3W vs Driver off the tee

[LoopySwing13]

As a high school golfer, I got the opportunity to work as a "shag boy" for a local weekend golf school and I met some very nice teachers. I asked one of them about what to work on next with my own game, being a 4/5 spot guy on my team as a junior, perhaps a 7 handicap.

 

His answer? Driver. He said I should learn to hit driver because a player (at the level we were playing at) who can hit their driver well has the opportunity (both hitting driver and using sound club selection judgement) to virtually eliminate double bogies from the card WHILE giving them self the most opportunities for birdies.

 

Sadly, I didn't listen very well.

 

Another note, this time about my dad. He has been a 6-9 hcp for the last 20 years. He is not longer than he used to be, club for club. He is not a better putter than he used to be. He is not a better chipper than he used to be. He is better out of the sand than he used to be. His iron play is the same, but shorter. And yet he is still the same handicap. How is that possible? He learned to hit driver. 20 years ago, he teed off every non-par 3 with a 4 iron. 190 carry, roll to 200 or so. Very accurate, but he had maxed out his scoring potential. He never shot under par.

 

A few years ago, I got him a hot faced, low spinning 3 wood and we called it his driver. He learned to hit that well, 220 carry, roll to 230ish, and he started to play better. He had his lowest cap of his life and shot under par multiple times. He has since taught himself a driver swing/shot and he is now able to maintain his cap, even as the rest of his game slowly deteriorates a bit (he's 67 fwiw).

 

The last time he played, he hit every fairway for the first time in his life. 14/14. He didn't post his best score ever, or anything of the sort. But if a straight-hitting (and relatively short hitting) guy with a consistent swing who has played 2+ times a week for the last 40 years and hit nothing but 4i's for 20+ of those years just had his first 14/14 round, it doesn't look good for the rest of us to do that very often. You are going to miss fairways. Miss them in the right spots with the right club selection.

I have more thoughts, but my fingers just cramped up and there' an Open to watch!

a 7 hdcp and played # 5 on the HS team? must have been some HS team

 

Our #1 was the 2nd best junior in the panhandle of FL, only Bubba was better. Yes, it was a good team.

 

Near me in Florida there is a high school player right now who is a +1. It's not that uncommon anymore for phenomenal junior golfers. If anything, it's the new norm.

[JeffreySpicoli]

So what do you see as an honest interpretation of Broadie in the context you're referring to? Saying that you're going to oversimply because others are oversimplying isn't very helpful.

 

What I said a long time ago in this thread. Everyone is different and you can't apply these stats universally in any way to anyone. They open our eyes to possibilities we might not have considered but they don't tell use what will happen if we change our 'normal' practices. Everyone has to track their own stats to accurately (no I don't just mean fairways hit) assess their performance with the different clubs (all the options, not just the ones they are 'used to' hitting) to make the best choices for their game and skill level for any given hole/course. Anything other then that is an oversimplification.

 

How does this apply to Broadie though? I don't read anything by Broadie that runs counter to what you've outlined here. What is it about Broadie that you think I've missed?

[tsecor]

As a high school golfer, I got the opportunity to work as a "shag boy" for a local weekend golf school and I met some very nice teachers. I asked one of them about what to work on next with my own game, being a 4/5 spot guy on my team as a junior, perhaps a 7 handicap.

 

His answer? Driver. He said I should learn to hit driver because a player (at the level we were playing at) who can hit their driver well has the opportunity (both hitting driver and using sound club selection judgement) to virtually eliminate double bogies from the card WHILE giving them self the most opportunities for birdies.

 

Sadly, I didn't listen very well.

 

Another note, this time about my dad. He has been a 6-9 hcp for the last 20 years. He is not longer than he used to be, club for club. He is not a better putter than he used to be. He is not a better chipper than he used to be. He is better out of the sand than he used to be. His iron play is the same, but shorter. And yet he is still the same handicap. How is that possible? He learned to hit driver. 20 years ago, he teed off every non-par 3 with a 4 iron. 190 carry, roll to 200 or so. Very accurate, but he had maxed out his scoring potential. He never shot under par.

 

A few years ago, I got him a hot faced, low spinning 3 wood and we called it his driver. He learned to hit that well, 220 carry, roll to 230ish, and he started to play better. He had his lowest cap of his life and shot under par multiple times. He has since taught himself a driver swing/shot and he is now able to maintain his cap, even as the rest of his game slowly deteriorates a bit (he's 67 fwiw).

 

The last time he played, he hit every fairway for the first time in his life. 14/14. He didn't post his best score ever, or anything of the sort. But if a straight-hitting (and relatively short hitting) guy with a consistent swing who has played 2+ times a week for the last 40 years and hit nothing but 4i's for 20+ of those years just had his first 14/14 round, it doesn't look good for the rest of us to do that very often. You are going to miss fairways. Miss them in the right spots with the right club selection.

I have more thoughts, but my fingers just cramped up and there' an Open to watch!

a 7 hdcp and played # 5 on the HS team? must have been some HS team

 

There are some phenomenal junior golfers right now. The guy who teaches me, his sons high school team average is about an 8, and one player is a +1. It's not that out of the ordinary this day in age. Not every high school is like that, but there are more than you think.

I disagree. Kids are not playing this game like they used to. the numbers are way down. My HS team had two guys in that range but we were the # 1 and 2 players....after that it was 12-16 players

[JeffreySpicoli]

If we take a step back, we might see this thread as a debate about the best method for assessing a golfer's performance off the tee. On the one hand, there's the OP who argues that it's all about FIR. On the other hand, there are those who advocate--PSG, most prolifically-- for strokes gained.

 

Framed this way, the debate is uninteresting. Despite some flaws, strokes gained is clearly superior to FIR when assessing a golfer's driving performance.

 

Setting aside personal style, we then have to ask, Why so much disagreement in this thread? I'd answer that the disagreement centers on what one does with strokes gained, not on its analytical validity.

 

So how might we productively think about this?

 

First, we don't take Broadie's work in Every Shot Counts and tell every golfer that their game matches the means/medians that Broadie describes. Broadie himself points this out:

 

"As I describe in the book, in golf, rather than measuring your progress by how far you’ve hit the ball on a hole, it’s more valuable to look at the decrease in the average strokes it will take you to finish a hole from where you are. When you go from one shot to the next, how much have you lowered that average score? That’s what strokes gained shows.

 

This is valuable because you can use it to figure out where your individual strengths and weaknesses are. If you’re [a golfer] whose average score is 90, and you can focus on developing a better long game or short game, this information can help you figure out which would lower your score the most. From this stat, we can tell, for example, that the answer is generally the long game and your score would go down by about 6.5 strokes. Of course, golfers come in all shapes and sizes, and everybody’s a little bit different."

