Killa

Thanks. Lined my putt up right edge and when I went to stand over the ball it looked straight so I pulled even further left than intended. If I just stood back and confirmed my read that would be an easy roll. We do use the WHS but we can’t enter our scores ourselves, and we have to pay if we want them entered (and you need to declare before the round that you will be playing for hcp purposes and you need a below 18 capper with you to mark your scorecard). I did finally manage to call our golf association and they reset my password so my official hi has now dropped to 22,7, but I only have 10 official rounds recorded in the 4 years I’ve been playing. If I just add the two last times I was out with my friends it would probably drop to around 15.

Also in the meantime I have played my first tournament in the past year and won my club championship in the net Stableford group. Don’t know what my hcp is at the moment but I have played -13 to my 27 index. I have shot +1 on the first 9, that should’ve been 0 as I was in a greenside bunker on a par 5 8th with my 2nd and got it to about 4” but was overthinking the putt and pulled it for a tap in par.

Made some mental breakthroughs 2 days ago swinging a club in my living room. Realized for the first time where the release happens. And my chicken wing is gone. Will need a while to incorporate that into my on course swing as my miss started to change from slice to hook even before doing this. Now the slice is gone completely, can get a slight push but the real miss is a bad hook. Also realized today that I can’t do this on my pitch shots as it’s much harder to control direction of partial shots. On the game side I expect to break 80 this year on an easier course. One round with no penalty shots should do it as my chiping and putting have improved vastly, so more up and downs, less 3 putts and more longer putts (over 8”) hit than in the past.

Breaking 90 pretty consistently now. An easier course layout helps from 6200 yards out. While the high rough is a death penalty (you are lucky to just get it out, unless your name is Brooks) the fairways roll out more than anytime in recent memory. And while the fairways are hard I can still hold the greens with the height of my iron shots. So last round out I shot an 86 with a 10 on a par 5 (the 10 was a result of me playing gross stableford and not really worrying on stroke play and after I hit my first drive OB on a par 5 I was 270 out laying 4 and really needed to hit the green to have any chance of scoring a gross point so I whacked my 3 wood and it just went into a water hazard) and a 6 on a par 3, where I hit my greenside bunker shot out of a “concrete” bunker way too hard and it went over the green (I didn’t blade it I just gave it too much as I expected the club to go into the ground much softer than it did). The rest were 10 pars and 6 bogeys. And so I have really experienced in first hand what a difference conditions make. If I go play the same course I nearly broke 80 on now, and I probably would break 80 if I went to play every day for the next 2 weeks, I will be struggling to break 90 when fall hits and those 400 yard uphill par 4s turn from driver - 8 iron into driver 4 iron.

Dry fairways are really helping my scores nowadays. This is downhill but my longest drive ever nonetheless. Finally got one past 300 meters, while I hit one just the past round 289m uphill.

Thank you - the link after 16.1b solved it for me. I understood everything about the rule (stance, bushes etc.) but I couldn’t manage to find the exact definition of NPCR and this link finally lead to the answer. And the answer I was looking for is: “It is the estimated point where the ball would lie” so I was correct all along but I needed to find this confirmation and was unable to do this by myself

Yes I know all of that. But we are measuring the distance between where the ball lies and the distance where the ball could be dropped nearest on either side of the hazard, right? (yes including that you mustn’t stand in the hazard after taking relief)

The usga link doesn’t work for me (from mobile device and app isn’t available in our area) but my guess is that the diagram is the same as here at the randa website: https://www.randa.org/Rog/2019/Rules/The-Rules-of-Golf/Rule-16 but I still can’t find the wording anywhere so just let me make it clear - we are determining the nearest point of complete relief by the possible ball position and not the stance right? So we determine the nearest point where we could play the ball to one side and then the nearest point of the drop to the other side and then we decide which is closer? The stance has nothing to do with nearest point other than determining where our club would rest once we stand clear of the area we are taking relief from right?

