Big Question?
What non-technical golf skills do you need to work on this winter?
Feels
My feeling this week is one of encouragement.
After another oddly positive round at the weekend and starting with Ryan on Thursday this coming week, I am riding a wave of positivity! Following my free swing analysis on Skillest, I got to work on one suggestion; flattening my lead wrist leading to a closing of the face. Ryan identified an issue with my clubface being open as the route cause of my lack of rotation. I had to stand up and raise the handle to hit a semi-functional shot. After spending a little time with the feeling, I have played two pretty good rounds, scoring well and improving on my season average strokes gained for approach play (more on that later). With a month of unlimited lessons and time to practice, I am feeling encouraged and excited to get to work!
The full video of my Swing Analysis is available below if you’re interested in the specifics and details;
Practice
I have had a disrupted week of practice which has led to some impromptu home sessions around the weather and work. Every day I have worked on the ‘flattening the wrist’ feeling at home. I have rehearsed it around 30 times per day during purposeful takeaways and holding at the top of the backswing. When it came to playing my round on Sunday, I included this ‘move’ in my practice swing and then went through my normal on-course routine (more on this later too!).
My planned putting session was disrupted by some horrid weather. I did 25 minutes of putting on my PuttOut mat using my mirror and a gate for the start line. I attempted 20 putts during that time, going through my routine on each putt. I hit the gate 5 times out of 20 with 4 of those clipping the left side of the gate, indicating a slight pull as a tendency. I will repeat this test regularly when putting at home. Despite this, can’t wait to get on a green and do some putting practice centred around speed control and different breaks of putt.
Playing
I played in a Remembrance Sunday Stableford competition this week. After a week of limited ball striking practice and minimal putting practice, I wasn’t holding out too much hope of a good round. I was actually expecting some issues after making a small change to the swing (#manageyourexpectations). The round itself was a relatively ‘comfortable’ one. Very solid off the tee despite getting zero run out due to the wet conditions. My season's best approach play (+2.35 in SG on a 5hc benchmark) and a pretty solid short game. But putting…. I 3-putted the 3rd, 8th and 10th and had 2 silly short 3-putts after good chips on the 11th, 13th and 17th. The best word to describe it was comfortable. The ball striking was solid with very few low-point errors and the face direction was pretty solid overall. It almost feels like a missed opportunity. Still, ‘wooly’ and bumpy greens and limited practice on them for 2 weeks were always going to affect the results.
Approach Play
Two things are at play with my improvement in approach play.
a slight closing o the club face has led to more consistent ball striking and ball flight which has led to an improvement in GIR
I made a commitment to take one more club into greens to what I ‘thought’ would be the club to hit, e.g. 148y I would naturally select an 8 iron, but instead I would take a 7. Simple.
The images above show my GIR data and miss for the round on Sunday versus the season. 61% of greens were hit Sunday with 17% coming up short. My season average is 39% with 43% coming up short. My left to right miss has altered slightly with a closing of the face (more left than right misses).
This is certainly a statistic I will keep an eye on as improving GIR is considered to be an ideal starting point when looking for low-hanging fruit to improve scores.
How is your GIR?
What is your tendancy when missing the green?
Routine
We can all agree that a strong routine is essential for sound and consistent performance. It does not guarantee success. It does not suddenly mean I am going to drop shots off my score. It means I can focus on a solid habit and consistent approach to playing golf shots.
Over the last 5 weeks, I have worked hard at the range to have a ‘Quality over quantity’ mindset. This means taking my time, rehearsing, going through a process. It involves stepping away from the ball and lining up correctly, picking an intermediate target, having a practice swing with the feeling that I am working on, and then letting it go. For the first time on Sunday, I felt the work coming to fruition. My focus began to feel natural and had some flow to it. I try to notice as much as I can about what is going for me, what I am thinking and what I am feeling. The feeling of confidence and flow was how my routine felt on Sunday.
It has taken a while but this work has shown itself to me in a positive way which gives me the motivation to continue the work at the range. The routine I am currently working into my practice and play is;
assess the lie, distance, wind and hazards
select a club
select a target line (minimising the damage caused by a miss, e.g. often not the flag)
select an intermediate target in the target line
practice swing
line up clubface then feet and body
let it go!
This is phase one and will change and be tweaked down the line but steps 1-4 are now beginning to feel more ingrained and I will continue to practice them as much as I practice my swing.
Training
Still pushing my training, making progress in each session. Either the weight or reps are moving every session. Over halfway through this phase now and still looking forward to training. Another speed session is planned for this coming week, results on Twitter (Scratch Journey Twitter) and full reporting coming next week.
Reflective questions
What is your full routine?
Do you practice your routine each time you hit a ball?
How do you pick your targets?