 

https://www8.gsb.columbia.edu/articles/node/1644

 

In other words, the statistics that Broadie provides are not the criteria to diagnose an individual golf game. Rather the diagnostic criteria is strokes gained itself. A golfer would need to track their performance via the strokes gained methodology in order to determine their strengths and weaknesses via this criteria.

 

So we now understand how to diagnose but what about treatment? That's another discussion and I won't pursue it in this post. However, I note it here in order to lay out some important distinctions:

 

(1) the purpose of cumulative strokes gained statistics is to demonstrate its superiority to traditional metrics like FIR, GIR, and putts per round

(2) diagnosis of individual performance relies on tracking actual performance, not assuming every golfer's game matches the cumulative statistics for golfers of their handicap

(3) treatment is distinct from diagnosis

[Matt J]

Gotta decide day to day hole to hole. What's gained, what's lost? Length of rough being a huge factor.

 

I hit 3W off the tee a lot. I'm more confident in the shape and it's only 10 or 15 yards shorter than driver for me.

 

Have started hitting a little stinger cut with the #1 wood that's super dependable on short positional holes. All about knowing your own game and the golf course.

 

 

 

[pinestreetgolf]

PSG, had you REALLY rather be punching out of the trees from 100 instead of hitting a wedge shot from 120 in the fairway? Because that's exactly what your preaching here.

 

Also, you want to know why all those high caps are practicing those straight iron shots all the time, because only about 20% of their irons shots go high and straight! The rest are tops, shanks, thins, fats, etc. I watch them all the time. They don't HIT the shot every time they try it, that's why they're practicing it. But YOU sit here and criticize all these people you don't even know as if they're a bunch of friggin idiots! I think there are a lot of folks getting a little tired of that.

BT

 

 

 

As to the second part, I don't know if 'people' are getting 'tired' of it (you don't have to keep reading and posting in these threads to tell me your getting tired of it) but you are correct that I don''t think high handicappers practice well. That's most of the reason they are high handicappers. The worse you are the less you should practice hitting straight shots off perfect lies. If you really want to fix the fats hitting out of crap is a much better way to do it than hitting off of perfect grass, and it will be a much better representation of what you will encounter on the course.

 

 

 

I disagree wholeheartedly with this. What the high(er) cap should be working on IS being able to make solid contact on a more consistent basis, or at least more frequently than they currently do (since using the word consisent will open another semantics debate).

 

Why in the world would you spend time practing recovery shots, which in order for them to be successful have to be even more precise than a shot from a unimpeeded place, when you dont hit it solidly from a clean lie on a regular basis?

 

So the 20 handicapper practices hitting shots from under a branch, guess what happens when he encounters that on the course. He still misses the recovery shot most of the time anyway. Because he is a 20 handicapper. Funny how much better a person becomes at hitting those recovery shots after they learned to hit the ball better in general, which happens in the controlled environment of the range. Don't put "the cart in front of the horse".

 

The last time I discussed this I was told to post in my own thread, which I did (its called "Why do you want consistency in strike if your bad?" or something to that effect). Rather than allow people to discuss in there, several posters, mainly high caps, called me things ranging from "bad for golf", to "full of myself" to "constantly trying to be the smartest guy in the room" etc... etc... They got pretty personal. I was somewhat baffled by it - I started my own thread, and they didn't have to join it, so I hesitate to wade back into the waters of telling bad players who have time to practice they are bad because their practice methods are idiotic/subpar.

 

That said, there are two types of practice (this has been studied repeatedly in all disciplines from boxing to soccer to violin to golf). One is functional practice (or technique practice) in which a player develops their actual physical technique - for example, not jerking the club off plane during the takeaway. This is how muscle memory is developed and how the brain forms myelin between nerve endings that allow a motion to be repeated over and over with precision. Technique practice requires (1) correct information and (2) instant feedback. This is why a high cap hitting balls forever doesn't do anything for them. Unless they are isolating a motion and feeling it, they are not engaging in technique practice and they are not building mylenic connections between their nerves. If, however, they did a drill to get a divot in front of the ball and marked the ball with a tee before they swung, they would get instant feedback -> they either got the divot in front of the ball, or they did not, especially at low speed. After 8-10 tries, they would know "how" to hit the divot on target side of the ball.

 

The problem with this is that the brain can only handle so much technique practice at once. This is why you can't become great at boxing by practicing 10 hours a day for an entire year. The connections are made slowly, the brain doesn't have the capacity to "build" that much muscle memory at once.

 

There is also a second type of practice, which is known as skills practice. This is applying the muscle memory and movements learned during technique practice to an actual golf ball in an actual lie in an actual situation. Skill practice is basically unlimited - rather than actually devloping muscle memory, you are getting better at solving problems. Evaluating lie, and wind, taking different stances for different shots, etc... Rather than have a top limit on what you can achieve given a certain period of time, skill practice you could do for 10 hours a day and get just as much out of the 1st our as the last.

 

In the context of skill practice, it is undisputed that the harder and more challenging you make the practice the more the brain gets out of it. Now, this needs to be balanced against confidence and fun, but if I had a high cap I was teaching and you had a high cap you were teaching, and we each had six months and my guy hit 10 balls really slow on the range focusing on perfect technique and then hit out of rocks and bunkers and trees and made it incredibly difficult and your guy spent the six months taking full swind up swing on perfect lies (i.e. how most high caps practice) my guy would get much better much faster.

 

The "controlled enviornment of the range" is nonsense. It retards your development. Basketball coaches don't have their teams practice free throws when they first show up to practice, they do it at the end, when they are tired. it makes them harder. Its the same in every sport (except bad golfers I suppose).

 

I've read a ton of literature on how to get better, and I'm a low cap principally because I started applying it (instead of just working inside the "controlled range enviornment") and this is the best book I've read on the science of learning to swing a golf club:

 

https://www.amazon.c...s/dp/1507723172

 

As I said, when I brought this up in another thread - why are you just hitting your 7 iron at the 150 flag in full motion over and over and over it will never make you better - people went ballistic. So hopefully that doesn't happen again.

 

EDIT

Someone in another post (redneck I think) said I think high handicappers are "friggin idiots", which couldn't be further from the truth. Y'all are the ones who want to coddle them. They're not puppies. They can handle it. Their going to get a lot worse, and then their going to get a lot better. This idea that you improve at golf by going from 100 to 98 to 95 to 94 to 90 to 88, etc... is fantasyland. Now, kids, wife, no time - i get it. No worries. But if your trying to get better, you shouldn't be whacking balls at the 150 flag with your 150 club for an hour and a half. It doesn't work. Seve learned golf by hitting balls on a beach. Its harder. Jack learned with his head being held still. Its harder. Most NBA players played with older kids when they were younger. Its harder. If you wanted to learn basketball today at 30-whatever, you wouldn't go play in an "easy controlled enviornment" with 8 year olds (the range). You'd go find the best game you could find and you'd fall on your face until you can hang. That's how you get good at golf (Efficiently).

