A way of keeping stats - thoughts

[alleztom]

I have developed my own method of keeping stats to track my progress and improvement.I thought I'd share the system in order to get a sense from you all whether it is a worthwhile system and where it should be tweaked. It is basically shots lost/gained to par.

As a starting point I used my first putt distance. Using some of the charts on the forum I've come up with the following categories:

A) inside 34" (my putter length) - expected 1 putt.

B) 34" to 9' - expected 1.6 putts (ie make 60% in this range).

C) 9' to 15' - expected 1.2 putts (ie make 20% in this range).

D) outside 15' - expected 2 putts.

So Strokes gained/ lost putting:

So If I 1 putt from A, I gain 0 shots, from B I gain 0.4 shots, from C I gain 0.8 shots and from D I gain 1 shot. If I 2 putt from A I lose 1 shot, from B I lose 0.6 shots, from C I lose 0.2 shots, from D I lose 0 shots.

Strokes gained/lost tee to green:

GIR:

Thus if I hit GIR to A, I've gained 1 shot (expect 1 putt from that distance) tee to green, hit it to B I've gained 0.6 shots, to C gained 0.2 shots, to D have not gained or lost.

The Idea being that if you make a tap in birdie you've gained that shot with your tee to green play, not from putting.

If you hit the ball to B and make a birdie, you've gained 0.4 of that shot with the putt, leaving 0.6 from tee to green.

If you hit the ball to B and make par, you've lost 0.6 shots putting, which you had gained from tee to green, which add to zero (par).

nGIR:

If I hit near Green in Regulation (using the definition of near Green in Regulation in Lowest Score Wins) I hope to get up and down 35% of the time. Therefore I've lost 0.65 of a shot by not hitting the green.

If I miss nGIR and GIR, then I just add the number of strokes it took me to get get to GIR/nGIR.

So if I hit it to D in GIR+1 I've lost 1 shot. If I hit to B in GIR+1 I've lost 0.4 shots (negative one for the GIR+1, plus 0.6 because I've got it close). If I hit nGIR+2 I've lost 2.65 shots tee to green (2 for the tee to green, 0.65 for missing the green).

Strokes gained/lost chipping:

I can then work out, from how close I got my chip, how many strokes I gained or lost from the chip.

If I chip it to A, I have gained 0.65 shots, to B I've gained 0.25, C I've lost 0.15, to D I've lost 0.35, to E (chipping again) I've lost 1.

The way I note it below in a notebook for each hole

Drive

Club, Direction (F,L,R), Miss #

ie I get the miss number from the following
0 - have a look at the green

0.5 - Can advance the ball but can't hit straight to the green
1 - Must hit the ball sideways (ie behind a tree)

1.5 - Lateral Hazard

2 - Out of bounds.

Approach: GIR/nGIR + alpha
eg GIR, nGIR+2

First putt distance:

A,B,C,D,E

Number of putts :

Score

So if on a par four I make a bogey by getting nGIR, chipping to C and two putting wold note the following:

D R 0 (driver, fairway miss right, clear shot at green), nGIR (near GIR), C (1st putt 9'-15'), 2(putts), 5(score)

And strokes lost/ gained:

Tee to green lost 0.65

Chipping lost 0.15

Putting lost 0.2

If I make a par on a par 4 by hitting GIR and two putting from C

DF0, GIR, C, 2, 5

Strokes lost/gained:

tee to green gained 0.2

no chip

putting lost 0.2

It is a lot more unwieldy to write it out like this than to actually use it, but I think it is a good indication of how play is going, where you can work out after a round where you're losing shots.

Items I'd particularly like thoughts on are
1) The initial putter stats

2) Whether 35% up and down is a reasonable number at my handicap?

3) The value in this system generally.

4) Whether the relative weights of the three stats make sense

[Club Rat]

Honestly, that's a lot of information to track/write during a round, not to mention time.

But hey, what ever floats your boat, track away.

Generally I look back on the day and recall situations and put in a little extra practice time on current faults.

If I have a trend/problem hole or certain conditions which I'm playing poorly, I address them.

