tuffluck

Good advice. I shot a 98 from the tips last weekend. 3 lost drives (6 strokes), 5 putts within 3ft I missed. That's 11 strokes I should easily should have gotten 8 or more back from. This is pretty much a textbook round for me. Short putts and lost drives is always 10 strokes of my rounds. My chipping game is actually an 8/10 because my irons are so unfitted for me that I miss most greens right and get a lot of practice with the wedge. I 2 putt almost every hole, whether I am 65 feet away or obviously, 3 feet away. If I had better fitted irons that were a bit more predictable, I figure I can eliminate at least 30% of my chipping game. That would be good for about 5 strokes I figure. And that is why I got fit for i20s today :) Sorry for the old post revival, I don't check this website enough! Thanks for the responses.

Garbage. I paid for a full course, I will play a full course if I choose to do so. 1. I could shoot an 85 or a 115, and either way will still finish 18 in 3 hours if no one in front of me is delaying me. So I don't give a damn what other people want to think I should play since pace of play is the only thing a golfer other than myself should care about MY game. 2. I drive 260 and find that playing from whites I use my 7i and up most holes, and from the tips I get to use the shorter irons more. Sometimes I will switch tees just to practice with shorter and/or longer irons. 3. Each course is a different length. Tips from one course nearby is 6500. Blue tees from another is 6900. Trying to adhere to tee it forward when tee it forward doesn't exactly adhere to tee it forward makes it a silly concept. Its only designed to speed up pace. Play from where you want to. If I shoot an 85 or a 115, nobody cares but me. If I'm okay with practicing long irons at the expense of shooting a 115, its really none of your business.

Went to him today and ordered my i20s. He knows his stuff and I would definitely recommend him. I even got a little lesson out of it too, and he waived the fitting fee when I bought the clubs. Thanks for the tip!

You may even need 3 clubs. I hit a 4i 200, a 7 wood 210, a 5 wood 225, 3 wood 240, driver 260. Perfect, except I don't hit the 7 wood all that well. I could probably cut out the 7 wood, but then again if I don't hit the 4i flush (which can happen with longer irons for an average Joe) then I have an even bigger gap from that 5 wood. But, outside of 200 probably most average golfers aren't going to land on the green most of the time anyway, so a distance discrepancy there is not your biggest issue regardless. Either way, I still personally only use one wedge. In the future I anticipate playing a 3h and a 3/4 wood for these reasons. Either way, I still personally only use one wedge. If you are a low handicapped then I suspect your situation is a bit more difficult to figure out.

I have an old school setup of a 3, 5, 7 wood followed by a 4 iron. I am gettjng new irons and wanted to get a 3 iron that i assume will be about the same distance as my 7 wood. What could i use in place of the 5 wood? I may just keep the 5 wood, but idike to know what the alternatives are just so i can hit them and find out if i like them better. Fwiw, i hit my 5 wood about 215.

I know that i can go to pings website they have a list of ping dealers and fitters, but not all of those have great fitters. I. E. Golfsmith is listed... I want to get i20s and i am 6'6" so i wont just need standard loft and lie, so i really want to get the fitting right if im dropping $800 on good clubs. If you can personally recommend a specific dealer that would be great. My default is going to be hank haneys golf center, but they do charge a lot even if you buy your clubs through them, so i dont know if that is normal to pay a good fitter (since golfsmith applies the charge to the purchase of the clubs). Thanks in advance.

when i first started playing i had my series of tantrums, but only around close friends that were playing with me. my girlfriend and my best friend saw the worst of it...sarcastically tossing clubs up in the air after a shot, stabbing the ground, etc. albeit never anything destructive to the greens or even to my clubs for that matter (at least not that i know of). when i played with people i didn't know or got paired randomly with people, i acted very calm. i have no idea why i felt so much more comfortable about getting angry in front of people i knew--i guess i wasn't afraid of embarrassing myself. anyway, the best friend finally told me one evening after we played and were relaxing with beers that sometimes "you can be a very angry golfer." pretty much ever since then i haven't thrown a club or stabbed the ground. a little stomping here and there but nothing that i would be ashamed of if i was on national television (except maybe the outcome of the shots!). anyway, controlling anger on the course wasn't easy for me as a beginner. i'm sure it isn't easy for everyone, but hopefully everyone has a friend tell them when the time is right. while they are angry at their game, their clubs, or the ground is usually not the best time to bring it up though IMO. if they aren't a very good friend, let sleeping dogs lie. just don't play with them until they get their attitude straight. looking back, i'm surprised my girlfriend and best friend didn't stop playing with me.

i'm in dallas. the popular muni's (aka the closest) are easy 5+ hour 18 hole rounds during the busy season. during the hot summer or cold winter, it's still an easy 4 hours. if you don't mind driving a little further and spending $20 more, the courses are much nicer and pace of play is usually not that big of a deal at all. i'm a 90s shooter but could easily walk 18 holes in 3 hours max, riding about 2.5 hours if no one was in front of me.