[pinestreetgolf]

Laying back off the tee isn't a choice between the woods and the fairway. Thats my whole point. Laying back off the tee is a choice between a higher chance at the woods and an easier chance at biridie with a good shot versus a higher chance of the fairway but a harder shot versus less of a chance of the woods. Your post reads as if 3w is guarenteed to be good and driver is guarenteed to be bad. That isn't the choice.

 

Only in the same way that your posts' read that you always score better on each hole hitting driver. He knows every choice is a percentages game - everyone who plays the game knows that. Some just know their percentages better then others. If, for a given hole, I have a 90% of keeping it out of the trees with my 3wd, and only 60% with my driver, the choice is a no brainer.

 

 

And you over emphasize the importance of the recovery shot. A good recovery shot (no matter how much practice you put it) will rarely be able to make up scoring potential you lost by hitting a shot that needed to be recovered from. Even Broadie knows that it really is more important to avoid getting into trouble off the tee (see the quote above). You can't recover from OB, you can't recover from the majority of balls that go in hazards, and (at least on 95% of the course I play) when in the trees, a real good recovery shot will only get you back into the fairway and hopefully take double or worse out of play. So for most practice would be better spent elsewhere.

 

I don't know how to respond, Stuart. You've posted this several times and I've always responded the same way. I'm not advocating for an insane approach where you bomb every hole and say damn the torpedoes. I am, however, advocating that over X rounds a golfer *should* have Y OB shots. If they don't, they arn't being aggressive enough. I am also saying that most golfers are more scared of bad shots then they are enthused for good shots.

 

You don't "always score better on each hole hitting driver". That would be insane. There are 18 holes in a round, and 18*X in a season. One hole doesn't matter very much. It is my opinion that the majority of golfers are way too timid because they are scared of the hole they are currently on and don't think about the cumulative effect of more aggression over the course of a round or a season. I could be wrong, but this is my experience. Course management is very important and I think most (especially in the context of the OP) are too timid than is optimal. That isn't the same thing as me telling people to hit driver every hole because water hazards don't matter.

 

A good recovery shot (no matter how much practice you put it) will rarely be able to make up scoring potential you lost by hitting a shot that needed to be recovered from.

 

Right, but again you are only looking at that hole in isolation. The "scoring potential" (if you keep playing aggressively) might show up 4 holes later. Obviously *once you've hit the shot* if its in the garbage you wish you had done something else. But comitting to an aggressive strategy and practicing shots on the range that an aggressive strategy tends to lead to (punch outs to the fringe, FW bunkers, off waste, line drive nGIRs out of gnarly rough, etc...)

 

This view is put forward in the book "Lowest Score Wins" which introduces the concept of an nGIR (near green in regulation) that posits a mathematical relationship between your strokes lost from a given short game shot (Versus a putt) and your strokes gained IF your aggressive tee shot had gone well. For example, if your long-sided pitch is a 2.31 short game shot and your wedge from where the aggressive tee shot would land is 2.11, and you know you can hack it out of the woods to the long-sided pitch area at the worst, you are only losing .2 for that miss and you should absolutely launch it. A chip after a recovery shot isn't the end of the world, and the book does a good job of addressing this exact issue - its better to have a scoring shot one hole and a recovery/chip the next than two 8 irons for a lot of players.

 

Of course if you take one hole in isolation nobody wants to hit recovery shots. But over an entire season the aggressive philosophy will pay off way more than the timid one IMO IF you practice for it.

 

1. I am not advocating hitting driver on every hole. I am using "driver" as code for "the longest tee club that does not bring a stroke losing hazard into play" not literally driver.

2. If you already know you are going to need a recovery shot, don't hit that tee shot. But if your recovery shot will produce either a GIR or a nGIR with a short game shot, the comparison is the short game shot difficult versus what you make up if you pull the tee shot off.

3. I do not think you should just bomb tee shots into lakes repeatedly.

 

Again, IMO.

 

EDIT;:

Currently building a set using those Matrix shafts from the other thread so *really* don't want to upset you. I might need your help!! :P

[ThinkingPlus]

PSG, had you REALLY rather be punching out of the trees from 100 instead of hitting a wedge shot from 120 in the fairway? Because that's exactly what your preaching here.

 

Also, you want to know why all those high caps are practicing those straight iron shots all the time, because only about 20% of their irons shots go high and straight! The rest are tops, shanks, thins, fats, etc. I watch them all the time. They don't HIT the shot every time they try it, that's why they're practicing it. But YOU sit here and criticize all these people you don't even know as if they're a bunch of friggin idiots! I think there are a lot of folks getting a little tired of that.

BT

 

 

 

As to the second part, I don't know if 'people' are getting 'tired' of it (you don't have to keep reading and posting in these threads to tell me your getting tired of it) but you are correct that I don''t think high handicappers practice well. That's most of the reason they are high handicappers. The worse you are the less you should practice hitting straight shots off perfect lies. If you really want to fix the fats hitting out of crap is a much better way to do it than hitting off of perfect grass, and it will be a much better representation of what you will encounter on the course.

 

 

 

I disagree wholeheartedly with this. What the high(er) cap should be working on IS being able to make solid contact on a more consistent basis, or at least more frequently than they currently do (since using the word consisent will open another semantics debate).

 

Why in the world would you spend time practing recovery shots, which in order for them to be successful have to be even more precise than a shot from a unimpeeded place, when you dont hit it solidly from a clean lie on a regular basis?

 

So the 20 handicapper practices hitting shots from under a branch, guess what happens when he encounters that on the course. He still misses the recovery shot most of the time anyway. Because he is a 20 handicapper. Funny how much better a person becomes at hitting those recovery shots after they learned to hit the ball better in general, which happens in the controlled environment of the range. Don't put "the cart in front of the horse".

 

The last time I discussed this I was told to post in my own thread, which I did (its called "Why do you want consistency in strike if your bad?" or something to that effect). Rather than allow people to discuss in there, several posters, mainly high caps, called me things ranging from "bad for golf", to "full of myself" to "constantly trying to be the smartest guy in the room" etc... etc... They got pretty personal. I was somewhat baffled by it - I started my own thread, and they didn't have to join it, so I hesitate to wade back into the waters of telling bad players who have time to practice they are bad because their practice methods are idiotic/subpar.

