3 Good Shots - Articles

Golf Sense With Roy Palmer

Mon, 08 Nov 2010 22:31:16 GMT

I had the chance to speak with Roy Palmer about his new book - Golf Sense, Practical Tips On How To Play Golf In The Zone. It has some great tips on how to stay in the moment and really enjoy your golf. Take a listen to the interview below:

Golf Sense with Roy Palmer

Buy Golf Sense on Amazon.com
Buy Golf Sense on Amazon.co.uk

Transcript

NICK: So hello and welcome to “Three Good Shots” podcast. I’m Nick Swan here with Roy Palmer, who’s released a new book called “Golf Sense,” which he was kind enough to send me a copy. Tell me Roy, how’s it going and can you tell me a little bit about yourself

ROY: Hi Nick. Thanks for having me on the podcast. I’m a teacher of the Alexander technique, which many people still don’t know what that is. It’s about moving re-education, getting to know how your body works and getting it to work more efficiently. There’s more to it than that. It could be really useful for all sports people, but especially golfers.

NICK: Can you give us a quick elevated pitch about your book?

ROY: The subtitle really says it all: “practical tips on how to play golf in the zone.” I did a lot of work looking into this phenomena. It’s when you play your best. When it’s your peak performance and it’s not really hard work at all. That’s when you’re in the zone and I hope the book has lots of little hints and tips about how to get into the zone more often and play better, more enjoyable golf.

NICK: Quite early in the book you say you don’t play too much golf yourself. Did that help when you were working with the golfers that you used as examples in the book?

ROY: Yes, certainly the golfers I’ve worked with would say that it does help, simply because with any sport we can get the blinkers on. We can get a bit stuck in our own ways and bogged down with the technical jargon and technical advice we’ve been given. Really, a lot of it comes down to simple movements. “Basics,” as I call them, that have nothing to do with golf and more about how you move and use your body. As an outsider, I can quite often see things that a golfer’s doing that maybe wouldn’t be picked up by a coach.

NICK: The front of the book has the words “observe, think, act, and achieve.” Are these the 4 key principles that you go through in the book?

ROY: Absolutely. [For] So many people, not just golfers, but athletes that I work with, the “observe” is the bit that most people miss out. They’re not aware that they’re doing certain things. Mini golfers will lift their shoulders and tighten their necks. It does affect the whole dynamics of the shot, so you have to be more self-aware of what you’re doing. Also, the “think:” Many of us think we’re in control but in fact we can be anything BUT in control because we get stuck in our habitual way of doing things. Habits rob us of the opportunity of being fully aware of what we’re doing. Just 4 words that nicely encapsulate what we need to do, and if you do those, it can make a huge difference to your game.

NICK: You mentioned playing in the zone, which is funny because when you’ve played a really good round, you realize afterwards that you’ve been in the zone, rather than when you’re playing. How can you put effort into getting in that zone more often? It seems the harder you try, the least likely you are to make it in that zone.

ROY: That’s exactly what led me down this route: the techniques I use in the book. It got to me one day that getting in the zone is a bit like falling asleep. To fall asleep, it doesn’t happen any faster if you lie in bed trying to fall asleep. Anything you do with interfere with the process. It’s the same with the zone. It’s about being present in the moment. Enjoying what you’re doing and allowing that process to continue. Then you will suddenly slip into the zone. I achieve a lot when I’m running. Certain things I need to put into place, but not to try. To sleep, you need a quiet room, warmth, and a comfortable bed. Then you allow the process to take care of itself.

NICK: So you’ve got a few tips we could try next time we’re out on the golf course to take out mind off it?

ROY: Well it’s things that I talk about in the book about not actually focusing specifically on the golfing aspects because you’ll be doing that anyway. It’s other things that get you into the moment, which can be as simple as being aware of your feet in your socks, on the ground. My favorite is just being aware of my ribs moving against my shirt as I breathe. Other golfers I know like to be aware of the contact of their lips so they can be aware of their jaws. It’s to be aware of things that are relative to the moment, but not necessarily relative to golf. If you concentrate on your grip, for instance, you’ll be trying to do it in your golfy fashion and trying to do it too much, whereas if you could just be aware of the contact of your hand against the club, that’s another way of getting into the moment.

NICK: Is it different for different golfers? Do you have to find out what works best for you?

ROY: Yes. Everybody’s individual so there must be 20 or 30 different things that I’d use and it’s about finding the right thing for each particular golfer. Working with golfers, I will discover new ones as they will tell me what works for them. It should be related to the moment, but not directly related to the shot you’re about to play. That’s in the preparation. Just to be aware of certain things. It just helps to quiet things down. I think of it as quieting down the nervous system, reducing the amount of traffic going between your brain and your muscles. There are so many things to think about. I see a lot of golfers get completely paralyzed by trying to think or do 20 different things at once and confusing themselves.

NICK: Can you give us a few stories about people you’ve worked with and the improvements you’ve seen by practicing your techniques?

ROY: Yes, actually many fall into the category I mentioned earlier of lifting their shoulders or tightening their necks before they swing. One particular chap had good technique on the hold, but with the swing, he just didn’t achieve the distance he thought he was capable of. His practice shot looked fine, but when you bring the ball into the equation, he would do more preparation and stiffen up a fraction. We all have our little habits. As he got into his stance, he would wiggle the club a little bit. Just pull down his stance, tighten his back and do a little wiggle. He just got into feeling the contact of his lips on each other and to check he didn’t clinch his jaw. It kept him in the moment and he didn’t do any of the normal things he wanted to do. Then he could do the same sort of swing he did in his practice swing. Once he lined up the shot and was standing over the ball, it got him to almost stop thinking of the ball completely. He got 10-15 extra yards when he didn’t do his usual preparation and allowed something different to happen. It freed up his movement and made a huge difference. He was very pleased.

NICK: It’s so funny, isn’t it, when you see golfers’ practice swing is better than their actual swing.

ROY: Practically everybody, except for the top pros. Once you put the ball into the equation, as soon as they start thinking about how the shot will turn out, it stiffens them up a little. The guy with the clinching jaw realized he’d done all the work before he did his swing. He’d chosen his club, lined up the shot, he knew roughly where he wanted to go, so he just had to not have any concern about where the ball went. He knew anything he’d do then to improve the shot would be detrimental to the shot. Again, this part about being in the moment.

NICK: When a golfer hits a bad shot, they’ll be thinking “it must be my grip” and they’ll focus on their grip a bit more. How do you get around doing it? I do it, myself.

ROY: We’re all human. We all have our idea about what’s going on, but surprisingly we get it wrong on many occasions. What’s actually wrong on any particular day with our game may be nothing to do with what we think we’re doing. Once you’ve brought in that anxiety, we start to make corrections. Often, what we’re doing is adding more unnecessary movements or actions on top of something that’s already going wrong. I was thinking, rather than try doing something extra, try to do less. The more you try to do, the more there is to get wrong. We hear the term “simple golf” a lot, because those who actually worked it out realize that the simpler your golf, the better you play. Try doing less. It’s about coming back to the basics. I’m not talking golf basics, but the basics of movement. I see many golfers get into poor stances. I ask them to talk me through what they’re doing. Often they’re doing something they’re unaware of. They’re tightening their hamstrings, pulling themselves down into their stance, claiming their getting into “their stance.” You can see in their faces, they’re actually tightening their lower backs, which reduces their rotation. Try to keep it simple, and not over-analytical. Often, what’s going wrong is something you may be totally unaware of.

NICK: One thing I’ve realized since reading your book is how tense my jaw was. It’s not until you try relaxing it that you realize how tense it was before and while you’re taking your shot.