Thanks for the responses. I thought about this some more after I posted, and realized a few things myself. I think the weeding-out process of golfers is a little bit more practical. If you're good, you can play amateur tours. If you're one of the best there, you can go to Q-school or the web.com tour. If you're really good there, you can go pro. It's a pretty *easy* (conceptually) way to track the best of the best. But that doesn't exist in showbiz. Sure, there are auditions for parts, but not anyone off the street can walk into an audition for Iron Man 3. And it's not like there is any lower level where you can say "If I start here and I'm good, I am guaranteed a shot at a role in Iron Man 3 eventually." With golf, if you start at the bottom and you are that good, your skill will get you to each next level. There are no levels in Hollywood, and a lot of ambiguity is present around the idea of someone going from a "nobody" to a "somebody." I think if golf lacked this tracking system and relied more on this ambiguous "maybe" concept, maybe you would never see a Jason Dufner or a Zach Johnson playing in the pros at all. Maybe they got comfortable in their white-collared lifestyle and figured the idea of never knowing where you stand or how to move up just isn't work the risk. I.E. there may be 100 potential George Clooney's out there, but only 1 of them was ever going to be "The" George Clooney, and only half of them ever tried.

This question stems from something unrelated to golf. A person I'm pretty close to just got his "big break" in Hollywood, which occurred due to a series of obscenely lucky and fortunate turn of events that no person in this lifetime will I ever meet that could replicate. I think he is good at what he is doing, but I do not think he is great. I think he has been astronomically lucky. Well it made me think about the number of people in showbiz that try and do not succeed. Some of them are probably better than this guy I know, but missed the lucky break or opportunity. It just made me wonder if other entertainment venues have the same results. I love golf but know that I'm not ever going to be Tiger Woods; but I'm not an actor either and think I could probably star alongside George Clooney in a movie and make out alright. At least the embarrassment would be significantly less than playing against Tiger in a round of golf. :P Nevertheless, I wonder how many golfers out there are really good--like so good they could beat a Jason Dufner or a Zach Johnson 50% of the time--that will never be on Tour because they just haven't had the right stroke of luck, pun intended. Thoughts?

I shoot in the low 90s usually. Worst is low 100s. I strike the ball well. I putt well outside of 5 feet. I chip well with a good lie. I lose 80% of my strokes on bad chips due to unfamiliar lies, and putts less than 5 feet. Time to laugh at me. I actually play similar scores on the tips vs gold because I hit decently long. I am old school and have a 7 wood, and a 5 too. I drive 260 average, 3 wood is 250, but my r9 4 iron is only 200 at best. Which is strange because the 8 iron is about 160. Anyway, I would like to play tips more since I have the distance...I think...but my irons just don't go long enough. The i20s I'm in love with and I hit each club about 15 yards further than my r9s. Ultimately my short game needs a ton of work, but IMO as long as I strike the ball well, I may as well play my distance capability. Most par 4s I drive or use a 3 wood and then

Nope. Those were my revised rules, in case you couldn't tell by the made up ones...

Almost every rule in golf is dumb. Really. It's the only sport I watch (or play) where I'm constantly saying, "WTF?" Hit the ball where it falls, take as many practice shots as needed, if something non environmental affects your shot then drop; and lastly, if you lose your ball, courses need a drop zone (like for water) where you always drop no matter the shot number, and then take an x number of penalty strokes from that spot (to be deemed by the dumbass people who write the rules of golf typically). Rules are relative because everyone adheres to them. Competition and scores are not.

Seems to me like back surgery could be helpful for more than just golf, no?

I played today with my girlfriend and shot a 92 and she shot a 105. Best for her and second best for me ever. It was a good day, even though it topped 98 here in TX :)

IMO it depends on how you drive. If you are long and consistent, moving back should'nt affect scores much unless you are also poor with 4-6 irons. If you absolutely cant drive past 220 or so, cant see how playing from the tips would ever be reasonable.

Anyone?

I am 6'5" and have long arms so my swing is very upright. I have a 9.5 degree Nike sq dymo round that I hit very high, like about the height of the tallest trees on a regular course. I hit the ball square in the center of the clubhead, so it isnt an issue of teeing up too high. My swing speed is around 110 and I drive about 260 in the air and I get maybe 10 yards of roll. Ball speed is about 145, backspin in the 4000 range. I've tried a gazillion of the mainstream drivers out there and the results are pretty much identical with all of them. Am I missing something? Do I need a lower loft than 8.5, some non mainstream driver, a special shaft, or what? I just feel at a dead end with the driver dilemma right now.

this i found also, says +.5" and standard lie. how the heck am i supposed to know what is right? though i will admit the tech used a lie board and 2 degree upright and +1 did give me the correct swing marks. http://www.golf-components.com/custom-golf-club-fitting.html

yeah, you guys are all right. they couldn't be bent because the metal is too hard. they said they've done it before on R9s and actually caused the head to buckle, and that is bad. so, no bending for the R9s. also i almost don't believe the fitting i got. my wrist to floor measures 37", which says standard length clubs. but i'm 6'5", which says +1. i guess i don't know which to go by, and to be honest i'm wondering if i paid the golf galaxy tech $50 just to look at the same damn table i found myself on the internet... http://www.taylormadegolfpreowned.com/custom/clubfitting.aspx

i went to get fitted for my own clubs and they need to be +1" and 2 degrees upright. i am 6'5" tall and supposedly i have fitted myself to my clubs vs. fitted my clubs to me. my R9's are +1", so that's good, but have the standard lie, so i crouch a bit more than i should. i had the shop bend them 2 degrees upright, but they called and told me they can't bend mine for some reason. so now i don't know if i should just play on and distort my posture by using clubs that aren't exactly fitted, or if i should get new clubs fitted properly and go from there. what are your thoughts? and then there is of course the whole "which club should i get" debate. i shoot under 100 consistently, and occasionally an 80s here and there, so i'm definitely in the GI market. i like the AP1s a lot, and the R11s seem pretty good also. any recommendations for a tall player with my handicap?