Or slowly poison the tree?
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That would work too!
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You also need to work on averaging 4.5ish from that spotā¦ should be able to green lots of punches from there!!
I hit a LOT of punch shotsā¦ not sure what a respectable GIR stat would be from that spot but I would think 60%+
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Yeahā¦ Iām honestly not sure what my deal with this hole isā¦ I think it actually might be beneficial to walk it backwardsā¦ Iām just not comfortable with my strategy, which then makes it harder to commit to the shot.
Honestly, if I could find a club that basically went 260 with a draw, Iād have use for it on at least 3 holes. I think I need to do some shoppingā¦
what are your yardages at the top of the bag?
also i think there is a huge psychological benefit to adopting a scrambler mindsetā¦ ie bomb driver and know that you know how to hit punches, high shots, sand shots and make puttsā¦
I am honestly pretty terrible off the tee for my index and I think note getting frazzled and not giving up is most of the reason i keep a single digit
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A choppy and nondescript week. A played at an āawayā course on Monday; 5,800 yds and had a 79. Ball striking was good in that I hit 3/4 par-3s GIR and 13/14 fairways. I game planned it not to hit a fairway wood on par 5s and it paid off.
Tuesday an absolute suck practice round. I spent the back nine hitting FW off tee and down the fairway. At least something constructive was done.
Back to āmainā course yesterday and had an 83. Two errant tee shots cost me three strokes and a couple loss-of-focus 3-putts, but the game is starting to round into shape.
A hot, humid and very slow front nine (42) so we bagged it. Monday is another day. Pretty much mirrored play from previous day. Highlight of the day was inaugural play of my new Hogan GS53 Max driver. Iām happy with impact density, but I think itās about a line lower than it should be. And, yes, as you can tell from the intra-dimple patterns, I was playing a Wilson Staff ball 
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Driver is about 275 carry, 3 wood (which i hate and tend not to hit) is 250. Hybrid (which I love) is 230. 4 utility is 215.
This is a fairly large hole in the top of my bagā¦ I really need to get a new 3 woodā¦ Ideally, a 2 woodā¦ or maybe just get a 14 degree 3 wood Iām comfortable with and see how it goes.
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Had my first round match today in our club match play tournament. I won 2&1 despite playing like the Village Idiot.
I opened Bogey-Double-Bogey to go 2 down, then missed a 3 footer for birdie at 4 to halve the hole. After my opponent hit one to gimme range at 6, I was 4 down and I still had to give him 5 more shots. But I had righted the ship a little and was at least making pars.
I got one back at 8 when I parred and he bogeyed, so finished the front 9 down 3. I managed to win 2 of the next 3 holes, but then made a bad double to go 2 down with 5 to play.
I was pretty demoralized but picked up one on 14 when I parred and my opponent missed a 2 footer for bogey (he was getting a stroke). The I went par, birdie, par to close him out. The missed 2 footer on 14 and my birdie on 16 were key.
Overall I shot a Net +8, so it was bad golf. I had, easily, my worst putting round of 2021 and my chipping is really poor at the moment. But I won, and Iām proud of grinding it out when I didnāt even have my C game on and around the greens. My driving and irons were probably a B.
Iāll build on this. I know my putting wonāt be this bad again and I am going to get my chipping fixed.
Next!
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Had an interesting round this morning, a very colorful card not in the best way. My off the tee game was erratic and thatās putting it nicely. I think my set up is off with the driver, but didnāt try to fix it out on the course just clubbed down when I could and will try to sort that out.
Hitting 3 wood off the tee has actually been a big thing for me on certain holes at my club. Today I birdied one of my ādemonā holes by laying back and putting it at about the 150 marker. With my driver inconsistencies I kept pulling it into the trees on the left, so by playing a little cleaner I left myself a look from about 35 feet and snaked the putt in. (Note: while Iām not the longest hitter, itās uphill with a little headwind so donāt judge my 7 iron distance)
Kudos to you for grinding through the round. Sometimes you just have to outlast your opponent and make fewer errors.
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Started today with a low slicing running drive to 146m out. Hit a 6i and we couldnāt see where it landed. Got up to the green and it was so close. Pitch mark was right beside the hole and I had a tap in birdie. Finished 9 over 79 with 7 pars and 2 birdies and only 2 doubles. My all time best round is 78. Went out and played another 18 straight after finishing and shot 83 with 8 pars. Had 6 more putts than the am and bladed a chip ob at the last where the garden just behind the green is ob. I hit loads of good shots and am a bit sore as my course is hilly and I walk. I hit 8 gir in both rounds after hitting 8 gir for the first time 2 weeks ago.
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Another weak round gross, but parred course net last week. Started with the old driver fade shot working normally 1st two driver holes. Biggest defect was the darn pull/hooks reared up for rest of front 9. Based on face strike,(mainly 10 mm high, 10 mm toe) I figured it was a more-ish closed face at impact. Weakening grip got me 6 FWs hit on back 9. Didnāt pay attention on 1 tee shot & hooked it, but scrambled for net bogey. Hit a lot of iron shots 2nd groove that didnāt hold green. That made for too many long, out of fringe putts.
I had worked on neutralizing driver going left at range last week, by weaking grip. Again practice with a purpose paid some dividends. Taking the driver out of draw bias setting for this weeks practice & play.