ROY: Absolutely. This is the problem with habits. There’s a reflex that connects the jaw and the hands. If you look at a young baby feeding, they grip their fists. It’s called the “babkin response.” So quite often, people will have tension in their jaw when they’re concentrating on their grip. Because it’s a habit you’ve done 20 or 30,000 times before, it’s not until you release that tension that you go “Ah! There was tension there.” But if it was business as usual, you’ll start to do that as part of your preparation. Many golfers tense themselves up purely as part of their habit, then once it’s a habit, they do it without even thinking. You jaw muscles will affect your neck muscles, which are very sensitive. They’re used to coordinate every muscle in your body. Putting the tension on your jaw could be the equivalent of putting the brake on your car.

NICK: When you see a professional golf coach and you’re working on bits of your swing, as you’re improving your grip or taking a different way in a slightly clever direction, how do you combine the advice the pros give you with the teachings from your book?

ROY: It’s about trying to give people the means to use the advice a coach could give them. Now, I’m not a golf coach. I can’t say I can do anything that a golf coach can. There’s a few I’ve worked with and it’s fascinating, the techniques some of them have devised. I teach people a “pre-technique.” So if the coach is telling you how to do something, I can help people carry that instruction more accurately. Again, I’m like a driving instructor for the body. If you can have lessons from a coach, they’ll ask you to do something. Quite often people are unable to carry that advice exactly. I used to teach karate, where I noticed that verbal instructions that you give can be interpreted by 10 different people in very different ways. That comes down to, yes, language, and how people use their bodies, the concept they have. Again, someone says to keep your back straight and you’ll see people actually tighten their lower back. People feel, “that’s how I do that particular instruction. It’s really just trying to help golfers get more from lessons from a coach. They’re more body-aware of it, if you like. To understand the body mechanics of everything you do. The technique could be used for all sports people or if you sit at a desk all day. It’s all about how you use your body.

NICK: I didn’t mean to turn this into a personal coaching lesson for me [laughs], but one thing I’m working on with my coach is my lower body in terms of my hips and my downswing. My arms and things like that. So all I’m thinking about when I swing is to stop my lower body, my legs and my hips from moving. How would you use the Alexander technique to help me there? Thinking about my legs and my hips is probably tensing them up.

ROY: You’re then probably going in the opposite direction and restricting movement. With work from the idea of the “top-down” approach, the neck muscles will coordinate every other muscle in your body. It’s really about not trying so hard. Try to get a better appreciation of the momentum. Let the club hit and do an awful lot of that work. Another golfer I worked with tried to hit the ball too hard, adding too much and completely destroying his coordination. He said he was knocking down an old brick wall in his backyard and I was asking him when he was using the sledgehammer, to not try to hit the wall and let the weight of the hammer do it. Obviously, his club doesn’t weigh that much, but it gave him the lesson that you don’t have to try and hit the ball hard to get the coordination. And again, coordination is very much a lower level brain function. If you try to keep your lower body still, you may go too far and prevent the body from coordinating whole movement. Trying to stay relaxed and free, then as the upper body swings through, then every other part will start to be engaged, as and when is necessary, but again, that’s not a function that we need to try to think about consciously. It’s something that should mostly be done at a subconscious level. It’s like the captain of a ship. The captain gives the order. He doesn’t go to the engine room to shovel coal. Part of his crew should then carry out their own particular function. Again if you’re focusing on your jaw, try to keep you neck relaxed. Keep the body free and try some practice swings. Get a sense of the head of the club coming through and let it lead the shot. See if you can let your body follow:

NICK: You said about the guy swinging the sledgehammer, not trying, but you look at the pros player swinging so fast, that in terms of their body, it looks like they’re hardly trying at all. Especially someone like Ernie Els. He swings so easily.

ROY: Also Rory McElroy. I’m a big fan of his swing. Though it was interesting watching Tiger Woods a while back, where he did have the degree of control to actually “give it some stick” if you like. You could see him accelerate that club, though he did sort of have problems with his knees. But yes the top people in any sport do tend to make it look easy. Think of Roger Federer, big chap on the tennis court, but boy does he move freely. And again, they’re at the top of their sport because they do have that natural coordination and movement, and the ability to let it happen, to let it take care of itself.

NICK: You say “natural coordination.” Is it natural, or is it something you have to teach yourself to get better at?

ROY: That’s a good question. I think a lot us do lose our natural coordination through poor habits. We can get it back. My background was running, martial arts, cricket, and I noticed, through my mid twenties, performances dropping, and it wasn’t until later when I came across this technique that I realized I’d lost my coordination, basically. It was really poor. Now, in my late 40s, I can do things better than when I was in my mid 20s. So yes, it’s possible. It’s about unlearning bad habits, to allow your natural coordination to do it for you. It’s a lesson a lot of us have to relearn because we’ve gone so far past that natural poise we had as young children. It takes a bit of practice, but it is worth it.

NICK: Unfortunately, I spend 8-10 hours a day sitting in front of a computer. Do you think these kind of work habits will affect our posture and our golf swing?

ROY: Yes it does. When you go out on the golf course, you don’t suddenly get a new body. You’re taking a body that’s been sitting in front of a computer all day, and unfortunately, a lot of people do develop very poor sitting posture. That changes the shape of your spine and it conditions your muscles in a particular way. But it is possible to learn how to sit, poised, with less tension in the body. The same skills you can learn to get into the moment in any sport, you can use for sitting at your computer. Quite often, I do go into companies and talk about sitting posture. Quite often, it’s just to get people aware that the support is coming up through the seat of the chair and they should think of it pushing up through the top of their spine to the top of their head. Quite often the people who try to sit up straight are like a golfer trying to keep his back straight. They’ll tighten their lower backs and make it worse. There are tricks and little techniques you can use throughout the day to ensure you body doesn’t get out of shape. I went out for pizza earlier. Just sitting there you see some poorly shaped spines, sitting there eating. Once you get out of shape, it could be very difficult to get it back.

NICK: Sitting here now, I’ve just kind of noticed the tension going through my jaw and my hamstrings. I’ve tried loads of different things. I’ve tried sitting on swiss balls-

ROY: Yes, they can be useful, but its like people who spend hundreds of pounds on an ergonomic chair. I still see people sitting badly on them. It’s not furniture, it’s us that needs to be aware.

NICK: So you’ve written a book on golf sense. You’ve been involved in other sports before you’ve written a book on golf?

ROY: Yes, I used to teach karate. My daughter’s not a brown belt. I still coach cricket, where there are a lot of similarities. I know a lot of cricket players who play golf, but not a lot of golf players who play cricket. It doesn’t seem to work the other way around. Running and swimming as well. I do a lot of that myself and work a lot with runners. The Alexander technique does wonders for people’s running. And once again, it’s about teaching people to try less and get more from your body.

NICK: Running does seem to be a sport that people do get injured quite a lot in.

ROY: It’s one of those things that people assume they know how to do. A lot of people who play golf, tennis and cricket will have coaching, but very few people who run will think they need coaching sessions because we assume we can do it. Again, you know, maybe when we were 10, we could run around all day to our heart’s content. But suddenly people take it up again in their late 20s or later, and they’re taking a body that’s been very poorly coordinated for many years and trying to make it do something as vigorous as running. And again, it’s clearly poor movement habits that leave to excessive stress on the joints. Again, here are a few pointers on how to reduce that stress.

NICK: So you mentioned karate, but what do you do for fun outside of work?

ROY: There’s not much time these days to do anything else [laughs]. My daughter and I were playing cricket because we couldn’t find the football. I do enjoy reading a lot. I’ve been reading quite a few golf books lately. But I enjoy science fiction, history, and Lord of the Rings. I’ve read it 3 or 4 times in my life, but not in about 15 years. It was sitting on my bookshelf the other day and I picked it up. I’m halfway through it again already.

NICK: Fantastic. So how can people find out more about the book and the Alexander technique?

ROY: There’s my website, Play-better-golf.com. It’s on Amazon. There are quite a few reviews on there now that I’m very pleased with. They’ve been saying it’s quite a different approach, a bit left of center. There’s also Simplyalexandertechnique.com. There’s a lot of information on there about the technique and how to find a teacher. I do recommend that people at least read about it and if possible, to find a teacher and find out some more for themselves.

