Liko81

Except that's the whole point of having corporate entities; liability protection. Whether the reasons the business went under are your fault or not, an LLC or corporation exists for the sole purpose of protecting its investors (including upper management) from liability for the debts incurred as the business went under. We could get rid of them, require at least one individual person to always bear general liability for business failures (an LLP, for instance, requires at least one "general partner" who bears unlimited liability). But then, sauce for the goose; all the small-business LLCs and startups would have to play by the same rules, appointing one business owner or investor to be the fall guy. Nobody wants to be the fall guy, not you or I, or Sue Gove or Donald Morrison. That's the point. Golfsmith's failure and bankruptcy is, in the grand scheme, not a huge deal. They failed to react quickly and significantly enough to an increasingly online marketplace and a decline in the casual popularity of golf. Things like this are quite common; Blockbuster was once the #1 video rental business in the world, but they failed to react appropriately to new competitors like Redbox and Netflix until it was far too late. K-Mart used to be one of the Big-3 big-box department stores, but they couldn't compete on price with Wal-Mart or with dollar stores, and couldn't reinvent its image as something more upscale like Target did. Sports Authority, similar to Golfsmith but more generally sports-oriented, fell behind Academy and Dick's in consumer name recognition and thus in market share. This is corporate survival of the fittest, plain and simple. If investors want clawbacks of executive compensation for corporate misfeasance or malfeasance, that's usually an option (it's not yet required under Dodd-Frank but 85% of Fortune 100 companies have it in their bylaws), but there usually has to be some real evidence that the managers acted directly against the best interests of the stakeholders, or broke the law. Simply making what turned out to be the wrong decisions that led to a downturn is not evidence of wrongdoing; wrong decisions are not necessarily bad decisions. What we should be talking about is that it's been almost ten years since the bottom fell out of the housing market, and not only has nobody gone to jail for blatant SEC violations, most of the people in middle and upper management of the banking cartel at the time still have their jobs, and they're still making serious and often illegal mistakes for which nobody in charge is being personally held accountable. We heard just a week or so ago that Wells Fargo pressured tellers to open new accounts without their customers' knowledge. The tellers and account managers were fired, but their bosses and their bosses' bosses, with one exception, still have their jobs, and the one senior manager no longer with the bank still has all her compensation earned for running this incentive program.

All I know is that if the grounds crew is in a hurry that day, I have to putt right at the hole, because when they pull the cutter out, if they're not being careful, they'll leave a raised lip around the edge of the hole that sends anything but a perfect putt off to the sides. I also find that a damaged/worn hole tends to lip-out more, as the ball will spin around the edge, hit a discontinuity and pop back up onto the green. However, the same putt played to a perfectly cut, immaculate cup would probably miss wide and continue straight.

