Joey's Golf Bag

On Saturday, I met Jarvis for practice and play. The weather was warm with a strong breeze from the north.

I spent half the practice session hitting short and medium irons, working on drawing the ball, as usual. I was drawing the ball pretty good today, but the wind made my draws straight and my straight balls fade. Next up, I practiced short wedge shots into the practice flags. I had good direction control today, but most shots were long. After that, I practiced chipping. Jarvis and I had a chipping content (he owes me lunch). A few practice putts and time to hit the course.

My score:

* Hit green in regulation.

Themes:

• Shots from the tee, other than the first two holes, were mostly long today; I guess I overcompensated for the wind. Misses were to the left, so the draw is starting to become more natural.
• Chipping, despite the practice, was bad all day.
• Today was my worst day putting in recent memory; three 3-putts.

Nevertheless, the weather was beautiful and had a fun day.

Last Saturday, my usual golf buddy was unable to play, so I headed to the range to hit some balls. I concentrated on irons, hitting only a couple of drives, badly.

The weather: cool, sunny, soft breeze. I hit many, many, iron shots with the 7-iron, working on backswing and shot shaping. While I hit a few draws, I could never get the draw to be repeatable. At least the bad shots were fades and not slices. I also hit the 5-iron and 3-iron, but mostly hit fades.

Today, the weather was again sunny and cool, but there was a two club breeze into my face at a 45 degree angle to my target line. It turned draws into straight shots and fades into slices, but I persevered.

I worked on fundamentals again today. First, I made sure my grip was correct, especially having the club in the correct “strong” position with the club in the fingers and not in the palm of my left hand. I still have to check continually to make sure that the club is gripped correctly. Next, on the backswing, I made sure that the end of the club pointed at the target line. I also moved the ball position back a little to just forward of center, hoping to hit the ball a little more reliably. Lastly, instead of grounding the club, I hovered it at the equator of the ball in hopes of curing my problem hitting too many fat shots.

For the most part, the checking the fundamentals worked well. I began to hit a higher proportion of draws and straight shots to fades. My bad shots are always fades or slices; rarely, with the driver or 3-iron, I will hook, but that is uncommon. Today, I hit only 7-, 5- and 3-irons, with a brief break to hit a few drives. Near the end of practice, I had the draw working, even with the 3-iron.

The advantage for me is my draw carries 10-15 yds farther than my fade, so I prefer it. Unfortunately, I can’t hit it reliably; I can always hit a fade, and as long as my timing is good, the slice is avoided. Thus, I want to make the draw my normal shot and only use a fade when I need the ball to land softly.

Today, when I was down to my last 5 balls, I got out the 10-iron and hit nearly every shot fat, due, it seems, to the ball being played too far forward. On my next practice, I’m going to start from the center and see if I can determine the optimal position for the ball.

When I got home, I had a little epiphany. I’ve been practicing mostly using tees, since it helps me learn to shape the shots. I seem to have created a problem, however, in that the club face isn’t square until the club is on the way back up. Hitting on a tee hid this effect from me. The main reason I’ve been playing the ball forward is it gives me more time to release the clubface, but it looks like the release is happening too late, and on the way back up. Now that I see the problem, I can now work on fixing it. No more tees for a while…

I practiced at GBGC after work this afternoon, practicing mainly short and mid irons. The weather again was flawless, mid-70s, soft breeze, not a cloud in the sky. I started hitting the 7-iron, fades, and noticed that I had too much lower body motion. That caused inconsistent striking of the ball. After some practice shots with my feet together and ball centered, I got my swing back in sync and started hitting the ball well.

I also hit the 6- and 5-irons well, mostly straight or soft fades, though I did have more pushes than usual. 4- and 3-irons were disappointing, though, I never got a consistent straight ball flight, either hooked it or faded it. I didn’t do any driver or 3-metal work today.

After the 4- and 3-irons, I went back to the 7-irons and worked my way up through the short irons. Most shots were straight without any side spin. With the shorter irons, I tended to pull some of the shots more than usual.

I also hit a few full wedge shots with the pitching and sand wedges. The pitching wedge shots were particularly straight on target, but I alternately pulled or pushed the sand wedge.

I ran out of time and wasn’t able to putt or practice my short game.

