DrvFrShow

I wonder if the USGA is going to rate the 5600 yd tees at my home course 76/130 for women when this comes out. Those are the forward tees. If they reduce the ball 10% those tees will be brutal. A 10% reduction for the men will bring people who play the 6250 yd whites down to 5600 - do the math. Will courses like this have to put in more tee boxes? Yes, and the costs will get passed on to us. I wish the USGA luck in enforcing this rule on the general public. Those of us who just play for fun and have a 3 yr supply of balls in the house. I doubt people who don't play competitive golf are going to just toss those away and buy new ones. Also the old balls will continue to be sold on Amazon until their supply runs out, too. Amazon is under no obligation to comply with the rule. I think Adam Scott mentioned that the driver used to be the most difficult club to hit, and now it's the most forgiving. Guys reach for it when they're nervous. So why didn't they just say, "Pros hit with a smaller, less forgiving driver head," - mini-drivers - and be done with it. Amateurs keep our 460 cc driver heads. Still the PGA could tell the USGA to go stuff it. With the ball they can't, unless they have their own ball made. You know like MLB where the big leagues use a wooden bat, and college and high school ball use aluminum bats. The game is already bifurcated for all practical purposes. The proto irons that we can buy but why when we can't hit them well? And then some of those custom made putters we can't buy. And who among us can hit Bryson's 5 degree driver? I turned 71 in October, and last year my avg drive was 195 yds. So I'll have a 175 yd drive. Hit 5W approaches into every par 4 and be short all the time. So I'm going to have to put a lot of work into my short game and putting. That's where golf is now. Short game and putting. Practice will be hit a small bucket and spend the rest of the time chipping and putting just so I can have a chance of shooting 90. Fun times ahead. Unless they put in more tee boxes. Or maybe I won't care about the rule?

Age and bad knees have caught up with me and I'm moving up to 5200.

FYI, Chevron regular is $4.99/gal out here. There was a 50 cent/gal increase in fuel costs. Fuel for the golf carts has gone up... also they bought new golf carts. But the price increases mean that I'm walking this year.

15th hole. 185 yds out approach. Incline (plays as 205). 7W to pin high 8' from the hole.

Walked 9. 45. 67% FW. 33% GIR. 3 pars.

Dumb ball rule change is dumb. Solution in search of problem. That's all I have to say. Done.

Q: Does slow motion practice work? A: Yes. When you're learning a Beethoven Sonata on the piano, you don't play it full speed straight away. You play it slow and in little sections until you get the notes right. It doesn't sound much like music, but then when you know the notes, you speed it up. Now it starts sounding more like it's supposed to, but you're not done. There's still more to learn. There's the expression... the details that you have to learn. You're at a moderate pace and you add in those. Once you know how to play those you ramp it up to full tempo and it sounds like a piece of music. Same with golf.

Since there's all this discussion about velocore and stock shafts.

Drivers have always been super expensive. The only problem is that my income hasn't kept up with the inflation.

Here's mine vs. 15 HC final for 2022. Looks like I need to work on approach and driver. Driver got a lot better toward the end of the season, but it's not something to slack on. I do 15-20 mins of lag putting before every round.

@Dgolfer277 Next spring, why don't you just download one of the free apps for your phone and get a HC even if an unofficial one. I suggest The Grint because your unofficial HC can become official if you decide to become a paid member. I joined the USGA last July when I got an e-mail from the WA State Golf Ass'n that told me that if I had a bunch of scorecards from rounds played this season I could pay my membership fee and enter all of them so I said "why not?" And then I entered my USGA membership number on The Grint and it's now linked with the WHS. I use The Grint for some online golf tournaments.

