phillyk

Through the last couple years, a couple friends have attempted WM Phoenix Open pre-qualifying. So, I knew it was a popular one to try. Prior to the streak above, I would never had thought to try it. But, I got hot, and I had to try. I hadn’t ever played in Arizona and it was on the bucketlist. So, why not? In terms of distances and playing full shots, it was very similar to playing in Eastern WA, which is desert. The greens played remarkably flat and the cups, somehow, seemed/played smaller. I had a 180 and several 90 degree turns in my round. The short of it is, I didn’t make it. I shot a +2, 73. Qualifiers shot -7, 64. I would rate my game today as: Full swing C-, Short game D, and Putting B+. Despite the misses putting, distance and my reads were good, it just didn’t drop for me. Full swing, I had to resort to my B swing after several holes. My miss has been a flippy hook. My second hole had a very unfortunate bounce to put me OB, so 2 strokes gone right away. My B swing kept things straight enough, but obviously not where I’d want it to be. The course played very short (6800yds today played like 6100yds at my course in WA). My wedges are typically very on point, but I hesitated too much because of the swing. Left myself too far away on putts. Missed enough greens. Whenever possible, if I missed the green, I putted and it was successful. The times I had to use short game, I failed. The yips came running back. Luckily, I only needed these yippy shots three times, but those were three shots I lost. I did finish on a high note like I have before. Hit a 400yd drive on my last hole (570yds down wind, had 145yd left), soft lipped for eagle, and made birdie. I have 3 big takeaways from this. One, I drink too much beer 😆. Seriously, these guys take their body and well being very seriously. Two, I met a lot of cool people. Canadian PGA Tour, Latino PGA Tour, and more. These guys are grinding to get into these events. I met and played my practice round with a retired 14yr MLB catcher who played with the Yankees (very nice guy and super laid back), and he was sponsoring a couple of the local pros in their hometown. Three, I have the skills to play this game at the elite level. I am not consistent enough, yet. There is nothing they did, that I didn’t and can not do. The guys winning just do it more often. I love what I do. I love teaching/coaching and learning as much as I can in the game. IDK, but I really want to try more of these in the future. I didn’t expect to walk away feeling like this is something I can do. I didn’t want to fail, I guess. But, more, I didn’t want to feel close. I have to and want to take myself more seriously, competitively. Onto the next…

Especially some of the best golfers. I’m at a qualifier where a mini tour player willingly smoked it over the heads of beginner golfers to pass them in a practice round. It’s not the first time I’ve been in a group that they did it either. Who’s job is it to enforce etiquette? Parents or the golf course? In every single Get Golf Ready class I instruct, I talk etiquette and pace of play. The golf courses must hire and put policies in place to uphold etiquette. Outside of the course, lets push it hard!

Tyrrell Hatton joins Rahm along with Caleb Surratt and Keiran Vincent. Rumor from normal twitter sources put Hovland in talks. Certainly, with an open door on European Ryder Cup side, I’d expect more people to go. Only time will tell.

Played again yesterday and yet again, another 65. I was actually -7 through 11 holes but got cold. I also broke my no bogey streak. I went 41 holes without a bogey. Not bad! So through 4 rounds, I’m -32. I’ll try to keep it going!

Students should never have to dictate how a lesson goes. If that’s the case, the instructor failed. The three categories by Jim Mclean may be true for a large portion of instructors (I don’t know) but definitely not all. I see all 3 of those as failure. I’ve always said my success is not based on just how much I know, but how well I can connect with the students. I need to know the foundations and biomechanics, of course. But the job is to help the student be successful. I need to know how you think and learn. Heck, before the lesson, the instructor should be asking you questions to see which of the following or more work: video analysis, training aids, launch monitor, 4D aids (lime GEARs), or just tell me what to do. I don't expect a light bulb moment in every lesson, but I hope to be close in every one Short answer, if you have to be the star of the lesson in the way the article describes, I’m sorry.

Well played another 18 today. Brought my kid along even. I hit ball well enough tee to green. Didn’t feel quite as tight, but I’m pretty sure I was 16/18 GIR (one sandy save and one fringe putt). I missed a couple easier putts early on and lipped out several throughout the round. However, I still managed to finish at a -7, 65. Which puts me at an insane -25 through my last 3 rounds. Going -5 on the par 5s and being bogey free helps. So there is my no 6s and no 5s round for 2024! 😉 In today’s round I did a 3v1. Played against three 5ish handicaps who did a best ball. No strokes given as I have no idea how long I’ll keep up this crazy run. I won on hole 14 (got to -7 here, so parred out). I haven’t had this much fun playing in a long time. Hopefully I can keep whatever it is.

Well, I don’t know what to say or think. 64 a couple days ago. 62, my All Time Career Low today WITH a HIO!!! What the heck is going on? Either way, thank goodness I don’t have to post a 64 and 62 to my ghin. 😉

Had some fun today. A couple personal records and one group record. I shot a 64, which is 1 above my record. Definitely felt something good in the swing once I got it. We started on 13 to “find a gap.” I had a penalty par and a double in the first 3 holes. I proceeded to get a record 5 birdies in a row. My other record is getting 10 birdies in a round. Sucks a lot that a double contaminated this round, but it did. I had several hurtful misses too. On the hole I lost my streak, I missed a 6ft slider for birdie. 7 I was green-side in 2 and missed my pitch. 8 I missed a 10ft birdie. 10 I missed an 8ft birdie. I mean there was an absolute ton of potential in this round. I was sticking approaches tight and making putts most of the round. Most fun I’ve had playing in a while. The group record is we shot -14 as a best ball. One person played the first 6 holes with us before he left. He had 1 birdie (3 handicap). The other 2 handicaps are 6 and 3-5ish (hasn’t kept any handicap before). I mean only missing 4 holes for birdie is crazy.

