Single most lied about sports accomplishment

[Brakkus]

I hit it 300 once with a tail wind,but i'm around 250.
Interestingly my local pro plays on the British seniors tour,and he stopped to look at my swing,and to my suprise said it was a good looking swing.He noticed my hybrid,which is a Ram fx9.He liked it and had a couple of swings.Amazingly he hit the same distance I would.
It's a 16 degree with a graffalloy shaft,then he got his club out with a 200 pound shaft and 4 more degrees of loft and hit it the same distance.

The moral of this story is that equipment can have a large bearing on distance,but nailing any length of shot down the middle is of higher value than any 300 yard shot.I had one lad I know boast how he could drive his ball 30 odd yards past me,but he's rubbish at the rest of of golf,so it's a redundant point when I can nail greens from 170 in.

I just don't know why it's so important for some blokes to have the 300 yard drive,it's a small piece of a very large pie.

[TigerCurtis333]

I average around 245-255, and every once in a while I can hit 285. Ask me if I'd rather consistantly hit 285 while sometimes reaching 300 or hit 3 or 4 more fairways a round, give me accuracy every time. Let my friends outdrive me by a couple of yards. I'd rather be 160 away and in the fairway than 145 away and in the trees.

My friends - "Yeah - I drove the ball farther than you today," laughing.
Me - "Yeah...but I won."

[rgoudy1975]

Actually, I never drive the ball UNDER 300 yards, and it's always straight as an arrow, never OB and never goes in the water. I also one putt every green.

Seriously, I play with some guys that hit driver on every hole. There's no course management going on and they even laugh when I say something about it. I've stopped asking "Are you going to hit that here?" I am confident hitting my 2 iron 210 yards off the tee down the middle while these 300-yard-hitter-friends of mine slice, pull, push, and hook their drives 240-260 yards out into the rough and behind a tree.

[jaw1978]

[QUOTE=Fraser;197343]Isn't that like saying there's no way a 30 handicap player could get a hole in one, or two putt every green? Hitting a one off 300yrd drive isn't rocket science, you basically just need a lot of strength...
QUOTE]

I stand corrected to some extent. But hitting it 300 doesn't have a lot to do with strength. I'm a pretty lanky 6'0 and won't admit to being very strong or very limber. For some reason the ball just goes far for me. I have a heck of a time hitting a 45 yard flip wedge though, so I share your short game problems.

I do think anyone can get a hole in one. I've had none and I know there are thousands of 70 year old grandmas that have rolled one in. Holes in one come in many forms though. You don't need to pure a shot to get an ace, but you do need to strike the ball pretty pure and with a lot of clubhead speed to hit it 300+. I agree that it can happen at times, but I've played thousands of rounds of golf with some big, strong dudes that are 90s golfers, and I can't think of a specific time where I remember them going deep. Even when they bomb it by their own admission, it's generally shy of 300. But I concede that it can and does happen. If given the betting opportunity, I would take the 20 handicapper getting a hole in one before he stripes it 300 (left, right, straight, or otherwise). I only speak from my experiece though, which isn't always perfect data. :)

[jaw1978]

And I agree with all the course management quotes. 300+ does not guarantee the golfer is any good. I've been owned by plenty of 245 yard knockers to realize that getting the ball in the hole doesn't happen off the tee.

[geezer]

Alot of peoples confusion about their actual distance can, I believe, be chalked up to not actually being able to determine how far the drive went. I've only ever hit over 300 once (Downhill, strongly downwind, firm conditions, 314 yds) and once just sub 300 (298 downwind).

But its not until you actually measure out 300 yards that you realise how far 300 yards actually is. Its a phenomenal distance. So that drive that you thought must have went past 300, may well actually have been a burly 270...

[whip_it_out]

there is no way a 15+ handicap will hit it 300 without some cart path involvement.

Theres a guy at my course whos plays to a 15, but he really should be a 5, but he takes SO many penalty strokes on his drives. He swings so hard, and so long, that if he connects, I wouldn't be suprised if he carried it 340. But, if he doesn't hit it perfect, it can go 300 yards left. He goes places no golfer should ever see,

[meenman]

I have a buddy at one of the courses I play at that can hit the green on a 301 yard par 4 about 25% of the time.

A real easy thing to do since it has a huge dog leg right and that 301 yards from the tee is probably about 230 if you play over the water.

Plus he has a lot of confidence in that shot since we all know he is taking a mulligan when its wet.

[Stacey_E]

Maybe the biggest lie is when golfers tell themselves that a 300 hundred yard drive counts more than a 3 foot putt? That's the irony of the game. I think a lot of golfers are hung up on the "drive for show" part of the old saying.

I hit 235 and 72% of my fairways week in, week out. I can consistently go 250 with 50% of my fairways. What's the payoff there? BTW longest drive for me is 351 measured on a dead straight par 5. Carried about 230 (20 more than usual for me) hit a hardpan fairway and took a 20 yard hard high kick, bounce and rolled about 100 yards down what had to be 30 degree grade, and burnt up fairway. Sometimes the stars do align. But ask me, I hit 235.