NICK: I’m going to take a look at that about posture and golf.

ROY: Certainly they feed into each other. We play these sports, but it’s not just about the sport. There’s a lot we can learn from sport that can help feed back into our professional lives and all other aspects. It’s more than that, especially something like golf.

NICK: Especially with golf. Golf is supposed to be something you do for fun, but you see people get so wound up about it when they play badly.

ROY: I’m just as bad at some of the sports I’ve done in the past. I got so annoyed at myself, but that doesn’t help at all, does it? [laughs] It’s good to take it seriously because why do something where you don’t care if you’re any good at it or not. It’s how to take it seriously without getting frustrated with yourself. Because it can be intensely rewarding to do any sport or activity well.

NICK: Right. Thank you very much for your time. I will link to your book and your website, and that other Alexander one you mentioned. Thank you for your time.

ROY: Thank you very much, Nick.

Texas Scramble Tips

Sun, 31 Oct 2010 21:07:54 GMT

Texas scramble is one of the most fun golf games to play. It is usually played in teams of 3. Each team member plays a shot, and then it is up to the team to decide which shot is in the best position. Once the best position is decided each player then plays their next shot from that position. You need to make sure the position is marked before the first player hits, and then each person drops their ball to play. This process is continued until one of the players holes out with the stroke score being recorded.

In Texas Scramble the teams handicap is worked out by adding all the players individual handicaps together and then taking 10% if the team has 3 players or 5% if it has 4.

Generally you have to choose to take 5 tee shots from each player during the round. This leaves 3 spare where you can choose anyone's. This certainly adds a bit of extra pressure towards the end of the round and you have a number of tee shots left to take.

I've played quite a few Texas Scramble competitions and here are my tips for doing well in this type of competition

1, Lower handicap teams do better

Every time I have played Texas Scramble it has been a team that is mostly made up with lower handicap players that has won. The 10% handicap allowance that a team of 3 gets isn't very much. A low handicap team is quite likely to have a birdie opportunity at every hole as they have 3 goes at hitting a fairway in regulation and 3 attempts at hitting a green.
If you have the choice, always go for the team with the lower handicap players.

2, Let high handicap players tee off first

In Texas Scramble you need to take 5 tee shots from each player so there is always pressure to hit good tee shots - unless the team has already taken all 5 of yours! I've found it puts less pressure on the high handicap players if you let them tee off first out of the group. They seem to take a much more relaxed swing at the ball as they know that if it's a bad shot there is still a low handicap player to come who'll probably hit a good shot.

If the low handicap player goes first and hits a bad shot - this only increases the pressure on the high handicap player meaning they are also less likely to hit a bad shot.

3, Let the high handicap players putt first

It's quite likely that the low handicap players are better putters. By letting the high handicap golfers putt first in Texas Scramble you are giving the better putter more information they can use such as line and pace.

4, Play aggresively

You have 3 chances of making each shot, so you might as well go for it. On a par 5 rather than laying up get your 3 wood out and give it a wack. You need to get birdies to win a Texas Scramble competition so you might as well have a go at it! If you want to play safe, let the first member of the group lay up and get his shot safe, then the other two players can really go for it.

5, Always mark those short putts!

No matter how short the final putt is to finish the hole, make sure you mark it! You do not want to be the one who costs your team the trophy because you missed a two foot putt and didn't mark it!

Remember if you do not mark the place of your ball before you play it, then your playing partners miss their turns once the ball has been hit.

What are your tips for playing Texas Scramble?

Golf Teams and Comments

Sat, 30 Oct 2010 21:01:08 GMT

Some cool new features to let you know about on the 3 Good Shots web site...

Golf Teams

Golf can sometimes be quite a lonely sport, you against the course. Wouldn't it be much better to have a team behind you to offer encouragement to keep you going? Well now on 3 Good Shots you can invite people to your Golf Team so they can get alerts when you add new rounds and practice sessions.

You can find the link to invite people to your Golf Team on the top right of each members profile page.

Add Comments...

As well as being alerted to when your team members add new activity on the site you can now leave comments. Offer encouragement or tips - it certainly turns golf into a more social activity away from the course.

Any ideas?

We're always looking for new ideas for the site to make golf and practice more fun. So if you have any ideas please reply to this email and we'll see what we can do...

Golf Flop Shot - Good Shot Daily

Wed, 06 Oct 2010 19:23:40 GMT

Welcome to the eighth edition of Good Shot Daily - the golf newsletter that will give you a summary of the golf things you need to read on the internet.

Playing Tips

Play the flop shot
Golf Monthly Top 25 Coach, Paul Ashwell, demonstrates how to execute the flop shot.

Golf Psychology Tips - What am I supposed to see??
"I have been following your tips but I am confused. You talk about seeing the shot - what do you mean?"

Equipment Reviews

What's in the bag - Ryder Cup Edition
A great blog post looking at what some of the Ryder Cup players used during the tournament.

Nike VR Pro Combo Irons
Paul Casey does it. So does Stewart Cink. In fact, if you look inside the bags of many of golf's best players you'll see they blend a few game-improving cavity back long irons with blade-style short irons to create their set.

Pro News

The Decider: Who Are the Next Ryder Cup Captains?
Just as one Ryder Cup ends, another begins.

2010 Ryder Cup Report Cards
After the most exciting Ryder Cup in recent history, what about the players - who played the best and the worst? Might as well follow suit and give them grades, too!

Golf Stats

Tue, 05 Oct 2010 21:46:52 GMT

There is an interesting saying from Business Management guru Peter Drucker – ‘You can only manage what you measure’.

Now taking this saying into your golf game, how can you improve when you don’t measure any golf stats. Sure you keep track of your score and handicap, but in a business that is as general as revenue and profit. If you actually wanted to improve your businesses revenue and profit you would need to dig deeper into the numbers and you can only do that if you historically have measured certain key points. The same with your golf game, if you want to be getting your handicap down just looking at your score won’t help you. You need to be able to dig deeper into your golf stats to see what you are good at, and what needs to be improved. But how deep to go? If you are trying to record every little detail then you’ll actually be distracted from playing golf – which is the last thing we want to try to achieve. So here is my take on what golf stats are important and what we will be building into 3 Good Shots:

1, Distance for each club.
I consider this the most important of the golf stats to keep, and perhaps not what you’d have expected to be first. This is something you can do once a year, and then just refer to your numbers for the season. Most golfers think they know how far they hit each club – but it is usually a guess. And whenever a guess is involved it throws uncertainty into the mix, and any uncertainty can lead to nervous golf swings.

I’ve written before about the process I went through about getting distance measured so I won’t go into too much detail this time. Suffice to say, if you can get your yardages measured by some kind of radar device then do it as it’s the most accurate way of doing it. You’ll be able to get the difference between the carry and actual distance, as the carry is probably the most important number here.

Alternatively you’ll need to spend a little while out on the course hitting golf balls and pacing them out. This works of course, but it will be harder for you to work out the carry of each club as you won’t necessarily know where each ball pitched on its first bounce. Still, better than nothing and certainly better than guessing.

2, Scrambles
No matter what level of golf you play, this golf stat is important. Your ability to get up and down is the critical factor between winning and losing a competition whether you are playing in your monthly medal at your local club or the British Open. It was during a Jamie Edwards seminar that he made the point that the higher level you get to in golf, the more important your short game gets. I didn’t think this made much sense as surely better golfers spend more time hitting greens in regulation, but bear with me.

Most professional golf competitions are won by one or two shots
In most professional golf competitions it is not unusual to see the leaders hitting 14 or 15 greens in regulation. That leaves four or five holes where they don’t hit the green and need to try to get up and down. This can easily be the difference between 2 or 3 shots, and as most golf competitions are won by one or two shots it is the difference between winning and second or third place.
Quite often the winners of pro golf competitions aren’t the golfers with the best fairways and green stats, but the best scrambling and putting stats.

