FrivolouslyWasted

I’d hit that

Hmmm. I may have misread something the first time I looked at it. I could’ve sworn I saw that they were interchangeable, but looking back at it that doesn’t appear to be the case. My bad.

Fun fact if you want to tinker with your titleist woods: the adapters are interchangeable with their hybrids, however the hybrid adapters change loft in 1° increments instead of .75°

You would have to completely change the club head. Non-adjustable clubs have shafts epoxied into the head. Adjustable clubs have differently design heads. The shaft goes through the head basically, and attaches underneath with a screw. I think it would be a very difficult, nigh on impossible, conversion

I worked on my irons a lot in 2018 and finally got some results late in the year. In 2019 I need to work on my driver and wedges. I would like to add 20-25 yards with the driver while keeping my fairways hit at or above their current average. I don’t have a lot of confidence with my driver, so on the course I rarely swing it very hard. Basically where I’m at right now I can either have distance or fairways, but I can rarely have both. I want both. Plan to put in more time on the range, and hope to get a net at some point. I also need to work with the wedges. When I was younger my wedge play was my strength, in part because I practiced a lot in the yard. Now that I’m no longer in an apartment I have a yard of my own again, so I need to use it. The course nearest my current work has a pretty nice chipping and bunker practice area. I’d like to utilize it some too. If I can accomplish the goals above, I think I’ll have no problem accomplishing my scoring goals of breaking both 90 and 85. I’m right on the cusp of breaking 90, so 85 I think is within reason for the year. I lose so many strokes off the tee and inside of maybe 75 yards. I would like to be able to set single digits as a goal for 2020. I may be on track to make a career change (and hopefully a little more money) in early 2019. If so I may get my first membership somewhere. Having more money and more control over my schedule certainly wouldn’t hurt my golf game. There are other goals, either more minor or more nebulous in their description, but those are the big, concrete ones.

I’ve been looking to get a set of FG-51s. I’m an old school Wilson Staff guy. Typically play FG-17s, but sometimes rotate my Goosenecks into the bag. I haven’t got any persimmons anymore. I need to snag some so I can go all classic sometimes. My usual rounds are played with my old irons and putter but newer driver, woods and hybrids

I have often considered putting the 1 and 2 irons and the 64° wedge in the bag and playing an all blades round sometime, just for the hell of it. Maybe move up to a closer tee box to compensate for losing some distance off the tee. I also struggle with driver pretty severely at times and feel much more confident in my irons, in general. I’m very stubborn though and I want to get better with my driver, so I always end up playing it. All the work I put into my irons this year has finally paid off in the end. Next year I’ll have to turn a similar focus to the big stick.

The Wilson Top Notch was the line from the 50’s. Kind of the predecessor to the Dynapower line. Pictures would definitely help pinpoint the exact model. I don’t know the stats on them, but I assume they would match most of the older Wilson sets. Don’t know the lie angles, just lofts. 2i-20° 3i-23° 4i-26° 5i-30° 6i-34° 7i-38° 8i-42° 9i-46° PW-50°

I just snagged a set of FG-J8s that look to be in beautiful condition, I’ll have them in hand in a few days. I can’t find much info on them though, aside from the fact that they were a European-only release. From the photos they look fairly similar to the FG-17s except they seem to have a lot more muscle and, correspondingly, a thicker sole. Does anyone know anything about these? I’d love to know the loft and lie on these guys. I’d email Wilson but I’ve tried that with other models and unfortunately they don’t seem to have any info available on older equipment. Help me, Internet.

Same, except mine are old Wilson staffs. I love traditional lofts. Only need 3 wedges. Right now I’ve got an unmatched wedge, however I recently purchased an FG-17 PW head that I need to throw a shaft in. Once I do that it’ll probably go into play for a while. I’ve been considering getting a Cleveland 50° to serve as my PW, which will probably happen eventually. I love my Cleveland 60° and wouldn’t mind getting it a mate

Get yourself an old Wilson 8813. Stepped and fluted shaft. Wonderful feel. Great for fast greens

As a kid I always used to enjoy stopping by the practice range during the Masters and watching those guys crush it. I remember watching a couple of guys drive balls into the net all the way at the end of the range. Not sure the distance, but way farther than I’ll ever be able to hit it. Those guys are good, indeed.

As I have gotten better and more serious about my golf, I’ve been cutting back on the consumption on course. At the start of the year, golf was a fun opportunity to goof off outside with a few beers. Now I’ll typically bring two, but usually only drink one. I’ve gotten better about opting for lower risk plays, especially if I've already played myself into trouble. Where overconfidence can rear up for me is after a string of good shots, I start feeling good about my swing and don’t stay properly focused. Then I seem to let my old swing habits creep back in. I still need to film a swing to put on here. I’m sure there’s still things I can improve on, but I definitely think my new swing is way better than the one I started the year with. I’m playing to my expectations more frequently and for longer stretches and I feel like there’s a big drop in my scores just around the dogleg. Bummer that after all year of working on it, it’s starting to show right as it’s getting cold.

