Broke 70 yesterday for the first time - Takeaways after sleeping on it

Good morning fellow WRXers, long-time forum lurker that finally decided to join. Still haven't figured out the signature thing so a little about me: 28 years old with a very homemade swing, have maintained a low single digit handicap for years now (always between 1.6 and 3.5), and legitimately average around 285-300 off the tee depending on fairway conditions. I hit it far enough that most courses around 6500 yards with firm conditions become a driver and flip wedge contest, what should be a recipe for low scores. Alas, I shot 70 and 71 (par 72 courses) numerous times but never could crack the magic number and it ended up becoming a mental block...until I fired a 68 yesterday on a par 72.

Here are my takeaways:

Golf is not a game of perfect (thanks Dr. Rotella) - It was not a perfect round by any means, made one bogey and one double bogey. As one of my best friends told me last night, it wasn't like I had to blackout and go nuts to do it.Focus on the "small stuff" - The putter and the short game often get overlooked in this current SG:OTT discussion, but they made the round for me. I only hit 8 greens...but had 24 putts. Acceptance acceptance acceptance - I made it a point yesterday to accept the outcome of every shot and not let it affect the next one. This doesn't mean I was "happy go lucky" the entire round. I was ticked with myself on #2 for missing the green from 110 yards. Recovered nicely with a chip to 3 feet and lipped out the par putt. It sounds corny as heck, but I gave myself til the count of 10 to be mad and then I left that bogey there and rode over to the third tee box. I also snap hooked one OB on the 10th tee en route to a double bogey, but once again I didn't dwell on it and recovered with an eagle on 11. The whole idea of "acceptance" has really been my Achilles heel for years because one bad hole or a few bad swings and all of the sudden I would feel like the round was a lost cause and I couldn't shoot the score I wanted to. Miss it in front of you - only hitting 8 greens can make 18 holes extremely stressful. However, missing close or in the right spots can greatly improve your chances of getting up and down. I was able to use putter from just off the green in the fringe probably 4 times, holed out from a bunker on a par 3, and was able to have straight-forward chips with plenty of green to work with on the rest. Pick good targets - this ties in to #4 above. I've read some of the DECADE ideas and have been trying to incorporate that into how I hit approach shots. I didn't know it at all during the round but last night I realized I didn't short-side myself on any of the 11 greens I missed. This was all because of picking better targets.Golf is hard, nerves make it harder - I knew I had a great chance to finally break through on the 16th tee after birdieing 15 to get to 4 under. I haven't been that keyed up and antsy in competition like that in a long time, much less in a casual round. Again, this is so corny, but taking a deep breath with some positive self-talk calmed me down enough to focus on my last point.Golf is a game of conviction - indecision or being so concerned with performing a swing "perfectly" or getting in the "textbook positions" can paralyze your athletic instinct. Pick your spot, go through your routine, and trust your preparation, then, just let it fly! I hit both fairway and green on 17 and 18 by picking a spot and "swinging hard". I personally struggle with trying to guide the ball under pressure, but yesterday I convinced myself I was ready and let it rip.WRXers, some of the best advice I've ever received about the game of golf was given to me in the last two months and I'll leave you with it.

"Golf is not a beauty contest, it's a math contest"

Thanks for reading, play well and stay safe!

1,3,5,6 and 7 - Thanks Dr. Rotella.

Woa really? I guess those books have stuck with me over the years and I didn't realize it. Thanks Dr. Rotella indeed!

I think so.

3 - He talks about having to deal with the outcome of the previous shot with the next one and that there is no good reason to dwell on the previous shot.

5 - I could be wrong but I am pretty sure Rotella talks of always picking a target and going through your routine and committing fully to the shot before hitting it.

6 - He talks about visualizing in one chapter. Can't recall the name of the lady golfer that he was using as the example but stated that she very intricately visualized winning a major all the way down to how it would feel to accept the trophy.

7 - Commit fully to the shot and to your goal and dreams. He talks about dreams and goals very early in the "Not Perfect" book.

Congrats on the great score by the way!

Thanks for relating this experience. I’m not sure if the previous comment was supposed to be a smart remark but it’s good to hear someone’s experience with putting professional advice together with their own experience to a positive end.

I’ll keep this in mind next time I’m out and try and break 80.

Personally the thing that’s been killing me is standing at 100 and not having confidence I can put it in the middle of the green. As long as I’m not hitting over a bunker, punching a 7 iron up seems more consistent than a full sand wedge, but I never want to do it.

