B-Con

I might be. Don't know for sure yet.

You're right, the Olympic field won't be able to match the field that we expect of a major. And we have four of those per year. The quality of the prize is typically determined by the quality of the field. So, no, the Olympic prize is very unlikely to match the honor of a major.

Video of Tiger's 9-iron shot around the tree: [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nD_d4QlOeI[/video]

We already have 4 competitions per year where we invite basically the 150 best in the world to compete on the best and hardest courses that exist, and most of them show up. Unless the 2016 Olympics use a different style of play, how exactly are they going to compete with that kind of quality of field? No doubt an Olympic gold would be an honor, but more than a major? I have a hard time seeing that.

Wow, I currently have the top 4-way tie all picked in my fantasy lineup. One in class A, three in class B. A day to remember. :-)

Until recently I used to play with sunglasses on. I don't think it makes a difference one way or another. I thought that the squinting/glare would kill me, but the hat brim does a decent job of mitigating that and I don't play much when the sun is at it's brightest. So after some adjustment I don't really notice it any more. I'm trying to think of anything I do that was inspired by the pros do. It's hard to be sure, but the only thing I can think of is that I've found some who's swing tempos intrigued me that I tried to imitate. And I'm sure I've picked up a small piece or two of my pre-shot routine from pros.

Sweet. I could carry two drivers that I don't hit well. I can't wait until I have the option to hit club 1 somewhere between 210 and 250 and possible off to the left or club 2 somewhere between 210 and 250 and possible off to the left .

Playing golf with few strokes is hard. Playing golf consistently with few strokes is really hard. The former is akin to having a good hole. It's actually reasonably difficult to move the ball 350 yards an into a 4.25" cup in just 4 strokes. The latter is what a golf score is about, how consistently you played golf. Keeping the ball in play and hitting a good shot or two is a nice way to play golf. But golf scores aren't about playing decently some of the time, it's about not playing badly ever. Taking a few mulligans or not counting a few OB shots may not seem like a big deal, but for the way golf is set up it's a [i]huge[/i] difference. There is a big difference in consistency between the guy who never hits OB and the guy who hits OB 3 times per round. Those penalties are measuring something perfectly legitimate to measure, the fact that it costs you a stroke or two is [i]not unfair[/i]. If you play OB with no penalty dropping from where it went out, you're essentially not counting 2.5 shots per instance. The first shot is a penalty stroke, the second shot is the original one you should have counted. Now you should be back on the tee hitting three but you're standing down the hole dropping another. That should be your third shot, but I'll guess that it's probably a bad angle off in the rough and not as ideal as another drive would be and so it's only "worth" half a shot. So if you miss 2 to 4 OB shots per round, that's probably roughly 5 to 10 strokes worse you would have actually shot. We don't know for sure, but that's what I'd estimate, since you asked. I couldn't break 90 for the longest time. I straightened out my driver a bit and stopped hitting my irons fat as often, so I stopped losing so many balls in hazards and OB. My score dropped 3 or 4 strokes on average with very little actual improvement. Penalties really do add up. I emphasize that I personally don't care how others play, but if you're concerned with how accurate your score is compared to the real thing, it's a big difference. [quote name="Timothy Voyles" url="/t/59887/how-honest-are-you-with-scoring#post_733946"]I personally won't hit off rocks or cart paths if that's where I end up. I do however count a stroke for a drop (not sure if it's the proper way or not, could be relief in some situations?).[/quote] First, you can always take a penalty stroke and drop within two clublengths not nearer the hole. That's legal. But second, why do that? I totally understand not wanting to ding up a nice club just for one shot, but in such situations I just use a smaller, controlled, make-shift shot to get out of trouble A choked down 1/4 swing hybrid can be easily controlled to not hit the ground, and it's easy to still move the ball 80 or so yards that way. Heck, use your putter and move it 10 or so yards. It's got to be way better than taking an entire stroke to move it a few feet. :-)

PM sent.

Yeah, confirmation bias is probably the biggest reason why myths, or bad rules of thumb, prevail. Three greens in a row break in a certain direction, and a handful of other ones do, and suddenly it's well-known knowledge that that's how all the greens break. Every time someone misses on that side, they instantly remember that's the direction the greens break. But when it's missed to the other side, well, that's not worth remembering. :-P

My stock shot tends to be pretty much straight. I'd like to be a push-drawer, but I do it with any consistency with my shortest irons at the moment. My typical miss tends to be an OTT pull fade. One of the nicest additions to the new forum (well, "new" in the sense of 1.5 years old) is block lists. Just throwing that out there. :-)

I agree that's how they were intended. But I thought it had a [i]subtle[/i] feel of the homage aspect. Regardless, it looks like they're hoping he'll bring some more popularity to the game.