Back before MaxFli was bought by TaylorMade, the standard Noodle "Long and Soft" ball was available in an extreme high-viz yellow; translucent neon with gloss flake. I think many manufacturers call it "optic yellow" but mileage varies considerably within that term. "Pearl yellow" is another name but it seems uncommon as a marketing term. Anyway, as used with the MaxFli-era Noodles, you could not possibly mistake these things for anything natural laying around or growing on the course, like the myriad "Little Yellow Flowers" even botanists can't tell apart, nor did it look like the duller yellow range balls common at some courses I play, or anything painted yellow around the course. However, after the TaylorMade purchase, this optic yellow cover seems to be going the way of the dodo. The current base Noodle is white-only, and TM's current yellows are all a duller opaque yellow that blends right in with range balls and LYFs littering the course. That's ironic, because TaylorMade used this very same pearl neon yellow cover for a number of low-end ball types (which if I know TM were probably all the same ball with different names), including Burner, SuperDeep, RocketBallz, Distance/Distance+, etc. So, I'm looking for a replacement optic yellow "value" ball. Currently I'm just playing standard white Noodles, the $15 for 15 pack available practically anywhere, and while they work well, I feel I lose fewer balls for no reason with the yellow. It's incredibly maddening to hit a shot, watch it land and roll downrange into some rough, know the exact tuft of grass it came to rest in, and when you get there, it's nowhere to be seen . These optic yellows are also rarer (and I'm beginning to see why) so it's easier to pick out my ball from a cluster of other players' balls as well as any abandoned balls. The ideal ball would be in the $1-$2/ball range ($10-$25/doz), with a softer feel but a compression level still adequate for a ~95mph swing similar to the Noodle's profile, and of course that translucent flake neon yellow cover. They also have to be available from local brick-and-mortar stores (golf specialty or otherwise); I'm not the stock-up type, so I typically pick up a dozen on my way to the course that morning, and so the ball I play has to be on the shelf at an Academy, Dick's, even a Target or Wal-Mart (as long as I'm getting the same ball from each). Balls I've considered (no purchases yet) include: - Titleist NXT Tour S - Great ball for the golfer with a swing speed in the 90s who doesn't want to pay for Pro V1s. The yellow is perfect, every review is glowing, and I've played a few recycled/L&F balls of this label and like them a lot, but they're $3 a ball new and I still lose between 3-6 a round. Still the front-runner even if I end up buying packs of white Noodles alongside them for water holes. - Bridgestone e6 - Same basic idea and pricepoint as the NXT Tour, but I have less personal experience with Bridgestone balls, positive or negative. - Srixon Z-Star - Ditto, except Srixon has a bad rep with me at their lower levels. - Wilson Staff DUO - These advertise a very similar profile as the Noodle; long off the tee, soft around the green, and there's even a local retailer. But, Wilson. Like Srixon, these are kind of an "eeh" choice from past experience, even at this pricepoint. - Nike PD Soft/RZN - Out of production and/or no brick-and-mortar suppliers near me. - Nike MOJO - good yellow and I've used MOJOs before, but if I want just yellow I have to buy online, and we know Nike's looking to get out of golf equipment. - Volvik Vibe/Vivid - Never heard of the brand before, and like Nikes, nobody I know of in my area is stocking them. - Callaway Supersoft - Way too soft; the Noodles pencil out at around a 60 rating and that seems about right for me given the feel I want. A 35 would get pancaked on my driver face. If anyone has any votes to give for any of these, or any additional suggestions, I'm all ears.

That's correct, looking at frame-by-frames of tour players. The rate of acceleration tends to be highest in the middle of the downswing; exactly where depends on your swing tempo, which is also a factor in shaft flex (and kickpoint) selection. if you kept accelerating the clubhead at a constant rate all the way to impact, you wouldn't want any flex at all, because any flex to the shaft in this scenario would beam the club is flexed at impact, wasting your energy, and opening and delofting the clubface. Instead, the ideal human swing motion accelerates on the downswing, then "releases" on the throughswing just before impact, and the shaft flex keeps the clubhead accelerating into the ball even as your hands slow. Better players accelerate more, and for a longer portion of their swing ending closer to impact, so they need a stiff shaft that will release the energy in less time at the bottom of their swing. The rest of us slow our acceleration earlier and have less overall acceleration force, so a more flexible shaft will bend more for less force earlier in our swing and store that energy for a longer time, "unwinding" over the longer distance between our maximum acceleration point and the ball to match this slower swing tempo.

I haven't played the X20s specifically, but Professor Google shows they're 2008 vintage, and look like pretty standard classic Callaway GIs from the "naughties" (I have a knockoff set of very similar appearance in my garage). Ping's answer to this general line is the G-series. If you're looking for a club about the same age on the used market, you're looking at G10s or G15s. The current Ping model in this line, if you're shopping new, is simply called "G"; Ping stopped bothering with numbers after the G30 in 2014. Depending on your handicap, and how your iron play contributes to it, you should demo the G and G-MAX to see which one you like better. Give the I-series a try as well, or even the i-Blades if you're feeling adventurous; some say that all the better-player irons give you is workability at the cost of forgiveness, but I've found, the more I've demoed the lower-cap clubs and A/Bed them with GIs, that if you can make consistent contact with either iron, you'll get a narrower dispersion from a better-player iron than a GI. The GI will keep that mis-hit on the fairway more often, but there's more of a shotgun spread to the good hits as well. Just my opinion, try the clubs, go with what works best for you in terms of distance, accuracy etc.

