into the bag it is going!

[nevets88]

I'm late to the original coupon code and missed it, saw it's still good and tried it but it didn't work. I'll try again later.

[Shindig]

In reading the documentation, and thinking about my round and numbers from yesterday, I discovered a few things I want to explore.   I'm putting sub-headlines in after writing this.

The GPS Unit

First, on the GPS unit (H4), the yardage "to the front" is not distance from where you are to a fixed point that they are defining as the front of the green.  It appears to be the nearest front point (nearest point to me that is on the green).  I like this, and I kind of wish there was an "approach view" where we could see each green's outline and maybe specify where I'd like a distance to.  My first GPS (a Callaway uPro, which I lost in 2015 after making birdie on a long par 4 in my club championship) did this -- one of the things I liked about it.  My only later GPS was a hand-me-down that only showed me distance to the middle.   I would like it a bit better if I could get the equivalent of "my line is over that bunker, what do I need to do to carry it" from the unit.  There are some vague drawings of bunkers, maybe when I use this on a course I'm more familiar with, I'll be able to figure out which bunkers each is.

I like the dynamic distance feature -- it means that when you're off to the side, you still have meaningful data from the GPS unit.  

I especially like it because I now have front-middle-back and, before the round, I wrote my median and reasonable bounds for where a lot of shots fell, distance wise, in a notebook.  Instead of saying, say, "I hit my 9-iron 110 yards" I have been thinking "I hit my 9-iron 105-117 yards" and, when deciding on an approach shot, I'm looking for which one has the most overlap with the green on 'typical' shots.  A discussion of this strategy and its appropriateness, doesn't belong here -- I'm mentioning it only for why I'm happy for the numbers I get from the GPS. 

Shot Categories and Performance Statistics

I also discovered the system defines a short game shot as inside 50 yards, not 100 (as Broadie and GG).  This is not a complaint -- it's certainly my preference, at least for players of my level where a full swing with a sand wedge falls between the two and sure doesn't feel like a short game shot to me.  On the other hand, a 75 yard shot is a short game shot for good players, but how such a player would hit a 75 yard shot probably resembles full swing more than chipping.

And only tee shots and approach shots are considered when deciding the average distance for each club... which is great, except I hit my PW outside of 50 yards on both full and half swings.   I think there's no way to define a "short game shot" that will make every customer happy and keep information consistent. 

I would like it if I could get a diagram of distances the way there was on GG.  Something like "show me the distances I've hit 5-iron in the past ten rounds."  I might end up asking this if I decide it's that important to me.  Their performance average statistic might get me the information I want for this, especially if they add performance standard deviation to it.   I could also use this to separate my half and full swings with pitching wedge, thus making the previous distinction unnecessary as I'm probably one of very few people who wants that piece of data.

I also think that as I get better at quarter and half shots, this worry goes away and I'll ultimately have longer quarter and half shots with wedge-wedges not iron-wedges and then I'm probably not hitting a 45-degree iron half to get a distance often enough.

ShotScope's "what is strokes gained?" page says that putting is all shots with a putter?  So it is counting putter strokes from off the green, which to me are short game shots, not putting.

What is strokes gained? – Shot Scope

---

This article is relevant for V1, V2, V3, H4 and ProLx+ users. It will explain what Strokes Gained is and how it works.   Strokes gained is a term being used more and more frequently within the golf...

 I now wonder where ShotScope gets their data.  They obviously have access to a lot of data -- a bunch of players, of various handicaps hitting shots in various capacities from around the course and how many strokes it took them to finish.  It dawns on me that if you didn't already have the data, ShotScope's databases could probably generate it (as could the databases of some of their competitors). 

Reading the output

My round yesterday was an 87, good for a 14.2 differential, and had seven positional shots (of which two were topped 4-woods, but nevermind that now).  

I took the above picture with a baseline of 10 handicap.  I hit my drives much further than I typically do, and had a clear second shot on 11/13 drives (and a convenient punch-out that took me greenside on one of the other two).  But does this mean I gained 1.32 strokes off the tee compared to a 10 handicap?  And had slightly better than a 10 handicap approach play?   4 GIR (plus two greens hit on full swings that weren't for GIR), plus nine near-GIR... so maybe?  Especially since my two worst non-tee shots were positional (on the par-5 first, I topped my second and third shots, both with a 4-wood... neither of which involved going for the green in two, and thus were positional).  

Short game, gaining 0.87 on a ten handicap... I realize this is a small sample size (one round), six ups-and-downs (although two were a one-putt after my second shot game shot), and another three where I hit a short game shot within "my handicap in yards" but didn't make the putt (I still consider that a good short game shot, I really need to figure out what my expectation should be). 

And putting.  Yes, I know, you don't need to tell me that getting a random 20 handicap as a designated putter would improve my scores  

But did I really lose only 0.22 strokes to a 10 handicap in a round where I had a 14.2 differential?  I must have lost approximately four shots somewhere.   On a related note, I have looked through the "positional" pieces and strokes gained pieces, but I can't get it through my head where these go in the calculations.  I had two horrible positional shots, four good, one great.  In GG these were approach shots.  I know these shots affect my expected strokes to finish -- there's obviously an "expected strokes to finish the hole" from before and after.  The two horrible are close to a full shot lost each.   I can't imagine my other five lost me an average of half a stroke or so each.  Now I really wish I could share the round and get someone to look through it and help me out on this.