Awesome job, @BigtimeHC ! That's an amazing accomplishment to put it all together like that and capitalize in a key moment.
I've been playing some of my better golf recently as well. Granted, I'm not sub-70 but I'm starting to show signs of life with several 9-hole stretches around level par. What I've noticed is that good scores require a rock solid game. You have to keep it in good position, keep your approaches in good places and save yourself with good chipping and putting. You said the same thing. Golf is just a question of frequency. Everyone's got another double bogey coming at some point. It's the amount of time we spend in between those low points that tell us how good we are. It's how many good holes we can string together.
I agree it's not about hitting perfect shots. However, in my experience it's still really hard and does require some statistically-unlikely stuff to happen. So I'd say perfect is still in those good stretches, baked into the play somehow. Personally, I think it's in how we sometimes get all of our different shots to complement each other in just the perfect way.
It's a lot about having the right misses on the right holes on the right day leaving the right next shot. This explains why it sometimes feels easy when each miss falls into just the right place, yet sometimes we feel the same physically but we just can't get things to fall in our favor. As you described, golf asks you to keep your misses in front of you. That's a good description. I think it's our job to understand what "in front of you" really means.

Great post, OP! I’ll take some of that to heart next time I play. I had a tough round yesterday when things had been trending positively. I even decided pre-round that my swing is now “good enough” to just play golf and not “golf swing”. Well, that didn’t work for me yesterday and so I guess my swing still needs some work. But at least I know that now and am determined to put in the work. It’s also annoying that when I finished the round and added up my scores I was appalled of course at my score. BUT, I wish I had been more aware of it during the round because even though I felt I was playing terribly, my score wasn’t actually that bad through 9. If I hadn’t mentally checked out by that point and had finished well, it could have been a decent round despite not having my best stuff.

Wasn't sure how to take it either, but I have read all of Rotella's work so apparently a lot of it is still in there somewhere.

One thing I would caution against is hitting the wedges "full" or "all out" until you get comfortable with 50-75% swings and consistently striking the ball. I used to only hit wedges full from 125 and in and as a result my consistency was atrocious. I don't remember the last time I hit a "full wedge" unless it was a full swing pitching wedge distance (in the 135 range). I've always struggled with a hook and found out that I could greatly improve my dispersion and curvature on wedge shots by backing off of them slightly. It sounds like you are already on to the idea if you know the punchy 7 iron is more consistent!

Congrats. Here's to many more.

1,2,6,7. Especially #2. Good scrambling can seriously save your bacon.

I completely agree with you. I think I finally understood what "in front of you" really means when I finally figured out how to get rid of my hook. Decreasing the curvature on the ball lowered the frequency of the big miss and tightened overall dispersion akin to a full choke's effect on the pattern of a shotgun. Once the big miss was more or less eliminated, I quit having the holes where I'd miss my approach shot by a mile and need a world class up and down to save a par. Now those misses are "in front of me" aka still on the hole, and still in relatively decent position to continue to play the hole as it was designed to be played.

Although that ugly snap hook did show its face once yesterday!

#3 - I need to adhere to this much more than I do. I think I was much better about this a couple years ago, but lately I've sunk back into my old habits. I will hit a bad shot, and quietly mumble "you idiot!" to myself. And then as I am standing over the next shot, which can often be from a bad location, I tend to get irritated with myself because I feel as though "I shouldn't have hit it here in the first place".

So thanks for the reminder that I need to get back to having a short memory after each shot. I'm going to focus on that again.

Thanks, this is exactly what I needed to read tonight. I keep hitting 80% iron/wedge shots like a machine, then fight the hook on "full" swings. My 80% swings are SUPPOSED to be the "full" swings. Who cares if 9i is 140/145 vs 150/155, if you're hitting all the irons straight and pure, the number on the bottom DOESN'T MATTER. Same with the wedges....half swings, solid contact, distance control.

I know it sounds trite, but a switch flipped in my brain after reading this. tyvm

My game has improved significantly since I started to hit the scoring clubs 80% or less. Took a few months to dial in the distances but the distance control and trajectory are much more consistent for me.

So actually played today and found myself with a tree just above and ahead me with about 125 to the pin. Punched an 8 iron with a nice draw up to about 10 ft and made the birdie. Later, on a par 5, I had 37ft for my 3rd shot and was totally stymied. Went for a running gap wedge, chunked it and disaster ensured. Should have gone with the 60. Whatever, came out with a 79 so I'm psyched.