So I’m trying to find the definition but nowhere does it state if that’s measuring where the ball will be dropped or where the stance is. I always assumed that it is the ball position that is measured. So let’s say there is a cart path running down the center of the fairway directly at the flag. That would mean that if the ball in on the left ~ 2/3s of the path the ball would be dropped left for a rigthy and if it’s on the right 1/3rd on the right side. Because I have been told that you basically always look for the middle of the path and then drop on whatever side the ball is on. And for really narrow obstructions like ground under repair it would almost always be on the left side of it (or behind) and almost never on the right?

This course has 2 of those dog legs that suit me. I managed to get close to the green on both but this one was much better because you have trees that start about 30m from the tee box and you need to go over them. Smashed driver and didn’t hear a noise. There is no way to cut it off any further to the right only if you can hit it longer. Pitched to pin high and two putted for par though.

Set up a net in my backyard for the first time today. And immediately I did somewhat of a breakthrough. Shallowed the shaft and made a great turn, no flip, no early extension hitting foam balls. I was so excited that I drove to the nearby driving range to test it out. And there was no way I could repeat it. I thought the only problem would be to repeat a practice swing but obviously a foam ball is like a practice swing in my head as well even though I was hitting the foam balls great. I will continue to work with foam balls though because if I can ingrain the moves they will have to translate to hitting real balls sooner or later...

No it’s combined with a watch. But the watch also has gps and everything on it so I just replaced my Garmin watch with this one. While it’s not a small watch it is super light so if you are used to wear a watch while golfing (I used a garmin approach before) it’s no different.

I have stashed my GameGolf and bought Shot Scope v3. It is much better as it picks up shots automatically and you only need to collect the pin for more exact putting strokes.

well I think that if it’s that big of a difference on the PGA it’s even worse for me... Naturally my % will increase if I hit 3 iron of the tee than driver. Even if I am at the same accuracy with both of them the dispersion is simply that much greater at a longer distance. And I don’t hit my driver 60 yards further than my 3 iron. Last time out I hit 9 greens and 3 fairways... and the driver was really working that day.

Ok so I’ve been a big fan of hitting it longer in the rough than shorter in the fairway ever since I read LSW and Every shot counts. Now the thing is that I’m rereading Every shot counts and I’m looking at the table attached in the picture. So for PGA pros the average strokes to hole out from 100 yards in the rough are 3.02. If we look at the fairway numbers the first number higher than that is at 180 yards at 3.08! So even from 160 yards from the fairway it’s 2,98. So we can say that they are equal from about 165 yards. So doesn’t that mean that a fairway hit is worth 65!!! yards less in driving distance? The difference is less with higher distances but still it hovers about 40 yards? If someone can point me out to where my logic is flawed that’d be great.

Ok I think if you are doing it like that it will be useful. But I see a lot of people advocating using this for rotating the hips consciously and that doesn’t work as it engages different muscles.

I was practicing with this kind of gear last summer to prevent early extension and... it doesn’t work. I mean it works while you are using the aid but not afterwards. At least for me. That is because by using this you kind of forcibly rotate your hips and while that might look good it’s not the correct movement. The rotation of the hips on the downswing is a consequence not something you want to do actively. For example if you bend your knees about half way to a squat you can rotate your hips super fast but that doesn’t add anything to your golf swing. If you rather than rotate your hips, turn into your back hip on the backswing and then the rotation of the hips is a consequence of you pushing off your lead leg and thereby pushing your lead hip back this adds a lot of power to your swing and by result rotates your hips. I hope you can make some sense of this post, I do think Malaska has a video where he explains it brilliantly.

Last hole of my last round. Short par 5 450 yards but it goes from a tee box that is 40 yards below the bunkers that you see and the trees are about 50 yards above the tee box at about 200-220 yards out. Hit a fade over the trees and we didn’t hear it hit anything so I figured I should be safe. Came up over the hill and couldn’t find the ball anywhere. Dropped a ball 180 yards out and a guy in our group pointed out a ball that was a good 35 yards further down the fairway. So I only had 145 yards to the pin (135 to the green) on a par 5. Hit my 8 iron to about 5 yards and again missed my chance at my first eagle and missed my putt by 1,5’. Another round with a tap in birdie to finish.