 

That said, there are two types of practice (this has been studied repeatedly in all disciplines from boxing to soccer to violin to golf). One is functional practice (or technique practice) in which a player develops their actual physical technique - for example, not jerking the club off plane during the takeaway. This is how muscle memory is developed and how the brain forms myelin between nerve endings that allow a motion to be repeated over and over with precision. Technique practice requires (1) correct information and (2) instant feedback. This is why a high cap hitting balls forever doesn't do anything for them. Unless they are isolating a motion and feeling it, they are not engaging in technique practice and they are not building mylenic connections between their nerves. If, however, they did a drill to get a divot in front of the ball and marked the ball with a tee before they swung, they would get instant feedback -> they either got the divot in front of the ball, or they did not, especially at low speed. After 8-10 tries, they would know "how" to hit the divot on target side of the ball.

 

The problem with this is that the brain can only handle so much technique practice at once. This is why you can't become great at boxing by practicing 10 hours a day for an entire year. The connections are made slowly, the brain doesn't have the capacity to "build" that much muscle memory at once.

 

There is also a second type of practice, which is known as skills practice. This is applying the muscle memory and movements learned during technique practice to an actual golf ball in an actual lie in an actual situation. Skill practice is basically unlimited - rather than actually devloping muscle memory, you are getting better at solving problems. Evaluating lie, and wind, taking different stances for different shots, etc... Rather than have a top limit on what you can achieve given a certain period of time, skill practice you could do for 10 hours a day and get just as much out of the 1st our as the last.

 

In the context of skill practice, it is undisputed that the harder and more challenging you make the practice the more the brain gets out of it. Now, this needs to be balanced against confidence and fun, but if I had a high cap I was teaching and you had a high cap you were teaching, and we each had six months and my guy hit 10 balls really slow on the range focusing on perfect technique and then hit out of rocks and bunkers and trees and made it incredibly difficult and your guy spent the six months taking full swind up swing on perfect lies (i.e. how most high caps practice) my guy would get much better much faster.

 

The "controlled enviornment of the range" is nonsense. It retards your development. Basketball coaches don't have their teams practice free throws when they first show up to practice, they do it at the end, when they are tired. it makes them harder. Its the same in every sport (except bad golfers I suppose).

 

I've read a ton of literature on how to get better, and I'm a low cap principally because I started applying it (instead of just working inside the "controlled range enviornment") and this is the best book I've read on the science of learning to swing a golf club:

 

https://www.amazon.c...s/dp/1507723172

 

As I said, when I brought this up in another thread - why are you just hitting your 7 iron at the 150 flag in full motion over and over and over it will never make you better - people went ballistic. So hopefully that doesn't happen again.

 

EDIT

Someone in another post (redneck I think) said I think high handicappers are "friggin idiots", which couldn't be further from the truth. Y'all are the ones who want to coddle them. They're not puppies. They can handle it. Their going to get a lot worse, and then their going to get a lot better. This idea that you improve at golf by going from 100 to 98 to 95 to 94 to 90 to 88, etc... is fantasyland. Now, kids, wife, no time - i get it. No worries. But if your trying to get better, you shouldn't be whacking balls at the 150 flag with your 150 club for an hour and a half. It doesn't work. Seve learned golf by hitting balls on a beach. Its harder. Jack learned with his head being held still. Its harder. Most NBA players played with older kids when they were younger. Its harder. If you wanted to learn basketball today at 30-whatever, you wouldn't go play in an "easy controlled enviornment" with 8 year olds (the range). You'd go find the best game you could find and you'd fall on your face until you can hang. That's how you get good at golf (Efficiently).

 

Wow. That was a close call. I thought I might have to seriously consider following this approach. Fortunately I am exempt since I more or less fall into the wife category.

[pinestreetgolf]

PSG, had you REALLY rather be punching out of the trees from 100 instead of hitting a wedge shot from 120 in the fairway? Because that's exactly what your preaching here.

 

Also, you want to know why all those high caps are practicing those straight iron shots all the time, because only about 20% of their irons shots go high and straight! The rest are tops, shanks, thins, fats, etc. I watch them all the time. They don't HIT the shot every time they try it, that's why they're practicing it. But YOU sit here and criticize all these people you don't even know as if they're a bunch of friggin idiots! I think there are a lot of folks getting a little tired of that.

BT

 

 

 

As to the second part, I don't know if 'people' are getting 'tired' of it (you don't have to keep reading and posting in these threads to tell me your getting tired of it) but you are correct that I don''t think high handicappers practice well. That's most of the reason they are high handicappers. The worse you are the less you should practice hitting straight shots off perfect lies. If you really want to fix the fats hitting out of crap is a much better way to do it than hitting off of perfect grass, and it will be a much better representation of what you will encounter on the course.

 

 

 

I disagree wholeheartedly with this. What the high(er) cap should be working on IS being able to make solid contact on a more consistent basis, or at least more frequently than they currently do (since using the word consisent will open another semantics debate).

 

Why in the world would you spend time practing recovery shots, which in order for them to be successful have to be even more precise than a shot from a unimpeeded place, when you dont hit it solidly from a clean lie on a regular basis?

 

So the 20 handicapper practices hitting shots from under a branch, guess what happens when he encounters that on the course. He still misses the recovery shot most of the time anyway. Because he is a 20 handicapper. Funny how much better a person becomes at hitting those recovery shots after they learned to hit the ball better in general, which happens in the controlled environment of the range. Don't put "the cart in front of the horse".

 

The last time I discussed this I was told to post in my own thread, which I did (its called "Why do you want consistency in strike if your bad?" or something to that effect). Rather than allow people to discuss in there, several posters, mainly high caps, called me things ranging from "bad for golf", to "full of myself" to "constantly trying to be the smartest guy in the room" etc... etc... They got pretty personal. I was somewhat baffled by it - I started my own thread, and they didn't have to join it, so I hesitate to wade back into the waters of telling bad players who have time to practice they are bad because their practice methods are idiotic/subpar.

 

That said, there are two types of practice (this has been studied repeatedly in all disciplines from boxing to soccer to violin to golf). One is functional practice (or technique practice) in which a player develops their actual physical technique - for example, not jerking the club off plane during the takeaway. This is how muscle memory is developed and how the brain forms myelin between nerve endings that allow a motion to be repeated over and over with precision. Technique practice requires (1) correct information and (2) instant feedback. This is why a high cap hitting balls forever doesn't do anything for them. Unless they are isolating a motion and feeling it, they are not engaging in technique practice and they are not building mylenic connections between their nerves. If, however, they did a drill to get a divot in front of the ball and marked the ball with a tee before they swung, they would get instant feedback -> they either got the divot in front of the ball, or they did not, especially at low speed. After 8-10 tries, they would know "how" to hit the divot on target side of the ball.