“Golf isn’t a beauty contest”

An old professor of mine looked me dead in the eye and said “Jeff, C’s get degrees”

Also, congrats man. I bet you busted through a plateau and will shoot sub 70 very soon again

Congrats on the 68. You finished much stronger than I did on my first sub-70. I was 16-17 years old, par 70 course. Parred the first 5. Birdied the next five to put me at -5 through 10. Par out for 65 with 2 par 5's to go on the back nine. 71 was my best round at that point. Got nervous and bogeyed 11, 12, 14 (par 5) and 17. Needed a par on 18 (440 yard par 4) for 69. Made a knee-knocking 4 footer for 69. It gets much easier after the first one to calm your nerves. Probably broke 70 about 10 times in the couple of years after that including a couple of -5 efforts. Good luck and keep going low!

Amen on the partial wedge shots! Don't know why it took me so many years (53) to figure that out...

Dang, Nice fella

congrats on the round.

I always remember as the junior golf my instructor told me your round goes in flows, so sometimes its foot on the pedal, sometimes you're just trying to survive. Sometimes what you shoot is the best you can do that day, it can't be under par or in the 70s every time (for example, I'm sure last weekend Rory wasn't not trying to shoot 65 on Sunday).

Really it comes down to just not letting things compound. If you miss a green to a tucked pin, better to sometimes take a bogey than try to save par but end up making double or worse bc you tried a flop. Last night on the golf channel they had Tiger's 2000 US Open final round replay, here's a guy playing at arguably the best level ever (I know its the US Open) but, as an example, he got the par 5 #6 ( I think) in two, had a bad lie, chips over the green, now has to get up and down for par. How many times have we all been green side, or at a par five in two, had a bad chip, and start sweating. Tiger went on to make par, but it serves as a lesson, you have to play the shot at hand.

Really nice round and nice thoughts. I had my best round Sunday (73) and had such a similar experience. I played extremely poorly on the front, but like you said, accepted it and stayed in the moment and focused on the next shot.

I haven't been able to practice at all and this was 100% a mental victory. I had far less than my best stuff.

Congrats and thanks for sharing!

Congrats! I was so close to breaking par, not 70 before. I hope I can do it once in life. I agree on all your points. I actually applied almost if not all of those pointers and I have been playing the best golf of my life. In the first few games of the season, I have been on fire with my scrambling and driving but was bad with my GIR (new irons that now I got rid off lol). Now that my irons are back (another set of new ones that I love), I can't wait to give this is shot!

It is very true that sometimes your best scores don't feel like "perfect" rounds. My lowest round last year was -2 , and i would not say it was a very memorable round for any reason other than the score, i missed fairways and didn't have tap-ins. I actually hit a par 5 in two and then 3-putted for par.

had a few long putts go in and only made 2 bogeys. I've had rounds where i shot 76 and thought i hit the ball way better

Congratulations on your achievement. Those takeaways will certainly help you going forward. I have broken 70 twice, and shot a 33 for nine, and each time I was in a "zone". I knew I would hit the fairway with that tee shot, or would make that putt, etc. I didn't think about my swing, or any of that stuff. I just played. I have tried to recapture that feeling, but haven't done it yet. Golf is a simple game...get the ball in the hole with the fewest strokes, but infinitely complex in how one goes about doing that.

Again, congratulations!

Congratulations and great notes! Sounds like you are on the right track. A good short game can make up for a lot of mistakes with the long game.

thanks for sharing these reflections... I noticed that I've been trying to guide the ball late in rounds where I'm going lower than I have before. perhaps being forgetful about my score on all prior holes will help me finish stronger.

Man, I remember the first time I broke 70. I shot 69 with a lone bogey on the 18th. Difference was I hit something like 16 greens. That show's there are several ways to do it.

With that said, your round is much more impressive. I'm not sure if most folks realize how impressive it is to go low hitting less than 50% of greens as an amateur, even if you're a low single digit HCP.

Great job man! It's been 2-3 years since I broke the barrier. Had a shot a few weeks ago but stumbled early on the back 9 and couldn't recover.

Congrats!

Im working on #2. I enjoy golf playing from tee to green. The hard part for is the short game and putting That game was non existent for me years ago, but I’m trying to get the ball in the hole. Currently focus on green reading and using the line on the ball

Congratulations on an achievement that very few golfers ever realize. I can remember the feeling after I broke 80 many years ago (when I was MUCH better than I am now)...thinking how easy it was, and that I'd do it again the next time out (of course, the next time out, I was in the high 90s). Save the scorecard and the last ball you used as a trophy.

Congrats!!!

Congrats!