I have noticed that Pings as a brand seem to get me less distance on average than other GI lines like Callaway, Taylormade, even Mizuno (their JPX lines are some real rockets). However, 9 out of 10 times, the difference has turned out to be in loft for each number, which IMO is cheating. All these brands (including Ping) have, since the release of the G10s I play, delofted their clubs even more than the big shift in the late 90s, so that the JPX 850 forged 7-iron at 32*, for example, is a full 2* stronger than my G10's stock spec at 34*. Your G15s have about the same loft as the 850; I really wouldn't expect much additional distance, but you can always try em out with a clubfitter. Callaway's current XR OS sets are even more delofted at 31.5* 7-iron (and a 44* PW!!! I mean seriously! You need a gap wedge just to get to where gap wedges used to be when they became a thing!) If you want pure distance, stick with GIs/SGIs, and definitely take a look at TaylorMade, Callaway and Mizuno; these are three brands I've personally A/Bed recent sets of against each other and my own G10s, which have produced serious distance gains for the same number on the toe. To give you an idea of some of the possible gains, my G10 7-iron is my 140-150yd club. The JPX850 7-iron in my hands is good for a 170-yard average in the same basic conditions. However, remember that it's not all about maximizing distance, especially with irons. You have enough irons that it doesn't really matter which number is your 150-yard club; what matters is that you have a 150-yard club you can trust. And a 140-yard, and a 130-yard, and a 120-yard, etc. The shorter your irons play, the smaller your distance gaps will be where it matters; in the approach game. It's extremely rare for me to have to come up with a shot with high carry distance precision and low rollout beyond about 170 yards (if you do face this often, you're probably playing from the tips; bad golfer, no cart girl flirting for you). It's extremely common that I have to stick my landing at exactly some given distance inside 170 yards. If your longest reliable actual iron is in the neighborhood of 160 to 180 yards, and you have reliable gaps between irons down to about 80-100 yards, congratulations, you have an iron set that's actually useful on the course. Beyond that, if you really want to impress someone, you just get a custom set with your 25* club labelled a 9-iron instead of the 4 or 5 that it should be and goes up from there; "Yeah, my swing's so powerful I need a 17-iron for those close-in shots".

Will a better ball help you? Yes? No? Depends on why you're a high-capper, and whether your current ball mitigates or accentuates those problems. If you have a short drive distance but good mid and short iron play, a better ball can help with that by increasing effective compression rating for drives and lowering spin from the box, without reducing spin on the approach. However, if you're already playing a 2-piece "distance" ball, you're probably only going to get a softer feel off the tee for your money, and if you can spin a distance ball, you might lose a few strokes in close until you adjust for a "spinnier" ball's tendency to stop faster or even back away from its landing spot. If your short game is lacking, a better ball can help by adding spin at higher lofts. Urethane covers instead of Surlyn/ionomer will grip the clubface (and the ground) a little better, imparting more spin and making the spin work for you more on landing, and a 3- or 4-piece will compress more at lower swing speeds to increase the clubface's footprint, without overcompressing off the tee like a softer 2-piece. However, you still have to dial in your line of play and distances to take advantage of a ball that nails itself to the green; if, like me, your short game woes are tops, turfs, flops and airmails, a new ball will only help if it's part of a bucket at the driving range aiming for the short flags. Even if you're doing well in those departments, you could still lose strokes with a ball that gives you significantly more or less wedge spin, by misjudging the actual impact point based on how far you think it will roll. Overall, from my experience, high 'cappers tend to make mistakes that a ball upgrade won't help with. That's especially true when you can't find the darn thing after your last hit (or, equivalently, you know where it is; out in the middle of the lake off to your right). Value balls are a new, consistent ball (as opposed to playing a "bag o' shags" on the course where each new ball you hit will do something different), that doesn't hurt nearly as much to lose as a $4 V1x, B330 or Chrome Soft. You aren't going to lose 10 strokes on your next round playing with an NXT or V1. What you will lose is $10 more than you would have, watching those top-grade balls sail into lakes, fenced backyards, pools, windows (eek) etc. I currently play Noodles, which are dollar balls that for their price are the best I've found, not getting me ridiculous tee distance nor buzz-saw green attacks, but doing okay at both while feeling really good off the clubface. My only gripe is that since TaylorMade bought Max-Fli, they stopped making the high-vis yellow variant of the standard Noodle, offering it only in their Distance variants which are real rocks (and this isn't as much a gripe as it used to be since my new home course uses yellow range balls, so at least on a couple holes near the range I have to switch to white anyway to avoid having to find a needle in a stack of needles). And because they're a dollar, when I'm at the beginning of a meltdown hole and just can't get one to launch straight off the tee, I'm not throwing my driver into the bushes after the second shanked boomerang slice into some investment banker's back yard. If this sounds like your game, stay with the cheapest ball that feels good to play. If you can hit it straight and find it afterward, but you want more distance or a straight-up bounce on your approach shots, consider an upgrade.

