Full Swing vs 3/4 Swing on Approach Shots

[Themightyoz]

Question for low hcp players. I seem to be coming so close to getting it on the green with my approach shots, but 65% still come up short. On approach shots over 100 yards do you find that 3/4 swings with the next club up is more effective or full swings with the club that can reach the middle?

[DaveP043]

10 minutes ago, Themightyoz said:

full swings with the club that can reach the middle

To me, the operative word here is "can".  Most of us mishit a whole lot of shots, maybe even the majority of shots, so that our average shot pattern isn't centered where we CAN hit it.  I want my average distance to be the middle of the green, which means selecting a club that CAN get near the back of the green.  This is where doing some detailed data collection will help you, learn what your normal dispersion pattern is really like, don't base club selection on a perfect strike.

[billchao]

2 hours ago, Themightyoz said:

Question for low hcp players. I seem to be coming so close to getting it on the green with my approach shots, but 65% still come up short. On approach shots over 100 yards do you find that 3/4 swings with the next club up is more effective or full swings with the club that can reach the middle?

If 65% of your approach shots are coming up short, you’re probably not taking enough club.

I mostly make 3/4 swings inside of 150 yards. I make better contact which gives me better control both in terms of distance and lateral dispersion. 

[snapfade]

I try to always use a full swing when ever possible. 65 % short = wrong club. Best advice I have ever received here is to purchase a Shot Scope. All of your questions will be answered. Stats don't lie, but you will.  It will humble even the hardest of individuals.  I found out on average I was about 7 yards short, underestimating, sometimes I got away with it others nope. I was telling myself uneven lie, poor contact, etc. Shot Scope told me, "You are a weakling tiny man, use a higher club next time" I obeyed the master and my life has improved. Seriously, do your self a favor and get a shot tracker. 

[ChetlovesMer]

47 minutes ago, billchao said:

I mostly make 3/4 swings inside of 150 yards. I make better contact which gives me better control both in terms of distance and lateral dispersion. 

3/4 speed or drawn back to 3/4 height? 

[Shindig]

There are two things going on here that I think are instructive and that have helped me in the past.

First, read this thread about full swings with shorter clubs: 

Since reading that thread however long ago, I pretty much don't take full swings with my 8-iron on down, and I hit far more than my fair share of greens as a percent of attempts with these shorter clubs.  I'm not pin hunting by any stretch of the imagination, but I wouldn't pin hunt with a full swing either. 

Second, let's talk club selection.  In your head, what are you optimizing for?  I'm going to word this carefully:  are you (a) trying to maximize your chances of having a short birdie putt, or (b) trying to minimize your expected score on the hole?

Despite similar wording, those are two different objectives.  If 2/3 are coming up short, unless your greens are very shallow, take a longer club.  I would guess that you're optimizing for (a) and not (b), but you recognize the latter is what you should be optimizing for.

I'll give you an example.  Suppose my 6-iron performance average is 150 yards and, on a windless day, I'm in a good lie on the fairway shooting to a green at the same elevation I am at, with a pin in the middle of the green, 150 yards from me.  Is 6-iron the right club?  Maybe.   But if it's 165 to the back of the green, I might hit 5-iron instead.  It's very unlikely I overshoot the green with that club, I'd have to horribly mishit it to wind up short of the green, and my left/right dispersion with the 5-iron isn't that much worse than the same with my 6-iron. 

LSW, which you'll see linked in many signatures here, goes into detail about this quite a bit and it requires some homework.  It's a great read.  You need to know more than the one-dimensional distance number (performance average), but also the extent and pattern of misses.  You can then pick a target that gets you a likely good outcome.  I like to picture the target circles that the old Tiger Woods X-box games had (although my circles are larger than the ones in the game).   You aren't likely to have a combination of "I hit a great shot [for me] AND have a short birdie attempt," but you'll have more birdie attempts and, more importantly, lower scores -- after all, once you're on the green, a lot fewer bad things can happen, especially at your handicap level. 

By the way, that unlikely possibility doesn't mean you won't have short birdie putts ever again, it means they come by differently.  Two years ago, I won my flight of my club championship.  In the first round, on the third hole, a par-3, the pin was front-right.  I decided before the tournament that whenever a pin was in the front, I'd prioritize being on the green over pin-high.  I took one more club than would be needed to be pin high, hit it decently but not great, and missed short-right of my target... leaving me a birdie putt inside of two feet (which I made).  