Update: it’s coming along. I perhaps need to be a bit more patient. It’s all about getting rid of the bad holes, staying focused and calm and not rushing myself. I’m absolutely getting better, but occasionally bad habits creep back in and they tend to cost me. Today’s round is a perfect example. I went to the range to warm up, and was striping the ball really well. Then I went to play my round, and everything went wrong. My front 9 was so bad I quit keeping score. I regrouped mentally at the turn, and I started playing the golf that I’m always expecting myself to play. My first 6 holes on the back were bogey, par, double, and 3 consecutive pars. If I could have merely bogeyed the last two holes I would have shot 43 for the 9, which would have been far and away my best 9 ever. Instead I closed with consecutive 8s. I was 5 over through my first 7 holes on the back, and I played the last two holes in +8. I just couldn’t keep my last two tee shots in the fairway. Hit them both badly off the toe and hooked them. There was a lot of good to take away, especially on that back 9. It’s encouraging that I’m starting to string together long streaks of solid play (to my standard at any rate). The ball striking is definitely improving, but two bad swings of the driver cost me dearly, along with a couple of poor wedge shots. A few stats for the back nine: 5/8 fairways - missed the first and the last two, all left 3/9 GIR + 2 nGIR 4 pars, 1 bogey, 2 doubles, 2 quads 😞 18 putts- 1 one-putt, 1 three-putt, 7 two-putts When I kept my tee shot in the fairway, I either had a GIR or nGIR. I’m playing pretty well from the fairway, but the rough can really penalize me. Most of my bad wedge shots also come either from green side rough, or bunkers. I’m still learning to adjust to the different types of lies I get in the rough, and my bunker play is all over the place. The improvement with my irons over the course of the year has been very noticeable. I also putt decently, though there’s room to improve especially on speed. The driver and the wedges are what cost me the most strokes. Before my long hiatus from the game, my wedge play was pretty good, so I’m confident I can get that back. Driver has been the albatross of my game for most of my life. If I cut these last few bad swings from my rounds I think my scores will come way down.

Here’s my anachronistic bag. Fairly modern in the woods, hybrids and wedges, but antique irons and putter. Driver- Callaway Big Bertha Alpha 3W-Titleist 913F 15° 3H-Callaway X2Hot 19° Irons- Wilson Staff FG-17, 3-9 iron (Soon to be joined by PW) SW-Vokey 54° LW-Cleveland RTX 2.0 60° Putter-Wilson Staff 8813 I swap the iron sometimes with a set of 1988 Wilson Staff Goosenecks that are in basically pristine condition. The chrome is beautiful and I hit them fairly well, but they don’t have the same sweet feel as the FG-17s, so these are my primary set.

My idiot brain does this, I think. Played 9 yesterday and while I didn’t lose any OB or in the water, I did manage to place my drives on the bad side of almost every dogleg fairway I played. 1st hole - can’t miss left or trees block the green. So I snap hook my drive left. A few holes later, trees block the green to the right, and I push my drive right. The scores are starting to come down though. Perhaps I was being a bit impatient. I’m definitely reducing my really bad strikes, although bad habits still creep back in more than I’d like. Yet again I had quite a few really good strikes, just not enough club. Now that I’m gaining confidence in my swing, especially with my irons, I need to start turning up the power a little bit. Driver and wedges are probably what what I need to work the most now. I’m fairly content with the progress in my full swing irons and putting. I’ll probably get a net in the near future so I can work in the backyard through the winter

This is another one I’ve considered. I’ve seen legend of a 2 Deep from callaway, but I’m not convinced it actually exists, because I can’t find one anywhere.

Thanks for the input. That’s about what I expected to hear, which does kinda have me leaning towards strong 3. Basically I’d like to have something that could let me take two clubs out of the bag, and give me a little more flexibility to play around with different club configurations. That may not ultimately be feasible or worthwhile. I’ll have to keep my eyes peeled for a good deal on a secondhand strong 3 and give it a try. That said, mini driver might still be worth looking into simply as a replacement for the 460cc, which I struggle to find the center of the face on. It’s funny, I play tiny irons and I’m getting pretty decent at hitting them, but give me something with a huge face, and that’s just more area to miss on

I’ve been fairly interested since discovering them. How much yardage do you lose vs your full-size driver, and how well does it perform off of turf?