Last and least, I would ask if there's a "smart practice suggestions" feature like GG pretended to have.  I say pretended because I really only got useful information about which range of putts I was doing poorly with, but I kind of knew that from my rounds anyway, but given how important people thought putting was before strokes gained analysis, it was good to know.  On the other hand, GG telling me that improving my tee shots on holes between 350-400 yards could improve my game by 0.04 strokes didn't help. 

[billchao]

28 minutes ago, Shindig said:

ShotScope's "what is strokes gained?" page says that putting is all shots with a putter?  So it is counting putter strokes from off the green, which to me are short game shots, not putting.

I’m not able to go over the rest of your post at the moment, but this one is wrong.

On the Performance pages what is considered a Tee Shot, an Approach, a Short Game shot and a Putt? – Shot Scope

---

Tee Shot: Any shot taken from the tee box on a hole apart from par 3's. Par 3 tee shots are considered an...

You’re basing your conclusion on that simplified graphic? I skimmed the article you linked and didn’t see any definitions explicitly written.

[Shindig]

7 minutes ago, billchao said:

You’re basing your conclusion on that simplified graphic? I skimmed the article you linked and didn’t see any definitions explicitly written.

"Conclusion" might imply I put more thought into it than I did.  I saw the graphic when reading and must have latched onto it.  Glad to know I'm wrong on this.  It also helps explain my SG:SG and SG:P scores from yesterday -- I had three pretty good putter-strokes from off the green.

[iacas]

1 hour ago, nevets88 said:

I'm late to the original coupon code and missed it, saw it's still good and tried it but it didn't work. I'll try again later.

I’ll email them about that later. It says it was expired to me too.

56 minutes ago, Shindig said:

On the other hand, a 75 yard shot is a short game shot for good players

I disagree. 🙂

59 minutes ago, Shindig said:

But did I really lose only 0.22 strokes to a 10 handicap in a round where I had a 14.2 differential?

What do you think their average differential is? It’s not 10.0.

[Shindig]

4 minutes ago, iacas said:

I disagree. 🙂

For a 75 yard shot, I think you're hitting about half a sand wedge.  

Oh.  That's a full swing motion.  

I now disagree with classifying a 75 yard shot as a short game shot too.

7 minutes ago, iacas said:

What do you think their average differential is? It’s not 10.0.

I just realized that, for the past half dozen years (since I first got the GG), I've been thinking of "ten handicap baseline" as a baseline for rounds with a ten differential, not rounds produced by a ten handicap.

I need to write out my thoughts more often, I've learned three things today and it's still 9:30 AM. 

[billchao]

5 hours ago, Shindig said:

I like this, and I kind of wish there was an "approach view" where we could see each green's outline and maybe specify where I'd like a distance to.

This is why I still carry my GPS. It has a touchscreen that allows me to pick spots on the hole display that I want a yardage to.

The H4 is pretty accurate, though. The two units I carry take a second or two to sync, but they're usually only about a yard or two apart.

5 hours ago, Shindig said:

On the other hand, a 75 yard shot is a short game shot for good players, but how such a player would hit a 75 yard shot probably resembles full swing more than chipping.

Then it's not a short game shot, no? I'm pretty sure I read a book that defines short game as within 60 yards.

5 hours ago, Shindig said:

I would like it if I could get a diagram of distances the way there was on GG.  Something like "show me the distances I've hit 5-iron in the past ten rounds."  I might end up asking this if I decide it's that important to me.  Their performance average statistic might get me the information I want for this, especially if they add performance standard deviation to it.   I could also use this to separate my half and full swings with pitching wedge, thus making the previous distinction unnecessary as I'm probably one of very few people who wants that piece of data.

I also think that as I get better at quarter and half shots, this worry goes away and I'll ultimately have longer quarter and half shots with wedge-wedges not iron-wedges and then I'm probably not hitting a 45-degree iron half to get a distance often enough.

I'm a little bit confused. You want to use your shot tracking device to map your partial wedge distances? There are lots of ways to do that without needing to play a dozen rounds of golf in order to collect enough relevant data.

6 hours ago, Shindig said:

I hit a short game shot within "my handicap in yards" but didn't make the putt (I still consider that a good short game shot, I really need to figure out what my expectation should be). 

Handicap in feet, Michael. If you're 20 yards out and you hit it to 14 yards, that's not good 

5 hours ago, Shindig said:

On a related note, I have looked through the "positional" pieces and strokes gained pieces, but I can't get it through my head where these go in the calculations.  I had two horrible positional shots, four good, one great.

Like I said yesterday, only the stroke is counted, but the shot data is not. I think you're using the GG mindset of their insights and where to improve your game or whatever, and Shot Scope doesn't really work that way. But really, do you need an app to tell you that you need to stop topping fairway woods?

