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  #16 (permalink)  
Old May 13th, 2008, 02:01 PM
QuadrupleEagle QuadrupleEagle is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

Looks like a good training plan to me. I do have a little advice though.

You will come to a point where spending the majority of your time on putting and chipping will not be as productive as spending a little more time on irons and pitching.

IMO, you should spend the majority of your time on putting and chipping up to a certain point. You will reach a point where getting a little better around the green is not as productive scoring wise as getting better at pitching and hitting the irons. I would say this point is about when you can 2 putt from 20-40 ft 90% of the time, and make 6-8 footers 50% of the time. It's very hard to get better than that (and these are rough percentages for easier greens ... playing on very difficult greens, the above stats would be better than the average PGA tour pro).

If anything, I think the chipping practice is more important that the putting. The reason for this is that you aren't going to hit putts fat or thin ... if your pace is decent, you will rarely have a horrible putt. But it is much easier to mess up a chip. Get consistent, solid contact on all your chips, and you will soon be able to get a 30 ft chip almost as close on average as a 30 ft putt. A lot more can go wrong on a chip than a putt, so getting the consistency with the chips is very important.
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  #17 (permalink)  
Old May 15th, 2008, 06:27 AM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

I hear you Quadruple, I am a proponent of utility analysis regarding what to put most effort in to.

Lets see if we can try to make some landmarks for me then? On how good I should become in each shot?

Putting goals.
Goal 1: Draining 50% of 6-8 footers. Lets call it yards, because then I can make the comparison to meters easier .
Goal 2: Two putting withing 13-15 yards 90% of the time

Chipping goals:
30 yards from the pin: Within 5 yards ?
20 yards from the pin: Within 3 yards ?
10 yards from the pin: Within 2 yards ?
Those are just suggestions, you are free to give me advice here quadruple.

Pitching goals:
ill write these in meters.
1. Learn how far to take back the club and the proper rythm for a 50, 60 and 70 meter pitch shot with the wedge. If I can master three distances I would be on my way to be a great golfer.

Bunker goals:
1. Get the ball out every time. Im really terrible at this.
2. Learn a flop bunker shot
3. Learn the more rolling bunker shot.
I will make these goals more sofisticated and more difficult later but now Im not good enough so ill keep it simple.

And for my iron and driving game. I will for now not have any goals here, but they will come. My main priority is fighting my out to in swingplane, and I don't need any more goals than that right now.
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Old May 15th, 2008, 11:07 AM
QuadrupleEagle QuadrupleEagle is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

I think your putting goals are set much higher than the chipping goals.

2 putting 90% of the time from 13 meters is extremely good, and to accomplish this, I would say at a minimum, your average putt from 13 meters will have to end up less than a meter from the hole. If it were me, I would lower this goal to 2 putting 90% from 3-10 meters. That's IMO, pretty close to a scratch golfer's putting ability. Also, making 50% from 1-3 meters and 90-95% from 1 meter in would also be very excellent putting.

As for the chipping, getting a 30 meter chip to 5 meters is a so-so accomplishment. Now for a bogey golfer, this is pretty good, because you probably aren't going to 3 putt from 5 meters, but the chances of saving a stroke and getting up and down are pretty low.

Now the first thing I think a 20 something handicapper needs to accomplish is to just make sure that pretty much all chips get within comfortable 2 putting range. That can generally be accomplished by just having a consistent stroke and making consistent solid contact on every chip (not hitting the ball very fat or thin very often at all). But it doesn't sound like you are going to be satisfied with just having the chipping game of a bogey golfer (and as it sounds like you are serious about improving, and primarily the short game first, there is no reason to be satisfied with this). But that is the first thing to master IMO with chipping. Just as distance control should be learned first with putting, and later direction, I think with chipping, direction and consistent contact should be worked on first, and then more attention to distance control. What's the point of perfect distance on a well struck chip if 20% are poorly struck and many of the chips end up 5 meters off line? A chip with perfect distance 5 meters off line is no better than a chip with perfect direction that is 5 meters short or long.