Incidentally, that round was my first ever sub-80 round on my home course, and I aimed away from at least six of the pins that day.

[billchao]

1 hour ago, ChetlovesMer said:

3/4 speed or drawn back to 3/4 height? 

It’s probably a little of both. The feel for me is a 3/4 finish. I feel like the end point is the arms fully extended and the club not wrapped around my body. That feel produces the reduction in speed on the swing. It probably shortens the backswing a bit but that’s not what I focus on in the swing.

[ChetlovesMer]

8 minutes ago, billchao said:

It’s probably a little of both. The feel for me is a 3/4 finish. I feel like the end point is the arms fully extended and the club not wrapped around my body. That feel produces the reduction in speed on the swing. It probably shortens the backswing a bit but that’s not what I focus on in the swing.

Here's why I ask:
I need to improve my approach play. 

[mdl]

Great responses so far, especially @Shindig. Def recommend that how to flight shots thread. I often use that technique, also learned from that thread. A few thoughts...

One, I wonder what you consider a "full" swing with the scoring irons. Even the pros, who are wildly more talented and dialed in than us, don't consider the max distance they can hit consistently their "full" distance. So maybe they can hit their PW 160y consistently, but can only hit it 146y with the control and consistency they want. So in one sense you could say pros ~always hit their "3/4" shot even when they're not flighting the ball.

Two, a related point is that swinging too hard will decrease your distance consistency. If you tone it down a bit, you'll hit the sweet spot much more consistently. That will decrease your distance dispersion and maybe even increase your average distance.

Three, on top of "3/4" being your stock swing and explicitly flighting the ball, I've had some success taking honest "3/4" or "1/2" shots as my approach shots. For me, the feel is less flighting the ball and more taking mid to long range pitch shots but with longer clubs than my 60˚ which is my default short game club. For example, if the pins aren't near the front of the green, at 80y instead of a "full" LW I might hit a GW where I bring my hands back only to the bottom of my rib cage. Or from 100y instead of a "full" SW I might hit PW where I bring my hands back to just below lead arm parallel.

[billchao]

17 minutes ago, ChetlovesMer said:

Here's why I ask:
I need to improve my approach play. 

It’s essentially the flighted shot from the thread @Shindig shared, only I don’t typically choke down on the grip unless I want to take even more off the shot. That happens say when I have a back flag that’s 125 and 125 is my stock flighted PW, but I absolutely do not want to hit it past that for whatever reason, then I’ll choke down on the grip to make sure even if I fail to take enough speed off with the swing I won’t accidentally hit it past my number.

Here is my intended finish with the practice swing:

And here is the actual finish:

Its obviously longer than the feel but still short of my full swing finish because the speed isn’t there to carry it through.

It’s mostly learning to hit off speed shots. Once you start to develop that you can play around with different things and see how it works for you. Like I can hit a lower running shot if I aim to finish waist high and stuff. The backswing will be even shorter there because my intent with the swing changes. But again, that’s my feel. I’ve learned over the years that for me, focusing on the finish or the desired result works better than the mechanics of how far back to take the club.

[Themightyoz]

So many great points here will try and provide more context.

What do I consider 3/4 swing?

If a full swing is a swing with a full hip turn and arms with as much depth as I can get. I would say a 3/4 is just past the arms parallel in the back swing such that there's not that last little extra push to get to 90 degree shoulder turn and full backswing extension.  3/4 backswing would be the easy explanation.

Other variables

I am starting to get better at accounting for wind and green contours and generally try and get it close enough so it rolls on probably because I am very used to it rolling off.  A change in strategy might be in order.

Main Goal

My perfect distance is 100yds so my goal is to always get to that point.  Barring a few flubs yesterday for example I would say without those and the 2 lost balls I could have scored 92 vs my 98 given how well I was doing getting to that point.  

Where do I get my numbers from.

I use shot scope and got new clubs to the start the season so the numbers are a bit off but this is what I'm going off of.  These are carry+roll of course.

 

 

 

 

[billchao]

22 minutes ago, Themightyoz said:

I am starting to get better at accounting for wind and green contours and generally try and get it close enough so it rolls on probably because I am very used to it rolling off.  A change in strategy might be in order.

