Another balmy 20 degree afternoon. I had been tied up with Rotary meetings and grand kids all day. It was great to get out for a hit in the sunshine late in the afternoon. The people at the club were all buoyed by the pleasant conditions. The wind ? SW, at about 15 kph maybe.
It was a little busy, so I decided to play the back nine rather than wait 10 minutes.

I hit pars on 10,11, 14,15 and bogeys on 12 ,13,17,18. my only double was on 16: the par 5 into the wind. There was a bloke searching for his ball on the left side of the rough. Mentally I thought to myself, ” do not go left” with the 4W ( which it does). Instead I aimed down the rough side treeline and clipped a branch and got a B grade bounce into the pines. I chipped out with my 9 i being aware that I needed to get on the fairway, so I tried to lob over the rough stuff, but I got another B grade bounce. The ball hit the ground and stopped dead/ no roll out into the fairway at all. From a poor lie I hit the 3H club 156m like a low dart. Gotta love that single length hybrid, it is so versatile! I used it again on 17 when my drive went too far right and I had to bend the ball around a tree and over a bush to get at the green. I not only got out, but the ball ended on the green. I thought to myself that my putting was much better today. That was mistake, because I missed a short putt to score a 5 ( bogey) . On 18, my Driver fade shot over did it and ended up pin high , but right of the green. I used the LW and got it on the green and down for two. I am getting better using the LW when short sided. I have more confidence with the LW than rolling a shot over say 10 m of thicker grass. If it was short mown stuff, I like to roll them on with the SL Hybrid.

Two Steps Forward

1) I know it was not in a game but a 42 OTS is an improvement for me. I hit fairways, I hit greens, I putted better.
2) I hit more GIR using my irons. Inside 127 m ( my 7 iron distance) I am reducing my lateral dispersion. From 130-160 I have several options, depending on whether I need a high or low shot. Possibly the 6H ( 29) and the 5 H ( 23.5) are overlapping a bit, but that is strike dependent.

One Step Backward
Discipline! I have started saying this to myself before every shot to remind me to use my PSR, rather than skipping bits of it and playing too fast. I get annoyed when I make a stupid error by not sticking to my PSR.

Tony and I have volunteered to cook the BBQ after today’s game. The game is some sort of hybrid style 4 player team event.
Anyway most of the field elected to start at 12:45 and only three groups at 7:45. This left the course fairly vacant, so Tony and I decided to have practice hit starting at 8;30 and follow behind the field.

Tony isn’t a long hitter, but he is very accurate, especially inside 100 m. His short game is excellent.
We bogeyed hole 1, then I managed to clip the trees on the right side of the fairway. My starting line for my attempted fade was too far right and the wind didn’t have a chance to push the ball back to the centre of the fairway, as I had hoped for. Tony crept up on the hole, down the centre, while I zigzagged playing army golf. My 6 H approach shot was pin high, but left by about 10 m. A simple chip was all that I needed, not the thinned shot that scurried over to the other side of the green. Darn; double bogey on hole 2!
My tee shot on hole three hooked a bit, so I had a PW rescue over to the other side. I hit a 3H shot 188m ( impressive) to be just short of the green on the par 5. I bumped another 3H shot onto the green and two putted for a bogey. I managed another good tee shot on hole 4 getting over the ridge. It was not quite as long as yesterday’s effort. I hit the 9i approach shot fat, but managed to get it on the green with a 50% swing PW. Bogey result. My tee shot on hole 5 was effective, hitting the green with a slighlty faded/ almost straight flight. I sunk a 4.6m putt at last for a birdie. The 6th hole was uneventful par. I hit a 200m fade ( can I call it a power fade?) , then a 50% 9 i and 2 putts. Now on the seventh hole, things got interesting. I am pleased to report that I hit my tee shot 245m into the left side bunkers. I had only reached them once before. Yes, there was a bit of wind assistance there. I hit my 7W shot out of the bunker 176 m and it rolled into the green side bunker. My 60 degree wedge shot was near the pin ( 1.6m), but I missed the birdie putt. I bogeyed the 8th and 9th holes. On the 10th I put my tee shot into the right side trees. I punched out with the 3H 97 m through the trees ( hero shot). I feel confident with the low flat draw shaped shot , so maybe It isn’t a hero shot at all! We played 11 ( bogey) , but caught the field, so we skipped over to the 16th hole. My drive went 201m and the 4W 184m, so the wind had dropped a bit. I bogeyed 16,17 &18.
Overall a workman like outcome. Some holes were not pretty, but I managed to grind out bogeys when the shots were not perfect.

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Can break 80

Can break 80 wrote:

xrman wrote:

Tony and I have volunteered to cook the BBQ after today’s game. The game is some sort of hybrid style 4 player team event.
Anyway most of the field elected to start at 12:45 and only three groups at 7:45. This left the course fairly vacant, so Tony and I decided to have practice hit starting at 8;30 and follow behind the field.

