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Mizunoman · #13 (**permalink**) 07-19-2005, 04:54 PM

Erm...tips.....erm....I dunno. I did approach things in a certain way every match. I dont know if a sense of routine made a difference or not. The main thing was I went to the range pre match and worked on the shots I didnt feel too confident with. I always made sure I hit a lot of drives at the end to get myself ready to hit the all important first drive. Then i went to the putting green and did some work there. I used Monty's putting drill of hitting lots of 2 footers trying to hole as many in a row as I could. Then I went to longer putts and worked on line reading and pace. Did a bit of chipping and found out what club I had my eye in best with on the day. Sometimes it was the SW sometimes it was the 9 iron.

I had a plan for the round, where to play safe and where to attack, that was pretty dependant on the pin placements. Me and my caddy had a little idiot card with reminders about safe places for sucker pins and best landing areas for others. Another thing was I didnt deliberately try and hole any putts over 15 feet, I just lagged those ones up, I did get lucky with a few that fell in but I dont think I three putted too many greens over the course of the 90 holes of matchplay, maybe 3 or 4 at most. If I was to give you any single pieces of advice it would be the following

1. Dont charge at long putts lag them up unless you must hole them. Any putt outside 6 feet is miss-able so dont charge at a 25 footer just cos the other guy has a 10 footer for it. If you get down in 2 then he has a much harder putt.
2. Par golf will win matches. Unless you are playing some maniac who can shoot 4 or 5 under, level par will usually win a match at our level. I played to par all week and won a lot of holes with level numbers. Forcing a guy to make birdies to win holes is money in the bank especially if you get a couple up early on.
3. Stay positive at all times, you are going to lose holes and you sometimes build a big lead and then get pegged back. These are the facts of match play. Concentrate on the holes to come.

Good Luck,

D.