My Swing (Lihu)

[Lihu]

Well, I'm glad today was a practice round. I didn't actually score that bad, but I thinned (topped) 8 shots that bounced and rolled about 80% distance. Out of 50 tee shots and approaches, I was in position for birdie chips and par putts. Overall, I feel improvement even though today was not as good as yesterday. Got three good shots to the center of the green with my 4i from 185 yards, so I know I can get the distance with my swing. It was nice seeing those shots land the green with a thunk. Unfortunate that it was out of 12 attempts. Working on my "loose" grip to prevent further injury to my finger. At least I'm not regressing with my driver. I got a few good shots out. Btw, I had to fix way more ball marks than I left. The tournament left a lot of craters in the green. I must have spent a quarter of my time fixing ball marks. On the plus side I have about 15 almost new pro-v1/v1x balls.

[Lihu]

Video is real. So embarrassed by yesterdays on course results I'm not posting. Spent a good half hour doing mirror work last night. Hope to get a postable video today.

[Lihu]

Video is real. So embarrassed by yesterdays on course results I'm not posting.

Spent a good half hour doing mirror work last night.

Hope to get a postable video today.

Changed my mind in the interests of keeping a history of my swings.

PW 30 yards partial swing.

3i full swings trying to get to the pin over a little water.

Please don't laugh too hard.

I am working on keeping my feet closer together and straightening out my body parts. Casting and weight shift will have to some later.

[billchao]

I am working on keeping my feet closer together and straightening out my body parts. Casting and weight shift will have to some later. :-X

I thought you were working on what @mvmac tells you to? ;-) I probably don't have to tell you those aren't the best camera angles, but I'm glad you decided to post your swings more.

[Lihu]

I thought you were working on what @mvmac tells you to?

I probably don't have to tell you those aren't the best camera angles, but I'm glad you decided to post your swings more.

Today will be better. I lost the wing nuts for my camera mount, so I needed to make do with what I got.

I also looked at the videos (no editing BTW), and thought my swings looked awful. Didn't want to post them. I seem to get worse every time I get better.

In any case, I will be taking more of them now that I got into a rhythm taking videos on course.

[billchao]

I seem to get worse every time I get better.

Film your practice. I know you hit a lot of balls, but from what I seem to remember, you don't really slow it down all that much when you're focusing on your piece. I'd love to see your actual practice drills (challenges!).

[Lihu]

Film your practice. I know you hit a lot of balls, but from what I seem to remember, you don't really slow it down all that much when you're focusing on your piece. I'd love to see your actual practice drills (challenges!).

Good point. I was practicing in front of a mirror last night with a PVC pipe when I saw how bad my body position was getting.

I need to work on setup and alignment again today. My focus is getting those right before even getting to my pieces. Probably will have more on course videos tomorrow. I'll post some Tai Chi slow movements this evening.

[Lihu]

Forgot the worst one (fell back, 0 for key 2, for a total of about a half key). Results were not bad (4i to 178 carry against a light breeze uphill, plugged and rolled back a foot), I ended up making a par missing a birdie putt by a little more than a foot.

[Lihu]

(From What'd you shoot today). Another practice round today. First hole was a 7, I hit my tee shot into a tree. My 3i approach also hit the same tree, and left a deep dent in it. I hit the 3i again to punch out between the tree and a generator/light fixture right into a bunker. Hit 8i from the bunker into the green side bunker after bouncing off the green. Bladed my bunker shot twice, then pitched on for a putt 7 finish. This was probably more memorable than my subsequent nGIR bogeys and pars.

I felt pretty good about my 7 on that hole.

My irons are more solid, if only I wasn't pulling them right.

My steel shafted G15 driver was performing really well, the first day back out on the course. Swing weight feels a little "laggy and heavy", but better than "flippy and light". Got about 240 yards with it. I compared my two steel drivers. The TM steel shafted driver I was getting 220 with a much lower flight with the "same swing".

3i distance is grooving into a nice 190-200 yards (carry/roll). My 6i carries about 160, but pretty much has no roll. In fact, everything from P to 6i/5i has no roll. Only my 4i and 3i have roll.