So chipping goals could be structured something like this:

Goal 1: Hit 90% of chips with solid contact and within 1 meter of the intended direction.
Goal 2: Be able to get a chip on average within twice the distance you would leave an average putt from the same distance. So if your average leave on a 20 meter putt is 1.5 meters, your average leave on a 20 meter chip would be 3 meters.
Later Goals: Set a goal of some percentage of all chips getting within 2 or 3 meters. The simple truth is that no matter how good you get at putting, you are never going to make most of your putts over 3 meters. So saving strokes with chipping means getting the ball within 3 meters, or better, 2 meters.

Another thing ... until you get good with irons and wedges, you will most likely be making a chip on the majority of holes. So getting very good at chipping will likely pay greater dividends than getting very good at putting.
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Old May 15th, 2008, 12:02 PM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

ill have to take that into consideration quadruple. But I believe that some things come easier for different people. Maybe getting extremely good at putting is easier for me than chipping, ore opposite.

I will soon find out what skills I will acquire faster then others.
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Old May 15th, 2008, 03:10 PM
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

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Any progress of late on the long game Avatar? What do you struggle with?
Played nine holes today and hit every fairway. Go figure.
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Old May 15th, 2008, 03:59 PM
QuadrupleEagle QuadrupleEagle is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

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ill have to take that into consideration quadruple. But I believe that some things come easier for different people. Maybe getting extremely good at putting is easier for me than chipping, ore opposite.

I will soon find out what skills I will acquire faster then others.
I hear ya there. I think as you progress you will certainly find the appropriate goals and will know what to work on. You are way ahead of the game as far as most golfers go by just thinking about a plan to improve. Most golfers' idea of practice is to just hit a bucket of balls with the driver.

A little info on how my game has been progressing:

Played Monday, scored 108 ... 57/51 on a course that IIRC is about a 69/120 rating and slope from the whites. Last fall, I was consistently hitting mid 90s, but have struggled to break 100 consistently this year. Before monday, I knew that was mostly from being rusty with the short game , but this time out, my short game was pretty strong, at least as strong as my typical days last fall, but my ball striking was as bad as it's been in a year (took up golf about 1 1/2 years ago).

I know exactly what I have to work on more than anything else to see big improvement on the course. Relaxing and using the good swing I have in practice. In practice, I make solid, consistent contact at least 90% of the time on my shots. I have a sound swing mechanically with good balance and follow through. When I get to the course, I am lucky to make that nice swing 20% of the time. My challenge is to somehow find a way to bring the swing I have in practice to the course. If I could do so, my handicap would be mid teens instead of high 20s.

But there were a lot of positives from my round Monday. The short game feel is starting to come back after a harsh winter that didn't allow me to practice much. I holed out a very difficult chip, nearly holed out 3 others, and also holed out a putt from 15 ft from off the green. I made 5 putts from 12-20 ft, which is very very good for me, and also had 3 or 4 very nice pitches from within 50 yds. Basically, almost every shot I managed to relax and not worry about turned out very well. But for some reason, I was feeling more stressed than usual about most of the shots, and hit a lot of bad ones. I carded 6 penalty strokes on the round.
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Old May 15th, 2008, 06:07 PM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

To me it sounds like your mental game is more important than your swing right now quadruple ?

Actually played my first tournament yesterday, based on stableford points and I won it.
BUT. I counted my clubs today on the course and realized I had 16 clubs in the bag on not 14.. So guess what, Im going to let the club now that I actually had to many clubs in the bag and take the penalty.

Feel I have the essence of golf in me now, didn't take long before I realized what I had to do. Even though it will probably cost me the victory
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Old May 15th, 2008, 06:08 PM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

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Originally Posted by Avatar View Post
Played nine holes today and hit every fairway. Go figure.
Not bad my man
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Old May 15th, 2008, 06:13 PM
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

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Not bad my man
Thanks, Max. That's golf!
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Old May 15th, 2008, 07:18 PM
QuadrupleEagle QuadrupleEagle is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

Oh, man, that's rough ... 36 penalty strokes.