So obviously having a killer short game is important to the pro’s, but when you are an 18 handicapper and only hitting 3 or 4 greens in regulation in a normal round your short game becomes even more important.

By keeping track of your scrambling percentage you can see if this is something you need to work on. Par18 is a great game for doing this and your Par18 scores is something you can keep track of on www.3goodshots.com. From doing lots of Par18 you can be standing over a chip and say to yourself, “the odds are I’m going to get up and down from this chip” which is an amazing confidence booster. Also when you are in the middle of the fairway and hitting into the green, if you know that a miss still probably means an up and down par, you’ll be firing at the flag with a lot more confidence.

3, Fairways in Regulation
“Driving for show, putting for dough” is the old saying, but if your drives are always putting you in trouble or making you play three off the tee it is something that you should be looking at. I’m actually fairly flexible in what I class as a fairway when keeping this stat. If I hit a drive that lands in the light rough but still allows me to hit a green in regulation then I class it as a fairway in regulation. When looking back at my stats I want to see if my driving has cost me shots or not. As I get better I might get a bit more strict with this.

When I do hit a bad drive I usually make a note as to whether it went left or right by marking a left or right arrow. This helps in two ways; Firstly if I notice a patterns after a few holes I can consider what to do about it. I know my golf game and swing quite well so if my first few drives have been blocks to the right I know what might be the problem. Secondly, again related to the arrows, if a lot of my drives have been a bit hook’y, I know what to work on when I get to the driving range next time.

4, Greens In Regulation (GIR)
This one had to appear somewhere in the golf stats. How many greens in regulation you can hit does depend on how good your driving is each day. If you are hitting a lot of bad drives then it is going to be very tough to have a good GIR number. I use the format of

Tick – green hit
Cross – couldn’t actually go for green in reg, generally means because of a bad drive
Arrows – if I don’t hit the green in regulation I use up, down, left and right arrows to indicate how it was missed in relation to the green.

As with the driving, I find the arrows important to consider how I’m playing the round, as well as what to concentrate on next time I’m at the driving range or what to report my issues are next time I’m having a lesson.

5, Number of putts
I’ve placed this as the fifth most important golf stat to keep track of. Putting is obviously hugely important, but the number of putts you have hugely depends on how good your scrambling is and how many greens in regulation you hit. A more important number is putts per green in regulation, which certainly wants to be below 2 – and if not you are three putting more often than you should so practice it. The good news is that www.3goodshots.com will calculate your putts per green in regulation for you automatically when you enter your rounds full details.

So what stats do you keep track of when playing?

Ryder Cup Victory - Good Shot Daily

Mon, 04 Oct 2010 21:21:31 GMT

Welcome to the seventh edition of Good Shot Daily - the golf newsletter that will give you a summary of the things you need to read on the internet.

Pro News

Only one story today, and it is going first! Well done to the European Ryder Cup team on a great victory. The USA team played really well today and made it exciting all the way to the last match. A great three and a half days of golf! :-)

Links are all over the place about the Ryder Cup, if you spot a piece you really enjoyed reading reply with the link and I'll include it in the next newsletter.

Playing Tips

Golfing Gold - Where the Secret Lies is Not Always Obvious
Andy Morrison suggests maybe next year is a good time to try a different approach to reach your golfing goal instead of always looking for the quick fix.

Stretching before tee off
As winter approaches doing a little warm up can really help avoid golfing injuries

Equipment Reviews

Wilson Staff Di11 irons reviewed
The Wilson Staff Di11 irons' topline is big enough to instil confidence in a good strike, while not seeming too bulky to use from a range of lies. The face area is also large, which offered a real confidence boost.

Callaway Diablo Octane Drivers
With the help of a new material, this Callaway driver is designed for golfers who want to maximize distance

Caddy for Life - The Bruce Edwards Story

Sun, 03 Oct 2010 21:16:54 GMT

The bottom line is – if you are looking for a present for someone who likes golf, the will definitely enjoy reading this book.

There are a lot of books written about golf. Instructions books, biographies, golf psychology books, golf joke books and more. There haven’t been too many books written about caddies, mainly because they are the guys (and gals) carrying the bag around for the professional golfer who gets all the limelight. The one exception to this rule is Caddy For Life – the Bruce Edwards Story, which is written by John Feinstein. Bruce Edwards was Tom Watsons caddy for over 30 years and sadly died of ALS in 2004. Having only really started playing golf 3 years ago I didn’t know about Bruce’s plight at the time. I also didn’t know all that much about Tom Watson – he was definitely more from my dad’s generation of golfers. Having got to watch him play at Turnberry however in 2009 in what would have been the greatest sporting victory ever if he hadn’t got a big skip and bounce on the last green, I knew by the way he handled himself he is a class act. Reading about Bruce and Tom’s relationship on the golf course has made me want to read more about Tom Watson in general so if anybody can recommend any good Tom Watson books please do so in the comments…

You can learn a lot from the book and Bruce’s life. The thing that will stick with me is to never give up. Never give up when you are on the golf course, or in life when chasing after your passion. Those of us who are lucky enough to be playing golf do not realize how lucky we are. I’ve been guilty myself of banging my clubs into the ground and feeling like the most self-loathing golfer ever, wondering why I bother to get out and play the game. I need to stop and realize how lucky I am that I get to walk around outside and do the things I enjoy. There are thousands upon thousands of people in the world who would love to swap positions with me, but all I can do when I hit a bad shot is start cursing myself! Since reading this book I’ve found myself to have a different perspective while playing golf. Since having a great round a few weeks ago I’ve been struggling of late, and while playing the midweek stableford competition last week I had blobbed a few holes quite early. Rather than start moaning at myself and wondering what I was doing, I agreed with myself not to give up and keep battling for every point. I walked off the course with 32 points (36 would have been playing to handicap). Quite a few people I met in the clubhouse afterwards were quite surprised how happy I was with my round even though I came in 4 points below what I should have done. OK my score wasn’t great, but I was really proud that I didn’t give up and kept battling until the end.

One of the advantages that pro’s have over us mere amateurs is they have a caddy following them around. Long gone are the days when the caddy just carried around the clubs – they now advise on yardages and club selection, but in my mind most importantly offer words of encouragement every now and again at the right times. Unfortunately I’m not at the level to need a full time caddy quite yet :-), but that doesn’t mean I can’t use the power of my mind to pretend that Bruce Edwards is standing next to me offering me words of advice and telling me to get a grip of myself if I start acting in a grumpy fashion.

This book will make you happy and sad both at the same time. When watching films that have sad parts in I always do my upmost not to cry, mainly because Sophie my girlfriend cries at the first sign of sadness and I take the mickey out of her. But I found myself making sure I read this book while Sophie was asleep as it is a real tear jerker. It certainly makes you consider what you value in life and to make the most of it. I’ve placed this book on my ‘favourites shelf’ which I used to make sure I re-read the books I have gotten the most out of every month.

How to throw a golf club

Fri, 01 Oct 2010 17:23:21 GMT

Welcome to the sixth edition of Good Shot Daily - the golf newsletter that will give you a summary of the things you need to read on the internet.

Remember to submit your articles here...

Playing Tips

No. 1 Green-Reading Tip
How to read fast greens where understanding grain is really important

How to properly throw your golf club.
It's Friday, so time for a bit of fun - you'll be able to use this tips for many years of golf!

Equipment News

TaylorMade Driver Rumour - R11?
A relatively recent patent filed by TaylorMade shows a very interesting new driver model.

Lamborghini and Callaway Golf Form Strategic Partnership and Introduce Forged Composite
I wonder if we'll be getting drivers that can swing faster?!

Pro News

Friday Washout
I'm sure you've been following the Ryder Cup today, but just incase - you haven't missed much at all!

