jas80s

Like many if not most of the players on here, I have pretty good recall of every shot I hit in a round of golf. But, it's hard to glean any patterns or specific issues from just a memory of this hole or that. With that in mind, what do you guys recommend in the way of an app or other software that might be helpful for compiling statistics and determining what areas of the game are costing me the most shots? (As let's face it, they all cost me shots to some degree 🙂) This is all very new to me, so very basic advice would be great, thanks!

I have been going with a standard pitching wedge from the fairway. But, I have been placing the ball pretty far back in my stance, so I am going to move it forward a bit and see if that leads to a little softer landing. Thanks for taking the time!

I also had a quick question on this shot as I have been trying to weave it into my game. It has been going pretty well in terms of contact and direction. But, I am getting a ton of roll out on the shot, as much as 10 or 15 yards if it lands on the green. I know I am not posting a video of my swing, but does anyone have a thought as to why I might be generating so little spin? I really feel like I am accelerating downward through the ball, but of course I could be wrong. Thanks.

I was playing the other day with a guy who was struggling off the tee. I am pretty good at not offering any advice, but I couldn't help but notice on a tee shot that I observed that, sure enough, as he got over the ball his feet and shoulders were pointed well left of center. After he pulled his drive, I somewhat carefully offered, "You know, not for nothing, but you were actually set up exactly on the line of that shot." I added in the obligatory, "I do it all the time" which is absolutely true, but also so that we could commiserate as flawed golfers.. We had a good rapport (which is why I even said something in the first place) and he seemed quite surprised at the revelation and seemed almost relieved to get that particular feedback. It's a bit of a bad habit for me, if I feel comfortable with someone, I might just start talking golf and then it's easy to get on the subject of your individual games. Anyway, I think "setup" is somewhat immune to this dynamic in my experience. Perhaps people don't think it's as much of an indictment of their game and they feel that it's not so much someone trying to "fix" their game but just throwing out more of a simple fact that might or might not be relevant. I hope I'm not that guy.

Good advice all around, thanks very much to all of you for taking the time...

I am filling out my bag and I still have one slot left. I am thinking I can use a good club for low punch shots. I have a tendency to hit the ball on a somewhat higher trajectory generally, so this isn't a huge strength of mine, but it does represent a fairly large hole in my game so I would like to address it. With that being said, what club do you favor for low punch shots? I'm thinking of a low iron. I have a four iron, but that is still 25 degrees or more of loft. Do I need something with even less loft?

Hello all, How might one go about practicing the mental game of putting (and chipping for that matter)? One of the problems I have is that my mind when I play and when I practice are not the same at all. I am not full on "yips" or anything, but during a round, I tend to think more of the scoring implications of a putt and it does lead to some less than solid strikes, particularly on shorter putts. I go to practice putting, but sometimes I feel like it's time wasted because I can't carry it over to playing since the mental aspect creeps in and changes the dynamic. Any thoughts on how drills or techniques designed to quiet your mind while putting during a round? Thanks

Winning a major by 15 shots and holding all four majors at the same time are staggering achievements, like mind blowing. I don't think we will even see them again. I'm not a big Tiger guy generally, but some of the stuff he did...just incredible. How could he be so much better than his contemporaries?? The only thing even close to me might be Wayne Gretzky (totally different in many ways, I know but still, the numbers just blow your mind). Actually, his achievements might be more accurately described as "Ruthian". Now, having said that, one of the reasons I really like Brooks Koepka is that he makes me think of how a young Jack Nicklaus might be if he played in today's conditions... 1. Bombs it off the tee 2. Holes a sick amount of putts and often in such critical moments. 3. Tends to play really well on tough tracks and in big events. So, I feel like we can still say this is quite close (I'm sure we agree on that). I figure if you put Jack in Tiger's era and remove Tiger, I think Jack wins about 10-11 majors. Now THAT is a non-math opinion. 🙂

All of a sudden, I find that I am having real trouble with a full swing wedge. I just seem to be missing it all kinds of ways: Blocks, fat, pulls, you name it; just can't seem to get dialed in. Not that I am crushing it with every other club, but it's pretty much as I said in the subject: It's like I am in a "one club" slump. Has anyone encountered this? I am guessing it's not uncommon, anything I can do besides hitting the range and just swinging until some confidence comes back?

