SamW

Every day I hit 20-40 chips in my garden trying to land the chips on a frisbee from about 12 yards. twice a week I play a practice 9 holes. Each time I hit a bad shot I hit another from the same place, around the greens I usually hit 3-4 of each approach shot. Before a serious round if I have time I putt for at least 1/2 an hour with particular focus on putts in the 6-8 foot range, I start with a marker at 3 feet, after I hole 5 consecutive balls from there I move the marker back by 1 foot until I get to around 10 feet from the hole. Whenever I get time I take 2 tubes of balls (40 balls) and hit them in the 80-150 yard distance range, aiming for a 5% tolerance (usually achieving < 10%) with about 10 shots with each club to 8 iron. I don't practice my long game much at all other than practice rounds, I sometimes hit a tube of mid irons but not often. Overall it's quite a lot of practice, my short game is good, the course I play is very penal to wide tee shots and generally hard to score on (lots of golfers in the 1-8 hcap range and gross 83 still qualified for top 16 in the club championship). I don't get enough hit FW's and I don't get enough GIR's, but my putting is 1.87 per GIR and 1.64 overall these stats are good.

You can enjoy golf no matter how hard the course is... you can hate golf no matter how easy the course is... and the same player can do both of those things on consecutive days.

I think providing you have the imagination to make the shots real it's fine. Mindless hitting of 1 ball every 10 seconds does not do much good, you will just groove a bad habit. I use the range more in winter time personally, in the summer I'd sooner practice at the golf club.

One of these: http://cgi.ebay.com/Pinnacle-Tri-Line-Putter-35-/120702462564 ? Pinnacle didn't make so many putters I think.

And with these club's there's still often a first love, the one we go back to.. for me it's my Spalding TP Mills, I've tried other putters but it was my first love and it's the one I'll go back to for comfort every time. With putter's I think this is especially true.. it's a romance thing, but really it's not a technology thing... it's in the head.

I try not to analyse my backswing too much, I prefer just to focus on where I want the club to get to at the top. If I had to analyse 1 place during my backswing it would be the point the shaft reaches horizontal and I'd have this checklist: 1. hands are on the same plane that the club was at address. 2. Shaft is directed away from the target in line to the target line. E.G should be able to draw a line through the shaft that is pointed directly at the target. 3. Face is approximately vertical or slightly closed but not much. (e.g. wrist rotated). 4. In balance, shoulders turned about 40-45* away from target, hips barley moved at this point. Other people especially people who follow Leadbetter types of swing this wouldn't hold true as the wrist break would have already happened, I don't really think that way as I prefer to think of my wrist break as a damper for the club head's own momentum as I reach the top and start the downswing (e.g. wrists are still continuing to break with lag as I begin my downswing).

I'm of the old school view point, that if you believe/trust you can putt with it then you can putt with it. Top brand putters with all the marketing hype around them give people the believe that they can putt better so it works. Whatever any marketeer says I do not believe one ounce of putter hype, I do not believe that putter fitting has any benefit other than promoting the belief in the golfer that the putter fits them well, and I do not believe that over time I will putt any better with a brand new $400 putter than my 22 year old putter. Nor do I believe that there is any evidence that putting technology has ever improved putting performance in either the amateur or the professional game on any macro scale. If putting averages have improved (which they probably haven't) this will be 100% due to improved technology in green keeping producing better putting surfaces... I don't mind being controversial on this, we are talking about a couple of hundred grams of metal striking a rubber ball with 4* loft and very little velocity beheld by a golfer who has 2 jobs, one to point the putter at the target, and another to have the putter face perpendicular to the direction of travel at contact. Personally I miss more putts to misreads than bad strokes, if I do take a bad stroke its come from the brain not the body.

I think in a 10% margin right around the course if I'm thinking well, so I mentally consider what is going to happen if I miss by 10% in any direction from where I am aiming then try to estimate the consequences. For instance if I am driving 250ish to a fairway that is 30 wide, I assume my drive could land 25yards each side of where I aim: - it has 10 yards of rough each side, aim middle. - it has a trajedy waiting to happen right and just rough left aim up left edge. - it has horrific trouble both sides, hit a shorter club until I am happy that my 10% margin is safe. for the most part this keeps me safe and sane, occasionally I hit a shot worse than 10% bad and that can be painful.