A Quick Nine: Favorite Ryder Cup moments
The Ryder Cup routinely provides some of the most unforgettable moments in the game's great history. In that spirit, we asked our PGA.com Facebook fans in this week's 'A Quick Nine' feature: What is your favorite Ryder Cup moment?

Putting Tips

Thu, 30 Sep 2010 21:21:39 GMT

I’ve had a love/hate relationship with putting. Some days they all go in, other days you can seem to make a dam thing. I’ve gone into the pro shop to buy a new putter just after a bad round! That was around 2 years ago then and I think I’ve learned a thing or two about how to accept a few missed putts. At the moment my putting is on fire. I think this is down to a couple of reasons

1, I’ve actually been practising it. Rather than going to the driving range that is a 10 minute car journey I have been making a real effort to get to the golf club. They have a practice range there as well as a putting green to practice putting and chipping. Now rather than just spending 60 minutes hitting golf balls, I can spend that time in the range and then also spend 30-45 mins on my short game and putting. Just because the putting stroke seems so simple, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t practice it! In fact in a good round you’ll take 28-30 putts, whereas you’ll probably hit around 14 shots with your driver! So why do people spend so much more time practicing their driving than their putting?

Having actually spent some time practicing I have felt my putting become much more confident. I now step onto the green feeling I can make every single putt no matter how far it is. I’ll write an article covering the different putting drills I try to do in the near future.

2, I take my time to read the greens now. Rather than take one look behind the ball and try to figure out the break from one view I take my time and walk all around the hole trying to view the putt from as many different angles as possible. You may think this takes a lot of time, but if you do it while your playing partners are taking their putts, being careful not to put them off or stand behind or in front of their line, you’ll find that you’ll have completed your walk around when it comes to your turn to put. Golf course designers are sneaky in how they design the course and greens, they put many things in to trick you and I often find my bad putts are the ones that I haven’t taken the time to have a good look around on. Here are the things I look for and the order of importance I place on them:

Up or down slope. This obviously has a big effect on how hard you need to hit the putt to get it to the hole, and also how much the putt will break. Generally an uphill putt will break less than a down-hill one.
When walking around I’ll look for the lowest part of the green and try to view the putt from there. If the green has many different breaks I’ll try to find the lowest point from around the circumference of my putt where the hole is the centre of the circle
I often use my hand to kind of mimic how I see the ball is going to break as I walk around the hole. Kind of weird but it helps my mind see how the ball is going to break over the last two feet of the putt.
Finally I check the grain of the grass around the hole. If the grain is going with the direction of the putt you know it will roll out, if it is going against the grain – the grass is going to add a little more friction to the putt.
The most important thing is being able to see how the ball is going to get into the hole I try to do this by drawing a red line in my mind of how the ball is going to travel and get to the cup. I chose red because it is my favourite colour (something stupid to do with supporting Liverpool FC!). Once your mind has seen how the ball is going to get to the hole it is a lot easier to make a confident putting stroke

3, Quite often I’ll purposefully putt the ball away from the middle of the putter. This is something I have recently learned from Neal Granville to help me with fast downhill putts, but I now use it a lot for lots of short putts that have any kind of break. Every putter you try has a sweet spot. This is usually in the middle of the putter face with the size of it varying from putter to putter. You’ll know when you hit the ball from the sweet spot as you’ll hardly feel it in your hands. The problem I have found is when you do hit the sweet spot the ball comes off the putter face quite quickly, and if you have a fast downhill putt or a putt which you’d like to hit gently so it can roll and take the break – you will not want the ball coming off the putter face quickly. Hitting a fast downhill putt out of the sweetspot will often mean the ball races past the hole leaving you with a long one coming back. Hitting the putt out of the sweetspot on a putt where you see it taking a lot of break may mean the ball starts off faster and goes straight through the break.

Using this tactic works well with seeing how the ball will make it into the hole before even putting it. I see the line it will take, how much break to give it, and then try to vary how far away from the sweetspot I’ll try to hit it.

4, I have tried a few different putting grips. I always seem to putt quite well as soon as changing – it is as though the weird grip gives me more feeling through my fingers and I have a better feeling of the putter. I’m currently using a kind of 2 finger overlap hybrid grip with my thumbs down the side of the front of the grip. I try to make sure it almost feels like the putter is being held by just my thumbs and the tips of my fingers rather than the palms of my hands. Generally speaking the lighter I hold the putter in my fingers, the better I putt.

5, Tension is a big problem with any golf shot. I’ve recently found that a lot of tension can come from your jaw without you even realizing it. If you make sure your jaw, neck and shoulders are nice and relaxed, generally all of your other muscles will be as well which will allow you to make a nice smooth putting stroke.

What putting tips or hints do you keep referring to

Good Shot Daily #5

Wed, 29 Sep 2010 16:53:24 GMT

Welcome to the fifth edition of Good Shot Daily - the golf newsletter that will give you a summary of the things you need to read on the internet.

Getting very excited about the Ryder Cup now - who is going to win!?

Playing Tips

One of the Most Costly Mental Mistakes in Golf is the Easiest to Eliminate
Setting your expectations too high? Re-frame your mind-set and being more disciplined in your approach, you can easily eliminate this pressure and play better, more enjoyable golf.

Rory McIlroy's Golf Swing In Biz Hub Swing Vision Style
Slow motion swing video from Ryder Cup Rookie Rory McIlroy. Good luck in Wales slaying Tiger!

Equipment Reviews

The Driver White Paper Part 2 - Influences and brand choices
What do you look for in a good driver?

2011 Nike MachSpeed STR8-FIT Black Pics
In the market for a new driver?

Pro News

Jim Furyk Pockets $11.35 Million with $39 Used Putter
Previous Pulitzer Prize winner recognizes his putter while watching at a friend's house.

Tiger Woods replies to challenge
There is nothing like a little extra motivation for Tiger Woods -- perceived or otherwise -- heading into a big event.

No Tweeting at Ryder Cup - Good Shot Daily #4

Mon, 27 Sep 2010 21:25:02 GMT

Welcome to the fourth edition of Good Shot Daily - the golf newsletter that will give you a summary of the things you need to read on the internet.

Playing Tips

Paul Casey Swing Vision - Slow Motion Swing
What does a good swing look like?

Ask Brady Riggs Live! Golf Magazine Top 100 Teacher will fix your faults
Reading greens and getting the ball started on line is equal parts technique and art.

Equipment Reviews

Royal Albartross - Black Jack Nero Golf Shoes
"Had I had my new Royal Albartross patent leather golf shoes when I tied the knot back on May 22 of this year, I would have discarded the rental shoes from Men's Wearhouse which came with my tuxedo..."

Ping K15 Video Review
Golf Monthly review the latest offerings from Ping

Pro News

No Tweeting from the Ryder Cup
European and US team members are told to stay off Twitter! What will Ian Poulter do to keep himself amused when not playing!?

Jim Furyk wins FedEx Cup
If you need to borrow some monday, Jim Furyk may be the person to ask. He once again proves you do not need a textbook swing to be good at golf! Hope for us all...

Mental Golf Game - Good Shot Daily #3

Sat, 25 Sep 2010 09:22:41 GMT

Playing Tips

Redefining Success
Adam Sprackling reminds us to focus on the things we can control on the golf course, and feeling good about executing your intention perfectly.

Putting drills for increased feel
David MacKenzie takes us through some drills to improve your feel and visualization when putting.

Equipment Reviews

Now winter is on the way may be it is time to invest in some new winter clothing!

ProQuip new Aquastorm rain suits
A state-of-the-art, agenda-setting technical garment to cope with every type of weather condition.

Sunice Pullover Provides Perfect Layer For Fall Golf
When September arrives in the Ottawa Valley, it not only signals back to school but it reminds us die-hard golfers that our short golf season will soon be coming to an end. It becomes more difficult to get 18 holes in after work, and we start adding layers to our golf attire to keep warm on those early morning or later twilight rounds.