I totally get this. I feel as though I am easily the best I have ever been at the game, but I still have a decent sized range in terms of score and I can't seem to leave the higher end of my range behind, it's like the game gets tougher or something to keep your score where it was. I feel like I see more shots than ever where I find myself saying "I don't think I could do a whole lot better on that shot than that..." And the shot I just hit wasn't that sensational. 🙂 I agree with those that have suggested that there is a "talent level" in all of us and it is just very hard to go beyond that level. I know in my case, I have become pretty decent at all phases of the game, and it has dawned on me that "pretty decent" is about as much talent as I have for the game. Meh, I'll still work on things as long as I feel like playing, what else can you do?? Maybe a breakthrough will suddenly come about..life is like that sometimes.

First I thought, that's so true. Then I thought, what if I am not even REALLY keeping my arm straight! Then I just sat there...mind...blown. I think you nailed it, there has to be a reason that it hasn't made its way to the top of my swing thought list. If nothing else, it seems to clean up the clutter and gets me back to my mediocre swing when I am really struggling to get the feel...when I was younger I thought I would NEVER be happy about something like that, but many years later I am thankful for the smallest of victories... Anyway, I just kind of threw it out there wondering if the experience seemed familiar to anyone else and if they too had a story of how to get themselves out of an overflow of swing thoughts and ideas...seemed pretty universal.

With so much good instruction available on line it becomes so easy to start tinkering with new drills and techniques trying to improve your results hitting the ball. Unfortunately, it becomes easy to get too many thoughts swimming around in your head and before you know it, the ball is going everywhere and, in the words of the great Roy McAvoy "your swing feels like an unfolded lawn chair!" Well, that was me standing on the range today...and then I cleared my head and thought "left arm straight"....Left arm straight on the take away, left arm straight on the down swing...left arm straight, left arm straight.....and it all came back. I'm no single digit handicapper here, but solid strikes, good general direction, every club.....Thank god. It's a pretty simple game sometimes...Now, why after 30 some odd years of playing that is NOT the one simple swing thought in my head when I'm over the ball???? I don't know, but when I play tennis I don't look at the ball as I go to hit it and like every pro in the history of the universe does that, so it's safe to say I'm a bit of a sports moron....

I'm pretty new here, but I will give it a go. I don't have a handicap. I seem to shoot in the 80s a lot, but that is on courses I know well and they aren't exactly beastly either. 1. I will never really be able to fix my problem on my first move on the downswing. Maybe it's because I don't go about fixing it in an intentional way that will produce results or maybe I am simply not athletic enough to relearn the swing despite my repeated efforts. A little more distance off the tee would likely make a modest difference in my score, but that swing has always been beyond my talents, hard to imagine that changing. I know what to do, just can't seem to do it. 2. I will likely never get better because routinely breaking 80 means you are really, really good at this game and I am simply not really, really good at this game. No matter how much I practice: I make bad swings, I make bad putting strokes, I make poor contact on chips, and I make boneheaded decisions on the course. My bad shots get slightly better and may come slightly less often (or not honestly), but they still come and they still take par out of the equation and leave me scrambling for a bogey or worse. I've reached the point where I think, if I made fewer mistakes I would no longer be the golfer that I obviously am. 🙂 3. My desire to play well leads to nerves and lapses in focus that no doubt cost me a few strokes here and there. I am not sure I can change that. I mean, I would like to play well, so I don't think pretending I don't will be much help. I've never been great at fooling myself.

I didn't realize that Mike Tyson even played golf...

To be honest, I left kind of wondering if maybe I had missed the truth that fitting was usually something only sought out by very good players and that mid or high handicap players would not benefit greatly from the experience. The experience had been a tad humiliating. I was particularly interested though because I am only 5'5" and thus I had been choking all the way down on my driver. Moreover, I thought this might finally lay to rest any questions about what flex or type of shaft would be best for my swing, and perhaps what weight would be best for a club head. As I say, I had hoped for a modest bump in yardage from a newer club, but in reality, I really sought out the fitting to establish just what kind of length, weight, and shaft would work best as well. If nothing else, I thought at the very least, I would purchase a club that felt really comfortable in my hands. Alas, my guy didn't really think I was ready for that, but as you say, he also might have felt like the club I had in my hand was the right club for me already. Though, in point of fact, he never said anything like that. He did cut my club down by a half inch (at my request), so we did address that. Maybe that was all that was needed. The wind up is, I went back to youtube to address high spin rate on my drives and now I am working on hitting up on the ball a bit more, which in the end, is far and away my best chance to pick up any distance off the tee anyway....I honestly DO get that.. 😀