I’m interested in coming up with some alternate configurations for my bag. One thing that has kinda interested me are the mini-drivers, but it seems like if you’re going to shrink the clubhead and increase the loft, you should at least gain playability from the turf, but a lot of reviews I’ve read suggest that isn’t necessarily the case. Instead, I’m considering getting a strong 3, preferably with an adjustable hosel so I can turn it down to 12.5 degrees. My hope would be that I could replace both my driver and 3 wood with it, assuming I can find something I can hit well from the deck. This would give me a free slot in my bag I could then fill with a 5 wood, or another wedge, or whatever the course and conditions may call for. Has anybody tried this? How much distance do you lose from the driver to the 3+ and how much did you gain over a standard 3 wood? I’m hoping they would nearly balance out. The courses I typically play aren’t especially long, so if two whacks with a strong 3 are nearly equal to a drive + a standard 3w it might be efficient and give me more flexibility, but I don’t know. For those of you who’ve got a strong 3, any recommendations on a good model? Thanks

Part of that is down to not solidly knowing my distances yet. I seem to always be a club short on my approaches. Sometimes I’ll strike the ball solidly, but come up short of the green. Occasionally I have the right club and make good contact but my aim is a little off and I miss the green left or right. In either of those cases I’m fairly content at having made good contact, even though I don’t get a stat to put on my scorecard. I’m trying to focus more on the quality of my strike than the outcome of the stroke. I expect that as I continue to become more consistent striking the ball, better results will follow. And my use of the term “strength” is relative to the quality of my other skills. I know I’m not a great golfer. My point was simply that my irons are, somewhat oddly, the thing I feel most comfortable with right now. I’ve been trying very hard to get better with them, and it’s starting to feel like I am As for the My Swing thread, that’s also on my agenda. Every time I go out I intend to film some strokes and make a thread, and I always forget about it once I get out there. I’m considering hitting the range after work today. I’ll try to remember to get some film there.

I definitely had a few of those today. I’ll have to start tracking that stat as well

I really do need to get that book. I’ve heard so much about it on here. Shaking off previous holes is something I’m working on right now. I felt I improved on that over my two rounds this week. I do tend to be extremely self-competitive and I can get tilted, to borrow a poker term, during a round. I’m trying to work on my mental game as well as my physical game, and I think I’m making progress there. As to your first question, I’m not quite sure what you mean. I’ve been trying to build up my swing, so I often have a different focus from one practice session to another, depending on how my previous session went. I’m thinking about splurging for a few lessons soon. To this point I’ve been pretty much self-taught, so there’s a huge amount of trial and error involved in trying to analyze my own swing and make successful tweaks. Sometimes I have an idea that takes me in the wrong direction. Lately I’ve been focusing on shortening my backswing and rotating more from my lower spine, where my rotation had been mostly arms and shoulders. These two things seem to have made a huge leap forward. My head seems to be more stable and I’m able to keep my clubhead on path. With my swing seemingly improving, I think a lot of my problems may come at address. Maybe it would benefit me to figure out a good, constant pre-shot routine and perhaps slow down a bit sometimes. If I’m doing something basic like standing a little too tall, it shouldn’t surprise me when I blade one. Not a lot. I typically track fairways, greens and putts on my scorecard, but not nGIR. Maybe I should add it. I had a couple of greens yesterday and managed to card a birdie. I didn’t manage any GIR today, but had quite a few that came close, plus one that was perfectly struck but I didn’t club up enough for the stiff wind, and another that was struck perfectly off the tee and did make the green but was a provisional after slicing my first into the woods. How close is considered nGIR?

After really struggling to find consistency with my ball striking over the past few months, I’ve seen some marked improvement over the last couple of weeks. I’ve put a lot of work into my irons and it is really showing, and I’ve found myself in a rather unusual position. I’m a high handicap player playing with classic muscleback irons and my iron play is definitely the strongest part of my game. Today I really saw some improvement off the tee too. I had been struggling mightily with my driver, but today I hit 11/15 fairways, including 10 in a row, after hitting only 7/13 yesterday (on a different course, obviously). My problem is while I’m definitely getting better at striking the ball, I can’t seem to avoid meltdown holes - at least 2 or 3 a round. I’m having fewer severe mis-hits, but when I do have a bad stroke, it seems to always find the worst possible place on the course. Even when I do seemingly everything in my power to take the worst outcome out of play, my ball occasionally decides to home in on exactly the thing I’m putting all my effort into avoiding. I can’t figure out if it’s just bad luck, or my head f***ing with me and making me do the thing I most want to avoid. TLDR: my game feels like it’s really getting better, but my scores are not. I’m trying to learn to avoid making mistakes at the worst possible times. How do y’all keep the hazards and worst case scenarios from f***ing with you pre-shot? I just can’t make it through a round without at least a few disasters along the way and it’s making me crazy.

I have a set with a blue x. There was also a “tour” version. Perhaps those had a black x? I don’t know, but you could probably dig a bit and find out. Cant really tell you much about the grooves. I don’t know a ton about all that.