Wedges: Just shoot me
This afternoon, after work, I practiced at the Golden Bear Golf Center. The weather was warm and sunny, with only a trace of a breeze.
I warmed up hitting pitching wedges toward the red flagged green. I hit the ball pretty well, with a fat shot or two thrown in, and most of the shots were pulled just left of the flag. Next, I got out the 7-iron and lined up to hit shots at the blue flagged green. I was striking the ball fairly well, but my shots were mostly pulls or hooks. The more I hit, the more the ball started to hook. I got out the 9-iron and went to work trying to get the path straightened out. Hoping to get the hook out, I put the ball a little farther forward in my stance and worked on getting a clean strike on the ball. For the most part I was successful, but still had that nagging hook or fat shot lurking to torment me. I then rotated in the 5-iron into the mix, but couldn’t seem to get a good strike on the ball.
I traded the irons for the long clubs. First up, I hit the 5-wood, and boomed a nice one at the yellow flagged green. I followed that up by hitting the hybrid and driver. All of these clubs I hit pretty well, the only miss was hooks with the driver. I even hit nice shots off the deck, which was little more than a 1/4″ long grass over very hard dirt. I was pretty pleased with the long clubs, I continue to improve with those clubs, as long as I resist the urge to kill the ball (that causes the dreaded hook monster to torment me).
I then went back to the wedges, hoping to get the fat out of my game. No such luck today, I seem to be digressing with the wedges. I think I’m going to need to get some instruction, and soon.
Finally, I got out the longer irons and worked on striking the ball with the ball more forward in my stance than I’ve been using, hoping to get the hook monster to stay away. I seem to have made a bit of progress, as I even hit a decent 4-iron at the end.
I’d planned to hit the putting green to practice, but found the green overrun by junior golfers, so I reluctantly skipped putting practice and hit the road.