Self-analyzation & teaching helped āsalvageā the round.
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Meandered for a smooth 38-42=80 today; best score YTD. Played wearing rain gear on front nine and very enjoyable back nine. Walked it in ~ 2:45.
No doubles, no penalties, no 3-putts, hence the good, for me, score.
Of note; front nine has 6 pars on only 1 GIR. The nGIR was spot on because I think I was Externally Focused. Back nine was inverted (3 pars) because I think I lost proper mindset and was more Internally Focused.
Side note; Sunday I spent an hour hitting 100 yd wedges and 50 yd wedges finished by some variable chipping and putting. By āvariableā, Iāll chip two balls to a target, then try to hole them out. Again and again. Practice pays off! Who the hell knew?
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Went back and looked at where I went ob yesterday. 9 paces from the back edge of the 18th green down a slope. Huge penalty so close to the back of the green.
Oh manā¦ apparently my putting was due for a regression, and boy did it regress! 38 putts and I just had 0 confidence over the ballā¦ it was sad.
Took a lesson yesterday and Iām excited to get my ball striking backā¦ Iām definitely positioned for success in the future, just need to execute!
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The problem with your putting today is obviously that you focused on your full swing and ball striking yesterdayā¦damn game.
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I had the opportunity to play Pinehurst number 2 on Sunday and it did not disappoint. Absolute blue bird of a day, my only regret is that I was only on the property for about 6 hours
Some notes:
- I really enjoyed walking with a caddieā¦I usually like to play fast in a cart but it was a totally different experience to slow down and take a nice stroll
- the property is gorgeous and the first 6 holes are an absolute treatā¦ I played it from about 7k yards which was fairly long for meā¦ lots of hybrid, 4 and 5 iron into those turtleback greensā¦
- shot 46 - 41ā¦ sadly they do not serve alcohol before 10 am on Sunday in North Carolinaā¦ I was able to get some hair of the dog down after #5 and played the final 13 holes 5 overā¦
- I will definitely be organizing a trip back with buddiesā¦ the shuttle service to the Raleigh airport is super convenient and the property is amazing. The threesome I joined was raving about their 3 night trip as well as a group of 6 who was on my shuttle to the airportā¦ I will definitely be picking out combo tees to play number 2 from about 6500 yardsā¦ no need for my buddies with double digit indexes to be playing from 7k yards out there
@davep043 the waste areas are interestingā¦ the lie you receive can be so arbitraryā¦ i found the waste areas REALLY difficult once I was inside 100 yardsā¦ touch shots of that stuff was a nightmare
Edit #1: Hole 3,4,5,6 may be as good a stretch of 4 holes as any in golfā¦ just awesome designā¦ I found the front to be the more mentally stimulating set of golf holes but the back 9 is no slouch eitherā¦ already thinking about getting back
Edit #2: People always talk about the Donald Ross greensā¦ they are certainly challenging, but I did not think they were unfairā¦ I actually had a really nice read and bead after about 3 holesā¦ my best shot of the day was a V difficult lag putt that had to be hit sideways into a moundā¦ almost dieā¦take the breakā¦ trickle down the hill 30 feetā¦ settle 1 foot from the holeā¦this putt was the exception though, most of my putts were 2 cups out or less of break
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Played 18 yesterday and shot even par, despite only hitting 8 GIR. I had two chip-in birdies, both of which were pretty lucky as they would have gone 6-8 feet by had they not hit the cup.
What Iām most pleased about is my mindset. Perhaps it was a recent tweet by @jon which knocked some sense into me. My mindset was so good. I just accepted whatever the outcome of each shot was and moved on to totally focus on the next one. My chipping has been problematic lately, so every time I chipped I just accepted what happened and went to make the putt. I made par saving putts of 6, 10, 12 and 15 feet! Need to duplicate that mindset more often!
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Came up to Lake Tahoe for a first summer trip with my family and got out to play at Edgewood yesterday (where they play the American Century celebrity championship in a couple weeks).
First off, beautiful course in great condition and an amazing setting for golf:
I didnāt play awful, but not really well. A few pars, bunch of bogeys, and a double. No penalty stokes, just below average in all aspects for me.
Something else I figured out is that playing at my club has ruined me for handling slow golf mentally. Our round wound up at 4:50, which is too slow, but probably not unusually so for a really tough, long course that gets a lot of not-great golfers on it. Didnāt help that we were a threesome and all kept it in play. Back when I consistently played public courses, I could handle waiting on every shot without much problem, but yesterday it was a real struggle to stay mentally with the round and it definitely cost me some strokes.
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Itās funny how an extra few minutes each hole can throw you off. When I first took up golf (30 years old) I only played the public courses near my house on the weekend and a 5 hour round was the norm. I would play with my father-in-law a few times each year at his club and weād be done in 3.5 hoursā¦I felt like I could hardly keep up, but did prefer that pace.
For the past 5 years I have been at semi-private clubs and weāre done quickly, but the membership has increased drastically this year and the pace has slowed. The last tournament was mostly members and it was a 5 hour slog (we had only a 3-some)ā¦I was dying lol. I feel like I should be able to handle it since it was no problem years ago, but I canāt seem to.
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