Trying to play that way brings different elements of the course into play. Bunkers are one. Sloping fairways, rough, etc. all can stop a ball from bouncing up onto a green.

If you land the ball in the middle of the green, will it roll off the back? Did you get your new clubs properly fit?

32 minutes ago, Themightyoz said:

My perfect distance is 100yds so my goal is to always get to that point.  Barring a few flubs yesterday for example I would say without those and the 2 lost balls I could have scored 92 vs my 98 given how well I was doing getting to that point. 

For most golfers, the shorter the shot, the closer to the hole the result will likely be. Unless you're a weirdo like me 

35 minutes ago, Themightyoz said:

I use shot scope and got new clubs to the start the season so the numbers are a bit off but this is what I'm going off of.  These are carry+roll of course.

Is that the performance average on Shot Scope? I don't use the P-average to determine my shot selection. It kind of gets you in the ballpark but I find it's a little off and it errs slightly on the long side. I'm not sure how their algorithm determines it. For example, my P-average for an 8i is 170 yards. I can tell you, unless there's a significant drop from the tee box to the green, if I'm standing on a 170 yard par 3 there will be two clubs in my hand as I decide which one to hit and neither will be the 8i.

If you're missing short 65% of the time (and you're not just hitting the ball fat) I really think you should consider taking an extra club. How often do you miss the green long?

[Darkfrog]

37 minutes ago, billchao said:

It kind of gets you in the ballpark but I find it's a little off and it errs slightly on the long side. I'm not sure how their algorithm determines it.

Yeah, don't trust P-avg, it does a good job of adjusting for short outliers, but doesn't seem to adjust for the long ones. I don't even have a 5W.

[Shindig]

16 hours ago, billchao said:

Is that the performance average on Shot Scope? I don't use the P-average to determine my shot selection. It kind of gets you in the ballpark but I find it's a little off and it errs slightly on the long side. I'm not sure how their algorithm determines it. For example, my P-average for an 8i is 170 yards. I can tell you, unless there's a significant drop from the tee box to the green, if I'm standing on a 170 yard par 3 there will be two clubs in my hand as I decide which one to hit and neither will be the 8i.

Shot Scope recommends using the P-average for these, and says their algorithm removes outliers, short and long.  I haven't inspected their code, but I haven't had a reason to doubt them on this either.  My P-avg numbers seem right to me, but I'm not sure that's a meaningful statement here.

In any case, here's their view on it:

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

(Hmm... that showed up as a security check instead of a preview, not sure what's up with that)

[billchao]

15 minutes ago, Shindig said:

Shot Scope recommends using the P-average for these, and says their algorithm removes outliers, short and long.  I haven't inspected their code, but I haven't had a reason to doubt them on this either.  My P-avg numbers seem right to me, but I'm not sure that's a meaningful statement here.

In any case, here's their view on it:

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

(Hmm... that showed up as a security check instead of a preview, not sure what's up with that)

I don’t buy it. Did you see my reasoning above?

16 hours ago, billchao said:

For example, my P-average for an 8i is 170 yards. I can tell you, unless there's a significant drop from the tee box to the green, if I'm standing on a 170 yard par 3 there will be two clubs in my hand as I decide which one to hit and neither will be the 8i.

My average carry for my 7i from numerous Mevo+ sessions is 165. There’s no way I’m playing my 8i on course to 170.

The only thing I can think could be an issue is, for whatever reason, when I use an iron for a layup shot I tend to hit it longer (lower spin out of the rough, maybe?). I hit three 7i layups on Sunday, 179, 181, and 190. That could be factoring into the calculation. But then I mark those as positional so it shouldn’t be counting in my club stats.

So yea I have no real answer, only that I don’t use P-average and don’t plan to anytime soon.

[Themightyoz]

Quote

If you land the ball in the middle of the green, will it roll off the back? Did you get your new clubs properly fit?

It depends on the course I play.  We have had very limited rain this summer so it depends.  I don't have a very high ball flight so without the high incoming loft often I get quite a bit of release.  As for fitting yes I got properly fit last fall for Wishon clubs and they are working amazing.  I almost never hits balls off the course anymore and the confidence I get from hitting them gives me a lot more strategy.  Still getting used to them but it is helping a lot.