5 hours ago, Shindig said:

In GG these were approach shots.

I like this way better. GG had no way of recognizing obstacles. On GG, if I was 150 yards from the pin, deep in the woods, and punch out with a 6i to 20 yards off the green, it just thinks I missed the green short with my 6i from 150 yards.

5 hours ago, Shindig said:

I know these shots affect my expected strokes to finish -- there's obviously an "expected strokes to finish the hole" from before and after.  The two horrible are close to a full shot lost each.   I can't imagine my other five lost me an average of half a stroke or so each.

There's Strokes Gained: Tee to Green.

5 hours ago, Shindig said:

Last and least, I would ask if there's a "smart practice suggestions" feature like GG pretended to have.  I say pretended because I really only got useful information about which range of putts I was doing poorly with, but I kind of knew that from my rounds anyway, but given how important people thought putting was before strokes gained analysis, it was good to know.  On the other hand, GG telling me that improving my tee shots on holes between 350-400 yards could improve my game by 0.04 strokes didn't help.

Those sucked. I would have preferred if they displayed more detailed breakdowns of my stats so I could figure out where to improve on my own. Shot Scope does that.

[Shindig]

Thanks for breaking it down by the way. 

2 hours ago, billchao said:

This is why I still carry my GPS. It has a touchscreen that allows me to pick spots on the hole display that I want a yardage to.

Maybe I'll get a second GPS.  Which do you use?

  

2 hours ago, billchao said:

Then it's not a short game shot, no? I'm pretty sure I read a book that defines short game as within 60 yards.

Yeah, that's a good point.

  

2 hours ago, billchao said:

I'm a little bit confused. You want to use your shot tracking device to map your partial wedge distances? There are lots of ways to do that without needing to play a dozen rounds of golf in order to collect enough relevant data.

I'm good on partial wedge distances;  it's the full ones I'd like.  One of the things from LSW I haven't been able to implement, and I'm somehow only really realizing this the last day or so, is shot zone maps.  Steps 1-4 in their suggestion aren't things I can do here (ranges are too busy, as are courses, and always have been).  Maybe I can find a Flightscope to rent or even get something like one for home.  I guess I was hoping one of these shot tracking systems would do that over time.

  

2 hours ago, billchao said:

Handicap in feet, Michael. If you're 20 yards out and you hit it to 14 yards, that's not good 

Like I said yesterday, only the stroke is counted, but the shot data is not. I think you're using the GG mindset of their insights and where to improve your game or whatever, and Shot Scope doesn't really work that way. But really, do you need an app to tell you that you need to stop topping fairway woods?

Good point on both.  And it looks like I can break things down by things like par-3 by length (I was just coming around to accepting that I do poorly, even compared to how tough par-3s are, when I'm hitting a hybrid or wood off the tee).

I mean, the last point is very right -- not only don't I need to know to stop topping fairway woods, I do know that the best way to improve my situation on a positional shot is to safely advance the ball as far as I can.  

2 hours ago, billchao said:

I like this way better. GG had no way of recognizing obstacles. On GG, if I was 150 yards from the pin, deep in the woods, and punch out with a 6i to 20 yards off the green, it just thinks I missed the green short with my 6i from 150 yards.

There's Strokes Gained: Tee to Green.

Those sucked. I would have preferred if they displayed more detailed breakdowns of my stats so I could figure out where to improve on my own. Shot Scope does that.

Is there an SG: Tee to Green in Shot Scope?  I guess I'm not sure what data I'd get from most positional, maybe if there were a recovery option, but I'm not sure I want "strokes gained: recovery shots" to be a category I know about.  

I guess it's now on me to figure out where I need to practice, and the breaking putts down by distance is nice.  I guess a combination of putts feeling final (the classic problem) and knowing that no, I really am under-performing my handicap on short putts is good to know.  

[billchao]

30 minutes ago, Shindig said:

Maybe I'll get a second GPS.  Which do you use?

I have a Garmin Approach G6. Wow, it's ten years old already.

33 minutes ago, Shindig said:

Maybe I can find a Flightscope to rent or even get something like one for home.

I could sell you a Mevo if you're interested. Keep forgetting to list it on the Marketplace.

34 minutes ago, Shindig said:

I do know that the best way to improve my situation on a positional shot is to safely advance the ball as far as I can.  

Part of that is just improving your swing in general. I rarely hit my 3w (I keep calling it a 3w, it's actually a 4w I dialed down the loft on) the last couple of years because the results were generally worse than if I just hit my 7i. So last year my scores were better if I laid up on par 5s. But this year, after improving my swing, it's become my go-to club from long range and I find myself going for the green more often.

41 minutes ago, Shindig said:

Is there an SG: Tee to Green in Shot Scope?

It's in the Tee Shots page under the Strokes Gained tab.

[iacas]

46 minutes ago, Shindig said:

Maybe I'll get a second GPS.  Which do you use?

Get a laser.

[billchao]

Just now, iacas said:

Get a laser.

They're often not very useful from the next fairway 

Some of us need both...