Played again yesterday and even though the whole round was pretty bad, shot about a 95 with a lot of mental errors and bad chipps and putts. The course was still set up from the national tour that was played past weekend and all the pins were tucked into corners like the Masters on Sunday and much faster on the stimp as well. But again I finished with a tap in birdie on the 18, again a par 5 (different course). It’s a short par 5 450 yards but the teebox is 40 yards below the bunkers you see on the pictures and then the fairway goes down to the green. So had 145ih in to the pin and hit my 8 iron just right of it to about 5 yards. Then hit the put to tap in distance for birdie so still waiting for my first eagle. But as my driver swing keeps improving a lot of the par 5s become reachable so it’s just a matter of time. After the round I went to the range with my playing partner and worked on our swings. After a couple of shots my driver got dialed in and I was like a robot. Straight arrow after straight arrow, carrying about 250y (the net is at 220 and I was hitting it in the top half). Tried his g400 that had a regular flex shaft and it went the same. Launched a bit too high because it’s at 12°. Will get fit for a g425 max in April with a stiff shaft. Was hitting my coaches g410 with an xstiff shaft a couple of weeks back and it also went very far and straight. So I’ll probably still go with a stiff shaft because it’s much less tiring. Also in the 9° head because it can go +-1,5°.

Finally broke 90. I always felt that if I broke 90 it wouldn’t be an 89. And it was 87 but I felt I should be much closer to breaking 80 this round out. It’s a longish course at 6200yards. So I started out strong with +6 on my first 9 holes but that was with 3x 3 putting. And on the 9th I hit my first poor shot a bladed 6 iron of the tee that went about 100 yards. I managed to flight a wedge to about 12 feet and 2 putted for bogey. I was 7 over coming to the 13th hole that is the most difficult on the course. It’s a 420 yards par 4 and uphill all the way so it plays to about 450-460. I hit an average drive into the rough/mown grass and had a 5 iron in. But long story short 4 poor shots later I was on the green and made a triple. Next hole I 3 putted on a par 3 for a bogey and then on 15 that is a 520 yard par 5 with 2 bends I managed to get a quad bogey for a 9, that should really be a 7 at the worst but I managed to hit a tree when punching out that ricocheted OB. So on 3 consecutive holes I had as more strokes over par as over the other 15 combined (8 vs 7). On the 18th that is a reachable par 5 (500 downhill) my eagle putt missed by 1/2 inch and lipped out and left me with my only birdie of the day. Would’ve been my first eagle as well. I really feel the swing changes / practice over the winter are coming into effect and that I should break 90 regularly now. Given the right course and daily form I might actually break 80 this season.

Coming back to this thread I feel like most of us who struggled with this came from the place where the backswing was nowhere near steep enough. I’m not saying that’s for everyone but a lot of golfers could improve by making their backswing steeper.

Finally managed to break 90 today and it was an 87. And that was an 87 with a quad bogey, a triple bogey and 5 3 putts (and the 3 putts weren’t on the quad/triple holes) The swing changes really start to take effect in game as well. Managed to slow down my backswing and thus getting a good tempo. I also had an eagle putt on 18 from about 5 meters and it lipped out to about a foot, would be my first ever eagle but ended up being a tap in birdie. I have gained more distance off the tee so my last drive was over 300 yards. (downhill par 5, it’s always nice when you are hitting 6irons into your par 5s) The triple bogey came on the hcp 1 hole and it was a series of bad events. My drive went into the rough but I still was hitting a 5 iron, the ball sat on piles of mowed grass and it literally went undeneath it so the ball flew 60 yards in height and distance. Then I quickly proceeded to shank an 8 iron back into the mown grass and that ended with very poor strike as well. So I hit my 5th on the green and 2 putted. My quad came 2 holes after when on a tight par 5 that has 2 bends I hit 5 iron off the tee and I pulled left into some shrubs. I took my medicine, punched out about 40 yards down the fairway and then wanted to lay up with my 7 iron as the fairway is severely tilted and the ball was below my feet. I then hit a very poor shot towards OB into the same shrubs. And then came the shot that really almost threw me off my game completely. I wanted to take my medicine again and punch out but the twigs caught my club weirdly and I hit a tree and the ball bounced OB... dropped a ball and punced out in anger about 50 yards down the fairway. So I was lying 6 already. Then I managed to calm down and hit my pitching wedge to about 3 meters. Just missed the putt for triple. But what I’m most proud of is that after this quad bogey when I felt like I just ruined a really good round I proceeded to shoot par/bogey/birdie on the final 3 holes. So mentally that was a huge milestone.