My average iron carry distances are pretty much (range is dependent upon where in my stance I put the ball, low flight for the longer distances)

P: 105-115

9i: 115-125

8i: 125-135

7i: 135-150

6i: 160

5i: 170 (almost no roll with this and shorter clubs)

4i: 180-190 (with roll)

3i: 190-200 (with roll)

Woods/hybrids

3H: 200 (carry), off the tee (215) (only 4 shots to evaluate)

3W: 220 (carry), off the tee (230) (only 6 shots to evaluate)

Cobra PX6.0- 250 yards (if it does not slice, average is around 220)

G15:10.5-X100- 240 yards (average)

TM: 9.5-X100- 220 yards (average)  (this is only my backup club)

Keys evaluation videos to come when I have some alone time on the course.

[Lihu]

Was hoping to redeem myself from a bad front 9 score yesterday, but ended up with 1 stroke more than yesterday. 48. 47 yesterday. The back 9 which is supposed to be harder was 42 yesterday.

Not sure what really happened, my tee shots went into trees and stuff just like yesterday. I made pin high in 3 on the 509 yard par 5, with a Driver/3H/50 degree PW. Unfortunate that it landed the bunker, and I bladed my bunker shot then took 2 to get on again for a double bogey finish.

My drives weren't that bad, just put me in bad second shot positions. One tree cost me 2 strokes between yesterday and today. The worst part is I only used the driver off the tee 4 times. The rest of the times I used 3W or hybrid. Pulled almost everything. It's also possible that on this longer 6732 yard course, I should just use the driver.

Next time, I'll just use the driver on all the longer holes, and point myself more to the left. That seemed to get me the low 40s on this 9 hole monster.

[Lihu]

Got rid of my pulls!

My setup was becoming more and more straight up and down. So, I exaggerated my reverse K at home in the mirror to get the feel, and carried it out today on the course. No pulls. Got 3 GIR in 10 holes. I also made a whole bunch of thunks from 2nd or 3rd shots, too. I shanked a 3i off the tee on a par 3, and on the second shot landed about 6 feet from the pin with a thunk using an 8i from 140 yards away over some 80' tall trees. That was probably my shot of the day.

Now that I got my pulls and my setup and alignment somewhat working again, time to work on those priorities assigned to me almost 3 months ago. . .

[Lihu]

Copied from the chipping problem thread:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lihu

The baseline are the pitching and chipping videos posted earlier.

Just practiced chipping (flop shot type chipping) for over an hour while waiting for my kids at the course.

One thing I noticed is that if you come down more on the ball, it helps control the flight better. I tried in boot deep rough, and around the practice bunker.

As long as the speed of the club is constant, it doesn't seem to matter what you are hitting from, the ball seems to go about the same distance. I even tried using this stroke from the bunkers and it seems to work pretty well. The only difference is that I purposely hit fat from the bunker.

It seems like keeping the back swing and forward swing timing the same helps develop the feel for the distance.

Let me know if this works for you. I'm still experimenting too.

The method outlined seems to be working out pretty well for me. I am still getting used to the distances, but I definitely have a more controlled feeling when I chip now. It's probably going to take a few months just to gain some confidence in it.

Long game progress:

Today's round had only two really memorable shots. One is getting within 5 yards of the hole on a short par 5 (437 yards) with driver/3 iron. The other memorable shot was a 52 degree 50 yard shot hooked around a tree. Had a couple good 150 (carry and no roll)/160(carry and no roll) yard tee shots on some shorter par 3s with my 7i and 6i respectively, but I pulled them. So, my distance with even my steel shafted driver and 3i with probably too stiff a shaft was not too bad. I even had one good 170 yard approach with my 5i that landed the fringe pin high and stopped dead. These shots felt nice, but all missed the greens.

As long as I remember not to swing too fast, good things happen. If I swing too fast, I tend to hit too high with all my irons, that is if I don't shank or toe it. With my finger injury, everything has slowed down, but my touch on all the chips and putts is pretty bad due to the pain in the metacarpal bone in my lead hand index finger.

It is healing very well, but there is still some residual pain.

[Lihu]

Finally starting to work on my priorities.

My body alignment was so bad, it really needed work. I am no longer pulling my shots.

[Lihu]

Hit about 60 balls at the range with my 6i (MP-32 34 degrees loft) and was pleasantly surprised.

Just focusing on my priorities. Keeping the elbows together and "lagging" the head turn till after impact.

[Hammer 4]

I'm impressed..........

J/K...nice work.

[Lihu]

I'm impressed..........

J/K...nice work.

Never underestimate the power of the "Keys".

[Hammer 4]

Never underestimate the power of the "Keys".

True dat.

[Lihu]

Hand feels better, so I've started focusing on key 2. No pain, will renew my monthly for my first scoring round in 3 weeks.