When things really go haywire, I'll spend more time at the range and go to the basics, check setup, grip, stance, takeaway, tempo, etc.

Bottom line is enjoying each and every round.

Club Rat

[alleztom]

Honestly, that's a lot of information to track/write during a round, not to mention time.

I see your point, and it may seem a lot, but I do all the maths and time consuming stuff at home after. Time wise, it's writing 5 things, so I can sort it while others are teeing off.

[iacas]

A) inside 34" (my putter length) - expected 1 putt.

B) 34" to 9' - expected 1.6 putts (ie make 60% in this range).

C) 9' to 15' - expected 1.2 putts (ie make 20% in this range).

D) outside 15' - expected 2 putts.

Those are backwards: if you make 20%, you two-putt 80%, hence… 1.8. 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 = 18.

You got the .8 right below (you're expected to take 1.8, not 1.2, so if you make it in 1 you've saved the .8). The .4 is correct as well.

I think the system is fine. I might tweak the driver stats to help you determine whether it was a bad tee shot or a bad approach shot that resulted in a failed GIR or nGIR. You should also consider ranking - if you're going to go into THIS MUCH detail already - ranking the driver stuff too. For example, you can lose strokes on a tee shot (hitting it short and into the rough) but gain them back (and then some) with a great hybrid to ten feet.

Distance of your tee shot and the lie matter too. A 250-yard tee shot into the light rough is not bad (it's likely better than a 230-yard tee shot in the fairway) but often significantly better than a 280-yard tee shot into the weeds.

You might consider something simpler, and more like this: http://lowestscorewins.com/members/assessing-your-sv-results .

[alleztom]

Thank you very much iacas, yes i did get it wrong with the expected putts.

With regard to distance, I have toyed with a couple of ideas, but I'm not really sure how to measure and note this. I tend to approximate my shots lost in approach by subtracting shots lost off the tee from shots lost tee to green.

The improvement (subjective, in my view, please don't construe this as a criticism) over the 'Assessing your SV results' is because I struggle with the subjectivity of it. Also I'm not really sure where my 'average' for each of those skills lies. I'm trading off a little accuracy in aggregation but perhaps it is a character flaw that I love data like this.

In terms of practice time - as a 19 handicapper - my ball striking tee to green is where I'm losing most of my shots. Having read LSW that's not a surprise. I'm normally + or - 2 shots chipping and putting, but then again I'm setting a reasonably low bar for chipping.

[iacas]

The improvement (subjective, in my view, please don't construe this as a criticism) over the 'Assessing your SV results' is because I struggle with the subjectivity of it. Also I'm not really sure where my 'average' for each of those skills lies. I'm trading off a little accuracy in aggregation but perhaps it is a character flaw that I love data like this.

Fair enough. Without an idea of your "average" rating from 1-3 becomes difficult. As you play more I think your "average" will start to make itself more clear.

In terms of practice time - as a 19 handicapper - my ball striking tee to green is where I'm losing most of my shots. Having read LSW that's not a surprise. I'm normally + or - 2 shots chipping and putting, but then again I'm setting a reasonably low bar for chipping.

PGA Tour pros are only about 50-60%. And you won't be too far behind them in putting either. So I'd keep those where they are OR move your "chipping" stuff up to 50% (that's only 15% away so it won't shift things too much).

[Patch]

I just keep a short game handicap, and it is around 2.45 right now. So 2 shots (tee & fairway), plus my SGH 2.45 equals out to 4.45. 4.45 X 18 holes = 80.1 on average.  I use to keep all kinds of stats, and found it just too much to think about. I made up my own score card, that makes keeping things easier to understand, and went on from there.

[Hatchman]

I like the discussion. When the book arrives will study and try and to apply principles I've read in the threads. Until then, I currently simply note on a separate card with hole info to analyze at home: SCORE: Fairway: R, C, L Green: (F,B,C,L,R), if hit in reg Putts: UD: Note: On lie, condition, or from what distance. Helps me determine possible cause other than just a bad swing, especially from the fairway, that really bugs me.