Tony isn’t a long hitter, but he is very accurate, especially inside 100 m. His short game is excellent.
We bogeyed hole 1, then I managed to clip the trees on the right side of the fairway. My starting line for my attempted fade was too far right and the wind didn’t have a chance to push the ball back to the centre of the fairway, as I had hoped for. Tony crept up on the hole, down the centre, while I zigzagged playing army golf. My 6 H approach shot was pin high, but left by about 10 m. A simple chip was all that I needed, not the thinned shot that scurried over to the other side of the green. Darn; double bogey on hole 2!
My tee shot on hole three hooked a bit, so I had a PW rescue over to the other side. I hit a 3H shot 188m ( impressive) to be just short of the green on the par 5. I bumped another 3H shot onto the green and two putted for a bogey. I managed another good tee shot on hole 4 getting over the ridge. It was not quite as long as yesterday’s effort. I hit the 9i approach shot fat, but managed to get it on the green with a 50% swing PW. Bogey result. My tee shot on hole 5 was effective, hitting the green with a slighlty faded/ almost straight flight. I sunk a 4.6m putt at last for a birdie. The 6th hole was uneventful par. I hit a 200m fade ( can I call it a power fade?) , then a 50% 9 i and 2 putts. Now on the seventh hole, things got interesting. I am pleased to report that I hit my tee shot 245m into the left side bunkers. I had only reached them once before. Yes, there was a bit of wind assistance there. I hit my 7W shot out of the bunker 176 m and it rolled into the green side bunker. My 60 degree wedge shot was near the pin ( 1.6m), but I missed the birdie putt. I bogeyed the 8th and 9th holes. On the 10th I put my tee shot into the right side trees. I punched out with the 3H 97 m through the trees ( hero shot). I feel confident with the low flat draw shaped shot , so maybe It isn’t a hero shot at all! We played 11 ( bogey) , but caught the field, so we skipped over to the 16th hole. My drive went 201m and the 4W 184m, so the wind had dropped a bit. I bogeyed 16,17 &18.
Overall a workman like outcome. Some holes were not pretty, but I managed to grind out bogeys when the shots were not perfect.

Have a great Christmas XRMan and Mrs XRMAN and all your children and grandchildren and hope to catch up with you both in for another game around early Feb.

Thanks Geoff,
It will be a busy X-mas period when number 7 grandchild arrives any day now. I look forward to playing with you again.

Best Wishes to your family too.

I did it. I scored an 86 OTS and 35 points. The weather was overcast and drizzly, no wind at the start and then it built to about 30 kph from the West. The sun came out occasionally , so we were constantly changing clothing layers. I played with 3 guys in single figures.

It wasn’t a great performance , not hitting too many fairways off the tee, but I managed to keep the ball in play and scored better once on the green. I hit 4/14 fairways, 4/18 GIR, 3 up and downs, 34 putts. If I had won a trophy, I would be thanking my Cobra single length Hybrid for keeping me in the game.
Two steps forward
1) My Putting overall was better. I only 3 putted twice and from that distance, it was always going to be a 3 putt situation.
2) Chipping under 45m was improved. I chipped in on the 16th hole from 33m out.

One Step back
Driving was just a bit off today. Possibly I was trying to hit the ball too hard and lost control; maybe? I pulled a few left and pushed a few right.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by xrman.

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Can break 80

It must be summer! I had a pleasant bike ride around town in the sunshine and light Northerly wind. We have been waiting for such a day for months. The plan is to start ” Project T’ That is, work on documenting Tony’s club distances and see if we can work on a better Driver for him. Tony has a slow rhythmic swing and is using the same Driver that he has owned for 15 years. Being 72 now, he has lost a lot of distance off the tee. So far he has improved a lot with using a A flex 5-7 wood rather than his old 3 wood. He has also replaced his longer irons 5-7 with Cleveland Launcher (A flex graphite) , but still uses his older 8-SW with steel shafts.

Today we will play around with shaft flex and loft on the Driver to see what he can achieve.. It should be interesting.

I won the B grade with that 84 score.

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Weetbix, Madam, Can break 80, beansontoast

We did a comparison with Tony’s 10.5 regular Driver and my Nike Vapor Speed with a shorter A flex shaft set at 12.5 degrees.

in current course surface conditions he is gaining a lot of distance through roll. So the low trajectory shot with the 10.5 is paying dividends. We measured the swing speed with the two drivers and he was several MPH higher with the lighter 10.5 , but getting good trajectory with the 12.5 Nike. Distance was much the same with both Drivers, but getting there is different ways.

It was obvious that he needs a light 12 degree Driver, so an order has been placed for a Cleveland XL launcher light ( 40 gm shaft) , which should give him the best of both worlds.