My problem has been 50 yds and in. I tend to always hit sand wedge, which often comes up short, hit fat, or bladed. Practiced with 8 iron today, what a revelation! So much easier to hit solid…plus the margin of error on mishits is huge…instead of laying sod on the ball, a mishit has a different trajectory but goes almost the same distance.

Here are my “owned” short game shots as of today:

Pitching wedge: full swing, 110 yd
Sand wedge: full swing, 75 yd
Sand wedge: 9 to 3 swing, 50 yd carry, no rollout
8 iron: 9 to 3 swing, 50 yd carry, 25 yd rollout
8 iron: 8 to 4 swing, 30 yd carry, 20 yd rollout

Regards,

NG

I was focused on club low on the takeaway, turn with chest in place, hip slide to start the downswing, AND head down till after impact.

If I get eager to look I will lift the head early, leading to a thin shot left or right. Keeping the head down till after the thwack of impact results in much better shots.

Regards,
NG

Hit the first couple of shots with my 4 hybrid, these started left and stayed straight left. See the front part of the accumulated divot pattern in the photo.

This made realize that I was making my common miss of swaying and not getting my weight back forward, releasing my hands quickly through the hitting area to compensate.

After practicing my turn a bit, I hit several solid shots in a row, see the back of the divot pattern in the photo. Perfectly square to target.

Hitting off grass is clearly valuable for giving feedback on our misses…

Regards,
NG

Fairways hit: 10 / 14

Greens in regulation: 0/18

Up and Downs: 2 /18

Putts: 35

3-Putts: 2

Penalty strokes: 2 (1 water, 1 lost ball)

Hit perfect wedge shots all afternoon, hitting full swing and pitches perfectly solid.  Also used my new putting claw grip to great effect, only needing 35 putts.

Unfortunately, was not hitting fulls swings well.  Had several with strong fade, or thin hooks.  This tends to happen when I’m swaying on the backswing instead of turning.  Need to ingrain my weight shift some more, and do some practice turns on the course when things start to go south.

Regards,

NG

I had the sense that my hands were too involved in the putting stroke. I sometimes hit putts on the practice green with right hand only, and I’m surprisingly accurate from six feet.

So decide to try left hand only. At which point I realized my left wrist was breaking down. After correcting this, got a lot more accurate and consistent.

Then decided to try a claw grip, to remove the hands even more and focus on the shoulders rocking. Got comfy with this grip after only 20 min on the carpet, and put it into play on my last round.

Needed only 35 putts, with only two (2) 3-putts. Drained a few over six feet to save par and bogey. I think I’ll be keeping this claw grip….

Regards,
NG

Had one birdie and four pars. Also hit a record six (6) greens in regulation!

9/14 fairways
6 gir
36 putts
2 up and downs for par
1 penalty (lost ball)

My putting was decent, but hit several full swing wedge shots fat, due to a setup issue which I’ve now worked out on the range. I should be hitting perfect wedge shots soon.

Looking forward to breaking 90 soon!

Regards,
NG

Discovered today what the issue was. As usual, it was setup, not the swing itself. I was putting a lot of weight on the left leg (which works well for chipping), so much so that it was restricting my weight transfer back and through. This led to a very steep, armsy swing, which was very likely to hit a few inches behind the ball. I would have my weight 50-50 during the practice swing, which looked great, divot in front of the ball, then transfer most of the weight to my left side for the actual swing, and presto, fat shot!

Hit a whole bucket of sand wedge and pitching wedge today. Weight no more than 60-40 on the left side. Same motion as for my other clubs: low and smooth takeaway, turn over the ball, hip bump top start the downswing, full finish. Perfect solid wedge shots every time! Can hit high, medium, low, draw or fade with ease.

Moving the ball just back of center gets me more distance, but with extra roll. Since I want to use these clubs to hit the green near the flag, I’m going to stick with ball position in center of the stance: I get higher trajectory ball flight, with almost no roll.

Best Regards,
NG

I think there were two issues:

1) Swing path too shallow. I’ve been making sure the clubhead lays flat on the ground for chip shots, which works well for that purpose.  However, this makes for a shallower swing path, and steep seems to work better for the full swing wedges.  With the shallower path, I was carving out huge divots, starting behind the ball.  Standing a bit closer to the ball with the club heel slightly off the turn results in a steeper full swing and better ball contact.

I would not have realized all this, except I switched to using a grass range recently, which shows your faults much better than the typical driving range mats…

2) I’ve been so anxious about these 75-100 yard shots because of a couple misses, that I started swaying back on the backswing.  Just need to focus on keep my head steady relative to the ball.

With some solid wedge shots, I anticipate breaking 90 relatively soon…

Regards,

NG

Fairways hit = 50%

Greens in Regulation = 5 (my best ever!)

Penalty shots = 0

Putts = 42

Lots of 3-putts and even one 4-putt essentially ruined a possible personal best.  My ball-striking was really good, as evidenced by the Fairways and GIR numbers, and lack of OOB or lost balls.   Used 3-Wood off the tee a lot, sometimes 4 Hybrid (no driver).  Green misses tended to be long or short, not left or right.

It was also a tale of two nines, 54 on the front and 46 on the back (another personal best!).   The putting started to improve on the back nine. 

Was having trouble starting on my intended line with the putts.  Felt like I was pulling most of them.  Need to work on the putting stroke; I think I wasn’t setting the clubhead lie flat at address, causing it to veer offline and not return to the address position at impact…

So still some work to do, but at least the ball-striking has come around due to all the work on my grip and weight shift…

Regards,

NG