April 2008

This topic is getting lots of dialog, so I thought I would just write a little on the subject this morning. There is no question that almost every golfer . . . of any skill level . . . can improve their scores by altering the way they approach each hole on the golf course. To me, this is a very complex subject, and has thousands of angles, but let’s address the basics of course management that any golfer can work from.

1. Manage Your Expectations - This is the first principle, to my way of thinking. If you are a 10-15 handicap, for example, there are no “birdie holes”. None. If you make 5-8 pars and the rest bogies, you’ll lower your handicap quickly. The key for mid-handicap players is to take out the doubles or worse.  Even if you play to a low single digit, thinking “birdie” on the tee is quite often a recipe for bogey or worse. I try to not think “birdie” until the ball is on the green within one-putt range.

2. “Play” the hole backward - By this I mean to take a moment on the tee to dissect the hole from the cup back to the tee. On a mid-length par 4, for example, that has several fairway bunkers, maybe the best play is to hit a 3- or 4-wood off the tee, taking the bunker out of play (the fairway is usually widest just before fairway bunkers, by the way). That may leave you a couple of clubs more into the green, but a 5-iron from the fairway is a lot easier shot than a 7-iron from a fairway bunker.

3. The flag is seldom your target -  Unless you are a tour player, knocking down flags is not your game. Even those guys, however, will always target the “safe” side of a flag with their approach shots. In a typical golf course setup, only a few holes are positioned where you can fire right at it and have equal opportunity for par or birdie from either side. When you are assessing your approach shots, try looking at it from the perspective of which side of the hole offers you the best chance to AVOID BOGEY, rather than think “birdie”. You’ll see a “wide” side usually, and the side that offers uphill putts or chips.  Particularly when the greens are fast and firm, this is a great strategy for shooting good scores.

4. Bogey is not a bad score - Even for single digit handicap players, there are 4-5 holes on every course where bogey is not a bad score. When you’re playing the longer and tougher holes, make it your game plan to ensure yourself no worse than bogey. Play the hole more conservatively. On the 3-4 longest par 4s and 3s, for example, you’re not likely to hit long iron, hybrid or fairway wood to “easy par” range. Find the “safe zone”, which is generally short and wide of the flag, and play to it. Make bogey the worse you can make and give yourself a chance at par if you make a good chip or lag putt.

5. Keep reading The Wedge Guy - And use the Ask Terry button in the right-hand sidebar to ask me any golf questions you may have.
Especially when you play the same one or two courses all the time, we lose our analytical creativity. Next time you play, just look at each hole with “new eyes” and see if you don’t recognize a completely different way to play it. And I’ll bet you dollars to donuts that will improve your shotmaking and scores.

Feel free to leave me a comment and let us all know if it helps you the next time you’re fortunate enough to play this grand old game of golf.

Well, another Masters has come and gone and for the second year in a row we saw a “first major” breakthrough by a young player. Congratulations to Trevor Immelman, who is quite apparently a very talented young man.

I love watching this tournament, maybe more than any other, because of how that golf course demands your very best in shotmaking. It’s quite apparent that you cannot score this course from the wrong place on the greens, or if you’re missing greens. But what is not so apparent is the importance of hitting fairways . . . and being in the right place in the fairway . . . to place your iron shot in those right spots.

Last year, the “big story” to me was the way Zack Johnson chose not to attack any of the par fives in two, but rather to rely on his wedge play to dissect them into birdies. And he led the field in birdies on par fives with 11 !!!

That’s playing smart. We also talked about Zach’s driving, as this “short hitter” – 157th on Tour in driving distance – was tied for 2nd in driving accuracy for the week, allowing him to hit greens, where he ranked tied for fourth.

Well, guys, accuracy over distance did it again !

Trevor Immelman was commended throughout the telecast about his ball striking, even emitting kudos from Gary Player that he has a swing like Hogan’s !  Now that’s an accolade, isn’t it ?

So, what Trevor did was drive it in the fairway – he led the field in that statistic. And he hit lots of greens, ranking second in that category. That allowed him to finish 3rd in total putts ! Guess what, if that’s not a formula for winning, I don’t know what is.

So, your lesson here is, again, learn to hit your driver straight, and this game becomes a lot easier. If you’re hitting fairways, but leaving yourself too far from the greens, you are playing the wrong tees !

From my own experience, these 45 and 46 inch drivers are costing all of us strokes. I’ve been tweaking on mine for months, and have finally found that at just under 44”, I hit dramatically more fairways. So that’s where I play it. And you know what ? I haven’t noticed any drop off in distance whatsoever.

If you want to lower your scores, I strongly suggest you grip down on your modern “watermelon-sized” driver about two inches and watch what happens. I think you’ll be amazed at the improvement in your directional consistency, and how much more solid you hit it most of the time.

I’d like to hear from all of you about your “Master’s experience” and offer up questions you’d like me and the readers to sound off about.

Here it is – my favorite weekend of TV watching all year.

The Masters.

What I love most about this tournament on TV is watching the creativity that these guys have to exhibit around the greens . . . and on the greens. And we all can learn a lot from watching how the best players in the world navigate the most challenging track they face all year.  If you watch the Masters with your eyes on the right things, you can learn more from this tournament than any other.

Here’s The Wedge Guy’s Guide To Watching The Masters:

Watch where these guys miss the greens. This year the greens are firmer and faster than in recent years. Brandel Chamblee was talking yesterday about the fact that all the leaders hit many greens, as the course is not conducive to scrambling your way to par. As you watch the next few days, notice how often they arrange to miss the green on the wide side of the hole, giving them a better chip or pitch. The lesson: On many holes, on many normal golf courses even, your best odds are to play to a certain side of the hole and make sure you miss on the “wide” side, where the up-and-down is easier.