[iacas]

I just keep a short game handicap, and it is around 2.45 right now. So 2 shots (tee & fairway), plus my SGH 2.45 equals out to 4.45. 4.45 X 18 holes = 80.1 on average.  I use to keep all kinds of stats, and found it just too much to think about. I made up my own score card, that makes keeping things easier to understand, and went on from there.

Can you elaborate on that?

If you miss the green and take 3 strokes to get down, you consider that a "3" for your short game handicap for that hole? You give no weight to the fact that your full swing is the reason you missed the green to begin with?

[RandallT]

Many around here know I'm a geek for threads like this. A bigger geek is @natureboy , so I'll mention him to call attention to it.

At the big picture, it seems you're dissatisfied with the "out of the box" solutions available- either the cost or the lack of flexibility or lack of relevance of their analysis to what you are wanting to find out.  A combination of all of those factors has driven me to go DIY also.

The trick is finding the balance of how much data you are comfortable collecting and inputting into a system- and it's usefulness, of course. We are all different in that regard for our tolerance. My tolerance is fairly high for that kinda stuff . My preference is always to get results into # of strokes, since that's what we all care about.

How many strokes are we losing on the green? From what ranges? Off the tee? From the bunker? I just like to strive for an objective measure of where I'm burning my strokes. (surprise, it's mostly full swing, like LSW predicted).

I also enjoy GIR/nGIR analysis and strokes to hole out from various ranges. Lately, I've enjoyed analyzing my proximity to the hole from various ranges, but I'll likely post about that later in more detail, if this thread has legs. I'm still working on some graphs and polishing off some data input ideas.

To your specific Q's:

Quote:

Items I'd particularly like thoughts on are
1) The initial putter stats

2) Whether 35% up and down is a reasonable number at my handicap?

3) The value in this system generally.

4) Whether the relative weights of the three stats make sense

1) Putting seems like a no-brainer to me to use the Mark Broadie data for putt conversion rates.

Your ranges of 0-3', 3-9', 9-15', 15+ft seem good.  Bottom line, it'll work out that the 3-15' putts are where you need to practice, I think, and you'll likely find out which half of that is better/worse than the others.   There is little separation value inside 3 and outside 15.

My only comment is if you're going to track putts, why not just look up exact Strokes Gained info from the PGA stats? Just compare your putts exactly to those numbers, rather than group them. Either way is fine, as it just gives you an overall sense.

2) I just figure "it is what it is." Every course is different, and can be more/less penal around the greens. I played a course the other day in the rain with thick rough, and getting up and down was a beast for me. If you tend to play similar courses over time, I'd not worry about the absolute number, but instead how the trend goes.

FYI: I'm skeptical about comparing "Strokes Gained" for our courses against the "Strokes Gained" numbers from Mark Broadie, because they play tougher green complexes. From my initial analysis spreadsheet, my short game seems only a couple strokes worse than the pros.... but that's because my 20yard shot from the rough is FAR easier than a pro's 20yard shot from the rough.

3) I see value in whatever system you're comfortable with. I like the idea of analyzing:
Drives (par 4/5 tee)

Other full swings (par 3's and approaches)

Short game

Putts

I think you will end up with:

Tee to green

Short game

Putts

4) At first glance, the relative weights look ballpark, which is all we need.

My spreadsheet compares every single shot's expected hole out value with the end result's expected hole out value (data from Mark Broadie). So it assigns a "Strokes Gained" to each and every shot. Then I just categorize into the 4 groupings I list above.  Whether you use Mark Broadie data or your own coding system- whatever works. Just stick with it for a long enough time to see trends.

I enjoy analyzing each round to see if my "gut" was right. When I feel like I drove it well, did the numbers support that? If not, why not? If I feel like my putting has degraded for the last few rounds, do the numbers support that? If not, why not?  Is "feel" real for my gut analysis?  My last round, I thought I was striking the ball very well.... but damn, I lost more strokes with the full swing than any other round this year!  (it was a new course in the rain, and too many hazards were in the wrong place!! But I struck the ball solidly )

[iacas]

My only comment is if you're going to track putts, why not just look up exact Strokes Gained info from the PGA stats? Just compare your putts exactly to those numbers, rather than group them. Either way is fine, as it just gives you an overall sense.