You learn more on the course than you ever can on a driving range. I think if you can find an experienced golfer to take you out, when the course is quiet (maybe twilight or similar), take a tonne of balls, play a practice 9 don't try to score, if you hit a bad shot drop another ball and play another. If you ever have people waiting behind you just call them through and take the time pressure out. Being on the course hitting real shots from real lie's is the way to do it. Like the previous poster said, it's easy to spend too long on the range, feel like you are playing awesome golf then have a real reality check when you hit the course with high expectations. The overriding thing is do it in a way that avoids being a pain to other people on the course... hence quiet times are best.

I must be old because I truly did only have blades until I was about 16 years old. IMO all this is just a taste thing, if you like to control the club through the hitting area then a hybrid is definately easier to launch and hit straight. If you want more height then the low COG of a hybrid will definitely provide it. But that's on the assumption that its what you want. I actually don't want more height a lot of the time, in fact I spend 1/2 my time trying to stay under the tree line !

I also play a 3-PW iron set. What I see all the time with long irons is people don't use the same swing that they would with a 7-8-9 iron, they try to hit the ball harder and more often hit it fat or hit a big slice. Providing people swing easy and trust the club then it's fine. Personally I never change the ball position relative to my left foot with any club, I just change the width of my stance slightly by moving my right foot, which in turn changes my COG slightly back from the ball. I carry a 2hy in my bag, its really a 5w replacement to fill the gap between my 3w and 3i, and to be honest I find it a useful club, mostly because I can get a good contact from rough with it and I'd really struggle from the same place with an iron just due to the depth of the sole. Same way its a pretty reliable club if I want to hit 150yards from under a tree with a right to left flight that's extremely low with plenty of run. I have no issue if people are more comfortable with using a 3hy and 4hy instead of irons, personally I like hitting the long irons I prefer the shape of the flight and the feel. Hybrids for me don't give out a lot of feel and feedback compared with an iron, they seem to have a higher and more boring flight and seem to put almost no spin on the ball which can lead to quite frightening bounces in firm/hard conditions.

I still say match play is the best solution... nothing like the motivation to beat somebody to make somebody want to play better. Trouble with stroke play is some people don't have the self motivation for it they just don't care if they shoot 110 or 90. The difference in match play is that if you miss a 5 foot putt to 1/2 a hole you kick yourself about it because you lost the hole... The whole point of the handicap system is so that people can compete against each other anyway.

This is the right answer!.... too many swing thought not only make you too aware of what you are doing right and wrong, but also they MAKE YOU SLICE... seriously if you are aware of what the club head is exactly doing while hitting the ball then by definition you didn't release the club and you will slice it. You had all the lessons you did the practice, so you did the hard work... now just swing the club and hit the ball forget it all if the lessons and practice were worth anything then your body will remember it anyway.

If he want's to just play golf for fun and you want to play some more competitive golf, which is what it sounds like. Then I would suggest entering competitions and explaining to your friend that you want to try and win some stuff, any good friend would understand... There's nothing wrong with golf for fun it doesn't mean you can never play with the guy but just prioritize the competitive golf ahead of the fun golf if that's what you want to do. Another tack you could try is making it competitive with him, it sounds like he's a max hcap golfer (so 28 hcap) so play him match play give him 20 shot and play for $10 dollars for the front nine, $10 for the back and $10 for the match. That way the rounds will speed up a lot too because if you are on the green in 2 and he's busy hacking out of some rough he can just loose the hole and move on.

Depends what's important to you, there's 3 ways you can buy golf clubs and all will work in my experience: - buy in high season current model clubs and know you are going to be paying full price. - buy in around feb/march and buy last season models when shops are looking to clear the clubs for new models which most mfrs release in feb/mar, expect to save around 30-40% over what you would have paid but still know you are getting good clubs that are well fitted. - try new clubs, see which you like, then look for used previous models in decent condition either last season or the season before, despite mfrs claims the models do not change much at all in feel or performance year on year. Budget to have those clubs re-fitted to your spec which in my experience will cost somewhere like this: $10 per club for regripping, $5 club for loft/lie changes, $5/shortening, $25/club reshafting for standard dynamic gold steel shafts considerably more for reshafting for high end graphite shafts. So worst case is around $45/club on irons likely to be a lot less if you take a standard or shorter fit and you buy with the shafts you want already fitted. I took option 2 last year and spent $550 on brand new mizuno mp-52's custom fitted saving around $350 on full price (pound converted to dollars in my case). Never looked back completely happy with the irons, actually have hit the current mp-53 model a few times and prefer the mp-52 anyway. My plan for my next set of irons, when I get my hcap down a bit is option 3 and I already did the maths that if I can pick up a set of classic blades like mizuno mp-32 for around $120 then spend $100-$300 on getting them perfect for me I'll have breathed new life into an awesome iron set that is perfect fit for me.