I went to practice after work at GBGC. Since most of the grass range is closed, I used a mat on the closed section and spent most of the day practicing the full set of irons. The weather was flawless, mid-70s, soft breeze, sunny skies.

While I never did get a reliable draw going, most of my irons were going straight or soft fades. I did get a hook or two on the 3-iron, but nothing repeatable. The slice was gone except for one or two on the long irons and a couple while hitting the driver. The short irons were straight on target or slightly pushed or pulled. Mid-irons were soft fades mostly, some straight. Long irons were also mostly fades, but a hook or two thrown in when I hit a little fat.

I hit a few full wedge swings with each of my three wedges, balls were mostly straight with a few pushes.

I didn’t spend much time with the driver, but I did hit a couple of big banana slices before I got the ball going straight. No moon balls today.

I was a bit rushed and had little time for putting, but did putt well once I got the speed down. My five final putts from 9 to 21 feet all found the cup.

Jarvis and I played nine at North Texas Golf this morning. I put the 3-, 4-, and 5-irons back in my bag this morning and took out the hybrids while I get my swing back into shape. I started out with the 3-iron, hitting soft shots, mostly fades. Next, I hit some 5-irons, also fades. I then went back to the 7-iron and got the ball going straight and even a draw or two. I then went to the driver, which sliced, great big banana slices. Yeech!

I went back and hit many short irons, mostly straight, with pushes more prevalent than pulls. Distance was short; I wasn’t able to get the swing really fluid today.

Next up, I went and hit short and medium sand wedge shots at the target flags. I had some trouble getting my swing grooved in, but finally achieved some decent shots. I also hit a few lob wedges, mostly a bit short. I’ve been having trouble hitting the ball a bit fat with the wedges lately, and this continued during practice.

I then gathered some balls and hit short chips with the pitching wedge and got the distance and direction grooved in again. My chipping has been suspect of late and it was good to get it going again. I also hit some putts, but the putting green was in poor shape (needed mowing). There is maintenance in progress on the greens; many of them had sand spread today, which made putting difficult.

My score today:

* Hit green in regulation.

Themes:

• My main difficulty today was hitting the ball short. My distance was short all day, only went over the pin once. With the exception of one shot on the second hole, the slice didn’t reappear today.
• Putting was very mixed. I hit a 21 foot putt for par on the 4th hole but four putted the 7th hole. I don’t ever remember 4 putting a hole before.
• Chipping practice worked. I hit a 40 foot chip to 2 ft to par the 5th hole.

If the golf was lacking, the weather was flawless, 75 degrees with a slight westerly breeze.

I practiced at GBGC on Friday after work, to work on getting the slice, so prevalent the last time I played, out of my swing. With the exception of the driver, I was able to do that today.

I started off hitting 7-irons, trying to shape the shots into a draw. Though I wasn’t able to draw the ball consistently, I did manage to get the ball going mostly straight, with only a few fades thrown in. After that, I hit 6-irons and had similar results. The straight shots failed, though, when I got out the driver. While I excised the slice, most of the balls were fading, and never managed to get the ball to draw. Same results with the 3-metal and the three hybrids. All shots mostly faded, but at least the slice was gone.

After those clubs, I went through the short irons, hitting pretty good shots mostly straight, little or no fade. Some were pushed, which in short irons can mean the club face was open. I soon ran out of balls, but not before I finally got the balls going straight. Distance was somewhat shorter than usual, but I’m happy with shorter distance if the ball goes straight.

On Sunday, I watched most of the final round of Annika lapping the field at the Samsung tournament. Since I don’t have the Golf Channel, I didn’t see the end of the tournament and found out much later that night that Michelle Wie got DQ-ed for an incident on Saturday. What nonsense is this? I don’t believe for a second that Michelle meant to cheat, and without malice, there should be no disqualification.

Problems with the rules of golf:

1. The reporter didn’t bother to report the improper drop to anyone until the next day after the tournament was all but over. He was standing six feet away. Why not just point out then that she looked a bit closer to the hole?
2. Doesn’t anyone but engineers understand “margin of error”? The distance was walked off twice for distance, and was found “inconclusive”. A string was then used to measure the distance and found to be 12-18″ closer to the hole. The rules need a margin; people aren’t perfect.
3. She signed an incorrect scorecard. Just what the heck is wrong with correcting it after the fact? It’s not like the checks have been cashed already.