Pro News

Ryder Cup Deciding Holes?
'Show Me The Golf' have a great video previewing the holes at Celtic Manor that could decide where the Ryder Cup will go

Els Cruises Into Hall of Fame
Was there ever any doubt that the golfer known as the Big Easy would glide into the World Golf Hall of Fame?

One Plane Swing and Me

Thu, 23 Sep 2010 20:11:43 GMT

I’ve always had quite a flat golf swing, swinging the club more around my body than up and down. I think this is naturally how I made my first swing and it has always stuck. When I’ve been playing a round with a couple of low figure handicapper’s they have mentioned it to me before and it became something I was conscious and worried about. Quite often I also over swing the golf club. I can feel when I do this and quite often if I over swing I hit a bad shot so it is something I have wanted to cut out of my game. I thought this over swing problem may have something to do with having a flat swing.

Around 12 months ago I finally got around to reading Ben Hogan’s famous book ‘Five Lessons – The Modern Fundamentals of Golf’. The swing Ben Hogan teaches is what I now know to be called the one plane golf swing. At the top of the back swing the shoulders and arms are at the same angle relative to the ground. The image below demonstrates this nicely.

I thought my swing, and my ideas of how to swing a golf club were pretty similar to what Ben Hogan was teaching so started this season with a positive frame of mind. I have played pretty well all season, overall getting my handicap down from 10 to 8. I played the club championships at the two clubs I am a member at performing well at both. I consider these the two main competitions of the year and so when I went to see Neal Granville I told him I was happy to start trying to make swing changes that I could work on now and all over the winter to be in a great position for next season. Bearing in mind this was only the start of August I thought this gave me a lot of time to practice and get any swing changes working well for me.

Neal knew my concerns about my swing being too flat and so we started working on what I would later learn to be a two plane swing. This is where the shoulders turn a bit flatter and the arms move up higher on the back swing. It felt weird, as any swing change does and I started hitting a lot of funny shots on the range. As things settled down a bit more I was getting very good results with my shorter clubs, but I was having real trouble hitting the longer ones – especially my driver. I was still OK with this though as I knew any change takes a while to get right and bed in. I managed to get a few good scores in as well which was a sign things were going well.

What wasn’t working well though was my back. While my arms and shoulders were doing what they should have been doing for a two-plane swing on the way back, instead of my lower body staying relatively still on the down swing it was moving like it used to which caused a lot of pressure on my lower back. It got to the point where I had to take a few days off practice or take pain killers before a game – generally not a good idea. Although my brain knew my lower body was supposed to stay still and quiet, the old habit was still there and the back pain was stopping me from practicing and trying to put things right.

Then a few things happened – pretty much by chance.

During the week of the US Open I was sitting up in front of my computer trying to watch the golf on a dodgy internet stream. I checked the BBC page for the latest scoreboard and noticed someone had tweeted in ‘Matt Kuchar gets the award for the flattest swing in golf’. Hold on one second – if this guy has a flat swing but is leading the US Open (this was on Friday if I remember correctly) then I need to check it out. The first thought that popped into my head was ‘well if he can make it as a pro with a flat swing then maybe it is good enough for me!’

I found a couple of videos on YouTube, and then found this site called Plane Truth Golf. On their blog they had some great videos going through the one plane and two plane swing. I came to realize that before I naturally had what was close to a one plane swing and what Neal was trying to teach me was the two plane swing. Seeing Matt Kuchar do so well in the first two days of the US Open confirmed to me that my old swing was OK and I felt it would be better to work on improving what I did naturally than try and work on something completely different.

From the Plane Truth Golf web site I found out that they had authored a book called ‘The Plan Truth for Golfers’. I ordered this quickly on Amazon, and had it read within a day of it being delivered. The important thing to note here is that the book (and the web site) cover both the one-plane and two-plane golf swing. They have a couple of recommendations on how to figure out which swing is best for you – but at the end of the day I think you should go with whichever makes the most sense to your body and brain.

I went back to Neal and asked him to also take a look at the book, and get his thoughts. He was happy to help me with the one-plane swing and thought it made a lot more sense for me to choose a swing method that I was happy with rather than being dictated something.

Although I thought my natural swing was close to a single plane swing there are a lot of nuisances and small parts I have been working on. Switching back to a more flat swing started to improve my lower back straight away and I’ve been hitting the ball well with all my clubs.

Whenever you make a swing change, or buy a new golf club – you always have a honeymoon period where everything feels great. This happened to me with a peak of shooting gross 74, nett 65 – matching my personal best gross score. Since then though I’ve not been hitting the ball quite as well – but I’m persevering through it. I know the one plane golf swing is for me.

What do you know about golf swing planes? Are you a one plane or two plane swinger?

Chipping and Wedge Play - Good Shot Daily #2

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 12:34:46 GMT

Here's the second edition of Good Shot Daily - the golf newsletter that will give you a summary of the things you need to read on the internet.

Playing Tips

Five Keys to Hitting Crisp Wedges
Over the course of a round, good wedge play can mean the difference between breaking 100, 90, or even 80. If you’re serious about shaving strokes off your golf handicap, master your wedges.

Chipping Away
For such a simple little stroke and challenge, chipping seems to be a part of the game that eludes many of us

Equipment Reviews

Titleist 910 Prototype Driver
A shiny new driver for all you Titlest fans to take a look at

TaylorMade Rossa Corza Ghost Putter Review
TaylorMade’s newest addition to their line of putters

Pro News

Masters hour nice, but how about more?
The U.S. Open begins its telecast in the morning, and the British Open is broadcast all day in the U.K., and the PGA Championship is in a wall-to-wall broadcast window -- so why can't the Masters show us a little more? Or a lot more?

A Tiger Woods book worth reading
Few others had such access and trust as Tom Callahan, who met Earl Woods in 1996.

Why Play Golf?

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 20:09:46 GMT

I get asked why I play golf by my friends all the time. They can’t understand why you’d want to spend 4 hours walking around hitting a white ball in a little hole on Saturdays and Sundays. Many of us golfers take things a step further with midweek practice at the course during the summer and cold evenings down the driving range in the winter. I’ve been asked this question so many times I thought I’d put into words why I’ve fallen in love with this great game…

1, It is all down to you
I played quite a lot of football (soccer) when growing up and into my mid-twenties. It wasn’t too high a standard, but I took it seriously – trained quite hard for it and stayed in the night before games. Nothing would annoy me more than turning up at Saturday lunchtime and one or two of the team being hung over from the night before and playing terribly. I enjoy team games and the feeling of winning together, but one too many experiences of this made me feel as though I wanted to do an individual sport where the result was down to me alone.

While golf is mostly an individual sport there are the odd team situations such as doubles competitions and inter-club games, but mostly it is you – on your own – against the course. If I decide to go out the night before a competition and play badly I only have myself to blame. This kind of arrangement suits me a lot better. Sure you have to take the good and bad luck on the golf course but my performance and result are down to the practise and work I have put in, and not a team mate who can hardly see because he is still drunk from last night!

2, Practice makes perfect
“The more I practise, the luckier I get” is a quote that has been attributed to many people, but I always quote it as something Gary Player said. Generally speaking – if put more time into your golf practise, and practise the right things – your scores will improve. There are so many parts that make up a golfer such as putting, chipping, pitching, driving, bunker shots, flop shots and so the list goes on. You practise one thing a lot and improve that area, but something else will get worse – which is why you need to practice in the right way to see your game as a whole improve. This works well for me – I have the time and commitment to put into practising the different things that go into making a complete golfer and to date my handicap has kept coming down. As you get lower it gets much harder to keep improving at the same rate but that is all part of the challenge!

3, Beautiful scenery
Before I played golf I used to sit in front of my computer for 16 hours a day. I’m not going to claim I was working this entire time, but either way it certainly isn’t healthy for anyone to do that! Now I’m playing golf I get out into the countryside to breath fresh air, see lots of nature, and be close to water (although hopefully not too close!). Now I can easily go an entire weekend without touching my computer. On Mondays I now approach a new work week with renewed enthusiasm.