 

The problem with this is that the brain can only handle so much technique practice at once. This is why you can't become great at boxing by practicing 10 hours a day for an entire year. The connections are made slowly, the brain doesn't have the capacity to "build" that much muscle memory at once.

 

There is also a second type of practice, which is known as skills practice. This is applying the muscle memory and movements learned during technique practice to an actual golf ball in an actual lie in an actual situation. Skill practice is basically unlimited - rather than actually devloping muscle memory, you are getting better at solving problems. Evaluating lie, and wind, taking different stances for different shots, etc... Rather than have a top limit on what you can achieve given a certain period of time, skill practice you could do for 10 hours a day and get just as much out of the 1st our as the last.

 

In the context of skill practice, it is undisputed that the harder and more challenging you make the practice the more the brain gets out of it. Now, this needs to be balanced against confidence and fun, but if I had a high cap I was teaching and you had a high cap you were teaching, and we each had six months and my guy hit 10 balls really slow on the range focusing on perfect technique and then hit out of rocks and bunkers and trees and made it incredibly difficult and your guy spent the six months taking full swind up swing on perfect lies (i.e. how most high caps practice) my guy would get much better much faster.

 

The "controlled enviornment of the range" is nonsense. It retards your development. Basketball coaches don't have their teams practice free throws when they first show up to practice, they do it at the end, when they are tired. it makes them harder. Its the same in every sport (except bad golfers I suppose).

 

I've read a ton of literature on how to get better, and I'm a low cap principally because I started applying it (instead of just working inside the "controlled range enviornment") and this is the best book I've read on the science of learning to swing a golf club:

 

https://www.amazon.c...s/dp/1507723172

 

As I said, when I brought this up in another thread - why are you just hitting your 7 iron at the 150 flag in full motion over and over and over it will never make you better - people went ballistic. So hopefully that doesn't happen again.

 

EDIT

Someone in another post (redneck I think) said I think high handicappers are "friggin idiots", which couldn't be further from the truth. Y'all are the ones who want to coddle them. They're not puppies. They can handle it. Their going to get a lot worse, and then their going to get a lot better. This idea that you improve at golf by going from 100 to 98 to 95 to 94 to 90 to 88, etc... is fantasyland. Now, kids, significant other, no time - i get it. No worries. But if your trying to get better, you shouldn't be whacking balls at the 150 flag with your 150 club for an hour and a half. It doesn't work. Seve learned golf by hitting balls on a beach. Its harder. Jack learned with his head being held still. Its harder. Most NBA players played with older kids when they were younger. Its harder. If you wanted to learn basketball today at 30-whatever, you wouldn't go play in an "easy controlled enviornment" with 8 year olds (the range). You'd go find the best game you could find and you'd fall on your face until you can hang. That's how you get good at golf (Efficiently).

 

Wow. That was a close call. I thought I might have to seriously consider following this approach. Fortunately I am exempt since I more or less fall into the wife category.

 

My fault. Edited!

[Ri_Redneck]

PSG,

Yeah, in the post I was replying to, you were going on like they were idiots. Perhaps I should go at it like this. There are many "athletically challenged" people out there in the world. Most have never swung anything at all, much less a golf club at a ball. They're not like you and I who played sports since we could walk. They have to learn how to swing before they can even learn how to play. I work with a few guys like that. They barely knew which end of the club to hold , but they want to learn. THOSE are the people who NEED to hit those repetitive shots from pristine lies to hopefully get to the point where they don't have to think about a hundred things while they're trying to swing. You take those people out in the woods and pour out 30 balls and tell them hit them to that green they see out there and they'll tell you to get bent. They gotta walk before they can run.

 

Now, maybe I'm wrong, but you come off like that in most of your posts. Like someone grooving their swing on the range is just wasting their time. They should instead dump the bucket of balls in the weeds at the end of the range and start trying to hit them to the nearest flag. What the heck is wrong with them learning how to not hit in the weeds in the first place? Sure, they'll get in there occasionally, but they build confidence by grooving their swing and then they can start working on the trouble shots.

 

That's my only gripe with your posts. Sorry if I come off like an jerk. I would actually like to meet up with you next time I'm in Louisiana and play a round. If you're up for that, let me know.

 

BT

[pinestreetgolf]

THOSE are the people who NEED to hit those repetitive shots from pristine lies to hopefully get to the point where they don't have to think about a hundred things while they're trying to swing. You take those people out in the woods and pour out 30 balls and tell them hit them to that green they see out there and they'll tell you to get bent. They gotta walk before they can run.

 

They don't need to hit repetitive shots, they need to practice the individual pieces of the golf swing one at a time (technique practice) and then they need to work on using them all together *without* thinking (skill practice). They should either be working on a very specific thing in the swing doing a drill they believe in or they should be playing games in their mind when they hit balls and going through a routine. Anything in the middle isn't as efficient. Its not "worthless", but its not as efficient. You are a little dramatic with dropping it in the woods, but yes, in a general sense, you are correct. This is pretty indisputable given how thoroughly its been researched. Read the book I linked to above, its full of cites to academic work on how we learn muscle tasks.

 

At no point would I want them to "groove" a swing they barely understand that stinks.

 

There is a *ton* of academic literature on how to get better at repetitive motor skills like shooting a basketball, playing a musical instrument and hitting a golf ball. "Do it all at once a whole bunch of times at full speed" is literally the worst way possible, yet basically all high caps practice this way. Imagine someone learning the piano like this:

 

Student: *plays something that sounds awful*

Me: OK, lets take just this one little section and go really slow

You: No, this guy hasn't been around music his whole life. He needs to play the whole piece all at once and get into a groove with it.

Student: *plays more stuff that sounds awful*

Me: I really think this isn't getting us anywhere, we should probably break it up into parts and go really slow

You: No, just let him keep trying to play the whole piece at once at full speed

 

That would be just as insane as how most bad players practice. Now, can it be done? Sure. Its just a really inefficient way to learn repeatable muscle tasks. Its possible, just sub-optimal.

 

Like someone grooving their swing on the range is just wasting their time.

 

Someone who doesn't have a swing to groove or a bad swing is either wasting their time or actively harming their game. If your swing stinks, stop ingraining it into your muscle memory. You golf game is literally better off if you go to the movies than you are "grooving" a bad swing.

 

Now a good player? Sure. They can "groove" if they want I guess. But they'll get a TON more out of it if they say "OK, this 6 iron is around a tree into a 10 mph headwind" then the next shot they make something else OR they focus on one mechanical piece each swing and ignore the result, only caring about that piece being correct (they make it either technique or skills practice) versus just mindlessly beating balls.