I second that. Unless you just don't want to be precise measuring each of your putts.

FYI: I'm skeptical about comparing "Strokes Gained" for our courses against the "Strokes Gained" numbers from Mark Broadie, because they play tougher green complexes. From my initial analysis spreadsheet, my short game seems only a couple strokes worse than the pros.... but that's because my 20yard shot from the rough is FAR easier than a pro's 20yard shot from the rough.

Ah, but our course conditions aren't as good either. Greens are bumpier and slower. Rough less well maintained. Bunkers especially are far, FAR better on the PGA Tour. Plus, many of the Tour's courses ARE courses we can play. So I don't know if I buy into that really.

[alleztom]

Thanks to all for the responses, it's reassuring to see I'm if not on the right track I'm on a reasonable track.

Quote:

At the big picture, it seems you're dissatisfied with the "out of the box" solutions available- either the cost or the lack of flexibility or lack of relevance of their analysis to what you are wanting to find out.  A combination of all of those factors has driven me to go DIY also.

With regards to this what would an 'in the box' type solution be? I'm happy to track this for myself but if there's a better way? I'm not a particularly experienced golfer so if anyone has a list or another thread where I could find these to at lease compare them to what I'm doing

[Unkynd]

On the subject of handicapping individual parts of your game, the Arccos Golf technology (which I own) does a pretty good job of it.  I think the Game Golf stuff (which I don't own), also does it.  No clue what sort of formulas they use to determine it, but it seems to be pretty accurate.

[RandallT]

Thanks to all for the responses, it's reassuring to see I'm if not on the right track I'm on a reasonable track.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RandallT

At the big picture, it seems you're dissatisfied with the "out of the box" solutions available- either the cost or the lack of flexibility or lack of relevance of their analysis to what you are wanting to find out.  A combination of all of those factors has driven me to go DIY also.

With regards to this what would an 'in the box' type solution be? I'm happy to track this for myself but if there's a better way? I'm not a particularly experienced golfer so if anyone has a list or another thread where I could find these to at lease compare them to what I'm doing

I've been meaning to respond for a while, but keep thinking I needed more time than I had at the moment.  As mentioned above by @Unkynd , GameGolf and Arccos have modules that can analyze portions of your game. I used to use GolfShot, and they also had a companion product for instruction that uses the data from GolfShot to tell you where you stand with different aspects of your game (drives, approaches, short game, putts). I've looked at a bunch, and they mostly seem pretty good (FourSum, SwingBySwing, GolfLogic, etc). I think the apps get better each year, and I'll bet that before long they will kind of converge and all provide much the same analysis.

For me, I got interested in my own "home-grown" spreadsheet just from reading about the strokes gained analysis that was going on at the PGA level. I wanted to see if I could work up my own simple analysis by comparing my shots to the numbers provided to us by Mark Broadie/PGA.

I'm not saying it's what you should do, but just wanted to let you know what is possible, in case you wanted to head that direction. It's a fun exercise, but it'll take some of your time to do it right. I'll give you a glimpse into it below, and I'll divide it up into the data input, the data output, and a just little under the hood.

There's actually a ton more, but I've promised @iacas not to publish any proprietary information from the book "Lowest Score Wins" (or LSW, upon which some of the spreadsheet is based).  I have excluded all of that (but iacas should feel free to delete anything I have published here that I may have inadvertently displayed).  My own feeling is that LSW provides a great set of benchmarks against which we should compare ourselves. Buy that book and see how you compare against those benchmarks. (No I'm not a paid consultant!!)

That's my data entry screen. Fairly simple.

1. Date and course name.

2. An entry for each shot's distance and lie.

The first entry for each hole is the yardage of the hole followed by a "t"

The following shots for each hole use "f" for fairway. "r" for rough. "s" for sand. "g" for green (putt). If you take a penalty shot, use a "p", and if you are hitting out of trouble to just get back into the fairway, use a "c" for recovery, since the "r" was taken.

Much of what you see above is actually calculated:

- the score

- par for each hole (simple calculation based on yardage of tee- apt to be wrong for odd holes).

