Coming up short of your target is a horrible feeling. I know, as it was probably the biggest flaw in my game so far this year. I believe the second biggest flaw was thinking that the club would get to the target I was shooting for. While that may sound like the same issue, it honestly isn’t, they are two completely separate issues with two completely separate solutions. The first is usually caused by a poor swing or some external condition. The second is a complete head game that golfers play, which is usually started by the question, “What did you hit there?” Fortunately, both are pretty easy to solve and this is how.
Under-clubbing is a direct result of thinking you are going to hit the perfect shot every time you strike the ball. Or basing your distances off “one shot” or worse yet, those driving range distances. While it’s all fine and dandy to get a guesstimate at the range, until you physically check distances for a few rounds on the course, your never going to know your real world distances. These are the ones you need to have written down on that handy card in your bag. The best way I have found to chart yardages is to use the extra spaces on your scorecard to write the club and distance for each shot on a hole. If you chunk the shot or catch it thin, don’t count it in the averages, but anything else, fade vs. draw, slices, or even that pull hook gets distance and direction written down. If you have a bit of money burning a hole in your pocket, I can’t recommend using the Golf Pad App with your Android phone and pairing it with the $99 Golf Tags for the best tracking experience I’ve ever used. If you don’t want to shell out for those, you can also just use the App without the tags, it just takes a few seconds longer to track each shot.
Once you know the physical distances you actually hit your clubs, you can start tracking shot by shot on the screen to see what the difference is between a draw and a fade with your clubs. My 6 iron, for example, was hitting 181 on a draw and 176 on a fade. What was interesting about that was the fact that I had a 7 iron draw at 175 on my yardage chart that I carried with me on rounds, which ends up being that “perfect shot” on a draw with it. The problem is, that perfect shot comes out once or twice a round at best, and it’s usually about 5 yards off of that, and the fade is a few more. My 7 iron on a fade was a perfect 166. What this showed me was that I was about a 1/2 club under-clubbing every approach shot I was hitting. That means I still hit the green on back and middle pins, but instead of 10-15 foot putts, I has 30-40 foot putts.
Knowing your real carry distances is crucial to playing better. I see people dump thousands of dollars into equipment, practice and even lessons, when their swing is actually very decent, their clubs were just fine and the pro just tweaks their swing to be a bit smoother, when what they really need to do is learn how far the ball is going off the club face. I’ll admit it, I was one of the players that “thought” I knew how far I hit the ball, but after really tracking my play, I didn’t. Three yards a club doesn’t sound like much, but when you factor in that that is an additional 10 feet on a putt or that you land in the bunker going for that tucked pin, that 3 yards really starts to add to your score card quickly. Learn your distances, use a GPS or App to do it, it doesn’t have to cost you a dime if you are willing to work a bit on it and the results you will see in your game are worth the trouble.
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