Did a quick Trackman session yesterday. Nearly wanted to throw away my clubs. Basically we were trying to get my friend to 120mph with the driver. He started at about 113 and after a few swings and some tweaks to his motion (not his swing) we got him to 119,5. Maybe 120 next time. Now to my problem - I thought I gained speed and distance in the past year since my last Trackman session. And on the course it shows. I mean my longest total drive was 312 yards. But when I hit driver on Trackman my fastest speed was 105 and it depleted me so badly I almost threw it away 🙂 But then my friend/pro told me to hit some 7 irons. Started with 83. A couple of swings later I was up to 89. Then we were just playing around with some shafts (it’s also a Ping fitting center) and he gave me a whacky graphite shaft and the first swing with that shaft was 93, the second was almost 94. Then we switched back to iron shafts and I got up to 92. Then back to my irons and it was hovering around that 92 area. So that just confirmed to me what my friend/pro was telling me all along - I just can’t hit my driver. Because I should be over 110 with my on course swing with the driver if I’m swinging my 7 iron in the 90 range. But we will continue to work on my irons before we take on the driver. Slow and steady. And it could also be a bit of a gear issue. My king cobra f6+ - he was swinging 119 with Ping G410 and he could barely break 113 with mine.

So... covid happened and home schooling came with it and the 2-3 times a month golfing became 0 times a month golfing. Anyway. We did a change with my swing using the DNA swing “method” as used by Tischler and others. The main change is in my right elbow. I set it back in the backswing and keep it there down to impact in the side/cover position. Meaning keeping the right hand in front of my right elbow at all times. More like Stenson, much less (or the opposite of) DJ. this is the swing from early December and many things improved from there but no videos as they are pretty poorly lighted. Will try to get some this month. There are many things that I have “incorporated” or at least tried to in the past that made my progression slower IMO. The worst being “weight forward”. We don’t need weight forward in the golf swing, we need force forward. While some people understand weight forward correctly and in their mind it translates to force forward I have personally tried to move my weight forward for the past 2-3 years. Now that I “understand” that I can stop sliding excessively and also that I understand the hip turn more. The hip turn is a result of the golf swing and not the other way around. The best explanation I heard was - back swing try to get your right hip as far back as possible (depth) and on the downswing try to get your left hip as far back as possible - so the extension of the left leg creates the rotation and not the rotation causing the extension of the left leg. By forcing rotation you “spin out” and end up with some sort of early extension. So by changing the right elbow I got rid of the push slice that was my worst miss, and it especially came into play with the longer clubs 4i,2i,3w and D. Now it looks like I completely eliminated that and my worst miss is a push when the ball doesn’t draw. So that are my main 2 projects (force transfer and right elbow) till March/April when most of the courses will be available for regular play. If I am able to play regularly I feel like low 80s or even breaking 80 is doable this season.

So all the work I’ve been putting in doing drills at home and learning about the proper movements seems to finally be showing some results. I have learned today that if your hip and shoulder turn on the backswing are correct than the shallowing of the club happens automatically. I made absolutely no effort to shallow the club on these swings, the only thought was the “correct” hip loading in the backswing and transition. I would still like to open my hips more at impact and I’d like a bit more of forward shaft lean as a result of that, but I can see the early extension and chicken wing to slowly disappear. For anyone who wants to look more into the proper hip turn and loading check out the videos of Athletic Motion Golf. I’m a very visual person and their skeleton videos really help me understand what the good players are doing. From the start of October I’m changing my workweek to only 4 days working being off on Tuesdays. So that should hopefully result in golf 2-3 times per month.