I'll try taking it off between shots and letting the glove and my hand air-dry a little. However, I'll bet you a pair of Pro V1s that the reason your glove has lasted longer is that you haven't been playing/practicing regularly in 100-degree heat and high humidity (whether naturally or just because the range has the misting fans going). If I were playing in a climate where 97* was a record high for July instead of the average daytime high, I'd probably get a lot more out of a glove too, because I'd be sweating a lot less into it. I think the rain glove suggestion (if I can find a good white one; no way I'm wearing a black synthetic glove on a clear, sunny Texas day), along with letting leather gloves thoroughly air-dry as much as possible, are the takeaways for me here.

Drive: 225-260 3w: 190-220 4h: 180-205 5i: ~160-170 6i: ~150-160 7i: 135-150 8i: 125-140 9i: 110-120 PW: 90-110 GW: 70-85 SW: 60-75 These are full-swing carry distances assuming decent contact on the hit. My driver swing speed averages around 97mph, at the wedge side it's around 55mph. My driver is the most inconsistent on distance because the swing is so different from all the other clubs, I'm still trying to get an overall setup dialed in properly, but it plays. I was a little generous on the 3w; when I pop it out there, this is what I can expect, but tops and turfs are still the bane of my par-5 and long par-4 scores, so I'm as likely to end up with a 30-yard top or turf as to pop it in the air with a nice clean swing.

I think you should get fitted. I know as a beginner you'll be extremely inconsistent in your swing (I'm not that much more consistent), but you can at least be measured, and those specs checked out against your new clubs, to make sure the length and lie are in the ballpark for your height and arm length. Learning a good golf swing is hard enough without the club encouraging you to pull up on your shot because it's too long, or bob down at the ball because it's too short, or aim your swing left or right because the clubface is pointing the other way from the wrong lie angle.

Yikes! Chalk one up to "left my $150 raw-finish wedge in the bag in my trunk with the rain fly on until next round". I'd be pretty pissed. But you're right, it'd probably still play. I was thinking more like this: This is what even a chrome Vokey SM5 looks like after about two years' good use. Still totally playable and Titleist in fact recommends not trying to remove the rust (you'll just wear down the milling even more). After even a single round, the raw oil can and black finishes will start looking used.

