HOW TO SHOOT IN THE LOW 80,s

Well, it was brutal. Absolutely brutal. Not your fault aftford. Not your fault aftford. I think your method is sound.

The 7i worked fine though. Totally kept it in the fairway. A few holes (one par 3 and a par 4 with a right-angle turn right) need more than a 7 iron off the tee though.

The trouble for me is when I'm coming into the green and on the green. I'm used to having a few wedges to choose between so I can shoot those in-between shots.

My putting sucks what can I say? I had 3 holes where I 4-putted. My buddy was keeping score and ran in and handed in the card without adding them up so I'm not sure what my score was but I know it was just as bad if not worse than ever.

I'll try a variation next time with a couple more clubs. I really hit my 9w well and I find that's my go-to utility club. My take-away on this affair is you don't need a wood or driver off the tee to post a half decent score. You need to putt, pitch and chip well to score well. Those are the things I do worst. So from now on I'm working on those parts of my game not the driving and power shots.

I played 89 yesterday. - And 86 two weeks ago, but between those days I did not get near my HCP. I was trying too hard!

I am starting to beleave all the talk about golf being a mental game. If you enjoy a round, you don't worry about one or two bad shots - and in the end the score is very good. (And if you don't, it does not matter, you have enjoyed a nice round, good company, and found a bag full of new shots during your round .)

hi chaps.
since i first posted this thread , 15 people on-line have had a go at this system , some with truly amazing results and others that did not as well as they thought they would. However, the single common denominator of you all, wether you scored well or not so well, was, every one of you could pinpoint the reason why didnt score as well as you could have done. wether it be poor chipping or too many 3 or 4 putts, you all have now highlighted your weaknesses and that can only be a good thing.
If you can take time to re-read this thread you will find that not one person had problems finding the fairway, the problems arose from 70 yards in. so what does this tell us as a whole???

cheers aft

__________________
the dog wags the tail....the tail dosn't wag the dog

Aft,

stats show that at the tour accuracy for all shots are from 7 - 10% compared to the distance. BUT for pitcher it is 15%! Well tour players might pitch from farther way than 70 yards/meters, but problem comes from not making a full swing. (That was one reason for not being as accurate.)

I think you are saying that short game should be practiced more?

In a nutshell Hannu , YES.
We don't pay enough attention to our short game.
It is something we are all guilty of and yet it is still one of the main common factors in not being able to consistantly lower our scores.

You ask any pro or low handicapper, what is the best way for us to lower our scores and every single one of them without exception will say practice your short game.

cheers

hi james
you have hit the nail on the head
ive played using aftfords theory quite a few times it has taught me to think about course management a lot more and makes you have to improvise your shots.
with that in mind ive selected the clubs to use in future rounds they are clubs i know i can hit reliably well and if i start hitting a club not so well ditch it during the round(damage limitation)
my bag now consists of 3wood,23deg rescue,5-9i,pw,sw,lw and putter
confident i can low score anywhere with these!
short game practise,practise,practise!
good luck

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cheers slats
"Golf can best be defined as an endless series of tragedies obscured by the occasional miracle"

Geez ... could you please stop making things sound so logical, I'm getting all confused ??!!

Anyway ... I had another go today over 18 holes. Sadly it was almost just as poor as the last time, except this time I actually hit fairways (9 of 12 - 10 of 12 if we forget about the very first shot of the day going out of bounds) with my 3wood. The 2 I missed very both in decent first cut / semi rough positions on par 5 holes.

I probably instinctively tried to kill it a little more than necessary - and it really isn't necessary, since I was about 2 meters short of GIR on the longest par 5 on the course (595 yards), so it really isn't necessary to kill it on a 475 yard hole.

But today, my approach shots were off the mark, and since I spell "chip" d-u-f-f and count my putts in 3s (I had 5 3-putts today), being off the mark really hurts my score.

Missing approach shots of course also means missing par 3s, so all-in-all, I had only 1 GIR for 18 holes. Probably relevant to mention, that very few of these approach shots were too short. More often they were too long, or simply off to one side, so again, it's not a distance issue per se.

And yeah ... as you say, aftford ... it becomes pretty obvious where the flaws are.

