"5 Minutes Daily" Practice Challenge

[Patch]

Day 382

Still pretty damp at the course. Going to give it another day to dry out a little more. I am also hoping the mowers will be put to work today. 

This morning it was a few minutes of indoor (carpet) putting practice. Just stroking, and rolling  the ball over a dime, 18 inches in front of the ball. This to simulate hitting a straight putt, on a chosen line. 

focus was on club face aim, posture, and a square address position. 

In the past, before I started using a coin for an intermediate target, I used a red fire brick for a target when putting indoors. I would use the 4"+/- end of the brick as a rarget, for 3' to 8'  foot putts. The idea was to hit the brick with the ball, with a firm enough stroke, that the ball would return to me. At times, it became a rapid fire type of practice, as I would hit the returning ball before it stopped. 

Edited January 18, 2019 by Patch

[Wjf67]

Day 18, 18 January

1 hour golf lesson working on takeaway and driver set-up and release.

[boogielicious]

Day 104, January 18

Mirror work at the gym focusing on head position at setup, centered hip turn and pitch elbow in the downswing. Follow with some golf specific resistance band work. Hope to do some drill work outside later. 

[DeadMan]

Day 98: Went to a simulator because it was snowing sideways today! Hooray! Anyways, didn't work on anything in particular. I got data to update my shot zones. Hit 20 balls with driver, 3 wood, 4 iron, 7 iron PW, and then hit 5 balls with the rest of my bag except SW and LW to get some preliminary data (only had an hour and a half, so I couldn't do every club in the bag with 20 shots). Driver was a little wild, 4 iron was really wild too. I have the data, but haven't mapped it out yet. Everything else was really tight. I will probably want to recollect driver and 4 iron data closer to the spring, but otherwise, it looked pretty spot on. Pleased that I got a chance to do this.

[JuanTheGolfer]

DAY 418.    Played a round of miniature golf at Evie's Family Golf Center today with my wife.  Does that count for my 5 minutes of practice? LOL!!! BTW, this was the 114th different location we have played.   In addition, I spent a bunch of time working through the three things my coach wants me to improve this quarter.... so LOTS of practice swings with my shortened club in my home office.  

[DrMJG]

Day 186

Very light breeze to the east, lovely weather (clear and 72º at the range)

This was a bit of a continuation from yesterday.  I spent most of my time with my 7i-9i. In terms of loft, the majority of strikes ended up and off as expected.  Many ended up well with the distance expected, though that has dropped off average 8-12 yards shorter than I was doing a month ago.  With the exception of only a few of the shots, my line was good, though only a few would have fallen Ito the rate of full on recovery shots.

Again, the 7i gave the best results, including both the 7i and my 7 i/w. Both consistently ended up fairly straight and 175 yards. 8i got maybe 5-7 yards less.

I treat my 9i as if it were a cross between a pitching wedge and a traditional 9i. While distance was in the neighborhood of 140 or so yards, I was focused on creating a nice high school to eliminate too much roll.

While perfection and nirvana were not around, everything was fairly good.  So I then moved o for a short focus on my wedges (50º, 56º and 60º).  I play them as gap, sand and lob.   did not focus too much at all, just a few swings, with the 56º. Focus today was on a clean strike as close to sweet spot as I could and hitting at a 135 yard green and one about 50-55 yards out.  I was getting a very good feel from the 50º.  Loft was good with some finishing roll that maybe added another 20 yards or so.  The 60º was giving me high lofts and finished 15 feet or so from the gopher hole.  Direction was not too bad, but it is still an area to concentrate on.

[iacas]

Day 339 - January 18, 2019 - Putted against @NatalieB for 15 minutes or so.

[HJJ003]

Day 4:

Spent 5 minutes or so on my trail arm supination in transition. 

[Wjf67]

Day 20, 20 January,

 

Having had a lesson yesterday, I worked on my takeaway, and my release through the ball. Used a 7i, and progressed on to working on my driver.

[Patch]

Day 383

Just a small basket of range balls this morning. Things have dried out pretty well. By Monday we should be back to normal playing conditions for this time of year. 

Did something different today. I found an old practice aid a friend of mine developed a few decades ago. "Golf Flash Cards" he called it. Pretty sure he even recieved a patent on it, and he actually sold a few of them.  Basically the  random card shows a shot that the player tries to duplicate. In my case, I use them for a random club selection, and yardage. Anyone interested in this type of practice, can easily make up their own system with a pack of index cards. 

Focus today was my preshot routine right up to the point of starting my one piece take away.  Some balls were hit tee'd up, and others off the turf. Used 1/2-3/4, and full swings. 

One of the cards was a "driver off the deck".

As always when I am on the driving range, using the various targets, I made up a some what skinny fairway to simulate real fairways when playing. Idea was to keep the ball flights in that made up fairway. 

