Practice 4-14

[chilly]

I hit the range last night with a plan for working on some issues going from range to first tee in a round. Warmed up with a 7iron, hitting it very well. My misses, I noticed, weren't so much a swing breakdown as when I got too quick, sounds familiar to what happens on the course.

I then played a "practice" round. I counted 6 bad shots, 2 of them weren't too bad and were more swing faults. The four bad were definitely tempo related. That said, as a 15hcp, if I hit the ball that well on course I'd be absolutely ecstatic. I normally have trouble my first shot with my 20* hybrid for some reason, but with good tempo I striped it. Also hit 3wd off the deck with no problem, again due to tempo.

So, finish there and hit some chips, then head to first tee just to hit some driver shots. First two are pull/slices. I hadn't hit a single pull/slice on the range, my miss goes straight with more fade then I'd like at the end. Got to be tempo causing me to come over the top again. Hit more chips, then headed back to the tee. First ball is hammered, and I immediately noticed how much slower my tempo was. last drive was a normal missed "fade", but much better then the pull/slice. So, not a complete success, but at least I know now it's not so much a swing fault as a tempo issue. I'll keep working on this in practice and see how it goes.

Other thing I worked on was bump and runs with a 7/8/9. The 7 is pretty unforgiving, hit it a bit thin and they run a mile. I settled on the 9 when close, and the 8 when off the green a bit. Also found that a 56* is pretty dangerous in thicker grass finally coming in, I slipped under a bunch of chips and left them short. A 52* or PW is better from fluffy lies, for me. Finished up working on being less "mechanical" with short chips and getting a little more wrist in the shot, otherwise they'd have no spin and I couldn't stop them. Good day overall.