- strokes gained for each hole.

- Putts/Fairways Hit/GIR for each hole.

Bottom line, if you take a shot, you simply enter the distance from the hole and the lie (if it's on the green, you estimate in feet. All else in yards).

The output is broken down into Overview,  Tee Shots, Approaches, Short Game, and Putting

OVERVIEW:

A simple summary of which areas give you the most opportunity to improve!

All the basic stuff:

TEE SHOTS:

I like to see how I scored after hitting the fairway vs. missing the fairway.

In the chart below, I hit the fairway 6.4 per round, and then score 3.8 over par for those. When I miss the fairway 7.4 times per round, that leads to 8.4 over par.

In my 69 tee shots, I've lost 23 strokes! Yikes.

APPROACHES:

A cool bubble diagram showing you your average score from various ranges, and the size of the bubble shows your proximity (in feet).  The pros are in green and data is from PGA stats.

This chart analyzes the importance of hitting GIR or near GIR (nGIR). You can see how many times per round you achieve each, and the resulting actual scores from each.  As you see, I need more nGIR, as that's costing me +11 per round.

SHORT GAME

Self-explanatory

PUTTING

This is a snapshot of the codes involved for every distance and lie. It's all available (I think publicly). But the key in the calculations is finding out the expect value to hole out from that distance and lie. The rest of the spreadsheet basically follows from this.

Here is an ugly tab that does lots of calculations, if interested. It actually stretches way to the left with tons of columns, but I'm just showing the first page. This is all derived from the data entry page show at the top:

[dennyjones]

WOW.   That's a labor of love.   You put some time into that.   Impressive.

[RandallT]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RandallT

I did not in any way account for his different definition of short game. I strictly log the lie and distance of every single shot of mine, comparing to the resulting lie and distance.  Then calculate the strokes gained or lost for that shot.  My thought is that if he defines short game as 100yd, that would be irrelevant. I simply categorize my shots that are inside 60yds, but off the green. For those shots, I lost only 1 stroke per round- even though I had 15 opportunities per round. The 60yds is arbitrary, of course, but I could've picked anything without needing to adjust his tables, right?

Very interesting stuff in bold, as always. I've dabbled in identifying and reporting on "flubs" but haven't completed the thought or implementation. That might match his "awful shots" idea. I'll read into GIRP, but that sounds a lot like nGIR.

I think that yes, the pro game is quite different than the one I play so direct comparison is tough for the reasons mentioned, but I've heard there will be "strokes gained" numbers (expected shots to hole out) released for different handicaps, so I've built my spreadsheet with an eye toward the ability to swap in the comparison you want to make (pro/80/90/100 player).  Hopefully those numbers are forthcoming someday.

Fair enough. I thought you might be comparing to his summaries / analyses in which case the relative contributions to scoring from the different 'categories' may differ from his.

How did you deal with inside 10 yards on short game...interpolate off the existing curve or just use the putting numbers?

I'm not familiar with it, but I expect that as others have said that GIRP is similar to nGIR. The nice thing about GIRP (which may also be true for nGIR) is that you can calculate a very nice sigmoid curve (demonstrating the learning curve) for it through all HCPs and because it happens less frequently with low HCPs is actually a more ideal measure (more accurate indicator because it happens more) for mid to high HCP progression to better scoring than GIR.

My GIRP, GIR, and Par-3 GoFIR percentages are all aligned about 7 HCP points below my actual HCP underscoring my issues with putting skill and short game consistency (very high # of 'awful' short game shots) which I've been working to reduce.

I am also hopeful that he will release some amateur tables as well...at least for scratch on a 'typical course', which is generally the benchmark we are comparing ourselves to, but 80/90/100-shooter would round out the picture helpfully.

Hi @natureboy . I just wanted to answer you here, as I have a lot of info about my stats tracking here.  My solution is always keep things as simple as possible, so you might laugh to see my "design choices" with the spreadsheet if you ask more questions. Again, I'm not trying to say that my choices are the right ones, or that everyone should copy them. I'm just mostly fiddling around as an exercise to see what can be done to see if it's of use to me (and perhaps others if they're interested). I chase some blind alleys sometimes and throw it out. Some directions I pursue work out better than others.