I enjoy playing and practising on the course alone as well as with other people. I’ve always enjoyed my own company, and have had some great ideas and come up with many solutions to problems while playing 9 holes on my own.

During the summer here in the UK when sun rose really early I would get up at 5am and be teeing off at 6am. Nine holes great practise, and back to the office for an 830am start. The best way to start the day!

4, Socializing and friendship
Although in most competitions you play against each other and the course, you still have 2 or 3 playing partners who join you for the round and share the duties of scoring. 4 hours of golf will lead to many opportunities to get to know who you are playing with better and I’ve made some good friends and also business contacts from spending time on the golf course.

Of course there is plenty of time for socializing in the bar after a round of golf and often other social activities taking place at the golf club that members can join in with.

5, Good exercise
Golf is a great non-impact exercise. Seven thousands yards equals around 4 miles which is a good walk in anybody’s book. It’s not advisable that golf is the only exercise you partake in as you’ll certainly need some anaerobic exercise such as running or swimming to get your heart rate up.

But the good news is that as you play more golf and you want to improve you’ll start taking your exercise away from the course more seriously. I try to do a stretching routine twice a day, go for a run most days and am trying to get a weights program figured out for each morning.

6, A great challenge for all ages and abilities
Golf has to be one of the most accessible sports going – apart from maybe darts or fishing! (Are they really sports?) How many other sports can a 10 year old tee it up against an 80 year old and via the handicap system have a great competitive round of golf!

One of the things that attracted me to golf was the fact that it is a sport I can take up now and if everything goes well still be playing in my eighties. I love playing against my dad (who is 72) and little brother.

What other sports have a handicap system that allows a relative new-comer to golf give a seasoned scratch player a good game in a competition?

7, It is not as expensive as you think, and you do have time for it!
I added this in at the last moment as many of my friends think golf is too expensive for them to play and they don’t have time for it. Bear with me while I go a little bit of maths…

You can easily pick up a decent set of clubs and bag for £300.00
If you don’t want to join a club you can find a round of golf at many decent places for £25
Maybe you need a couple of t-shirts and golf shoes to wear £100
If you add this all up over the course of a year where you play once a week you are looking at a total spend of £1700. Quite a bit of money you might think.

But if you were to play once a week, your total playing time over 12 months would be 208 hours, so the actual hourly spend comes in at around £8.17 per hour. Now there are not many forms of entertainment these days that cost less than that! Plus you can shop around for cheap rounds of golf, only have to buy your equipment once etc…

So that brings us on to the question of time. Friends claim they don’t have four hours at the weekend to spend on golf – RUBBISH! When I play golf first thing I am back home by midday. If you were to go out drinking on a Friday night you probably wouldn’t be out of bed by that time! Maybe your priority is to go out and get drunk all weekend, but don’t tell me you don’t have time for golf!

So how about you? Why did you get into golf and what keeps you coming back to play this great game?

Good Shot Daily #1

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 13:09:17 GMT

Welcome to the first edition of Good Shot Daily - the golf newsletter that will give you a summary of the things you need to read on the internet.

Playing tips

Is it time to play golf on purpose
Andy Mossison has published a new article asking whether positive thinking is enough? Your golf will be much better when played with a purpose.

Creating backspin
If your course still has hard fast greens you'll want to check out this article on how to put backspin on your chip shots in Golf Monthly.

Equipment Reviews

Motocaddy S1 Digital golf trolley
If you don't mind spending a bit of money on a golf trolly check out this review of the Motocadddy S1 Digital golf trolley in Golf Monthly

Inside the Callaway Golf Tour Van
Rob from Sandbox8.com had a chance to get a look aronud the Callaway Golf Tour Van while he was at the recent BMW Championships

Pro Tour News

Padraig Harrington wary about Tiger Woods in Ryder Cup
BBC ask Harrington about the upcoming Ryder Cup and his thoughts about Tiger Woods getting a captains pick.

Tiger Woods and Sean Foley
Andrew Rice has an interesting piece on Sean Foley, who has been spending some time with Tiger Woods recently. Does Sean Foley teach stack and tilt? And find out his thoughts on Hank Haney and Butch Harmon.

Announcing Good Shot Daily

Sun, 19 Sep 2010 20:20:17 GMT

I'm delighted to announce that on Monday we'll be sending out the first of our email newsletters which we have decided to call - Good Shot Daily!

Amateur golfers around the world are very busy people and so to save you the time of having to check the huge number of golf sites out there we are going to do the checking - and then send out an email with links to the best new content we've located.

Each newsletter is going to include the best recently published playing tips, equipment reviews and tour news from around the web. We'll include a one paragraph summary of the article which you can use to decide if you'd like to read the full page by clicking on the title.

If you'd like to submit an article for us to include please visit the following page: http://www.3goodshots.com/home/submitarticle

If you'd like to receive the newsletter email please register for this site using the link in the top right or use the email newsletter sign-up form on the Home Page.

Scoring Well In Golf

Tue, 06 Jul 2010 23:00:00 GMT

Are you one of those people who know exactly how they are scoring during each round of golf they play? If this sounds like you I bet you have got to the 16th tee knowing you only need to par in to beat your personal best only for you to bogie all last three holes. How can this happen when you have played so great for the rest of the round? By working out where you are and exactly what you need to do you are putting added pressure on yourself - I should know as up until recently I did this to myself quite often. Many good rounds have been ruined by attempting to be too cautious or by thinking I need to be too aggressive in a competition only to find that a steady finish would have resulted in a win!

So how do you finish out a round to get a great score? If I look back at my good rounds I can remember that during playing I generally had no ideas what my score was while playing the 18 holes. I was focussed on my preshot routines and shot decisions when at the ball, and thinking about other things and chatting to playing partners. Unfortunately in a competition you need to keep writing your and one of your playing partners score down at the end of each hole - so how do you manage to stay away from adding up how you are doing?

Creating a game within a game

I read an excellent article by Adam Sprackling on the GTour web site called 'Accelerating Through the Line'. Adam suggests rather than playing one round of 18 holes, split it up into 3 seperate games of 6 holes. The aim is to try and play and score each 6 holes the best you can. I have been trying this now for a few weeks and it has worked really well. Every time I have walked off the 18th hole I have had no idea what my score was, and weirdly enough if you would have asked me to predict it - my actual score is generally better than I thought leaving me a happy golfer! Doing this also makes sure that you do not slow down over the last few holes and play defensively.

If you are struggling to score well - give the 3*6 game a go. Also suggest you sign up to Adams newsletter as he has written some other great articles.

Well Done Justin Rose

Sun, 04 Jul 2010 23:00:00 GMT

Congratulations to Justin Rose for his second win in three tournaments following a one shot victory at the AT&T National. It would have been three out of three if it hadn't been for a final day slump at the Travelers Championship only the week before. It shows great mental spirit to be able to forget that round and push through to win this week!

Justin Rose has moved back into the worlds top 20 now and must be one of the favourites going into the British Open? Surely it must be time for a British player to again with their home major with recent wins from Lee Westwood, Graeme McDowell and Justin Rose!

June Site Stats

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 23:00:00 GMT

3 Good Shots has been running for it's first full month. I've been concentrating on a mixture of marketing and developing new features throughout June. I've decided to do a monthly report of how the site is progressing as I'm sure members and other web site owners and developers will find the stats interesting.

Number of registered users : 15
Number of shots recorded : 68

Unique visitors to the site : 445
Page views : 1242

If you have any ideas on new features or ways to market the site please drop me an email to nick@golftribe.com

Golf club distances - how far do you hit yours?

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 23:00:00 GMT

I always thought I had a pretty good idea of how far I could hit each golf club in my bag. Pitching wedge was around 110 yards, moving up 15 yards for each club in my bag. Now that Sandford Springs have the excellent FlightScope equipment Neal Granville suggested that for Fridays lesson we use it to work out how far I can hit each club. Neal had done this himself earlier in the week so he thought it would be a really valuable thing for me to do. As mentioned above the distances I had for each club really were guestimates so I was excited to see the results.

