"5 Minutes Daily" Practice Challenge 2018-19

[DrMJG 89]

Day 492

More a day of keeping loose than anything specific.

Still, I primarily worked with 6i and 7i to continue to work on keeping the hook at bay. Results were OK but nothing special.  Still felt good after 25 shots.

[Darkfrog 11]

Day 12

Still working on getting a better grip to feel natural so my instincts don’t cause me to revert to my old grip inadvertently. 

Did about 25 slow (40% speed) full driver swings, then 5 wood, then 7 iron.

The grip is feeling more normal now but my hands still try to go back to their old positions.

 

[Shindig 556]

Day 1, let's try this again.  Got to the range this evening, despite having unpacked my mat (my goodness those can be a pain to set up, but the mat is so good it's worth it) at home.  Small bucket, outdoors, off a mat (not my own), focusing on setup and shift.  

[Darkfrog 11]

Day 13

Spent 10 minutes on the practice green working on reading the green with my feet before my round today.

[DrMJG 89]

Day 493

Decided I need to practice trap work!

Used my 56º and 60º in various trap situations from deep sand with green 10 yards away to even deeper sand with the lip directly in front of me.

I could say that all went well, but Santa would have to add me to his naughty list.  

I would say 60% were acceptable but I tended to not get enough spin for the way the shots landed. The runner stayed on the green but left me with very long putts.

 

[Shindig 556]

Day 2.  Drove an hour to get to my home course to play 18 with some friends.  Started poorly:  bogey-bogey-bogey-OB tee shot.  Still had an 85.  Will load GG data later. 

[Darkfrog 11]

Day 14

My right hamstring was rather stiff and sore this morning (must have tweaked it during my round yesterday), so spent a good deal of time stretching this morning to loosen it up. No full swings as I don't want to aggravate the muscle. Just did some indoor putting practice before my commute to work, working on getting putt started on the right line. Turns out I'm pretty decent at this. It's the speed and read parts I need to work on.

[DrMJG 89]

Day 494

Today was primarily a family day, so I was limited to Orange Whip® for 15minutes or stand 20 minutes putting on the mat.

[Shindig 556]

Day 3.  10 minutes of putting after dinner.  Real balls, on a real green, short putts, trying to recreate some shortish missed ones from yesterday. 

[Darkfrog 11]

Day 15

Hamstring still stiff, so just stretching and a bit of indoor putting.

[Shindig 556]

Day 4.  Another ten minutes of post-dinner putting, short putts again.  I need to set up the net indoors and I also need to get a light in that room so I can use it evenings  

[Darkfrog 11]

Day 16

Hamstring seems to be loosening up so felt confident making some full swings. Only went about 40-50% speed with 7-iron, working on finding the center of the club face, which has been a struggle lately (toe strikes).

[Shindig 556]

Day 5.  Set up my net, already had my mat set up.  Shindig's practice room in the new home is good to go -- and it's larger than the last one!

6-iron, full swings (SLOW, but I did a full speed one just to confirm I could), indoors, off a mat, into a net ;  some whiffle balls, a few real ones.  

[Patch 899]

Day 683 continous. It's probably closer to well over 900 days of continuous practice, and/or play, but this thread only goes back to 01/01/18. I don't post here daily, as it's too repetitive for me. I only use 6-8, different practice routines.

Today I hit 40 practice chips from 6' off the reen. 40, 30+/- yard pitches. All these were hit to different pins, from a few different locations. Actually holed out a few.

After the green side stuff, I hit seveal full swing shots out of a bunker with my SW,  7 iron, and 7 metal wood. . Used range balls for this. I don't get many opportunities to to hit out of fair way bunkers. 

After the sand stuff, i finished up with some d-range shots to to different targets as I meandered through my bag of clubs. 

Every practice shot had a purpose, and a specific target was used for all of them. Some I used my preshot rountine on. Others, not so much. I spent alot of time focused on my swing tempo, timing, and speed. I wanted the balls to go consistent distances, per each club/shot I hit. I rely heavily on consistency in my game. Some days are better than others.

I was out early, and probably spent 2+ hours practicing. The weather is great, course conditions are great, and I feel great, so the extended practice time was more of a fun adventure than anything else. I didn't rush things. 

Later on today I will hit some practice putts. Would've done the putting thing this morning, but those greens were being mowed, and pins rearranged. Not a big deal, since my chipping, and putting strokes are identical. I practice one, I am practicing the other. 

[Darkfrog 11]

Day 17

In process of regripping my clubs, so did some putting in my living room with my kids.

[DrMJG 89]

Day 494/495

This is a mea maxima culpa as my computer decided to go down last evening.  My work was the same.

I decided to change the shaft on my 50 wedge last week and Ping returned it on Thursday.  I now have a graphite sr flex as opposed to the steel "wedge shafts" Ping use, at first, on the Glide 2.0.

During warm up swings, after the Orange Whip was used, it did not seem all that different. By the tie I took say 20 swigs with no ball to hit, I began to feel both the slightly lighter weight and a bit of the SR feel.

The true test, especially for this club, was to see if both ball speed and ability to control aim seemed better.

Ball speed shot up 10% from 88 on average to 96.  Yardage went to a consistent 95-110 with no more than 7' off line.  The results were almost exactly the same yesterday and today.  As I use this club as my pitching wedge, the results have been more than pleasing.

More practice will really set this weapon in as I do need to adjust my thoughts to cover a more exacting use of this club.

I suspect I may change my 56 for the same reasons.

[dagolfer18 15]

Back to Day 1

Today I worked on 25-yard pitch shots with my PW, GW, 54 and 58 for about 20 minutes. Distance control was the main focus, but one of the shots I hit with 58 flew a bit too far and actually landed on the lip of the cup on my practice green. Almost a dunk! But successful practice session today. I feel that my short game has been getting a lot better in the past 6 months. It’s also a kind of challenge to see if I can hole one, which is much harder than it sounds. My green has all sorts of undulations, which makes for a nice putting challenge.

[Shindig 556]

Day 6.  A dozen full swings to a practice ball, off a mat, into a net, indoors, with a 7-iron (flight shot).  Slow practice swings first before the slow full swing.