Jump to content
IGNORED

Being Consistent


rfeight
Note: This thread is 2798 days old. We appreciate that you found this thread instead of starting a new one, but if you plan to post here please make sure it's still relevant. If not, please start a new topic. Thank you!

Recommended Posts

For those of you that have broke 80, how did you gain the consistency required to do it?

I've been struggling with being consistent. I was in the 80's regularly and was really trying close to breaking 80 when my game fell apart and now I'm struggling to break 90. My drive was the first thing to go, followed by distance on my approach shot. My flop shot has been killing my while the pitch and run works to my favor. But I need to be able to course correct when things go south and create a consistent swing. Thoughts?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

Practice more. And practice with a plan. My guess is that you're not practicing as much as you were when you were shooting in the 80s regularly.

Julia

:callaway:  :cobra:    :seemore:  :bushnell:  :clicgear:  :adidas:  :footjoy:

Spoiler

Driver: Callaway Big Bertha w/ Fubuki Z50 R 44.5"
FW: Cobra BiO CELL 14.5 degree; 
Hybrids: Cobra BiO CELL 22.5 degree Project X R-flex
Irons: Cobra BiO CELL 5 - GW Project X R-Flex
Wedges: Cobra BiO CELL SW, Fly-Z LW, 64* Callaway PM Grind.
Putter: 48" Odyssey Dart

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

The first time I ever broke 80 I was playing with one of the usual suspects and a friend of ours who had decided to take up the game.  I took a double, on the first, and went on to card a 77.  The guy familiar with my game said "I guess you were so busy trying to set a good example for ----- that you forgot to hit bad shots."  

In der bag:
Cleveland Hi-Bore driver, Maltby 5 wood, Maltby hybrid, Maltby irons and wedges (23 to 50) Vokey 59/07, Cleveland Niblick (LH-42), and a Maltby mallet putter.                                                                                                                                                 "When the going gets tough...it's tough to get going."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

One thing that helped me improve my game was to take an honest look at my round. I would write out every hole and what happened. Something like this:

Hole 1 [] - bogey - driver to right rough. 50deg from 120 to front bunker. 58 to 15ft. 2 putts (15,1)

I did this for about 4 rounds and immediately started to see some common themes. Here is a direct example out of my file from 2014 for the first hole that paved the way to me dropping at least 5 shots per round.

Hole 1 [] - bogey - driver to right rough. 50deg from 120 to front bunker. 58 to 15ft. 2 putts (15,1)

Hole 1 [gir] - par - driver to right rough. 58deg from 92 to 20ftt. 2 putts (20,3)

Hole 1 [gir] - bogey - driver to left bunker. PW from 128 to 60ft long. 3 putts (60,7, 1)

Hole 1 [fw,gir] - par - crap driver in fairway. 9 iron from 140 to 22ft. 2 putts (22,1)

I remember when I wrote that last one out kind of laughing. That hole felt easy to make a par on once I was on the fairway. I would stand on the tee and be scared of the water right, or the OB left, or the bunkers left, or the cart path (can't count how many times I hit it). Here is the hole

hole1.png

I then decided that trying to hit a driver over the bunker on the left was stupid. I started hitting a hybrid to just short of that bunker. ie: the fattest part of the fairway. I was around 70% pars on that hole. The previous year I was probably something like 40%. It went from my most hated hole to one I enjoyed as it was low stress. A hybrid would never go in the water. Longest I would have in to the pin would be a 7 iron. If the pin was back right I would aim for middle back of the green and call it good.

I did this for the remainder of the year. I ended up hitting driver less. About 5 times less. Which, surprise surprise, saved me 5 shots per round :) As the season progressed I dropped my handicap from about 8ish to 4. I have stuck around the 4 since then. I still shot the odd 92, almost always on a course I have never played before. If I have played the course I generally expect to be in the 70s.

Now with the advent of things like GameGolf, Sky Golf, and Arccos, you can pretty easily get this information and figure out where you are throwing shots away. 

 

Ian

Link to comment
Share on other sites


48 minutes ago, IanW said:

One thing that helped me improve my game was to take an honest look at my round. I would write out every hole and what happened. Something like this:

Hole 1 [] - bogey - driver to right rough. 50deg from 120 to front bunker. 58 to 15ft. 2 putts (15,1)

I did this for about 4 rounds and immediately started to see some common themes. Here is a direct example out of my file from 2014 for the first hole that paved the way to me dropping at least 5 shots per round.