The PGA Tour's official YouTube channel put out 4 short videos on Tiger Woods recently. I haven't seen them posted yet, so here they are. [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvP1LUlfAbE&feature;=g-all-u[/video] [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RowXnGKTdjg&feature;=youtu.be[/video] [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xxu6Srn4AC8&feature;=youtu.be[/video] [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_OtPORDeyE&feature;=youtu.be[/video] It seems like the goal was to re-invigorate interest in him (and thus golf) by reminding us of how good he was and the fact that he's picked back up recently while competing against the younger generation of golfers his legacy helped build. But it almost came across with something of a "farewall" vibe, like the homage you pay when a great athlete retires.

In the same place (trying to get a new driver for under $120) and I'm currently eyeing the Ping G15. Also thinking about the Adams Fast 10 and F11. Used good condition for all of those is about $120 or less on eBay.

Balls. Personally, I'd like to see the ball rolled back to about 75% of distance, or so, have courses add more forward tees or get shortened up, put even stricter regulations on club design with regard to distance, and let half the manufacturers go out of business. It's supposed to be a sport, not an arms race. I don't see why equipment needs to keep going farther. Why, so that the courses can then be made longer? What's the point? It won't happen, but in my dream world of "golf made perfect according to me" golf equipment is very tightly regulated and there's little benefit in rolling out new product lines. It's like most other sports, you have a set of standard equipment and everyone produces and uses almost the same thing.

I'd have to agree. They don't really add much by way of visibility. There are a couple areas where I think they are a bit easier to spot, such as sand traps and during late twilight hours, but for most circumstances they're none easier to find and sometimes harder. I don't know why yellow was the color of choice for everyone to branch out to. I closely resembles dead grass and leaves, and thus gets lost in the rough easily, which is the time when you want your ball to visually stand out. What we needed them to provide was blue, red, or orange balls.

I don't have [i]exact[/i] yardages for my clubs, but from GPS readings and Google Maps confirmed driving range distance markers I have a pretty good idea. LW - 50 GW - 85 PW - 111 9i - 122 8i - 133 7i -144 6i - 155 5i - 166 4h - 180 3h - 190 3w - 215 Driver - 240 Misc thoughts: My rule of thumb is that I have 11 yards between clubs. It's not terribly scientific, but when I did some research on Trackman that's what the pros seemed to have, and I think it produces iron distances that seem right on for me. As a bonus, it makes memorizing the distances really easy (111, 122, 133, etc). When I want to choose a club, these are the distances I start with before accounting for lie, wind, how well I'm hitting that day, etc. That's about how far I [i]do[/i] hit. I can hit farther, and I could add about 10 yards across all my irons if I wanted to. At the range occasionally I'll average a longer distance, but we all know that a groove on a good day at the range is not the same as pulling a club for the second time on the course. Trying to hit farther, though, my accuracy suffers, so I don't have much reason to try for farther. I can hit my LW farther, but I don't see a point in doing so as it's too much room for error for me to try. Anything from outside 50 yards is for the GW at that point. And I pretty much never pull my SW for full shots. I use GPS a few times per round to check my driving distance. I use it to spot-check distances some average drives and to check longer drives. The boring ones tend to be in the 230s, but the long ones will be out at roughly 250 - 260; I'll have one or two long ones per round if I'm playing decently. We have three holes here with a hazard at about 260 yards from the tees I play. I got to a point last year where I would consistently dump a drive into the water on at least one of those three holes, so I know that 260 yards is reasonably achievable on a good drive and I use a shorter swing or lower club on those holes. My hybrids really vary based on whether they're teed up or not. When I have them teed up I sometimes hit them much farther. I put my 4h out to 200 on lay-up holes on occasion, but I wouldn't expect that off the deck. My 3w can also really vary. I can hit it 230 or 190. If I had to layup in front of a hazard at 230 I wouldn't use it. If I needed 180 of carry, I wouldn't club down from it.