I currently play 46-52-56, mainly because I don't have a lot of money kicking around for new wedges. I recently gapped them and came up with about a 25-yard gap between PW and GW, then 15 yards between GW and SW. I'm considering picking up the matching 50* UW for my Ping G10 set off 2nd Swing to fill the gap. If I go with a standalone wedge instead, it'll likely be something closer to 48* to handle the additional distance difference inherent in extreme cavity-weighting versus more traditional cut-muscle wedges. In any case, 3 wedges is playable (your PW should really be thought of more like a 10-iron in this day and age), but you may find yourself having to back off your full swing sooner. With four or even five wedges ending at 60*, depending on what the resulting gaps are you could be hitting full swings as close as 40 yards. With a balanced set of just three wedges, assuming they gap relatively evenly, there are two scenarios; either your full swing with your highest available loft is still a genuine "approach" shot from 100+ yards out and you're pitching from anywhere inside that, or you can swing full from 100, 80 and 60 yards but have to choke down/back off a stronger club to hit 90 or 70. Which is the more palatable depends on what you have to do more often. My "home course" is a Par-70 with only two Par-5 holes, neither exceptionally long (for a competent player anyway), so when I'm pitching on it's because I missed my approach shot (which happens fairly often) and so I'm between 5-20 yards off. There's really nothing anyone's doing with a full swing at that range except from a bunker. If you're not hitting very often from between 40 and 100 yards, then three wedges leaving the 58* home and using the 54* for sand only will probably serve you well. If, however, your home course features a lot of shorter par-4s and 5s, where your drive and/or fairway shot isn't quite enough to roll to the green giving you a pitch-and-putt birdie chance, then you'll want as many reliable short-game weapons as your bag allows, so you can stay full and thus get more consistent results. So, be honest with yourself. Play a round and mark each shot on the little hole diagrams of your scorecard (or even better if you can do it quickly, use a GPS app to mark each lie and record the club you hit). Figure out what shots you have to hit most often from what distances in a normal game, and what clubs you're currently using. This will tell you what clubs in your bag are expendable, whether to meet the 14-club limit or just to shed some weight.

Depends on if it's pre-2010 or post-2010. Pre-2010, face grooves on wedges were deep and were supposed to be as sharp as possible; when they wore down, they wouldn't spin the ball as much from any lie. Theoretically these will be illegal for all players in 2020, but my current pair of wedges are non-conforming, and trust me, I don't get a whole lot of advantage from them, but that's on me. Post-2010, a lot of wedges have been designed with milled faces that are actually supposed to rust; the additional pitting of the clubface as it ages will help make up spin lost as the already-rounded corners of the new grooves wear down. This is especially true for the "raw" finishes, including the black satin finishes. It all comes down to what you have and how it's behaving. If you're not getting the spin, even with a rearward address and a lot of lag to hit down and punch out, then it might be time for new wedges. However, just because the black has worn off doesn't mean the club no longer works as intended; manufacturers of these wedges account for the wear on these softer raw finishes to keep the club usable long after it's no longer looking new.

Would you rather have debtor's prisons, like in bygone ages, where if you didn't have friends willing to pay your debt or a creditor willing to forgive it, you'd spend the rest of your life in jail? And when it's a corporate entity that defaults on debt, not an individual, then who goes to jail? It's popular to say "upper management", but not really helpful in a situation like this. Bankruptcy, as a concept, is a good thing, because it allows a person or a company who has failed to start over from scratch, instead of being burdened with past debts for the rest of their lives (and even burdening their next of kin with the same). Alternate forms like Chapter 11/13 reorganization encourage people/companies to file earlier, when they see themselves circling the drain, instead of when there's no other option and the damages to that person and their creditors is much higher. As far as penalties, there are some. The market itself will be more hesitant to get in bed with a company that's newly reorganized; suppliers, distributors, investors etc will demand higher interest/fees and more control than a company that's never gone to bankruptcy court. Stock prices for that company will be low enough that the company could be targeted for a hostile takeover. The Bankruptcy Court itself will be watching that company's finances and management uncomfortably closely to ensure they're living up to the terms of their reorganization. If they don't, the court can order them into liquidation.

Where do you get your clubs fitted/adjusted? GS isn't the best, I grant you, but it is a good option to have for the odd regrip or lie adjustment. That's one thing you really can't do online unless you exclusively shop Ping (and even then...).

Until this last buy, I've been fine with Nike Durafeel gloves. This time around I decided to give FootJoy WeatherSof a try and picked up a two-pack. After the first couple of rounds/rage trips, one potential disadvantage is obvious; they come packaged in an acetate plastic. I normally put the glove, flat, back into the package so it doesn't end up crumpled at the bottom of the bag pocket, and with the heavy card containers for the Durafeels that wasn't a problem, but after just a couple rounds of this treatment with the WeatherSof glove, not only did it come out of the package with the thumb stuck to the palm, and reeking to high heaven, but the other glove in the two-pack smells like a tannery in August as well. I generally get a season or sometimes more out of each glove, but the first glove of the two-pack only lasted a couple months. So, the question to the gallery is, how do you store your gloves between rounds, and how long do they last you with that treatment? Yeah, they're just gloves, but the less I spend even on "disposable" items like gloves, balls, etc, the easier it is to justify to the family accountant.