I’ve been having a lot of success with this idea. Lots of spin and low shots with control. Having fun with it.

I’m not sure how many times I’ve had 2 eagles in a round. The most memorable one was a hole in one followed by an eagle on the next hole, a par 5. That was 2 years ago.

This summer, at a high school golf match at my course, parents had a fist fight over the rules. I wish I was there. Sportsmanship is sportsmanship, no matter the sport.

The end goal is the USGA doesn’t like Tiger hitting a drive 376yds in the Bahamas. They blame the ball.

Rahm's comments is what I think of when it comes to the PGA Tour. Tradition and playing against the best players. Not money. Obviously money is important, but it shouldn’t be the reason to play, imo. It was that way when the PGA Tour split from PGA of America and it should be that way now. But LIV somehow forced the PGA Tour to lose its identity in the last couple years. I don’t like LIV but it has its place. It was built purely for entertainment. Not tradition and not playing against the best players. Best players help and LIV is willing to buy them, but they want to provide entertainment. If you want money and to play golf, LIV may very well be the better avenue. The PGA Tour thought Waste Management Open was a one of a kind deal. LIV wanted it to be every event. There is obviously a market for it. TGL is meant to be the PGA Tour’s sort of entertainment part to counter/provide competition against LIV. I don’t care really if Rahm leaves or not. It is what it is. I just think LIV and PGA Tour need to co exist. Let the players get rich at LIV and enjoy the traditions of the game with the PGA Tour.

Seeing more and more that Rahm is a LIVer now. I’m thinking if it isn’t a done deal, that it will be very soon. I don’t see LIV golf updates twitter as a legitimate source but they have interestingly specific numbers. Idk. There’s certainly a lot of talk. I can’t see it being based on nothing.

I hadn’t thought about firmer wrists for these shots before. It makes sense. Tried messing with this shot yesterday and it was working pretty well.

I’ll start with how I answered. Since being on the course property is my job, I’m including it. In summer, I’m averaging 22,000 steps a day and over 150min a week of moderate exercise. I have not realistically worked out/muscle building by any structure for a long time. Other than the occasional push ups/pull ups, I haven’t had anything or time or motivation. I have been doing a lot of speed training, but I’m not sure that qualifies. I like to get 7hrs of sleep but I’ve been playing my new video game religiously, so sleep is around 6hrs lately. My resting heart rate is terrible, at least according to fitbit. I attribute that to lack of muscle building workouts and the fact that I drink too much. However, now that my youngest is 2yrs old and I’m most definitely not having more kids, I feel more motivated to get in better shape. I will be installing a cable machine with pulley system in my golf school this off season. I’ve done some TPI stuff and they do a lot with that. It’s simple enough, small, and convenient. My friend is a physical trainer so I’ll ask for ideas on structure. I could do a gym membership but I’d only really use it 4 months of the year. So not sure it’s worth it. I do watch my weight. I know I need to be better about my overall health. Having young kids was/is tough for me. I definitely stress out a lot and have anxiety more than my wife about their health.

At the simplest level, we know GIR is the most significant when it comes to scoring. The post describes the approach as dicey versus more room for error. More room means a likely higher percentage GIR and lower scores.

I thought golf in juniors must have been going up. I get around 200 a summer through camps and fill my 3 teams of PGA Jr League fast. Wish I could have more space in league but the course can’t handle an in house league.

I’m doing it outside-ish in winter. Anywhere from 32 to 50 degrees is the expectation. I’m wearing my winter pull over for all my sessions so far. I feel warmed up enough for mine so far, but I assume my clothing is taking some mph off.

Got to a max 117 with the 195g, the set was 112. I think when I took big swings before, I was loosening my grip too much. I tried gripping firmer especially in transition and saw immediate improvement. My 145g swings stink. I’m not sure why they are not faster than the 195g swings.

Yes, we flush out the whole system and close the main supply pump from the lake. We did that a couple weeks ago. Most courses around here will do that. We may play year round golf, though, because we get all our annual rain between October and May. We don’t lack for water if the grass were to grow a little. Our non-posting season is Nov 15 to end of February.

I play quite a few 9 hole rounds. A good chunk of them contribute to my handicap, as in I play better over 9 holes than 18. It’ll be interesting to see how my index changes.

In transition, your club face is open. The face should be parallel with lead arm, or if anything slightly skyward pointing (closed). The hands and club are too far behind the body turn here. The body and chest ends up open (cleared) at impact, like you are working on. But, in this swing, the club fell behind too much. Feeling good connection with turn is hard. Could come from many different body areas. I’d say work on your connection more, between hands and chest on downswing.

I’d say you are too close to the ball. Arm hang is negative here, which isn’t the end of the world but your swing also looks like you are close. Try getting the hands either directly under the shoulder or slightly in front. It will give you more room to swing and turn.

I’m fortunate that value doesn’t change for me unless I’m traveling to a top course. Regarding the others, if I’m choosing to golf and one of my top reasons is pace, then I feel I’m golfing for the wrong reasons. I’d very much prefer it not get long, but it’s not a reason why I’d choose one course over another. I like a good layout, good company, and reasonable to good conditions.