20+ handicappers hitting 300 yards (mild rant)

[ScruffyScraper]

OK, recreational players don't hit 300 drives. We all know that.

So how far do we REALLY hit the dimpled sphere?

I'm 62, an 11, an 8 or 9 much of my adult life, a 7 at my absolute best, and with the blessing of modern equipment, these are the estimated yardages that work well for me. How about you...on the level?

Bobby Jones Workshop Edition…..12.5º driver …………….230 yds.
Titleist 909F2……………………...18.5º fairway metal…….210 yds
Fourteen UT-106…………………..21º hybrid………………195 yds (doubles as driving iron)
Miura MC-102……………………..# 5 iron…………………180 yds.
……………………………………...# 6 iron………………...168 yds
……………………………………...# 7 iron………………...156 yds
……………………………………...# 8 iron………………...144 yds
……………………………………...# 9 iron………………....132 yds
………………………………………47º W…………………..120 yds
Scratch TNC…………………………53º W………………….108 yds
Scratch FAW………………………..58º W…………………….85 yds
Moe Norman’s Sandy………………..sand iron
Matzie Chipmaster……………………utility short iron
Slighter Auburn………..……………..putter

[RocktimusPryme]

On a normal fairway hit I put my r7 between 250 and 260. If I really get ahold of one it will creep up just short of 300 in the 285 range. To get over 300 i ussually need a downhill fairway or some wind.

My irons range from about 210 with my 22* 4 hybrid, 170 7 iron, to 125 PW

my putters good to about 2 feet......

[Aaronsrix17]

My friend who is 13 years old is like a 25 hdcp and hits the ball like 280 consistently

[RocketSauce]

i have a younger cousin who is in his mid 20s who is an absolute HORRIBLE golfer, but he played baseball all of his life. occasionally he will absolutely CRUSH a driver around the 300 yard mark. Ive seen him hit a couple in the 320 range too (we measured them). 90% of his drives are snap hooks into the woods though. he's a big strong guy and very flexible, which probably helps.

[anthonykim3]

there isnt a way in hell that even 1 precent of 20 handicap golfers hit it average 300 yards i am a 8.4 and my average driving distance via skycaddie is 233.4 my longest how ever 291 i think they must be going off of the longest one they ever hit or they maybe forgetting to add the 200 yarders cause well i hit probaly 12 of my drives a round 260 but the other 4 at my home course like 230 220 215 223 and it averages out to like 230 the 233.4 number is season long and well 233.4 is long for a 13 year old and i think it is cause i have played baseball all my life at the AAA level and i hit fairways to i would say driver is the same difficulty to hit good as irons are i find it the same toughness ot hit a 260 drive in the middle of fairway as it is to hit a 7 iron inside 15 feet of the hole and i am a very good iron player and driver but i find it just as easy to hit 100 yards in to 10 fett and 50 yards to 5 feet but i have a great short game minus putting that is my problem i play like a 5 handicap but putt like a 12 so its not horable putting but when i becom a better putter i will probably play to a 2 next year

[grantc79]

My friend who is 13 years old is like a 25 hdcp and hits the ball like 280 consistently

Sure he does

[Titleist Man]

There is no way mayb if they play downwind down hill etc... all the time. At least iv never met anyone who does that. After all if catch my drive it goes 230 maybe an occasional 240.

[anthonykim3]

may i ask why or how he can do that does he swing at 115 mph does he use and ilegal ball or club i s he a profesanal body builder the belives you have to still be flexable to be considered strong i am 13 and i long hitter and i consiestitly hit it 260 i am 150 pound 5foot 7 kid who is very strong what gives him that extra 20 yards over me and if your talking average thats so bull it hurts my average 233.4 and i dont know one kid 13 or 14 that averages 280 bud so nice try but if he is a professinal body builder that likes to saty flexible then well he is one of akind then isent he man i wish i could spell

[907golfer12]

may i ask why or how he can do that does he swing at 115 mph does he use and ilegal ball or club i s he a profesanal body builder the belives you have to still be flexable to be considered strong i am 13 and i long hitter and i consiestitly hit it 260 i am 150 pound 5foot 7 kid who is very strong what gives him that extra 20 yards over me and if your talking average thats so bull it hurts my average 233.4 and i dont know one kid 13 or 14 that averages 280 bud so nice try but if he is a professinal body builder that likes to saty flexible then well he is one of akind then isent he man i wish i could spell

Dude you need to work on using punctuation and spelling. I had a very hard time reading your post. I read it twice and I still didn't track what you said.

[Fourputt]

may i ask why or how he can do that does he swing at 115 mph does he use and ilegal ball or club i s he a profesanal body builder the belives you have to still be flexable to be considered strong i am 13 and i long hitter and i consiestitly hit it 260 i am 150 pound 5foot 7 kid who is very strong what gives him that extra 20 yards over me and if your talking average thats so bull it hurts my average 233.4 and i dont know one kid 13 or 14 that averages 280 bud so nice try but if he is a professinal body builder that likes to saty flexible then well he is one of akind then isent he man i wish i could spell

Punctuation and capitalization please. This is unreadable.