Neoprene, being a closed-cell foam, will prevent transmission of water through the foam (water, of course, being a chemical catalyst for rust). This means if your bag's getting drizzled on, your clubheads will stay dry in the covers, but it also means if you put the club in the cover wet, it'll stay wet longer. IME the latter is much more likely than the former in any conditions where a wet clubhead is even a possibility. So, I would recommend an open-cell foam for the covers, which will allow the clubheads to breathe and thus allow water to evaporate from the clubheads. In any case, you should be wiping every club down after each round and letting them air-dry with covers off; most rust accumulates on your clubs when you just throw them back in the bag, and the bag in your trunk, where they're forgotten until next round. Personally, I only put covers on my putter (to prevent chatter damage), 4-hybrid (similar) and driver (because it's the longest club and so "shelters" all the others when the rain fly is on). My 3-wood ends up nicely nestled between the driver and 4h covers and so gets a decent amount of protection, while my cast-head duffhammer iron set can chatter all they like.

I tend to agree more with this mentality: "Aim small, miss small". If you putt with the intention of putting it in the hole, even if you don't, you'll end up closer than if you told yourself "just get it close". The only situation where a "just get it close" mentality is more likely to give you a better result is when the hole is badly positioned on the green, such as being too close (per USGA regs) to a severe slope on the green. Trying to put it in the hole might mean you miss the line, or misjudge the power, in the direction of that slope and your ball goes to the other side of the green. A "get it close" mentality focused on putting the ball onto a safe spot on the green within a couple feet of the hole will turn out better on average than trying to hole out, unless you're just that good.

Just overall, it looks stiff and limited. I know it's a pitch, so it is limited by design, but it looks like you're trying too hard to rein it in instead of simply backing off on it (but staying confident)0. What's been working better for me is to do everything the same for a pitch as with my full swing, just, less. Less forceful takeback, less weight transfer, torso rotation, etc, but keep it as fluid as your normal swing. Making the pitch motion choppier only takes away from all the good mechanics you learn in your full swing. Just a 30-capper's $0.02.

Every chart or listing I've seen for the G10 set has shown the PW at 46* with 10* bounce. I've also heard Ping's factory QA can be as far off as 2*, and these are 8 years old and bought at least secondhand. So my specific pitching wedge could well be 45*, it's just not supposed to be given stock specs. You might be thinking of the 2009 update to the series, the G15, which is indeed a 45* PW. All G-series irons after the 15s also have a 45* "10-iron".

Makes sense. My counter is, 30-capper playing 8-year-old SGI duffhammers. I do have an "11:30" swing and a "9:00" swing (essentially 1/3 and 2/3 of full) that will play through practically all my irons and even to my 3w, but shot power in this neverland of partial swings varies to widely for me to trust them much as far as distance. Obviously I should practice these, but a full-swing club in this distance range certainly wouldn't hurt (not when I have a club I can easily give up to get it).

I am at 14 clubs (D, 3w, 4h, 8 matched irons 3-PW, GW, SW, P) so yes, I will have to cut down. I will probably remove the 3-iron; I hardly ever hit it, it's theoretically my 190-yard club but choking down on my 3w produces a near-identical flight, and I'll still have the 4i for punching under trees. Adding a 48* wedge will give me 4 wedges which is pretty standard, just a little more lifted than I thought it would be. The suggestion of looking for the G10 UW is intriguing, I'd actually not thought of that. Trouble is the age and availability; G10s seem to be holding their used value fairly well compared to clubs of similar age, and not many people are giving them up. 2nd Swing doesn't currently have any UWs that are an exact match (basically RH, AWT steel reg flex, red or black dot). eBay does, but the best match is up in Canada, so we're talking $10 shipping plus a two-week hold at customs. But, I don't play every week and I've used the short-game setup I've had for about 5 years, so what's two weeks?

