golfrewind.com

Hi, new to the forum. I hope this is posted in the right forum, if not feel free to relocate. I appoligize in advance, for this will be kinda a long post. I'm 43 and new to golf, although I did "play" the spring/summer 1990, in which I found it was more challanging to play in the woods rather the fairway. So I'd like to get back in for sport/hobby. I know that an instructional dvd cannot replace professional instruction for learning, but, I will be in a lot better financial position in the early spring '08 to take some leasons. Also I have a older set of yard sell clubs that definetly needs to be replaced and will be later this fall.

So what I would like to do in the meantime is to get a very basic instructional dvd and workout a little before next spring. I have access to an indoor area 12' x 30' that I'm going to hang some tarps and maybe a small driving cage in. I would take it slow and video all my training, watch and compare my actions against the instructional dvd. Let me say again, the dvd will just get me through till next spring tell I can get "schooled".

Can anyone suggest a very basic dvd spoken in "laymen terms" for us "golf challenged".

Thanks and sorry again for the long post.
odie072

Sorry I can not suggest a DVD. I would warn about a one size fits all golf swing. Try a goggle search golf DVD instruction review. Hank Haney IMHO has some good books out there.

Where I am located its only $35 for a half hour lesson. I wouldn't waste the money on a DVD. IMO

Don't do any of that. Do yourself a huge favor.

Take your putter, a sleeve of new balls, and putt the carpet with whatever putter you have. Do that for a few weeks, and then go to a shop and buy a good putter. You will use it twice as much as a driver, and it costs half the price of a new driver. Think hard before you spend LESS than 100 dollars on one. Some shops have "putter fitting." No matter what, buy a putter that feels good to you.

If you don't have a rug good enough, they make those artificial turf greens you can buy. I don't know if they are great, but all you need is decent.

I promise you will help your return to the game this way.

I would never make any such promise with a hitting cage or net, or anything else you can do in the off season.

While the whole of your post is good, viking, that bolded part (I bolded it) is just ridiculous. A good putter is a good putter in the right hands, no matter what it costs. My regular playing partner is a much putter than I am, and he still uses the putter from his "whole set" cheap-o collection set that he got from Sprawl*Mart when he first started. It has the file mark where he wanted to make his own alignment aid, and lead tape all over the back and sides -- it was so cheap it wasn't even balanced -- but that doesn't mean it isn't a good putter in his hands.

A putter cannot be judged by how much it costs -- it can be judged by how it feels, how it plays, and how it performs in a golfer's hands. If the best putter to you is the cheap one from Sprawl-Mart, or the used one in the corner that's 45 years old, or the latest and greatest model, whatever the best one for you is that's the one that you should play.

Finally, a perfectly valid concern about buying a cheap driver is how long is it going to last? Is the shaft going to break off? Could the head cave in? A putter isn't going to any of those things -- simply because you aren't going to be taking full swings with the putter*. A cheap putter should last you a very long time, even though it is cheap, just treat it right.

* A long time ago, I played with a friend who didn't really play golf. Back then, I didn't either, we just enjoyed going out and having some fun and smacking some balls around. For example, sure a lost ball was a penalty, but if you found a ball in the woods you got that stroke back! In fact, you got one stroke back for every ball found -- I think our personal record for a hole was -6. It was a lot of balls, since we usually couldn't do much better than double par on any hole. Anyway, on the last hole one time, my friend decided he was going to tee off with his putter. He did, and the head snapped right off the shaft -- it's actually the only time I've ever seen a golf club break like that. Putters are in no way designed to handle those kind of stresses that a full swing would generate.

yea, I used to think it was ridiculous too. Then I spent 100 dollars on a putter, and I can tell the difference.

I bought every cheap putter I could find, worked endlessly with them to see if I could steal something for nothing. It never worked, for 25 years.

Then I made a committment to be a great putter. Not a good one, a great one. I worked with my discount putter for months, and when I missed an eagle by four putting, that was it.

I spent real money on a quality putter, and it made a huge difference.

You can buy whatever and get lucky, no question. But given that you hit half the shots in a round with it, your best bet is to spend a reasonable amount of money to do it right. Considering the bills people lay out for a club they use 12 or 14 times a round, a 100 dollar putter is an efficient means to spend your golf club money.

Oddessy 2 ball

I'm glad it worked out that way for you, but money spent does not in anyway whatsoever translate into better putts. Your situation is an example of anecdote, not evidence. I agree that finding the right putter is very important, but I don't want to encourage anyone to ignore the putters prices $99 or less, because they could very well be excellent putters for them as well. You won't know until you try it. I'm sorry, but just because Scotty Cameron puts his name on a putter, and charges a few hundred bucks doesn't mean that it is necessarily a great putter for any one individual. Again, I agree that finding the right tool for the job is important, but the price on the tag gives zero indication of how it performs. I also agree that one shouldn't necessarily go cheap just to go cheap, if that more expensive putter is significantly better then it is a worthy investment. I just bristle at the idea that only putters that cost more than $100 are "good" and anything less is "bad".

And besides, having to spend $100 or more on a putter completely ignores the used putter market, and used putters are perfectly serviceable.

There is no club that there is a "minimum" one has to spend in order to get quality. The advertisers may like you to think so, but if you shop around and shop used, you can get exceptionally good quality equipment for not a lot of money at all.