I prefer to think of them as proven tee's... very risky to take your tee shot on a par 3 with an unproven one.

I bought a used driver from ebay and never regretted it, I payed 1/3 what I would have paid retail for a driver that was literally 1 round old. I don't feel at all bad towards the Nevada Bobs store that let me demo 10 different drivers for over an hour so I could go ahead and buy the one I wanted on Ebay... Another day I could have bought the driver from them but honestly I don't like the price of drivers it just doesn't stack up to me. Once I got the driver I got it custom fitted which brought the cost up to about 50% what I would have paid new. Another good way to save cash is to buy the previous model of everything, particularly now when technology is moving very slowly in golf. Regarding custom fitting, not everyone needs it for every club. I had my driver custom fitted because I specifically wanted it shortened and stiffened. However I was custom fitted by mizuno for irons and their "prescription" was a 100% standard off the rack fit... I was also custom fitted for titleist irons at a demo day and I turned out 1/4" short and 0.5* flat and the guy said that's about as close to off the rack as you get with titleist fitting. Despite being a very standard fit, I'd have significant worries about buying any used irons because you don't know what's already been done to them before they come to you, the only time I'd do it is either if I was buying a classic set like Hogan Apex where I'd get the lofts and lies checked anyway, or if the seller was 100% sure that the clubs were direct from the rack with very little use.

Having played golf both sides of the atlantic, and generally witnessed much slower play on the US side (rounds often taking over 4 hours sometimes over 5 hours vs rounds rarely taking more than 3h40m in the UK) I can say that I don't think that course length has much to do with slow play so I don't see it making a big difference. Although I would say that for a lot of amateurs would enjoy golf more of the shorter tees. The reasons I see that play is slower are these: - everybody playing strokeplay all the time, therefore always holing out every hole. In the UK the main format is matchplay where you pick your ball up whenever you are out of the hole. At least if most people played stableford and picked up on net double bogey it would speed a lot up. - generally people not being ready to play, especially on the green while your buddy is putting you can still be lining up your putt/shot so you are ready to hit it very soon after they do. Don't take any of this the wrong way, the vast majority of players I've played with in the US are very aware of slow play and don't want it. But it really only takes 1-2 groups on the course to add an hour to everybodies round. Put it this way, if you have 4 golfers hitting around 90 shots on a course, each 10 seconds added to each players shot is worth an hour to the round... so not being ready to play is by far the biggest time killer, its got nothing to do with playing of the back pegs.

I swear I have never been able to hit the ball from a red tee as long as I can remember. I'm colorblind and it gets in my head that its going to be impossible to find the thing.

I'm in the same boat, as a golfer who came back to playing in January with no hcap and one who previously only played very casual golf due to it being a second sport for me. Short game, short game, short game. We don't have black (your version of blue tees as our blue tees are junior :)) I play off whites the course I usually play is 6600 but it's tight and trouble is often 2 shots worth. If my short game was immaculate I could break 80 with nothing but a 4 iron, 8 iron, wedge and putter in the bag truthfully but this is even true of most of the 7000+ yds courses I've played. Breaking 75 requires your long game to really be in check, breaking 80 just means getting the ball in the hole 3 or less shots on average from 150yds in regularly.

For me a 3w is a real confidence club, I can't say for sure that it will be for you. I wouldn't be without it, as it comes into play so much both the way I play and the course I play for instance: - any time I hit a bad drive, hit provisional with 3w. - any time I address the ball with a driver and don't feel confident :) - any time I have a need to hit over 220 from a fairway which comes into play various places on my main course due to the need to lay up some drives and some medium distance par 5's. - any time I really need to keep the ball low because of wind (because a 3 wood is easier to choke and punch straight where a hybrid will often draw too much when choked down and punched). - any time I'm driving down wind as it will carry the same or further for less risk. - any time I want more of a draw bias off the tee as my driver is fade biased (which I like) and my natural shot is a mild draw. If you get into a situation often where you have either an out-of-reach green or a very tight line off a drive then a 3 wood is a good club to have in the bag. If as you say you hit it quite high (as I also do) then a strong lofted 3 wood is a good option providing you have confidence with the club. Logically it makes a very even distance progression through the bag right up to driver, where based on actual averages (taken in geek mode on the practice ground with GPS) my distances (carry + roll in average aka soft conditions) are 240+, 228, 211, 196, 183, 169, 158, 143, 130, 119, 104, 91, 78, I'm not going to claim epic distance I hit average to long based on where I play, I'm far more interested in consistent distance than smashing it. Doing this work to figure out the no bragging, average distances with a normal easy swing on each club is helping my game more than anything else the actual clubs in the bag is a secondary point. Since I did this work my handicap is steadily trickling down and I'm winning things.

