The Importance of a Trouble Shot

[rehmwa]

6 minutes ago, iacas said:

The opposite is true: less loft makes it easier to tilt the spin axis.

I hear you and that's a given, but I have to swing easier since it's a longer club and I don't want to send it way past,, and it seems I just can't get the reaction I'd like when I'm....'tentative' about it....any hints?  (time to practice hooded swings?)

edit:  nevermind - I jsut read the rest of your response and enough is in there for me to figure it out.....

Edited October 12, 2017 by rehmwa

[billchao]

7 minutes ago, iacas said:

Because I wanted to get up the hill, and hook it, and by playing the ball back in my stance I could do both.

Hitting a shot like this too low makes judging the flight distance far trickier because the landing angle is so much flatter.

A 15% change in power changes the landing location and makes the runout far more difficult to predict than a higher lofted shot.

That makes a lot of sense to me. This is exactly the reason I don't chip greenside with a 7-iron or a hybrid; never thought to apply that reasoning to longer shots.

I get into the woods and I tend to just focus on hitting the ball low and I automatically pull a lower-lofted club.

11 minutes ago, iacas said:

You can't see the green, or the mound behind the green, or even the base of the trees that are farther up the hill and right of the green… and that's a photo taken from eye level. It's probably 15' uphill over the 15-20 yards.

D'oh, I think I misunderstood what you were saying. Yes, I can see there is a hill in front of you.

[sjduffers]

I would have gone through the window marked in red, punching low with either a 6 or 7 iron, trying to hook it a bit but also leaving it short of the bunker on the right (so say 100 yards or so?). Going through that opening does not seem too hard to achieve though, with only 23-30 yards to go to keep it low enough?

[RandallT]

1 hour ago, billchao said:

That makes a lot of sense to me. This is exactly the reason I don't chip greenside with a 7-iron or a hybrid; never thought to apply that reasoning to longer shots.

Yah I flagged that post with the graph of the trajectories as informative. I don't think of myself as a total idiot, but that concept hadn't been obvious to me. Kinda eye-opening.

[Buckeyebowman]

22 hours ago, colin007 said:

My 3 iron is a SGI that doesn't match the rest of my irons, but that's because it's my low-get-outta-trouble-club. I have great trouble keeping a high lofted club low, and just as much difficulty turning it over.

My go-to escape shot is a low screaming cut from the right trees.

This occurred to me after I posted. Hybrids aren't the best clubs for keeping a shot low! I thought that if the course you're playing calls for it, and you have space in the bag, your set makeup might allow you to carry a "traditional" long iron that you could use for a trouble club.Something you could fire 2 feet off the ground whenever you wanted to!

[RussUK]

16 hours ago, iacas said:

 

No, that's what the topic is about: even higher handicappers should punch a ball through the gap, with enough to get past the trees and ideally stay short of the bunker. Think of it as a 25-yard chip shot through a fairly (at that distance) large window.

This isn't one of those. The window is relatively large at only 15-20 yards.

You're costing yourself strokes. Every shot has a ton of options. Not just "super risky" or "ultra safe."

 

To be honest Erik im often guilty of talking myself out of a shot and err on the side of caution possibly too much. The way you put it above makes sense and i like the mental image of a long chip shot. That would certainly help in future.

I think it works both ways in strokes as theres those like me who are too cautious and those at are too reckless.  

[colin007]

13 hours ago, Buckeyebowman said:

This occurred to me after I posted. Hybrids aren't the best clubs for keeping a shot low! I thought that if the course you're playing calls for it, and you have space in the bag, your set makeup might allow you to carry a "traditional" long iron that you could use for a trouble club.Something you could fire 2 feet off the ground whenever you wanted to!

This is true, especially if you hit with any kind of negative AoA, the ball will climb fast.

Also, Newton's Fourth Law says, if you try to pitch out sideways to the fairway, you'll hit the only pure shot of the day directly ACROSS the fairway into the opposite trees.

[rehmwa]

Range time yesterday, just tried a 9i hooded draw shot to the 100 yard flag.  Actually worked really smooth and i was surprised at how low I could keep it with that club (my normal issue with getting out of jail is keeping it low enough).  I'll definitely play with these shots more in my practice.

[iacas]

1 hour ago, rehmwa said:

Range time yesterday, just tried a 9i hooded draw shot to the 100 yard flag.  Actually worked really smooth and i was surprised at how low I could keep it with that club (my normal issue with getting out of jail is keeping it low enough).  I'll definitely play with these shots more in my practice.