After setting up the equipment and warming up we began with my 7 iron and hit 3 good shots. We were only really interested in the good shots, so if I hit a duff one I'd have another go until there were 3 good numbers to get an average from. I suspected I hit my 7 iron around 150 yards. Flightscope gave me the information that the carry was 146 yards with the total distance being 149. Not too bad from my initial estimate, but great info to know that the carry was 146. I worked up the bag through my longer irons, hybrids and driver. The very interesting thing was my 5 iron and 4 hybrid had the same carry. My 4 hybrid however had a much higher flight. This is great to know if you want to hit a shot that is softly landing - typical on a par 3.

9 iron to lob wedge was the biggest surprise and where I feel this exercise will benefit me the most in the future. I now know the exact yardages I can hit each one of these clubs. I thought my lob wedge could go about 60 yards. I actually hit it 80! Sand wedge I thought went 80 yards - I actually hit it spot on 100 yards! This makes a huge difference with the shots from 130 yards in as I can confidently select the right club to attack the flag. Knowledge like this plus the use of a Skycaddie is a killer combination! I've printed my sheet of yardages off that Flightscope generates for you and inserted it into my scorecard holder. I'll be taking this everywhere with me now! I have had good results on the course since which I am confident I can put down to this session. On the Friday evening, the same day as the lesson, I got 20 stableford points over 9 holes (that is basically playing 2 better than my handicap), and on the Sunday I shot gross 76! Net 66! Which has meant my handicap has been cut to 9.3 (yay I'm a single figure handicapper!)

If I were you I'd look for somewhere that has the Flightscope system (such as Sandford Springs) and get your yardages worked out. I can tell this is going to make a real difference to my game.

Americans do not seem to like Graeme McDowell Winning!

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 23:00:00 GMT

I stayed up till 3am on Sunday night to watch the finish of the US Open. I have to thank the many people who stream it over the internet now as I've cancelled my subscription to SkySports. I can't bear to think of my money going to those over paid cheating, diving and general no-good footballers.

Was it worth staying up for, you are damm right it was. I nearly flaked out at 1am but I'm glad I lasted the distance to see Graeme McDowell win his first major. Surely a testament of how hard work, proper practice and a great mental game and attitude pays off.

It wasn't long before the blog posts started bashing Graeme McDowell's accomplishment. The one I'm going to single out is here:

What You Missed: Vomit Inducing Crapfest US Open

I'd like to know - what would you have done if you were Graeme McDowell? If you knew that level par would probably be enough to win the competition would you have gone out and tried to attack the golf course. I remember a great quote by Jack Nicklaus:

"I think I fail a bit less than everyone else."

Graeme McDowell won because he didn't make as many mistakes as the other golfers on probably the toughest golf course they will play this year. If you want to have a go at anyone it has to be the USGA for how the course was setup. It was hard, but then the US Open always is - and generally a score around par wins it.

So please, don't have a go at Graeme McDowell - he is a well deserved champion and the US are just going to have to get used to it.

Bring on the Ryder Cup!

Golf GPS Devices

Tue, 15 Jun 2010 23:00:00 GMT

Golf GPS devices are getting more popular. More people at your golf club are using them, and these days there are lots of devices to choose between. Generally all golf courses have 150 yard markers and most I have played have markers for 100 yards. With these available is a gps device really going to make a difference to your game?

I have been using my SkyCaddie 2.5 SG now for around 18 months and I feel I'd be lost without it. There is the membership fee that comes with owning a SkyCaddie if you want to download and use their courses but we'll come onto that issue later. So where do I feel having a gps device has helped me?

1. Knowing front, middle and back yardages
The markers on the golf course only give you the yardage to the front or middle depending on each course. I could be standing there waiting to play my approach shot in at the 150 marker thinking this is a good seven iron. With a gps device you get to know the distance to the front, middle and back of the green which could cover as much as a 30-40 yard distance! With this information and knowing the back of the green is 170 yards you can much more easily take a 6 iron and swing smoothly.

2. Distances inside 100 yards
If you want to play well, you've got to have a great short game. This doesn't just mean chipping around the fringe, but all shots from 100 yards in. I carry a pitching wedge, gap wedge, sand wedge and lob wedge and I have 3 different distances I can hit each club with different length back swings. Knowing the exact distance to the green from 100 yards in then becomes very important when selecting which club and shot to play. I think this is where my SkyCaddie has made the biggest difference to my game and allows me to play short game shots with much more confidence.

3. Yardages from odd places
Even Tour players have the odd shot that bounds onto a different fairway to the hole you are playing, so it is bound to happen to us mere amateurs! When you are on a different fairway and the angles you are playing in at are completely weird to you, your gps device can save your ass as it'll still give you an exact reading to the front, middle and back. You don't know how many times this has saved me and allowed me to walk away with a par from a terrible tee shot!

You may have decided that you need a range finder right now, but with so many to choose how can you decide which is right for you? 18 months ago there weren't so many choices and so SkyCaddie seemed to be the best one to go for. The great thing that SkyCaddie does is send people round with PDAs and GPS units on their backs in rucksacks to mark out the course and all the hazards. To cover the cost of this there is an annual fee to be able to use the SkyCaddie courses - but spread out over a year I feel this is a minimal cost. The rumour is that other GPS manufacturers use something like Google Maps to map out the course which would seem to be a very error prone way of doing it. I have compared distances with other players who have different devices and it seems there can be up to a 10 yard difference (and I'm pretty sure my SkyCaddie was giving the correct distance!)

Overall I am very happy with my SkyCaddie SG 2.5. Have you considered getting a gps device, and if you have one do you feel you benefit from it?

Useful Golfing Websites

Sat, 12 Jun 2010 23:00:00 GMT

Professional Golfers

Pat Perez

Good Reads

Golf Views - Sandbox8
Journey to Scratch
Phil Bundy - a quest to play on the PGA Tour
Rub of the Green
The Golf Geek
The Heart of Golf

Golf Practice Nets

Thu, 10 Jun 2010 23:00:00 GMT

Are golf practice nets worth investing in? I am lucky enough to have a garden large enough to get a full size driving net and after spending a lot of time and money at the practice range I decided to purchase one. After a little searching around online I decide the best golf practice net that seemed to be available in the UK was from Huxely Golf and their product called the Rota Net 2.

The net arrived quickly and I work from home so I managed to down tools and unpack it straight away. I didn't think my girlfriend would really want divots all over the garden so I ordered a mat to hit balls from as well. The practice net was easy enough to put up by myself although I did have to consult the instructions as it was a bit confusing to start with around where to put the metal stakes in the ground to hold the net up. But once they were in it was all straight forward.

For a golf practice net this is probably one of the larger ones available.

The practice net itself is very impressive. With this being one of the larger practice nets it is also one of the more expensive but I think this certainly pays through with the quality of it. The main target area you hit into is double netting so you can hit your driver as hard as you can. It also has an over-hanging roof section so you can use your most lofted club without having to worry about clearing the net! It can be taken down and put back up again in minutes which is a testiment again to it's quality.

But the big question is - was it a worthwhile investment? If all you did was hit balls into the net and play on the course I don't think it would help your game. The one thing a golf practice net is good for is working on a technical change to your swing. If you are working on something very specific such as keeping flex in your right knee during your back swing and you do not care about the end result too much, then a practice net is perfect. The problem is - as just mentioned, you can't see the end result. What feels like a good connection with the golf ball could end up being a big push right.

Overall I'm happy with the investment I made in the net. It doesn't replace practice at the course or on the range - but it is something that is useful to use for a week or so after a lesson when trying to work more on technical aspects.

Have you thought about getting a Golf Practice Net? Or if you have one what has your experience of them been?