 

Sorry if I come off like an jerk. I would actually like to meet up with you next time I'm in Louisiana and play a round. If you're up for that, let me know.

 

Its the internet. Its impossible to read subtlety in what people say as so much of communication is non-verbal, so I never really care about any of it. That other thread got pretty personal, so even though I thought I was right I just left. If those guys want to keep buying large buckets and putting up 95s its fine with me. Never any need to apologize to me, I promise you I never take offense via the internet.

 

As any New Orleanian would say, I don't live in Louisiana I live in New Orleans. :) That said, for sure. Send me a message! My primary track is TPC Louisiana but there are some great courses down here.

 

EDIT

I also fully understand this method isn't fun. Going from about a 15 to a 2 wasn't fun. It was hard, somewhat boring, and I got a lot worse before I got better. A lot of people just want to have some fun and maybe get better along the way and those people should ignore me (As I've said repeatedly). But practicing correctly can send your cap plummeting if you commit to it. Buy the book!

[Ri_Redneck]

Yes, they do the drill at home in front of the mirror and then incorporate it into their full swing at the range. We're talking about the same thing apparently, it just doesn't sound like it. Their INTENTION is not to groove a swing that stinks. They need instruction and a goal to work on. Thing is, it's difficult to tell if they've had instruction or not just by seeing them at the range.

 

The golf swing and a concerto aren't really the same. A decent swing is far easier to learn.

 

I agree totally that any beginner that is not working on specifics is totally wasting their time. It's all our job to point them in the right direction.

 

I agree totally that once you have a repeatable good swing that trouble shots should be worked on with regularity. It's the only way to get better.

 

I played 36 at the TPC in Feb this year. I like the track, but those tiny bunkers really messed with my head. Had to work on hitting sand shots while standing outside the bunker once I got home! I will probably be down sometime this fall or next spring and I will get in touch.

 

I have the book and as I mentioned a while back, I am starting to look at the short par 4s a little differently now. We'll see how it goes. I've made big strides with my ball striking this year and the hcp should be considerably lower by year end.

 

BT

[pinestreetgolf]

but those tiny bunkers really messed with my head.

 

I've never seen anything like them anywhere else. Hitting into the one on 17 was the only time in my golf career that I've thrown a club. That one is seriously diabolical. The others are bad but that one built into the side of a hill seriously makes me want to just go to the restaurant early. Right in the bailout area for the water left too. If I ever meet Pete Dye he's going to have to explain that one.

 

Just shoot me a message. Good thing about down here we play year round. Why I had to flee NH!

[granite45]

“There are three types of lies – lies, damn lies, and statistics.” – Benjamin Disraeli

 

You must have a really hard time getting around since you have to assume your gas gauge is wrong 85% of the time.

 

Funny... but opens the door to a contradiction... cars that have an indicator how much range, in miles, are left in the tank are intentionally conservative and thus inaccurate.

 

They would be far more useful if they display an actual number of how many actual miles are left.

 

Instead, anyone who has one of these cars learns to ignore that number (stat?) and thus "guess" how many miles you could have left.

 

Prime example of a useless statistic, and you pay extra for it...

[lenman73]

This question is to the guy who deleted a post before this one.

 

Who do you think would benefit more from practicing a punch shot from the trees , Jack friggin Nicklaus or a weekend warrior? Seriously

 

The people who spray it the most into the trees are the ones who should practice it the most along with trying to cure the shots that got them there in the first place.

 

This concept isn't that difficult to grasp. Some of you are intentionally playing ignorant or you simply like to argue for the sake of arguing and it wouldn't matter what the topic of this thread is about, you would still find a way to be a contrarian.

 

I have read this from the beginning. As someone who is distance challenged, I can promise you I know a difference between driver and 3w off the tee. I can also tell you beyond a shadow of a doubt that if that driver puts me in light rough, if you drop 100 balls there and I hit an 8 iron opposed to dropping 100 in the fairway and I hit a 5 or 6 iron, the friggin 8 iron is gonna STATISTICALLY come out the winner. All things being equal with a clear line to the pin. I did not say in knee deep Heather or in the woods or any other stroke causing hazard.

 

Do I hit driver every hole ? No I don't. After torturing myself with this game for 27 years and playing alot of the same courses locally here for 27 years, I developed course knowledge to help with the decision. But in those 27 years I know which holes have screwed me the most, one hole in particular on my league course. I hit that dam fairway once every 2 years if I'm lucky but I pull the driver anyway because laying back with a 3 wood still reduces my chance of being on in 2 so I go with the big stick because no risk it, no biscuit. Personally I don't practice alot of rescue shots at the range because I am so used to hitting them at the course anyway. But if I didn't know how to hit one you can bet I would practice it while trying to straighten my driver out.

[Stuart_G]

I don't know how to respond, Stuart. You've posted this several times and I've always responded the same way. I'm not advocating for an insane approach where you bomb every hole and say damn the torpedoes. I am, however, advocating that over X rounds a golfer *should* have Y OB shots. If they don't, they arn't being aggressive enough.

 

Nor have I ever said those numbers should be zero. But you never commit to actual numbers for the X's and Y's - nor do you actually consider all the details when you berate those individuals when they provide specific examples of when and why they choose to play a bit more conservatively. It's always something else they should be doing better or differently giving the impression that there choice was always the wrong one.

 

Right, but again you are only looking at that hole in isolation. The "scoring potential" (if you keep playing aggressively) might show up 4 holes later. Obviously *once you've hit the shot* if its in the garbage you wish you had done something else. But comitting to an aggressive strategy and practicing shots on the range that an aggressive strategy tends to lead to (punch outs to the fringe, FW bunkers, off waste, line drive nGIRs out of gnarly rough, etc...)

 

There you go again, making assumptions about what decisions are being referred to and what went into making them. Not to mention using this 'aggressive' strategy term w/o actually defining it in a useful way (what's aggressive? 80% chance of keeping the ball in play and having a shot at the green? 70%, 50% ? No I'm not looking at it in isolation at all. Quite the opposite, I'm talking about the scoring potential in the true statistical sense. Looking at the potential based on the percentage of a poor shot vs the percentage of a bad shot and the percentages of what might happen when recovering from that bad shot.

 

What choices I make on a different hole with different percentages, is a completely different 'problem' to solve.

 

This view is put forward in the book "Lowest Score Wins" which introduces the concept of an nGIR (near green in regulation) that posits a mathematical relationship between your strokes lost from a given short game shot (Versus a putt) and your strokes gained IF your aggressive tee shot had gone well. For example, if your long-sided pitch is a 2.31 short game shot and your wedge from where the aggressive tee shot would land is 2.11, and you know you can hack it out of the woods to the long-sided pitch area at the worst, you are only losing .2 for that miss and you should absolutely launch it. A chip after a recovery shot isn't the end of the world, and the book does a good job of addressing this exact issue - its better to have a scoring shot one hole and a recovery/chip the next than two 8 irons for a lot of players.