I have: Driver - 9.5 3 Wood - 13.5 2h - 17.5 3i - 9i (standard mizuno mp lofts) PW 47 GW 52 SW 56 I did the horrible geek work to be sure that my distance spread is about perfect for my golf and I know exactly what yardage I should carry with each club, these numbers aren't huge I'm not a huge hitter but generally speaking I know the club I want and I don't have any gap > 15 yds through my bag if I'm hitting the ball properly with each club. The reason I hit long irons over hybrids is that the ball stops better on the green I play with a long iron, we have 2 par 3's in the 185-195 yard range, I would need to take a different strategy on those holes with a hybrid because I couldn't land on the green and stop which I can with a 4 or 3 iron. My 3W is my goto club whenever the green is out of range, or if I'm hitting my driver badly. I switched from a 15* to 13.5* 3 wood and it was pretty much the best thing I ever did. For me my hybrid's main job is to play the long game from a tricky lie especially if I need to work the ball right to left.

Quote: I'm not sure what to do about getting fitted for clubs yet....I have a pretty nice set of clubs because my dad has so many. Maybe i'll just talk to the pro and see what he thinks. Everything else aside, i'm off to go play with some of my buddies. I'll keep yall updated with how it goes! I caught this haha....to each his own. Asking the pro isn't a bad start, he should point you in the right direction. If you plan to play pretty seriously then I am sure you will change clubs within 2 years if not less anyway as what you start with won't continue to be right for you. Don't be shy of second hand clubs for your first set especially if you are weighing them up against budget new clubs. And don't confuse yourself with buying too many clubs, when you start you won't have the consistency to really see the difference between a 5 and 6 iron, a 1/2 set is okay, I played with a 1/2 set for at least a year and if i was 1 club long on a hole I didn't mind when I was trying to break 95. 18 is a good age to start so is 8 or 80 (if you are fit enough) :)

I'd be very surprised if this happened in the UK for a few reasons. - there would be an assumption that your chosen playing partners were the people you wanted to play with, you might be asked if you minded if a single joined you but it wouldn't have been put like you say it was to you. - not many courses would have accepted a tee booking from a single anyway as they have no standing on the course and generally have to fit in with other play. - 4 ball stroke play isn't generally allowed unless its in better ball teams of 2 (you are not supposed to hole out if your score won't count for the hole), most courses will only allow an individual stroke play or match play round with a max of 3 balls because of speed of play. So this shows that things are quite different everywhere.

If somebody had asked me before I got a GPS I would have guessed I was at least 30-40 yards longer but the facts speak and my driving distance average is a poor sounding 237 yards. This is an actual average ignoring some of the holes on my course that really skew it due to downhill landing conditions. Despite this very poor sounding number I actually hit it as far as anybody I regularly play with and quite a bit further than most. When I flush one it goes further, if I flush one in bouncy conditions landing downhill I can get quite far past 300 but its the rare case. So when people write on here that they have over 300 yard averages I have some doubts, virtually all of the double digit handicappers I play with hit around 220-240 most of the time, even most of the single digit hcaps are only hitting 240-270 most of the time, to be honest even the club pro is really only hitting in that range off the tee and he's pretty good and he can crank one over 300 if he needs to :) The GPS was a real eye opener for sure :) but what it really tells me is that I'm very rarely getting perfect launch conditions, I know my swing speed with a driver is in the 104-107mph range as I've measured it on a trackman more than once but I'm very rarely converting that swing speed to maximum distance (because I would be averaging much higher if I did)... So in answer to the thread, I average 237 yards and I hit it long for a mid teen h-capper without a GPS I definitely averaged 260-270 in my head :)