And yes, my mental game is 90% of what I have to work on now.
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Old May 16th, 2008, 05:35 AM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

That many? I read somewhere that there is a 2 shot penalty stroke for too many clubs in the bag per whole, but maximum 4 strokes penalty per round.

Well ill see what happens.
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Old May 16th, 2008, 09:53 AM
QuadrupleEagle QuadrupleEagle is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

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That many? I read somewhere that there is a 2 shot penalty stroke for too many clubs in the bag per whole, but maximum 4 strokes penalty per round.

Well ill see what happens.

I forgot about that. You are right. Stroke play 2 strokes per hole, max of 4 strokes/round.

Match play, deduction of a hole for each hole where a breach of rule occured, max 2 holes deducted. It seems that this doesn't mean taking 2 holes away AND giving them to opponent, but just adjusting the score by 2. Suppose you are 2 up at the 3rd tee, and discover you have 15 clubs, by my reading of the rule, this would make the match All Square, not 2 down.

But of course, since you turned in your score and only later realized too many clubs, you should be disqualified for turning in too low a score.
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Old May 18th, 2008, 06:05 PM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

Quadruple, let's continue setting my goals.

For approach shots:
160
140
120
80
60
All in yards.

To be scratch, what green hit in regulation and as we go down to 80-60 how close to the pin?
As a bogey golfer on does not even need to make the green of course.
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  #29 (permalink)  
Old May 19th, 2008, 05:16 PM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

Had a LONG workout on the course today, way to long. all 4 hours.
Practiced everything. Bunker, chip, iron shots and putting and it was way overkill.

I had some questions though that needed to be answered.
What is my 110 yard club? It was my 9 iron, 110-120 yards depending on how much juice I applied and that was with poor range balls. I actually think a smooth 9 iron is enough from 110 yards, no wonder I have missed a lot of approach shots cause I had no clue what my yardages was.

Im going to take this as a estimation based on my 9 iron and use it on the course:
SW: 80 yards
PW: 95 yards maybe more
9 iron: 110 yards
8 Iron: 130 yards
7 Iron: 155 yards
6 Iron: 170yards
5 Iron: ? yards
4 iron: ? yards

I really have no clue on my yardages.. Well I need to find it out. Every time I make a perfect hit on the course I will have to note how far it travels.

I did some chipping and putting today quadruple, to see how good I am and what I need to work on, the results:

Chip and putt: First I chip the ball to a location on the green then I finish it with the putter.

From 24 yards out: 3 strokes on average. Meaning bogey skill right?

From various distances: From all 6 hole locations. Half of the time I got 3 strokes from chip to finished putt half of the time I got 2 strokes. Pin location was everything from 15 yards to 25 yards.
Half 3 and half 2 means a mix of par and bogey golf ability wise.


Only chipping:
From 12 yards- How many Inside 2 yards?
87% of the chips from 12 yards was inside 2 yards.

From 17 yards- Inside 3,5 yards
60% was inside 3,5 yards.

Over 22 yards- Inside 5 yards
Bad results here.
Or, maybe not that bad, but not many par's are going to be saved from chipping on that kind of distance.


Putting results:
From 10 yards:
Average 2 putt. Even made maybe 1 out of 10 from that distance. On this distance there I felt very confident.
Anything over that I made it very difficult for my self to get 2 putts.
From 2,5 yards (6 footer): made 50% of these quite consistently.

So what do you think? From my perspective I feel I need to work on distance controll on the longer putts and not hitting my chips on the toe of the club.

I also tried some flop shots. I would say I am now good enough to use them as long as the ball is sitting down in the rough. I will be delighted to use those over bunkers or down hill when I need to land the ball soft.
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Old May 19th, 2008, 05:19 PM
Max Iron Max Iron is offline
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Re: My golf diary- Max Iron 060508

Forgot to mention. Learned one thing about my bunker ability as well.
From a 4-5 feet high greenside bunker I can only hit it ouy consistently If I use a slightly open clubface on my SW and actually use a elongated chip swing with firm wrists and turning my body through.

I tried several hitting approaches but thats the only thing that got me out and soft enough.
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