[boogielicious]

Day 105, January 19 30F

Super Speed work followed by priority piece work outside. Hit 95/101 with the green club. Felt good. 

[iacas]

Day 340 - January 19, 2019 - SuperSpeed work plus a little work with the backswing.

[JuanTheGolfer]

DAY 419    Was out an about relatively early today... at the range by 9:30 and worked for almost 4 hours on drills to help me stay more centered and improve my rotation and impact position.  Had lunch.  Then back at the range for another hour. 

Then went out to the course... it was pretty busy, we played holes 1-5, when we got to the 6th tee there were two groups on the tee, and two in the fairway, so we drove in, and started at hole 1, and were able to play 1-9 without any wait.  I was 5 over on the 14 holes we played - again in really windy conditions..  Not particularly great scoring, though I hit a lot of solid shots, hit 8 GIR....  Finished up at 6 pm in the dark.    Time to rest and repeat!!

[Patch]

Day 384.

More range work this morning. Woke up to one of those perfect desert sw winter mornings. 

Focus was on landing balls in my targeted areas, and everything else that leads up to those successful shots. Stuff like getting my aim point, condition of the lie of the ball, club selection, getting my intermediate target, club face alignment to that intermediate target, stepping into my ball position, body alignment, posture, a quick look at my target area, while making sure I don't see my left shoulder in the picture, and then starting my one piece take away. 

Yeah, I know. Sounds like alot, but in reality, it only takes a second or two, and most of it, I don't  consciously, think about it. There are probably a few more things I do in my preshot routine that I failed to list. Extra things I might do in different situations as needed. 

While purchasing the basket of balls, I saw barrel full of clubs for sale. I saw a 72* LW in there. I asked the club pro If I could hit a few with it. That I didn't want to buy it. He laughingly said to knock myself out. 

After my long swing practice, I did hit a few with it. I failed miserably with it, which was no surprise, since I have had previous expierience with just such a club. Why anyone would make, and market this club is beyond me. Maybe the pros have a need for it.  I graciously returned it to $10 bargain barrel, but only after I ht a few more 6 irons to make I had not screwed up my swing. 

 

[boogielicious]

Day 106, January 20.

Just putting today. Shoveled wet concrete for two hours, so not much chance to hit balls or anything else. 

[DrMJG]

Day 187

As I got ready for my next round tomorrow, I fit in a short session with my coach.  I have developed a bit of a ten to 15 yard and even 20 yard arc of off line in the past few week. And, depending on that distance of the shot, I found myself getting more irritated on the fact that I have hit more than normal out of bonds.

Grip was deemed quite good. As was set-up at the address.  However when we went to the film, I saw the flaw almost as quickly as he did: an outside-in swing path has creeped back in.  We are not talking a wildly-off swing that caused my seemingly 45º-off ones to the right when I came back to golf, nor the odd one to the left the same amount.  The ones now are maybe 10º off the center line of the aim, mostly to the left.     

After looking on what I need to do to bring the sot back to a better finish, it was once again time to bring out the old lightning rods and work on gettin an inside-out swing back into my swing.  Looking at the film it was not that far off so we went through what I need to do to correct it.  But it was enough to close off the blue at impact. BTW, this was mainly the affect with my 5i-7i, and also appeared with the Driver. 

While it was frustrating, I consider this part of the fun of golf, learning how to minimize a problem during the game and then putting it in the past at the range.  

Day 188

Prior teeing off for my Sunday round, I spent about 20 minutes with the Orange Thing and was careful to watch that my swing, even with the torture device was more in-out.  Felt good and the end result was better narrowness in deviation from center.  Not perfect as I hit 3 OB and one went for a swim.  Still even with these penalties, I had a sold round with 3 fewer strokes the other day.

Continuation on the strike being in-out in practice tomorrow. 

[Wjf67]

Day 20, 20 January (wrongly posted yesterday’s update as day 20).

Again following-up on my lesson on Friday, I was in my garage, using my SkyTrak, working on my takeaway and rotating my shoulders through release - with my 8i. I am beginning to see consistent strikes and distances.

I then moved in to my driver, same principles, and again starting to see respectable results.

 Having read many folks in hear refer to TRAIN FOR HOLF LIKE AN OLYMPIAN, I too delivery of a copy yesterday.

 

 

 

[JuanTheGolfer]

DAY 420     A rest day for me.   It was cold and WINDY, so I stayed in...   watched the ESPN special "Tiger Woods - Return of the Roar"  then spent some time in my home office swinging with my shortened club and my Momentus Strength Trainer.  Then listened to a podcast based on some research of "Why Pro Golfers do not make it on the Tour" 

 

[new study] Why pro golfers DO NOT make it on tour

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Learn about the data and insights from a recent study looking at the careers of professional golfers who did not …