Well, the catalogs exist... [quote name="piaablue" url="/t/59813/is-anyone-getting-dicks-sporting-goods-coupons#post_732794"]I have been getting coupon flyers regularly as I have a scorecard with Dick's. I don't know if that has anything to do with it or not. I just used my 10.00 off a purchase over 50.00 for golf shoes and my 200 points bonus coupon last week. [/quote] Yeah, so do I. [quote name="meenman" url="/t/59813/is-anyone-getting-dicks-sporting-goods-coupons#post_732804"]I have a scorecard too - honestly, it's not a big deal since most of my purchases are made at my pro shop since everything is much cheaper there (while supporting my club) [/quote] Nice. I wish that were the case for me.

The post before the quoted one was from 2007. The poster bumped a 5 year old thread.

He said he had a tool that was easy and (in the next post) reliable for him to use. I still don't get your complaint. He said that he has the ability to use something. He didn't say that you should throw away everything else. There are two topics: The fact that iacas says he (and others) can read greens with their feet. This has been mentioned. Then there's a bunch of nonsense about throwing away all other techniques and ignoring rules of thumb when they apply in the absence of better information. This hasn't been brought up. You're mixing the two up. Like I said, stick to the [i]ability[/i] to and [i]reliability[/i] of reading greens with the feet. That's the only thing that's actually been mentioned. [i]If[/i] it is reliable, then it's trustworthiness is held in comparison to all other tools. But you can't argue about that until you address the basics.

DSG used to send out catalogues with coupons for golf stuff every few months. Like 50, 100, or 200 free points, a couple bucks off golf balls or apparel, etc. I haven't gotten any this year. I miss it, because I'd probably save about $30 or so over the season using them. Anyone else still getting them? I'm wondering if they stopped doing it or if they knocked me off their mailing list for purchase inactivity over the fall and winter. I've signed up.again online but.gotten nothing.

I re-read them. I suggest you do too. Again, no. All that was said was that Aimpoint helps you figure out break. Nothing else you asserted about extremes was even casually implied in those posts. Again, what thread are you reading? You're taking extremes that were never meant to be implied. [quote name="lonewolf" url="/t/59658/its-2012/36#post_732610"]--iacas point is very difficult for me to accept. I'm not buying that "feet reading" a green can tell me the difference between a 2" break and a 4" break ESPECIALLY when the the assertion is that local knowledge becomes moot when "feet reading". The question I would have is do you think you can tell a 2" break from a 4" break by "feet reading"?[/quote] Apparently he does. I don't think I could, but then I have not practiced it or been trained at all, so it's irrelevant. Really, this is the only point worth mentioning in this conversation. You think that it's hard (or impossible) to read a green with your feet. iacas asserts differently, that he can. All the other mumbo jumbo about "throwing away" and "rules of thumb" have nothing to do with the actual topic. Drop it and focus on this. [quote name="lonewolf" url="/t/59658/its-2012/36#post_732610"]--Oh. OK. One only has to be an expert to DISPUTE Aim point....but not an expert to actually defend it. That's good to know. I'll file that away.[/quote] I'm not defending Aimpoint (and that was pretty obvious), I'm pointing out that you're having a conversation over things that someone didn't say.

No it wasn't. It was interjected as a way to get better reads. And the rules of thumb were only thrown out when they're taken to non-sensible extremes (or, implicitly, when they contradict information from a reliable source). [quote name="lonewolf" url="/t/59658/its-2012/36#post_732560"]It was also explained as a great way to figure out greens with ones feet without caring about local knowledge (rules of thumb)-- even greens a player has never played on. And IMHO, that is BS.[/quote] Again, it wasn't. What thread have you been reading? [quote name="lonewolf" url="/t/59658/its-2012/36#post_732560"] Aimpoint is not a magic wand and nobody is saying it is --- Beg to differ. Read boogielicous and icacas posts. ' All I gotta do is read up on Aim point and read greens with mey feet.' And I quote "It's that simple". [/quote] iacas's original point was that he can read break very accurately through his feet. He claims that it is simple for him to do so. How is this difficult for you to accept? Rules of thumb are just general statistics, aka, "break tends to be toward local bodies of water 75% of the time". I made that up, but that's the idea. If you have another instrument for measuring break that you have higher confidence in than a general loose statistic, then you should use it. Really, it's that simple. I'm not an expert on Aimpoint, I don't use it nor study it, but come on, at least try to understand what people are saying.

Have you tried them both?

Levels are not approved equipment. You can't turn in a score you get while using one. So no. From what I understand you can build a map of greens you frequently play, but it also teaches you how to read greens without requiring a level. There are other AimPoint threads on here if you're interested in learning about the technique. The original post didn't even mention AimPoint, it was only about rules of thumb that get carried too far.