Hole 1 [] - bogey - driver to right rough. 50deg from 120 to front bunker. 58 to 15ft. 2 putts (15,1)

Hole 1 [gir] - par - driver to right rough. 58deg from 92 to 20ftt. 2 putts (20,3)

Hole 1 [gir] - bogey - driver to left bunker. PW from 128 to 60ft long. 3 putts (60,7, 1)

Hole 1 [fw,gir] - par - crap driver in fairway. 9 iron from 140 to 22ft. 2 putts (22,1)

I remember when I wrote that last one out kind of laughing. That hole felt easy to make a par on once I was on the fairway. I would stand on the tee and be scared of the water right, or the OB left, or the bunkers left, or the cart path (can't count how many times I hit it). Here is the hole

hole1.png

I then decided that trying to hit a driver over the bunker on the left was stupid. I started hitting a hybrid to just short of that bunker. ie: the fattest part of the fairway. I was around 70% pars on that hole. The previous year I was probably something like 40%. It went from my most hated hole to one I enjoyed as it was low stress. A hybrid would never go in the water. Longest I would have in to the pin would be a 7 iron. If the pin was back right I would aim for middle back of the green and call it gIood.

I did this for the remainder of the year. I ended up hitting driver less. About 5 times less. Which, surprise surprise, saved me 5 shots per round :) As the season progressed I dropped my handicap from about 8ish to 4. I have stuck around the 4 since then. I still shot the odd 92, almost always on a course I have never played before. If I have played the course I generally expect to be in the 70s.

Now with the advent of things like GameGolf, Sky Golf, and Arccos, you can pretty easily get this information and figure out where you are throwing shots away. 

 

4

Excellent strategy. Thank you for sharing. I've struggled also with a consistent driver. But your idea of mapping the course for club strategy and staying out of trouble is something I've always wondered about. This winter I'm going to take a serious look at my league course and start a strategy book on playing holes. Thanks for sharing. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

1 hour ago, rfeight said:

For those of you that have broke 80, how did you gain the consistency required to do it?

I've been struggling with being consistent. I was in the 80's regularly and was really trying close to breaking 80 when my game fell apart and now I'm struggling to break 90. My drive was the first thing to go, followed by distance on my approach shot. My flop shot has been killing my while the pitch and run works to my favor. But I need to be able to course correct when things go south and create a consistent swing. Thoughts?

You don't need a flop shot to shoot in the 70's.  For most of us it's a very low percentage shot, and is more likely hurt your score than help it.  I used to shoot 70's several times a season (my PB  is a one over par 73), and I've never used a flop.  

The best thing you can do to begin with is to examine your fundamentals - grip, stance, ball position, takeaway.  If anything is off there it can be very difficult to get in the right position at the top to start your downswing on a good plane.

  • Upvote 1

Rick

"He who has the fastest cart will never have a bad lie."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

1 minute ago, Fourputt said:

You don't need a flop shot to shoot in the 70's.  For most of us it's a very low percentage shot, and is more likely hurt your score than help it.  I used to shoot 70's several times a season (my PB  is a one over par 73), and I've never used a flop.  

The best thing you can do to begin with is to examine your fundamentals - grip, stance, ball position, takeaway.  If anything is off there it can be very difficult to get in the right position at the top to start your downswing on a good plane.

 

I think I miss spoke about the flop. I mean anything inside 100 yards. Particularly those pesky 20 to 30 yarders. 

Having said that, I know that the fundamentals is the reason my drive is so inconsistent. I have a pretty good idea if it goes straight and peels right that my clubface was open. If it starts left and peels right, I was over the top and/or open club face. But for some reason I have trouble consistently re-creating the same swing with my driver. Any thoughts? Or good routines/sites for the fundamentals? Thanks for the reply.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

3 minutes ago, rfeight said:

I think I miss spoke about the flop. I mean anything inside 100 yards. Particularly those pesky 20 to 30 yarders. 

Having said that, I know that the fundamentals is the reason my drive is so inconsistent. I have a pretty good idea if it goes straight and peels right that my clubface was open. If it starts left and peels right, I was over the top and/or open club face. But for some reason I have trouble consistently re-creating the same swing with my driver. Any thoughts? Or good routines/sites for the fundamentals? Thanks for the reply.

If it goes straight and peels right then your clubface wasn't open. Your clubface was 'straight'. Your swing path was outside to in.

Clubface dictates start direction and clubpath dictates curvature (roughly speaking).

Slap up a myswing thread. You will likely get feedback that is more helpful there :)

Edited by IanW

Ian

Link to comment
Share on other sites


That might help my strategy for fixing my swing mid-round. i.e. focusing on grip or closing my stance. 

I'll add a myswing thread. That's a great idea. Maybe I'll get it recorded before league tonight at the range..... what a game! Thanks everyone.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

For me breaking 80, it was the short game and putting getting consistent that allowed me to do that. Not so much a ball striking thing. Get up and down a couple more times a round, and drop a couple more putts, and those 85's turn into 78's. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites


An excellent thread...