 

I don't have a problem with that. IF you know your numbers for each aspect of the game, you should certainly use them and it can be very helpful. But you've been pushing people (whether intentionally or not) to make specific decisions when you don't have a clue what their various numbers might be or anything about their game. What you should be doing is helping people learn to gather the data they need so they can make the best decisions - not trying to make those decisions for them.

 

EDIT;:

Currently building a set using those Matrix shafts from the other thread so *really* don't want to upset you. I might need your help!! :P

 

No worries. It takes a lot to 'upset' me - you haven't even come close. And even if someone comes close, I'll usually just leave the thread long before letting it go that far.

[Stuart_G]

What is it about Broadie that you think I've missed?

 

Sorry I'm a bit confused. What gave you the idea that I thought you missed anything? I certainly don't remember saying anything like that that was targeted at any of your posts.

[tsecor]

“There are three types of lies – lies, damn lies, and statistics.” – Benjamin Disraeli

 

You must have a really hard time getting around since you have to assume your gas gauge is wrong 85% of the time.

 

Funny... but opens the door to a contradiction... cars that have an indicator how much range, in miles, are left in the tank are intentionally conservative and thus inaccurate.

 

They would be far more useful if they display an actual number of how many actual miles are left.

 

Instead, anyone who has one of these cars learns to ignore that number (stat?) and thus "guess" how many miles you could have left.

 

Prime example of a useless statistic, and you pay extra for it...

Horrible stat

 

Golfer A shot 125 today but was the best out of his 4 some. Statistically speaking he is #1........

[JeffreySpicoli]

What is it about Broadie that you think I've missed?

 

Sorry I'm a bit confused. What gave you the idea that I thought you missed anything? I certainly don't remember saying anything like that that was targeted at any of your posts.

 

It was an honest question. I was wondering if you had something in mind from Broadie that I was missing. You answered it. Thanks!

[JeffreySpicoli]

“There are three types of lies – lies, damn lies, and statistics.” – Benjamin Disraeli

 

You must have a really hard time getting around since you have to assume your gas gauge is wrong 85% of the time.

 

Funny... but opens the door to a contradiction... cars that have an indicator how much range, in miles, are left in the tank are intentionally conservative and thus inaccurate.

 

They would be far more useful if they display an actual number of how many actual miles are left.

 

Instead, anyone who has one of these cars learns to ignore that number (stat?) and thus "guess" how many miles you could have left.

 

Prime example of a useless statistic, and you pay extra for it...

Horrible stat

 

Golfer A shot 125 today but was the best out of his 4 some. Statistically speaking he is #1........

 

You're being ridiculous. To say that Golfer A won an 18 hole stroke match with a 125 says that and that only.

 

You've in no way pointed out anything of value as far as the validity--or lack thereof--of a statistical approach. You have though pointed out yet again how willing you are to be dishonest.

[tsecor]

#stattruthhurts

 

There are several undeniable truths about statistics: First and foremost, they can be manipulated, massaged and misstated. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson, “Aw, you can come up with statistics to prove anything … Forty percent of all people know that.”

Second, if bogus statistical information is repeated often enough, it eventually is considered to be true.

As to Point One, consider a presidential debate. In 2012, when Barak Obama and Mitt Romney squared off, the president was heard to declare that “Over the last 30 months, we’ve seen 5 million jobs in the private sector created.” But 30 months only dates back to January 2010. And the president took office in January 2009.

 

It turns out that in his first year in office, the country lost some 5 million jobs. While things got better, the cumulative job creation in the private sector during Obama’s first term is in fact a more humble 125,000.

 

Statistics may be a principled means of debate with opportunities for agreement,but this is true only if the parties agree to a set of rules. Misuses of statistics violate the rules.

Or to put it another way:

False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often long endure; but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, as every one takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness; and when this is done, one path towards error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened.

— Charles Darwin,

The Descent of Man

(1871), Vol. 2, 385.

In other words, stats are not facts

[JeffreySpicoli]

To be clear, all tsecor does is create straw men arguments. That's why his contributions are almost always dishonest and useless.

 

Here's some background:

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man

[tsecor]

To be clear, all I do is attack people

 

 

Truth hurts.....you should try it sometime....now move on from your continued attacks. I fixed your post

[JeffreySpicoli]

To be clear, all I do is attack people

 

 

Truth hurts.....you should try it sometime....now move on from your continued attacks. I fixed your post

 

Now you're using ad hominem attacks--and talking out of both sides of your mouth, which is again dishonest.

 

Without a basic foundation in logic (which you apparently lack), one can't understand how to evaluate statistics.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

 

[pinestreetgolf]

#stattruthhurts

 

There are several undeniable truths about statistics: First and foremost, they can be manipulated, massaged and misstated. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson, “Aw, you can come up with statistics to prove anything … Forty percent of all people know that.”

Second, if bogus statistical information is repeated often enough, it eventually is considered to be true.

As to Point One, consider a presidential debate. In 2012, when Barak Obama and Mitt Romney squared off, the president was heard to declare that “Over the last 30 months, we’ve seen 5 million jobs in the private sector created.” But 30 months only dates back to January 2010. And the president took office in January 2009.

 

It turns out that in his first year in office, the country lost some 5 million jobs. While things got better, the cumulative job creation in the private sector during Obama’s first term is in fact a more humble 125,000.

 

Statistics may be a principled means of debate with opportunities for agreement,but this is true only if the parties agree to a set of rules. Misuses of statistics violate the rules.

Or to put it another way:

False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often long endure; but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, as every one takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness; and when this is done, one path towards error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened.

— Charles Darwin,

The Descent of Man

(1871), Vol. 2, 385.

In other words, stats are not facts

 

You've made several good arguments about why random statistics are wrong. You've made zero good arguments about why the statistics we've presented you with are wrong.

 

We're not claiming every statistic used by everyone in the world is right. We are claiming the statistics used in this study are right (they are laid out on pages 116-122).

 

You could link me a news article that someone somewhere got E Coli from a hamburger. That doesn't mean I'll get it or that I should avoid burgers. This is why we are frustrated with you. You will talk about literally everything *except* the specific problem you have with these studies, which leads me to suspect one of two things is going on:

 

1. You haven't read them but you'd look like a fool now if you admitted that or

2. You don't understand them.

 

Either way, stop ranting about "statistics". Yes, *some* statistics are bad. We want to know why you think *these* statistics are bad.