Here was the chart I used (I'm not intending to hijack the thread and turn it into a Broadie strokes gained thread!):

To be honest, it was several months ago, so I do not recall exactly what I've done in every situation where I was faced with a question, but I just went back and looked how I "interpolated" Broadie for very close short game shots.

I used a mixture of following the trend, and adjusting to what I thought made sense. To me, his numbers at 20yards look so high, but who am I to argue with him? For 10yds, I used numbers much closer to 2.0 for the fairway, since it seems pros could get up and down fairly easily from 10yds.

For the rough, I kept the numbers more along the trend I saw in the data, but in hindsight, I think I could put more thought into those. I've been annoyed that my short game appears better than I think it really is, and I believe my lookup numbers for these short game shots need adjustments.

For what it's worth, 21 of my 76 short game opportunities this year have been

I'll put some more thought into this now, as I think you are onto something.

I'll also take a look at GIRP and the other stuff you mentioned. It's been busy here with family stuff, but it's always fun to revisit the golf stats stuff when I have a specific probably to dive into. The short game numbers have definitely revealed a possible issue after logging in my 5 rounds this year!

[saevel25]

I used a mixture of following the trend, and adjusting to what I thought made sense. To me, his numbers at 20yards look so high, but who am I to argue with him? For 10yds, I used numbers much closer to 2.0 for the fairway, since it seems pros could get up and down fairly easily from 10yds.

I'll also take a look at GIRP and the other stuff you mentioned. It's been busy here with family stuff, but it's always fun to revisit the golf stats stuff when I have a specific probably to dive into. The short game numbers have definitely revealed a possible issue after logging in my 5 rounds this year!

Lets say you are at 25 yards.

PGA Tour players from 20-30 yards, proximity to the hole = 9'2"

PGA Tour players putting from 10' = 40%

Strokes gained putting from 10' = 1.61

Lets say PGA Tour players don't duff the shot or what not. You add one stroke to that and you get 2.61 on average from 25 yards. Nice how that works out like that ;)

If you are 2.0 from the fairway, 20 yards out. That means you get up and down 100% of the time?

2.0 - 1 stroke from the fairway = 1.0 strokes on putting. You must hit it on average inside of 3 FT from the pin.

Not to sound harsh, I highly doubt it. I think your perception is off on what you are doing.

PGA Tour players end up 6-7 FT from 20 yards from the fairway.

[Patch]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patch

I just keep a short game handicap, and it is around 2.45 right now. So 2 shots (tee & fairway), plus my SGH 2.45 equals out to 4.45. 4.45 X 18 holes = 80.1 on average.  I use to keep all kinds of stats, and found it just too much to think about. I made up my own score card, that makes keeping things easier to understand, and went on from there.

Can you elaborate on that?

If you miss the green and take 3 strokes to get down, you consider that a "3" for your short game handicap for that hole? You give no weight to the fact that your full swing is the reason you missed the green to begin with?

Yes, if I miss the green in regulation, then of course I did something wrong with either my tee shot, and/or approach shot. Like a lot of other golfers, that's the type of game I play, on some holes. All my short game handicap tells me is how well my recovery game is working, for the greens I miss in regulation. When I get a GIR, on a hole, then that hole does not factor into my SGH, even though it effects my overall score for 18 holes. It's not a foolproof method, but only a stat that interest me. I read some where that when a pro misses the green their SGH is around 2.0 - 2.25 so this is a way for me compare my short game to theirs. In fact it's the only part of my game I can compare to theirs.

For me, the other part of this handicap is that I practice my short game probably twice, maybe three times as much as I do my longer shots. Time restraints, and practice areas available is the reason for that. I just simply rely too much on my short game to score well.

Some golfers also include all their putts, in addition to their extra chips, and pitches when they miss a green. This to me is a more realistic SGH. An example of this might be 30 putts, plus 10 extra chips/pitches divided by 18 would equal 2.20. In my case I just want to know how I did on the holes I missed in regulation.