Thanks for the vote. Yeah, I know the launch bay isn't the real world (not my ball, not my course's turf, no wind, ball flight based on high-speed of maybe a tenth of a second), but they were my clubs and as close to the same swing as I could produce, so if there's a gap in the launch bay there will be a gap at the range and on the course. Wherever the gap ends up in real-world conditions on the day, be that between 90-120 yards just like the bay, or 75-100 in realer conditions, 25-30 yards difference between two clubs at the short end of the bag seems steep, hence the question.

Hi guys, I "gapped" my existing wedges yesterday evening and identified a potential problem. My pitching wedge, from my G10 set, is a 46*, super-game-improvement monster that, with a full swing in the launch bay at the FLGS, was tracing about 120 yards average total (and not much if that was rollout, maybe 5 yards). That's about what I've been expecting my 9-iron to do on an average day, so either I was really on it or this new sod-cutting approach I've been adopting with the short irons is really punching them out there. Anyway, the problem was uncovered when I took the same full sod-cutter swing with my 52* Warrior gap wedge. That club is only going about 90 yards total, so I have a 30-yard gap between my set and my wedges. My 56* sand wedge, same brand/model, was a little closer to the gap at about 75 yards full swing, but the worrying thing was that 30-yard difference right around approach-stake distance. The reason is obvious; a six-degree difference between an extreme cavity-back wide-sole cast wedge and a slightly lower-cap oriented pair of thick forged bladelike wedges. I'm not even sure the length between the shafts of the PW and GW follows any recommended progression. I demoed some of the Cally MD3 wedges in 50, 54 and 58* (all low- to mid-bounce so I could play with ball position to find what worked), and the 50 got me a little closer, but not as much as I expected. I was looking for a 105-yard club and I got closer to 98-yd. The other clubs fell into fairly regular ~15-yard intervals with the 54 averaging 85 yds and the 58 in the high 60s. So, by strengthening my gap and switching to post-2010 face tech I gain in the neighborhood of 10 yards, but that still leaves a fairly sizeable gap of 20 yards in my bag. My options, as I see them, are: 1. Add a 48* wedge (or whatever will go 100-105) to what I have. I didn't demo the MD3 in a 48* loft but it's clear that as long as I'm rocking the Gs, the average standalone wedge won't be as distance-oriented, so I'll need a stronger loft to compensate. But, it'll probably be the first casualty after any upgrade to my numbered set (I've been casually looking to upgrade, but probably for the next year at least I'll stick with them), so I'll want to go real cheap, as cheap as finding/borrowing a 100yd club from some older set. 2. Go 50-54-58. If 20-15-15 is a reasonable interval set, cool. The wedges I have aren't conforming anyway and will be illegal in a few more years, so I might as well update. Only problem is that's the most expensive way forward right now even if I buy used. 3. Weaken my PW (or at least double-check it against the 8 and 9). I've had the lies adjusted recently, but I didn't pay as much attention to loft. If the pitching wedge is going about the same distance as my 9, then it's too strong; either it got knocked or the previous owner got it tweaked to adjust for his own swing preference. If my 8, 9 and PW all have consistent gaps (meaning I've simply gained about a club's distance over my expectations somewhere) then it's all about the differences between my set and my wedges. 4. Learn to soften the PW (or something stronger) when I need 100 instead of 120. This is something I would have been fine doing in the past, but reading up online many of the disadvantages of messing with swing power and tempo (like inconsistency) are things I've struggled with on the course, so the general advice of "stay full as often as you can" is something I'm trying to take to heart. But, depending on how many buckets it'll take to dial something in, simply backing off on a 9 or PW to about 80% power is the cheapest option of them all, unless someone gives me a free 100yd club.

Thanks? I guess it comes with the territory of learning to play in Texas summers where even the fairway is dry, hard and thin, to say nothing of the average lie under the trees. You don't want to hit the ground with the club, before or after hitting the ball, so I learned to sweep and I had to learn well. I still thin a ton of pitch shots though (that and my 3-wood are the primary reasons I'm still a 30-cap), so I'm hoping this new shallow dig will get me under the ball more reliably.