 

  • Upvote 1

In David's bag....

Driver: Titleist 910 D-3;  9.5* Diamana Kai'li
3-Wood: Titleist 910F;  15* Diamana Kai'li
Hybrids: Titleist 910H 19* and 21* Diamana Kai'li
Irons: Titleist 695cb 5-Pw

Wedges: Scratch 51-11 TNC grind, Vokey SM-5's;  56-14 F grind and 60-11 K grind
Putter: Scotty Cameron Kombi S
Ball: ProV1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

For me, when I was breaking 80 most of the the time, I never screwed around with my swing. Even when I had a run of bad scores, I just kept telling myself I had the swing to break 80, and didn't worry to much about it. The idea of breaking down my swing to find the problem that was costing 3 or 4 strokes, really never occurred to me. 

All I ever thought about were my own fundamentals. A consistant address position, grip, take away, position at the top, and good club face position at impact was all I needed. Even to today I have made it even simpler on myself. I only think about my take away, position at the top,  and club face at impact. When I get those three things right, I playing good golf at this stage of my life.

  • Upvote 1

In My Bag:
A whole bunch of Tour Edge golf stuff...... :beer:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

17 hours ago, rfeight said:

Excellent strategy. Thank you for sharing. I've struggled also with a consistent driver. But your idea of mapping the course for club strategy and staying out of trouble is something I've always wondered about. This winter I'm going to take a serious look at my league course and start a strategy book on playing holes. Thanks for sharing. 

 

 

18 hours ago, IanW said:

One thing that helped me improve my game was to take an honest look at my round. I would write out every hole and what happened. Something like this:

Hole 1 [] - bogey - driver to right rough. 50deg from 120 to front bunker. 58 to 15ft. 2 putts (15,1)

I did this for about 4 rounds and immediately started to see some common themes. Here is a direct example out of my file from 2014 for the first hole that paved the way to me dropping at least 5 shots per round.

Hole 1 [] - bogey - driver to right rough. 50deg from 120 to front bunker. 58 to 15ft. 2 putts (15,1)

Hole 1 [gir] - par - driver to right rough. 58deg from 92 to 20ftt. 2 putts (20,3)

Hole 1 [gir] - bogey - driver to left bunker. PW from 128 to 60ft long. 3 putts (60,7, 1)

Hole 1 [fw,gir] - par - crap driver in fairway. 9 iron from 140 to 22ft. 2 putts (22,1)

I remember when I wrote that last one out kind of laughing. That hole felt easy to make a par on once I was on the fairway. I would stand on the tee and be scared of the water right, or the OB left, or the bunkers left, or the cart path (can't count how many times I hit it). Here is the hole

hole1.png

I then decided that trying to hit a driver over the bunker on the left was stupid. I started hitting a hybrid to just short of that bunker. ie: the fattest part of the fairway. I was around 70% pars on that hole. The previous year I was probably something like 40%. It went from my most hated hole to one I enjoyed as it was low stress. A hybrid would never go in the water. Longest I would have in to the pin would be a 7 iron. If the pin was back right I would aim for middle back of the green and call it good.

I did this for the remainder of the year. I ended up hitting driver less. About 5 times less. Which, surprise surprise, saved me 5 shots per round :) As the season progressed I dropped my handicap from about 8ish to 4. I have stuck around the 4 since then. I still shot the odd 92, almost always on a course I have never played before. If I have played the course I generally expect to be in the 70s.

Now with the advent of things like GameGolf, Sky Golf, and Arccos, you can pretty easily get this information and figure out where you are throwing shots away. 

 

 

Golf is a mystery. Yesterday I started this post because I'd played my worst rounds of the year prior to taking a couple trips two weeks ago. I had a little angst about playing in league last night so I thought I'd post. Then I went out and shot a 40 complete with 3 different 3 putts. 

IanW I used your strategy on this hole that's plagued e all year. It's a long par 5 that has a very narrow fairway entrance from the tee box. I've been in the trees on the right many times, usually adding 2 strokes minimum because of the rough or penalties. Yesterday I hit my 5 iron off the tee and landed safely on the right side of the fairway 160 out. I could've made par if I'd just had more distance on my 2nd or 3rd shot. Anyway, here's my round

http://www.gamegolf.com/player/rfeight/round/1070702

 

hawk 15.png

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

Smart, consistent practice.

Higher priority focus on the short game.

Good course management.

 

That's my plan, at least.

 

BamaWade

Wade         --         "Thaaat's CRUSHED!"