I currently game the F9 One Lengths. The 5i is 23 degrees and the set GW is 49 degrees. You will need the GW, trust me. The LTDx OL gap wedge is 47.5 deg, so it's 6 deg. If you dropped the set GW and went to specialty wedges, you'd need to go probably Cleveland CBX Zipcore 46, 50, 54, 58 (or change to the RTX Zipcore 58 low depending upon if you hit flop shots). Here's the bag I played last season: Ping G410 4H (22), 5H (26); Cobra F9 OL - 7i - GW. Notice I dropped the 6i because the 6i is the same loft as the 5H. I used the 5H for the same shots as the 6i and for bump and runs around the green. I did this not because I couldn't hit a 6i - it's one of my favorite clubs - it was that a bump and run was an auto triple bogey. Using a hybrid for them put me in position to save par because it's very difficult to chili dip a hybrid. For wedges I used a Cleveland Zipcore RTX 50, Callaway MD-4 54/10, and Callaway MD-4 58/8. My wedges are pretty shot so next season I'm replacing them with Cleveland CBX2 52, Cobra Snakebite OL 56, Cobra MIM OL 60. I don't hit full shots with my wedges. Dropping the 6i allowed me to put a 7W in the bag. I play a 5W & 7W and Driver at the top end. I'd hit the LTDx OL and see if you like them better. If you do, I'd just get individual irons 6i - PW. There's no discount for buying a "set." The 6 is 23.5 deg. You already have a 4H that's 21 degrees. So you don't need a 5i, and then get the wedges. If you like the irons better than what you're already playing. You might want to compare your current hybrid to the LTDx hybrid or maybe even a Ping G425 425 hybrid (22) and loft it down to 21 degrees.

twitter was lit today.

I have had a chance to look at my Shot Scope Data from 2022. I have reread Lowest Score Wins and have torn into the book in the practice section, particularly the Separation Values to formulate a plan for next season that will work with my club distances. I did this because honestly 220+ approach shots are a non-sequitur for me. The bag is fine - I see no need to buy anything new for next year. SV4 - Driver (of course): I've improved here a lot this season. I've been on a launch monitor and it's all about is keeping up the good work; Approach Shots from 50 - 160 yds. - Acc'd to Shot Scope this is where the bulk of my approach shots fall, and acc'd to Strokes Gained this is where I did the worst. -8.42 vs. 0 HC. My goal is to pick up 2 strokes on my tee shots, and 3 strokes on my approach shots. This will mean target focused practice. Trouble shots aren't a problem. I used to compound a bad situation by trying things I couldn't do. Last year, I made better decisions. Hitting a punch shot from under a tree with a 5W instead of "taking my medicine" and knocking it back out onto the fairway turned a DBs into a par sometimes. SV3 - Shots 25-50 yds: I got these quite often. They were the result of a poor 2nd shot on a par 4, and I need to make better decisions about them. Do I hit a wedge? Do I run it up with a hybrid? Bottom line is that I need to continue to practice these shots with my wedges. It's a bread and butter shot. If there's something in the way, I need to have confidence from a tight lie, or from rough with the ball sitting up or buried and have it settle inside 20' - the closer the better. Shots inside 25 yds: Again I end up here quite often, the result of a missed green - the nGIR. To pitch or chip. I'm better at the simple pitch than a chip. If this shot is 5 yds to the green, I might consider using a hybrid or 7W these days just because there's almost no chance of chunking it. Bunker Shots - There's really no place to practice bunker shots. Practice bunkers don't even come close to the conditions of the bunkers on the courses I play. The practice bunkers have too much sand in them and are too easy to get out. My current Strokes Gained for Short Game is - 3.87 vs. 0 HC. My goal is to pick up 2 strokes on my short game - 1 stroke in each of those areas. My putting at the end of the season was -0.75 Strokes Gained vs. 0 HC which isn't bad. The low hanging fruit here is the 6 - 9 ft. putts. I only make 38% of these. If I make more 6 - 9 ft putts, I can make more pars and birdies. I turned 70 this year. I'm amazed I haven't lost distance. I know the day is coming. I'll be hitting the gym because I know strength training is the only way to postpone the inevitable.

It's always swing speed, technique (sequencing, tempo, clubface to club path, use of groundforce, etc.), and quality of contact. Someone mentioned Els and Couples. These guys are masters. They make it look so effortless.

It's been a crazy week.

not an issue right now... we're in a river of rain. But back in October I was playing a course a few years back and hit my tee shot dead center of the fairway. Like the entire foursome saw it land. We were virtually certain it was in the fairway about 210 yds out. It was breezy and leaves were blowing. We couldn't find the ball. Then we found the ball. People went to their balls. I went back to the cart to get the club I was going to hit and lo and behold some leaves blew over and covered the ball again and we lost it. I dropped another ball in the general vicinity and played on. Virtually Certain. Leaf rule.