Here’s what should happen for PGA / LPGA tournaments to get rid of ridiculous DQs like this one.

1. There should be an “official scorer” with each group keeping score. The players can verify the score at the end of the round.
2. There should be a rules official with each group to verify that the rules of golf are followed and to immediately assess any penalties when they happen.
3. Corrections to the scorecard for penalties before the end of the round should be allowed. The round is final once the last scorecard is turned in by the official scorer at the end of the round. No more bystander judges.

Pro golf needs to get rid of these antiquated rules that have player serve as their own judge and jury. Rules like the ones above are fine for small tournaments that don’t have the means to provide official scorers and rules officials, but the PGA and LPGA have no excuse.

I practiced on Friday at GBGC after work. It was not pretty. I’ve been working on getting my shots to draw, rather than fade, and it has been getting harder and harder to get the draw working. Friday was no exception, nearly everything was fading, and even, gasp!, the slice came back. I’m pretty sure that the main issue is my backswing is not in the proper plane, too flat, and I sometimes keep the club face too open at the top. I draw the ball most effectively when hitting half swings, and find it harder to get the draw to work on a 3/4 swing, and almost impossible with a full swing. Thus, I almost always use a 3/4 swing when I’m on the course, as it gives me better control of distance and direction.

On Friday, I also had problems hitting the balls fat, which I have mostly avoided for the past few months. Both of these issues compounded on Saturday, when Jarvis and I played the Lakes course at Indian Creek. Warming up, nothing would draw except on half swings, and everything else faded or sliced. This was not a comfortable feeling when playing on an 18-hole course for the first time since the spring.

The day started out poorly, made triple on the first two holes. I finally got it sorta working on the third, fourth and fifth, all of which I bogeyed. The remaining holes were very poor, and Jarvis and I decided to call it a day on the ninth hole, as the other two players were playing much better and getting annoyed with our poor play.

The only good thing about my game on Saturday was my putting. Despite the poor scores, putting was not the cause, as I had only 1 three-putt, and that one wasn’t really a three putt as the ball was on the fringe and not on the green. The greens of the Lakes course were the best Bermuda greens I’ve ever played on.

It looks like more lessons are in my immediate future.

After work, I went to the driving range to work on shot shaping. The weather was warm and muggy, very little wind. I started off hitting fades with a 7-iron, trying to get the draw to work. Mostly, though, fades and straight shots were most common. Next up was the 6-iron, no better results than with the 7-iron.

Next up was the driver, where I was unable to get the draw to work at all today. I hit mostly fades or high straight moon balls. The 3-metal, all fades. I tried a few shots with the hybrids, fades. Hmm…

I went back to the 7-iron, hitting half swings and finally got the draw going. By that time, I’d run out of balls.

Next up was putting practice, but putting was disappointing as well. I worked mainly on speed drills, poorly. I never got the putter to feel right today.

No wedges or short iron work today; those clubs worked pretty well last time I played.

A disappointing practice, but at least I got the draw finally going near the end.

What a fantastic day of golf at Harding Park on Sunday! Tiger, JD, Monty and Sergio all vying for the $1.3 million pay day. The Tiger – John Daly slugfest on the first hole of the playoff was a classic demonstration of driving perfection. More in Daly’s missed putt ends classic duel. A quote:

John Daly versus Tiger Woods? Man, that’s the best matchup since Predator versus Alien or King Kong versus Godzilla.

The Daly-Tiger bout was considerably more lopsided than the latter two. Be honest, you wouldn’t have bet your entire collection of Debbie Boone CDs on Daly. He was the underdog. Here’s the catch: Daly was the fans’ favorite (although it was a close call, since San Francisco and Harding Park qualify as a home game for Woods, who played two years of college golf at Stanford before turning pro) and, oh yeah, Woods was scraping by without his A-game.

It was a great matchup, much more interesting than Woods versus nice guy Ernie Els; Woods versus go-for-broke, never-won-the-big-one-until-last-year Phil Mickelson; Woods versus world No. 2 Vijay Singh, who does not stir much emotion in the public; or Woods versus Retief Goosen, who can still walk down a street in New York City without being recognized.