Driver:  Ping G400 LST 8.5°
FWs/Hybs:  Callaway BB Steelhead III 3w; TM R15 17° & 21°
Irons:  Mizuno JPX825
Wedges:  Cleveland Rotex 2.0 54° & 60°
Putter:  Odyssey 2-ball

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

1 hour ago, natureboy said:

The architect clearly favors a draw off the tee on this hole, maybe even 3 draws.

 Now that you mention it, you are correct. I have been known to draw it intentionally occasionally. I may have to work on it just for this hole. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

Since Tueday I've play 4 rounds of 18 and broke 90 every time. See http://www.gamegolf.com/player/rfeight. Very few duffed shots with some miss hits that went inline, but didn't have the distance. Some 3 putts, some penalty shots. Aside from penalty shots, Game golf says I could gain 6, almost 7 shots on short game and putting and another 2.8 on the approach shot against +5 handicaps... which would get me below 80. It just seems insurmountable. 

How can one break 80 with an average drive of 218 and my next longest club is 177 with the 3 wood. I feel like I'm missing a club length. Should I be looking into clubs, or lessons? I feel like I need some extra length some times to get a par on par 5s and long par 4s. Thoughts?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

14 minutes ago, rfeight said:

Since Tueday I've play 4 rounds of 18 and broke 90 every time. See http://www.gamegolf.com/player/rfeight. Very few duffed shots with some miss hits that went inline, but didn't have the distance. Some 3 putts, some penalty shots. Aside from penalty shots, Game golf says I could gain 6, almost 7 shots on short game and putting and another 2.8 on the approach shot against +5 handicaps... which would get me below 80. It just seems insurmountable. 

How can one break 80 with an average drive of 218 and my next longest club is 177 with the 3 wood. I feel like I'm missing a club length. Should I be looking into clubs, or lessons? I feel like I need some extra length some times to get a par on par 5s and long par 4s. Thoughts?

Maybe what you need is to move up a tee box?

  • Upvote 1

Rick

"He who has the fastest cart will never have a bad lie."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Awards, Achievements, and Accolades

Note: This thread is 2798 days old. We appreciate that you found this thread instead of starting a new one, but if you plan to post here please make sure it's still relevant. If not, please start a new topic. Thank you!

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


  • Want to join this community?

    We'd love to have you!

    Sign Up
  • TST Partners

    TourStriker PlaneMate
    Golfer's Journal
    ShotScope
    The Stack System
    FlightScope Mevo
    Direct: Mevo, Mevo+, and Pro Package.

    Coupon Codes (save 10-15%): "IACAS" for Mevo/Stack, "IACASPLUS" for Mevo+/Pro Package, and "THESANDTRAP" for ShotScope.
  • Popular Now

  • Posts

    • This is pretty much how I look at it.  I understand there are times when the piece of mind has value. I think over the long haul I'm money ahead by never buying the extended warrantee. Hell, What do I know? I went to Ch!cago PubIic SchooIs. 
    • Wordle 1,013 4/6 🟩⬜🟨⬜🟨 🟩⬜🟩🟩⬜ 🟩⬜🟩🟩⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
    • Wordle 1,013 3/6* 🟨⬜⬜⬜🟨 🟩⬜🟩🟩⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
    • On my car I got the extended power train warranty. I do read the fine print most of the time. Though at now 37, my eyes aren’t what they were 10 years ago.    The problem with most of these extended warranties on electronics and appliances is you don’t register the warranty with the place you buy the warranty from, which I’ve always found strange. Unless it’s GameStop then you know Alina drops her Switch in the next two years and the screen cracks they’ll replace it. No questions asked.    You buy a slow cooker at Walmart for $50 and the extended warranty is say $6, you have to go through a third party to register your product for the warranty, and it’s pretty damn annoying. Target is the same way. Anything you buy the extended protection on you have to go through a third party.    Why do retailers go through a “broker” for warranties? Because they don’t wanna deal with it? They make me talk to someone from another country, that I can barely understand, when I need my warranty fulfilled.   Sorry for the rant.
    • You may be able to find a regular flex Blueboard on the second hand market. I’m little more than half your age so I swing a shaft that launches pretty low so I don’t have a lot of experience with Regular flex (other than when I try to hit it I miss way to the left).    There are other shafts, such as the newer Ping Alta that I’ve heard good things about. And one that no one talks about. The Jupiter shaft. You can get this shaft for a $100 with a grip and your Ping adapter installed. I was talking to the golf manager at Dick’s Sporting Goods here and he has one in his driver and has nothing but good things to say about it. I thought about getting one for my Paradym Triple Diamond to play it a little shorter, but haven’t pulled the trigger yet.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

Welcome to TST! Signing up is free, and you'll see fewer ads and can talk with fellow golf enthusiasts! By using TST, you agree to our Terms of Use, our Privacy Policy, and our Guidelines.

The popup will be closed in 10 seconds...