[PiKapp23]

Of course being a 20 handicapper means nothing in regards to how far someone can hit the ball. I've seen guys who can't break 100, but can drive the ball a mile (OK, maybe that's an exaggeration...). They just can't hit it straight and/or can't do anything else well. Most players do over-estimate their drives, though.

An example of how a person could believe they hit a driver 300+ yards. Yesterday I was playing a par 5 that is a dog-leg left. The marker on tee box beside the tees said 491. My GPS said is was only 404 (and that's based on a straight line - not following fairway). I hit a big drive, but pulled it slightly left of fairway down the left hand side, but it kicked into fairway on that side. When I got to my ball GPS said I was 145 yards from center of green. That means (without using GPS) I hit the ball 346 yards! In actuality, using the shot distance tracking on my GPS unit, I had hit the ball about 255 or so (which is a little long for me anyway) because I cut a lot of the dogleg off and I hit a slight downslope on a frozen course to get some extra roll).

Since I got GPS I often check people's drive distances and typically will ask them how far they 'think' they drove the ball and they are usually guessing long by a lot (at least 20-30 yards, but sometimes they are right or have even guessed short). I'm not a long driver, but even I have hit the ball over 300 many times under certain circumstances. Funny thing is, when I was playing to a 25 or higher handicap I was routinely driving the ball 30-40 yards longer than now just because when I hit the ball I just swung as hard as I could and tried it hit it a long way (of course, I couldn't hit any club within 25 yards of my target). I think with a lot of long driving players this is what they are doing. After all, look at the people who compete in the big-time long drive competitions. Very few are scratch or better golfers.

[Fourputt]

Of course being a 20 handicapper means nothing in regards to how far someone can hit the ball. I've seen guys who can't break 100, but can drive the ball a mile (OK, maybe that's an exaggeration...). They just can't hit it straight and/or can't do anything else well. Most players do over-estimate their drives, though.

Yep. Most players "calculate" the drive by subtracting an on course yardage marker from the scorecard yardage, which will be a wrong answer 99% of the time. Then when the reality is pointed out to them, they usually doubt the accuracy of the measurement. Measuring on Google Earth is a good way to get some straight line distances from your normal tees to the spots you commonly drive to, and it's a real eye opener. And Google Earth is quite accurate if you are honest about those locations.

On my home course, I can see the yardage plates (250, 225, 200, 175, 150, 125, and 100) in the fairways from the satellite images, and I've checked them with the measuring tool and found them to be spot on (they were all set professionally using a laser). Since I know where I hit the majority of my tee shots, as well as where I hit the longest ones, it's pretty easy to measure the distance and get a reasonably accurate reading. The longest drive I ever hit was in the 340 yard range (nearly 20 years ago, with the help of a gale force tailwind and dry, firm winter fairways). My typical drive now is closer to 240, but can vary from 220 to 270, with most in the 230-240 range.

[RocketSauce]

Punctuation and capitalization please. This is unreadable.

LOL. How about the spelling? I gave up trying to decipher it halfway through

[extremeld]

why is it that golfers on forums assume that the majority of golfers cannot comprehend that cutting a dogleg makes a hole play shorter - of course people know this unless you are playing with idiots!

[Fourputt]

why is it that golfers on forums assume that the majority of golfers cannot comprehend that cutting a dogleg makes a hole play shorter - of course people know this unless you are playing with idiots!

It's not "golfers on forums", it's golfers who observe human nature.

I'm not talking about what they know intellectually, but how they figure it when they let their egos do the calculating. At least 90% of the players I know who say they drive in the 280+ range calculate it by some sort of flawed reasoning. They aren't idiots, but their egos just won't let them see it any other way. Half the time they won't even have calculated it themselves. A player's buddy says "Wow, I hit that one 280!", and since the player's ball is 5 yards farther, he MUST have hit it 285. The fact that his buddy's ball is actually only 230 yards from the tee never comes into the conversation.

[The FORE Man567]

i know one person who falls under those categorys

[flopdarock]

i just played with an old hs buddy of mine... he hardly ever plays and never ever practices... he's currently a baseball coach... needless to say... this guy can hammer balls... but he damn sure couldnt break a hundred the day we played... he outdrove me by 40-50 yrds every time he teed the ball up... his short game was atrocious and he 5 putted everything... it still amazes me that ppl are soooo shocked that high handicappers can go longer than they can... egos can go both ways...

long does not mean acurate

[wedge player]

i just played with an old hs buddy of mine... he hardly ever plays and never ever practices... he's currently a baseball coach... needless to say... this guy can hammer balls... but he damn sure couldnt break a hundred the day we played... he outdrove me by 40-50 yrds every time he teed the ball up... his short game was atrocious and he 5 putted everything... it still amazes me that ppl are soooo shocked that high handicappers can go longer than they can... egos can go both ways...

i agree completly with this i mean yea he can hit it 300 yards dont matter if its outta bounds twice in a row then twenty yards in the depest rough you could imagine its very reasonable to think 20 hdcps can hit it 300