[Jay-Bird]

I love the haters.

Today on hole 10 at eagle bend (380 from the blue tees) I was 53 yards from the center of the green. I stepped it off, hit a half swing lob wedge and made the 8 foot birdie. On 11 I one-hopped my drive into the greenside bunker; the hole is 330 from the blue tees. I was pin-high. Got up and down for birdie. On 15 (440 from blues) I was inside 100.

It was hot and dry. The ground is hard this time of year in Kansas. The 15mph wind was helping on these drives.

I am 5'8" and weigh 155. I shot 72 (37,35). The course is pretty easy. rating 71/ slope 122.

http://63.240.106.223/natcrsrating/ncrlisting.aspx
scorecard (yardages):
http://www.customscorecards.com/scor...p?course=12920

[Rugger]

I love the haters.

No way! You can't out drive tiger woods! That's impossible

[Jay-Bird]

No way! You can't out drive tiger woods! That's impossible

Tiger was in the group behind me. He hit into me from the tee on #14 with a 5 iron. I was chipping from the apron at the time. He drove up in his Buick and apologized. I told him it was no big deal.

[JessN16]

As to high handicappers not being able to hit long, I can do you one better than just hitting it 300 (which I don't typically do, but have done plenty of times): I hit, on average, 66 percent of my fairways, with an average driving distance of around 250.

However, I also average around 20 percent, if I'm very lucky, in GIR.

Why? Because I cannot hit out of a fairway. And why is that? Because I have a shallow swing plane, which results in topping a lot of shots out of the fairway and/or generally not being able to get the ball airborne.

However, that shallow swing plane allows me to murder the ball sometimes off the tee. I'm 5'11" and about 250. I'm kind of barrel-chested and have very strong legs.

But my handicap floats between 15 and 25 depending on how often I play. Reason is the fairway play. There's no excuse for 250/66 on the driving stats to translate into 4 GIR a round, tops.

Right now, I'm concentrating on my short game and my game from 100 in. I can get short irons in the air but not mid-irons, long irons or most fairway woods. I will probably always have to live with that glaring shortcoming in my game, so I'm trying to get better around the green and on it to cut most of my strokes out.

Jess

[Jay-Bird]

...Because I have a shallow swing plane, which results in topping a lot of shots out of the fairway and/or generally not being able to get the ball airborne.

Have you tried that 'towel behind the ball drill' ?

At the range put a towel an inch or so behind the ball. Try to hit the ball without hitting the towel. It will have you dropping the arm on the downswing and make you hit down on the ball. Just a thought.

[JessN16]

Have you tried that 'towel behind the ball drill' ?

I have not tried that. Haven't even heard of it, in fact, until you just said it. I've copied and pasted it into a "golf tips" file I'm keeping.

Usually, most of my attempts to purposefully hit down at the ball result in a very bad chunk, with the ball going about 30 yards downfield and a divot the size of Massachusetts going about 50. Jess

[Franco!]

If you go by the average 20 handicap, they rarely come close to the sweet spot, therefore aren't coming close to 300.
But, I'd believe a single digit doing it on occasion.
There are only 16 guys on the PGA Tour that average over 300.
I doubt you do if you're a bogey golfer.
Sorry.

[907golfer12]

My longest drive ever is 275 and that was measured with a cart, bit it was down wind, and onto a hard fairway, and I made the perfect swing. If you ask how far I drive the ball I will tell you 235-250, why? Because that is what I normally hit, an dI am okay with that. But I think the biggest thing is a lot of golfers hit that one shot (like I did on that 275 yard'er) and they say they can do that all the time which we know is not true.

Also I love the my little 13 and 14 year old friends, because they have 80 MPH swing speed and they know I hit the ball farther then them, but they insist they hit their 7 iron from 155 yards, when I carry my 145 with a stock swing. Oh, and they hit their drivers 250. It's amazing how skewed younger kids distance perception is.

[JessN16]

If you go by the average 20 handicap, they rarely come close to the sweet spot, therefore aren't coming close to 300.

Depends on whether the question is can you hit 300 or do you AVERAGE 300.

When I was playing regularly, we had a guy who played in our foursome on occasion that could bomb the cover off the ball, well over 300 by any kind of measurement. We were playing one of the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail courses in Alabama, Oxmoor Valley (Ridge Course), and he hit driver-soft chip shot into a 377-yard slightly uphill par 4. And he shot somewhere around 120-125 for the day. He was also 6'4", all arms and legs, with a very fast, upright swing. He may have hit four fairways all day long. But he crushed about half his drives (too bad most of them went as far offline laterally as they did vertically down the course). He also had his fair share of 125-yard choppers to the third baseman. It's very possible for high handicappers to once in a while catch one -- especially guys who have a strong baseball background. But if you're talking about guys who average 300, that's a totally different kettle of fish. I doubt we've got more than five of them on this message board and that's being generous. Averaging 300+ is a feat. Jess