Observe the short game techniques. This year, pay particular critical attention to the techniques of these best players when they have a short pitch or chip. Watch the position of the hands at address and impact – we’ve been talking about them being low, with the arms hanging naturally. Watch their tempo. These guys are being very precise, so you’ll notice a slower, more deliberate swing tempo. And notice the body engagement. Even on the shortest chips, they rotate their shoulders and arms in one piece.

Focus on the putting. The Masters always demands a good putter to win. Watch the leaders, as they are the ones putting best this week. You’ll notice very comfortable setups with most. You can almost see how lightly they are holding the putter. And also watch how they break down these big breaking putts into the path the ball has to take to get close to the hole.

Play along. I think watching golf tournaments with your putter and wedge handy, and spending time mimicking what you see these guys do, can be a great learning experience.  When they are taking practice swings and hitting shots with their wedges and putter, the camera will show you plenty of reps. Pick up your putter or wedge and mimic their pace.  You’ll see how slow and deliberate these guys are.

So there is The Wedge Guy’s Guide To Watching The Masters. I hope you all have a great weekend and I’ll see you next week with comments on the tournament.

I’ve had a few questions about club length, and I see golfers weekly that are being fitted long and upright. I sound off all the time about this in private, but it’s time to address this subject to my readers. I’d like to share my observations and thoughts on the subject and then have all of you sound off with your personal experiences or input.

When “custom fitting” became de rigueur about 10-12 years ago, the method was (and still is) to rely mainly on a lie board and fit the golfer with length and lie angle that gave him or her “flush” impact.

I have a couple of problems with that approach.

First, if you put a board on the turf and tell me I have to hit it, subconsciously I’m going to make a more downward blow to the ball than normal, and this has to skew the results of the testing to more upright.

Secondly, and more importantly, most golfers are stuck in the mid- to high-handicap range because their hands get too elevated and far from the body through impact. I’ve written about this before.

The key to good shotmaking and optimum distance with every club in the bag is to create an address position where the arms (the left arm in particular) are hanging naturally from the shoulder – then to “cover” that same position through the impact zone. Almost every golfer I observe begins with their arms extended so that the arms and club form an almost straight line from the shoulders to the ball, then they repeat that position through impact. You just cannot get to quality ball striking from that position.

As a result, we are seeing golfers being fitted long and upright to facilitate this poor technique. All the fitter is doing is trapping the golfer into this position at impact forever.

Now, I realize that there are many golfers whose games have improved after such a fitting – but to what level (I’m sure you’ll all tell me, right !?). And did you then hit another plateau where improvement stopped again ?

Here’s a drill for you just for fun and learning.

Take your 6-iron and set it behind a ball in your living room or den. Make sure the club is soled flush to the floor.

Now, holding it in that position with your right hand, assume your address position and posture, and let your left arm hang naturally from your shoulders. It should be about 4-5 inches off your left thigh. Get comfortable. As you move into the club, note the relationship between your left hand and the top half of the grip – were they close to the same spot ? Or was the grip much higher than this “natural” position of the left hand ?

Think about it this way. If your goal in the swing is to allow the left hand to come right back to this natural position, it will take much less manipulation and training than if your swing is trying to re-direct the left hand to a “manufactured” position that is unnaturally high and far from the body.

I know I can’t give complete golf lessons here, but my goal is to always help you get to a more natural way to strike the ball consistently and properly. I hope I’m making progress in that regard – please let me know if I’m not.

And let me know what other things you’d like me to speak out about by using the ASK TERRY button in the right-hand sidebar.

I owe all of you loyal readers an apology, as it came to our attention that the comment tool we use to keep this blog clean and safe for you was “whacked” for a few days, so you were unable to leave any comments.

But it’s fixed now and we have some great new articles up that we’d like your opinions and advice on.

So, please give it a try and leave a comment. It’s painless…I promise !
To make up to you this error, we’ll be giving away a pair of EIDOLON V-SOLE wedges (you choose the lofts) to a lucky reader who posts a comment between now and the end of the month.

Every reader who posts a comment will be entered into the drawing. Comment on more than one post if you have something to add and your name goes in the hat again !

Thanks for understanding and let me know what subjects you’d like me to address by using the ASK TERRY button in the right-hand sidebar.

It’s been almost a year since I first wrote about the performance of blade irons versus cavity backs, and those are still the most commented on posts I’ve ever done – they pull reader feedback even today. So, I thought I would dive into that subject a little deeper.

I was having a conversation about this with a golfer last week, and they asked me “why ?”

“ Terry, why and how can you say that a more muscle-back design produces better results than a cavity back design, when the entire industry has spent millions and millions of dollars developing these high-tech irons ? ”

My answer started out simple – “ Because it’s true. ”

Compare hitting a golf ball with driving a nail. If I started three large framing nails into a board, and gave you first a framing hammer, then a small sledge hammer, then a 12” cast iron fry pan, which would drive its respective nail with the least amount of blows ?

The sledge, right ?

Followed by the framing hammer, and trailing poorly would be the frying pan. Even though the frying pan may weigh as much or more than the hammers, it does not transfer force nearly as efficiently, because all of its mass is around the perimeter.

By the same measure, a more compact iron head, with the mass more centered, will be a more efficient golf ball striking tool than an oversize head with most of the mass spread as far away from the impact point as possible.

I told you, and I’ll tell you again. If you want to really learn something, borrow the 8-9- and PW from one of your friends or pros who plays a modern blade.

Even if the shafts are too stiff, and they don’t fit you, you’ll quickly see how much more accurate and consistent those short irons are than the perimeter-weighted clubs you currently play.

It’s not just me saying so – read the nearly 100 comments on the posts I wrote last spring !