You know you can still buy an M4 brand new direct from TaylorMade for $300. The M4 is almost the same as the M2 except it has the first generation of "Twist Face" to help a little more with dispersion on off center hit... well it's supposed to anyway. I went to their web site and checked to see if they still had them. The Sim 2 Max is also still available for $450. I play the Sim Max and it's probably the best driver I've owned. I didn't see any on the web site. They were going for $400 last Oct. so if you see any in the stores they'll be around $350 - 375.

Best Of All Time? +14/86. The 18th hole had been a nemesis most of the year. I'd been hitting my driver well all day so I went with grip it and rip it. Alas it didn't turn out so well. I hit my tee shot off the heel and watched it only tumble 134 yds just off the fairway to what looked like under a tree in a bad spot. Turned out not so bad. The shot that saved the round? The approach shot on the 18th. It was a bit breezy. I was 180 yds out. My 7W was normally 190. I had a sidehill lie in the rough just off the fairway but the ball was sitting up in the grass like it was on a low tee. Great lie. I decided to play a stinger out to the right over the bunker where it should naturally draw back onto the green. I made good contact, the ball took off low into the breeze heading straight for the bunker, and then at the last second curved over it and landed on the green bounced once and stopped. I waved to the fans as I approached the green. 😆 34 feet from the hole. I can't complain. At my HC I'm lucky to hit the green from that distance. Lagged to to 2 feet and tapped in for par.

So what do you do when people use this as a precedent? And it will happen.

I've had a long dry spell regarding birdies. It's been over 12 months. I'd been getting 1 per round, but then that stopped. I think I've been playing better golf. At least my mental game has been better. I finally broke the dry spell last Friday with a birdie on the #1 handicap hole. It has three bunkers where your drive lands - one large grass bunker and two sand bunkers. I'd been hitting my driver well, so I played it and split the fairway right between them. I had to wait for the next group to get onto the green, because there was an outside chance I could hit my 5W 225. It's happened a couple times. Chances are it would only go 210, but I didn't want to risk it. And I hit a nice 5W to the right side of the fairway about 210 from where I was. This left a 43 yd LW to the green. We're in "lift, clean, and place" so after noticing a chunk of mud on the ball I marked the ball with a tee and cleaned the mud off it, replaced it and got ready to hit. I dropped a nice high spinner on the green that stopped dead 4 feet from the hole. I pulled the flag. Lined up the putt and enjoyed the sound of the ball rattling in the bottom. Birdie. Fist pump. The 4 on a the #1 par 5 looks good.

I made peace with my driver. I'm hitting it better than I've ever hit it... or rather maybe I've finally been fit into one that works for me. Or I finally figured out how to hit it. It's probably the latter, because I can't believe that changing the loft from 10.5 to 11.25 and adding 150 rpm spin has made that much difference in ball flight. I did this three rounds ago. I was hitting around 32% fairways with it. The last 3 rounds I've been in the upper 50s%. I don't slice anyway.

You pick it: 9th hole: 45 yd LW to 4' that set up the birdie putt. OR 18th hole: after one of my worst drives of the day, 180 yds out. My good sense was telling me to hit a 7i to lay up and pitch on for an up and down or at worst a bogey. My bad sense was telling me "no layups." I'd bought that 7W just for this type of shot. It was a sidehill lie above my feet though, so I had to aim it at the Chevy Pickup in the parking lot and hope it hooked back over the bunker and landed on the green. I played the ball a little more centered to make sure I hit it on the in to out. I hit it. It went out and then it started hooking. I thought, "it's gonna land in the bunker," but it cleared, landed on the green and checked ending up short of the hole but in the center of the long green. Waddashot. Now I had a 45 foot putt for birdie. I checked the slope and break. It was straight and uphill. Just get it close. It finished about 2 feet long and 3 feet from the hole. From that distance, not bad. Putt in for par. Sometimes you have to go for it.

Personal Best 86. On the 10th hole I forgot how to putt and didn't remember until the 16th. 71% FIRs. This will drop my index to 16.2 for the year.

Erik makes a good point. If I was able to really lay into the ball with everything I had and was guaranteed to hit the fairway, I'd have a short shot onto the green anyway. For the better player who is good with their irons, the guaranteed fairway is more valuable. For the average player like most of us on this forum, the guaranteed up and down will be more valuable. I'm not a better player, so I'd take the guaranteed up and down.