[JeffreySpicoli]

#stattruthhurts

 

There are several undeniable truths about statistics: First and foremost, they can be manipulated, massaged and misstated. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson, “Aw, you can come up with statistics to prove anything … Forty percent of all people know that.”

Second, if bogus statistical information is repeated often enough, it eventually is considered to be true.

As to Point One, consider a presidential debate. In 2012, when Barak Obama and Mitt Romney squared off, the president was heard to declare that “Over the last 30 months, we’ve seen 5 million jobs in the private sector created.” But 30 months only dates back to January 2010. And the president took office in January 2009.

 

It turns out that in his first year in office, the country lost some 5 million jobs. While things got better, the cumulative job creation in the private sector during Obama’s first term is in fact a more humble 125,000.

 

Statistics may be a principled means of debate with opportunities for agreement,but this is true only if the parties agree to a set of rules. Misuses of statistics violate the rules.

Or to put it another way:

False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often long endure; but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, as every one takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness; and when this is done, one path towards error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened.

— Charles Darwin,

The Descent of Man

(1871), Vol. 2, 385.

In other words, stats are not facts

 

You've copied--without attribution--from other authors. That, too, is dishonest. You're also again indulging in confirmation bias as you you cherry pick support for your silliness.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

 

The first part of your post copied from here:

http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/general-news/20140524/statistics-can-be-manipulated-to-prove-anything

 

The second part of your post copied from here:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misuse_of_statistics

[tsecor]

stats are stats......a tool...nothing more.....

 

I shot 38 this morning on the area's toughest course....hit my 3 wood on 6 holes.....driver on one hole....3 wood hit the fairway 5 times.....driver missed....I was way more accurate with the 3 wood today.....hit my target 5 out of 6 times for a 83% accuracy rate......driver 0%.

 

examples are taken from all over the internet, who gives a Flying F......thee fact you guys try to mold your stats into something more is hilarious to read....ive had lots of fun reading your posts and attacks on me.....it doesn't bother me one bit that you make fun of my disability, its just low class on your part, but ive had fun reading your posts as you scramble to try and prove these theories......its all good. I harbor no ill will.....

 

you have your opinions, I have mine.......mine are just more "accurate".....lol

[JeffreySpicoli]

You will talk about literally everything *except* the specific problem you have with these studies, which leads me to suspect one of two things is going on:

 

1. You haven't read them but you'd look like a fool now if you admitted that or

2. You don't understand them.

 

Either way, stop ranting about "statistics". Yes, *some* statistics are bad. We want to know why you think *these* statistics are bad.

 

He either takes glee in playing the role of the supreme fool or he is clueless concerning the utter depth of his own ignorance. As some would say, "Sad!"

[pinestreetgolf]

But you've been pushing people (whether intentionally or not) to make specific decisions when you don't have a clue what their various numbers might be or anything about their game.

 

(i took out the parts of the response that I thought basically boiled down to this)

 

But that isn't true. Unless they are incredibly unique, they are better closer and they tend to place their clubs into boolean cateogries ("safe", "wild", "money", "can't hit") that don't actually exist. We know from the Purdue study that the only thing that unifies low cap amateur golfers is a lack of technical thoughts during a golf round. We know a whole lot about the typical golfer. Now, does that mean there isn't a 20 out there thinking about nothing but course management or a 1 that is only thinking about what his hips are doing? Of course not. But, by and large, the academic data on the traits of the "average golfer" is pretty irrefutable. Most golfers have no idea what is going on in their game - 40% of them can't even accurately remember each shot of a round *right after the round ends* (off top of my head, but I think that was the Brown study in 2005).

 

Most of the users on here think they buck these trends, and 95% of them are wrong. They are better from the rough with an 8 iron than the fairway with a 6 iron because its been studied and the overwhelming majority are that way.

 

I said this on one of the pages in the mid-teens, but I'll repeat it here for sure. There are three ways to "analyze your game" to improve course managment, ranked in order of best to worst:

 

1. Study your own game, compile your own statistics, and build your own player profile that is accurate to you. Do it objectively by recording shots as they happen on paper or computer or Game Golf, etc..

2. Use the data compiled by professionals who have devoted their careers to this and assume you are like most golfers in the world

3. Try to kinda remember your game and get a feel for it but don't write anything down and think in general about how you usually kinda play.

 

I think 1 is best, 2 is good, and 3 stinks. Most dogs love beef. My dog is allergic to beef. So some golfers won't be advantaged by taking an approach to course management consistent with the average golfer i.e. they are allergic to beef. But to say that I (we?) don't "know anything" about the forum users' games is to say I don't know anything about whether dogs like beef because one dog is allergic to it. We know a ton about what their game is likely to be. I could preface my comments with "assuming you are like 95% of the golfers in the world..." but I don't. But that is really what I'm saying.

 

What you should be doing is helping people learn to gather the data they need so they can make the best decisions - not trying to make those decisions for them.

 

Totally agree. Which is why I posted in this thread - "fairways hit" is useless metric just like "number of putts" because it isn't factoring out variables. I can hit the fairway every single time with a pitching wedge. In order to be accurate you MUST use distance as part of ANY statistic that purports to measure your accuracy. Players' brains don't understand this, so when they hit the 5 wood way right and it just goes into the first cut they think of it as their "money club" but that's nonsense - its just going short, its not going accurately. That is why I posted here, your quote above - if a player measures by "Fairways" they will get awful data because its an awful (and misleading) statistic. If someone cuts down his driver (taking away speed) he will, by default, hit more fairways (because he's shorter). That's why its a bit of an eye roll when I see all that "cut down my driver and hit more FWs!" threads. Its way more complex than that.

 

If a player compiles their own statistics and concludes based on 30 rounds or so that they are better with a more conservative/shorter tee strategy, they will get zero grief from me. But most skip that step. Most players hit driver into a lake once in front of people, get embarasssed, tell themselves they "can't hit it" and then start calling 3 wood their "money club". All I'm saying is that if you arn't going to keep track yourself for a while, you should assume you are average (i.e. feed your dog beef) and act accordingly. You shouldn't act based on made-up narratives in your own head involving how many fairways you think you remember hitting and which club is your "safe" one or whatever.

[tsecor]

You will talk about literally everything *except* the specific problem you have with these studies, which leads me to suspect one of two things is going on:

 

1. You haven't read them but you'd look like a fool now if you admitted that or

2. You don't understand them.

 

Either way, stop ranting about "statistics". Yes, *some* statistics are bad. We want to know why you think *these* statistics are bad.

 

He either takes glee in playing the role of the supreme fool or he is clueless concerning the utter depth of his own ignorance. As some would say, "Sad!"

I just call out the low class individuals......you are one of them....SAD!!!!