I lost 5 strokes on the putting surface, 6 strokes to "out of bounds" or water hazards, 2 strokes failing to get out of bunkers in the first attempt, and - for the sake of the experiment - I'll assume, that half of the missed greens would have saved me a stroke, and accept that the other half might have left me 3-putting anyway.

So it seems - based on my last two rounds - that my ENTIRE game is very 50/50, and when it all clicks, I CAN shoot in the 80s - not by luck, but by only shooting good shots. I did that over 9 holes only this wednesday.

The next couple of days of my vacation - of which there is still one week left - will be spent in majority on the putting green, at the chipping green and shooting a gazillion shots from 100 yards in at the range.

On a positive note - today, me and my playing partner made it round the course in almost one hour less than we usually do.
I admit - it wasn't as full as it usually is, but the main reason wasn't that, but the fact that we spent VERY little time actually searching for stray balls.

It IS more fun playing golf off the fairway - and I WILL make this work!

__________________
//Mox
2008 bag:
Mizuno MX-500 460cc 10.5* Fujikura Tour Platform 26.3 stiff. (about to be replaced by MP-600 10,5* UST Proforce V2 stiff)
Mizuno F-50 3w 15* Fujikura Tour Platform 26.3 stiff.
Wilson Deep Red 5w 18* Graphalloy Fatshaft stiff
Cleveland HALO 3i hybrid 22* graphite regular
Mizuno MP-60e forged 5i-PW True Temper Dynamic gold R300 steel
Mizuno MP Black OX raw haze 50/6 GW, 54/9 SW, 58/10 LW
Heavy Putter B3-M
Titleist NXT Extreme

Hey aftford, this is my second post in this thread, the first was to say how much better my round was using this way, anyway, had a comp this morning and went round in a net 66 ( 24 hcp) , my best ever round on the course.Will find out tomorrow if i won.I hit 11/14 fairways.The other 3 , one rolled in a ditch and 2 in the light rough.

hi slater
think your spot on when you say it makes you think about course managment more. i think about what club i want to play into the green now and not what club my driver leaves me, and on a tight hole that could be a 5 iron then a 7 iron and a wedge and not a driver then a 5 iron.
bill

Hi blue .
So glad it works for you.
I hope the result goes in your favour

well done mate

aft

Had another go yesterday - still using my 3wood from tee and keeping my driver in the bag, and also teeing off with irons on shorter par 4 holes.

Scored 39 stableford points and a net score of 69.
Handicap now down to 28.5.

I'm still far from consistent, and I waste a lot of shots on or around green.
But I have less 'disasters' and more often, when things go wrong, it's not worse than I'm able to recover and still score on the hole - even if just a single point.

Of course, I have begun focusing my practice session on the issues I feel cost me the most - definately the short game. And hopefully, that'll help me improve further.

__________________
//Mox
2008 bag:
Mizuno MX-500 460cc 10.5* Fujikura Tour Platform 26.3 stiff. (about to be replaced by MP-600 10,5* UST Proforce V2 stiff)
Mizuno F-50 3w 15* Fujikura Tour Platform 26.3 stiff.
Wilson Deep Red 5w 18* Graphalloy Fatshaft stiff
Cleveland HALO 3i hybrid 22* graphite regular
Mizuno MP-60e forged 5i-PW True Temper Dynamic gold R300 steel
Mizuno MP Black OX raw haze 50/6 GW, 54/9 SW, 58/10 LW
Heavy Putter B3-M
Titleist NXT Extreme

Hey all I once shot 86 on a 3 club day i used a driver, which i am able to hit of the ground, 7 iron and pw. i putted with my driver. i found that i was using my driver to get to a perfect distance of a 7iron or pw, i was hiting driver driver on par 5's.

I'm going out with a putter, pw, 7, and 5 (for long par 3s) today. I've played a total three times so far. Best score was a 115, I'll let you know how it worked out later today.

Tried it again. This time with a 6 iron (for a couple of the par 3's) GW and SW and Putter. 9 holes 57. No worse than usual and actually, a VERY honest score with no mulligans.

My problem is 3 and 4 putting. To save 9 strokes that's where to begin.