Like I said, Trouble Shots are only SV②, but they also don't take very long to practice or get good at, and when needed, can save a shot or two each time (high S-Value).

[Big_in_Belgium]

First thought was try to draw/hook a punch 6 iron, starting at the red line and get it as close to the green as possible without ending up in the bunker.
After reading the comments though and not realising how high that hill is, hooking an 8 iron makes more sense. However, that is a shot I not normally try in fear of hitting hit too high.

I will try it on the rang this weekend, see if I can make it work.

[saevel25]

12 minutes ago, Big_in_Belgium said:

First thought was try to draw/hook a punch 6 iron, starting at the red line and get it as close to the green as possible without ending up in the bunker.
After reading the comments though and not realising how high that hill is, hooking an 8 iron makes more sense. However, that is a shot I not normally try in fear of hitting hit too high.

I will try it on the rang this weekend, see if I can make it work.

Unless you sky it, you really have to not hit it at that branch circled in red. You have a pretty big window to hit through.

Even if you catch the branches past that tree on the left, you'll end up with an open shot towards the green. You'll be about 30-40 yards more forward than you'd be in the fairway if you punched out right. Really you just have to get it past that tree on the left side of the opening and I'd say you'd still be better off than punching out right into the fairway.

[Big_in_Belgium]

56 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

Unless you sky it, you really have to not hit it at that branch circled in red. You have a pretty big window to hit through.

Even if you catch the branches past that tree on the left, you'll end up with an open shot towards the green. You'll be about 30-40 yards more forward than you'd be in the fairway if you punched out right. Really you just have to get it past that tree on the left side of the opening and I'd say you'd still be better off than punching out right into the fairway.

Yeah, I get what you're saying, and if I wasn't clear,  I'm never ever pitching it sideways. I feel I can get it through that window every time.
Even if I clip those branches, I'll still be closer than a pitch to the right, as you said.

It's just that as a default, I'll pull my 6 in a situation like this. And maybe that's not the play here.

 

[iacas]

3 hours ago, saevel25 said:

Even if you catch the branches past that tree on the left, you'll end up with an open shot towards the green. You'll be about 30-40 yards more forward than you'd be in the fairway if you punched out right. Really you just have to get it past that tree on the left side of the opening and I'd say you'd still be better off than punching out right into the fairway.

Yep. Even if you hit the ball 25 yards, that window is better than going out sideways/slightly backward.

[Buckeyebowman]

10 hours ago, colin007 said:

This is true, especially if you hit with any kind of negative AoA, the ball will climb fast.

Also, Newton's Fourth Law says, if you try to pitch out sideways to the fairway, you'll hit the only pure shot of the day directly ACROSS the fairway into the opposite trees.

Yeah! Had that happen many times! Left me standing in the trees wondering, "Where did that come from?"

[colin007]

46 minutes ago, Buckeyebowman said:

Yeah! Had that happen many times! Left me standing in the trees wondering, "Where did that come from?"

Usually, these shots are the only ones I hit twenty yards past my target. Oh, and greenside bunkers too. Five foot putts as well.

Slightly OT, but for y'all smart guys, when ona hill like this, do you set up with your stance and shoulders on an up-slope to match the slope of the hill? If so, won't that provide the extra loft to get it up? So a 5 iron will really actually launch like a 7 or 8?

[iacas]

41 minutes ago, colin007 said:

Usually, these shots are the only ones I hit twenty yards past my target. Oh, and greenside bunkers too. Five foot putts as well.

Slightly OT, but for y'all smart guys, when ona hill like this, do you set up with your stance and shoulders on an up-slope to match the slope of the hill? If so, won't that provide the extra loft to get it up? So a 5 iron will really actually launch like a 7 or 8?

The bottom of the hill was flat. I wasn’t on the hill. It was in front of me.

[colin007]

9 hours ago, iacas said:

The bottom of the hill was flat. I wasn’t on the hill. It was in front of me.

Makes sense. Never mind me, lol...

[JonMA1]

I had 4 opportunities to use a right-to-left trouble shot today.

The first was a high draw that started at my alignment towards the bunkers and drew back to the green with a little help from the wind.

A second shot required a low hook to carry the creek and run up to the green, but I hit it just fat enough for it not to carry. Just for grins I dropped another ball and it worked (I was able to play the first ball out of the hazard).

The third opportunity was another low hook that didn't quite make the green but did curve enough to avoid the hazard.

The fourth would have required more curve than I feel comfortable trying. So I instead punched out and hit a soft 70 yard gap wedge to within 7-8 ft of the pin... where I 2-putted for bogey.