I believe I had a club fitting experience that I suspect was not typical, so I wanted to share and then follow up with a question. I don't have a true handicap, but just to put my play in some kind of perspective. I generally shoot in the 80s on fairly easy municipal courses. I'll throw in an occasional high 70s and I can creep up into the high 80s quite easily if I'm a little off or unlucky. That's just to give a sense of where I am in the journey. I arrived for my fitting very excited. I was looking to purchase a new driver. My clubs (including my driver) are about 5-7 years old, so I figured why not buy myself a new toy and take advantage of the technology of this game. There was certainly nothing wrong with my current driver, however. Upon seeing the clubs I brought, John (the fitter) commented about how my clubs were a little bit older and he excitedly went into how new clubs across the board would be a boon for me. I dreaded hearing this as I thought I might receive some pressure to drop 1500 dollars when 400-500 was going to be enough to come up with. Still, I was excited thinking that tech advancement in the last few years might just take my game up a tiny amount. I started to take some shots and after several I mentioned that I was pleased because, while the shots didn't appear to stellar on the big screen, my swing still felt pretty normal and I thought the contact felt about average for me so that whatever read he got for the various metrics was probably pretty indicative of my general swing. After that, I started to hit drivers. I don't exactly crush the ball off the tee and my shots were of the typical unspectacular variety, but again were pretty normal. At this point, John gave me several different drivers to try, and though they often felt pretty good, the results didn't seem to improve much. Personally, I don't really trust the big screen entirely on distance and roll out, so I was still willing to buy. I wasn't expecting miracles, I understand that the swing dictates the results, but I still figured that a driver that is several generations newer was still bound to offer a slight bump in distance and would perhaps be a bit more forgiving. However, John, to his credit, told me that my swing was simply too erratic and that I would not be able to glean the benefit of a newer club until I fixed the issues I have with: grip, posture, setup, and overall swing. Just to add a bit of context here, most of my numbers were OK, but my spin rate was much too high and none of the clubs he tried could lower the spin rate enough to be worth the money. This is my guess as to what he saw as he never really got into specifics beyond letting me know that what I needed was lessons, but he did at least go into the numbers in a cursory fashion at one point. As I say, I actually appreciate the fact that he didn't feel like he could put together a club that would bring about the kind of change that would be worth the investment and thus refused to lure me into what he no doubt considered a waste of money. It was impressive that he showed that type of integrity. So, beyond wondering if anyone here has had a fitter refuse to steer them toward a club or type of club to look for, my question is this: He said himself, that the newer clubs could offer a bit more distance when you hit them right and I have to believe that clubs are always improving in terms of being a little more forgiving on errant shots. This was all I was expecting, wouldn't a new club still have some value? It would seem that if you needed a certain level of swing to glean any benefit from newer clubs, than why would anyone other than the top 5-10 percent of players ever buy a new club? It seemed odd to me, I just have to believe that a better club will still give at least a modicum of improvement regardless of skill level, but what do you think? As a post script, I headed to the range to work on drills and tips that my lower my spin rate using my old driver. But, I still can't help but think that the newer technology will bring a little benefit, even to a mid handicap type player.

I began experimenting with a slight press right before my chips (basically just rotating my hips very gently and pressing my right knee in a bit) and then taking the club away. It has been very effective thus far. Obviously, the first thought any of us would likely have is "if it's working, keep with it" so I will...But, I have to say, it does concern me a bit that nobody seems to advocate doing it, and I can't recall ever seeing a good player doing it or even so much as a youtube clip showing it as a potential fix for chipping problems. Has anyone ever heard of doing this? It wasn't a miracle fix for me, but it definitely seemed to help.

Hello everyone, New member here getting back into playing after several months off, so I thought I would share my last two scores just because they kind of perfectly introduce my game. I played about a week and a half ago at a fairly easy muni course (playing from the whites). I shot an 82 (+6 front, +4 back). I recently purchased a decent putter for the first time in nearly thirty five years of playing. I proceeded to putt unbelievably well, hitting four long putts and only missing one short one. Suffice to say, it was a complete reversal from my recent putting. But, I know that no putter is going to magically make you a good putter....so naturally... A week later I played an executive course with very shaggy greens. (+10 front, +3 back). Big shock (sarcasm), I putted very badly. I hit the ball very nicely, but couldn't make anything of consequence and I choked a couple of short ones to boot. I am starting to realize that the hardest thing about this game is just how hard it is to consistently execute shots, even if you have the ability to do it, actually doing it? Over and over? Very....very....difficult. I am going to stop here because I fear I am already breaching forum etiquette by posting two scores and I don't want to introduce myself with an egregious forum misstep. 🙂 I have enjoyed reading the forum topics for a couple of weeks now, I hope to join in on some of the discussion moving forward.