Trending 1.2 Handicap - Still Haven't Broken Par

[cardoustie]

Lots of scratch players out of 74 - 75 / 140 - 148 tracks //// not too much par breaking going on

[gripandrip]

I agree with this. I play to around a 2-3, and in recent years have a couple of under par rounds. You can't change your game when you are going low. Stick with how you got there. I would say this mentality has been my downfall when going into the back nine under par. I remember when I was coaching soccer teams. We would get in the lead, and the parents would want us to play what I called "bunker ball." They wanted to protect the lead and drop back into a defensive posture. That's not why we were winning so we would just keep the foot on the gas. It usually lead to the best result.

[naval2006]

You’re definitely about to make it. There’s two ways to go under if you’re a near scratch club amateur: loads of pars or loads of birdies. The fact is most of us would do the former with a couple of birdies included to shoot minus one or two.

The course difficulty is key as they’ve already mentioned. But the greatest barrier is always mental since pressure is always there. It’s a great thing if you find like a mantra to keep on playing the same way in the closing holes which are the toughest. In my case the few times I shot under par I always kept on going at the ball with no thinking and just went like a robot around and on the green. You may get surprised when you break par using that simple mental approach. Good luck.

[Celebros]

34 years old. Carry my driver is 280 or so, 7-iron (33*) is 180.

 

[Celebros]

Generally some sort of wedge or short iron into most Par 4s given a reasonable drive.

Yes, there are very few Par 5's around me that I can't get on/near in two.

[Celebros]

This was kinda my thought/the impetus for this thread, lol.

[cardoustie]

What yardage do you usually play from?

Look at your course and you should be able mentally to picture birdies on 2 par 5’s and one par 4 .. bingo 69

you have all the distance you need unless your course is very long

 

 

[Celebros]

As far as how the rest of my game looks, I suppose that driving accuracy would be my biggest weakness. I don't often get into massive trouble/penalty strokes, but could certainly be on the fairway more than I am for my handicap.

Some stats (Last 20 Rounds):

Average Score - 75.6

GIR% - 56.4%

GIR% by Hole Par

Par 3 - 46.2%

Par 4 - 55%

Par 5 - 71.8%

Fairways - 41.1%

GIR% by Fairway Accuracy

Hit - 68.18%

Missed - 54.14%

Putts - 31.2

GIR Putts - 1.9

Scrambling/Par Saves - 48.5%

Average Score Par 3 - 3.4

Average Score Par 4 - 4.3

Average Score Par 5 - 4.9

 

[cardoustie]

more fairways and get better with your wedges ...

Course length?

 

[Celebros]

My home course plays around 6650 from the tips, 6350 from the Men's tee, Par 71. I end up playing a mix of rounds from either tee depending on the group/etc. When I play elsewhere, I am usually playing courses in the same range - occasionally a longer track.

[Socrates]

Putts - 31.2GIR Putts - 1.9Scrambling/Par Saves - 48.5%

 

Very similar numbers to my game. I kept track of my proximity to the hole one year and found I just wasn't hitting it close enough, often enough. And when I did, I was missing the birdie putts or par saving putts. Bought a PuttOut Matt and my putting got better at the end of last year and saw some more lower rounds because I was making a couple more 5-6 footers per round. If I can figure out how to shake the chipping yips and chip it closer to raise my scrambling/par saves %, I might really have something this season.

 

[Barfolomew]

If you're a 1.2 and NEVER broken par doesnt that mean you're EXTREMELY consitent.... infact so much so I can't even imagine a player like you and Im a par golfer with par golfer friends lol

 

Is my math right??? If you never shoot under that means you never shoot 2 strokes better then 1.2 over but also means you never shoot 2 strokes over 1.2 so you live in this tiny score bubble smaller then 4 strokes... that's unheard of or is my math wrong lol... I just watched a Masters where a player shot 63 then 78 haha

[nsxguy]

And STILL you haven't told us the slope rating of your 70.7, Par 71 course.

You don't understand why you can't break par ? You don't seem to understand how your handicap is calculated either.

Oh well. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[juststeve]

I break par a lot but not at my home course 76/150.

 

Steve

[Celebros]

Slope is 123 from the Men's tee, 131 from the tips.

 

Also, I understand how handicaps work, I just felt my current situation was somewhat anomalous, hence my post asking if anyone had been lower without breaking par.

[Celebros]

Yes, I also thought my current situation was strange and I decided to make this post about it, lol. Only 8 of my last 20 scores have to be in that bubble for handicap purposes though - I've shot higher than that within my last twenty rounds.

To be fair, I just came down to a 1.2 (career low, I started last year as a 3.5) so hopefully this not breaking par thing doesn't last long. :)

[nsxguy]

Oy. If you understand how handicaps work why is this like pulling teeth ?

You gave us a SINGLE course rating. 70.7

Now you're giving MULTIPLE slopes ?

 

Here's an idea. Why not take a picture of your GHIN card for your last 20 and post it ? Crossing out your name and GHIN number of course. Then we'll all see the calculations.

[pearsonified]

I love this thread—I went through the same journey between May 2014 and September 2018.

Before September 2018, I had never broken par despite holding a < 5hcp for nearly 4 years and being as low as 0.3 for most of the 2018 season.

From a statistical perspective, here's what I had to do in order to break par:

• My bad holes could only add up to +3 (statistical probability before breaking par = 0.3%)

• My good holes needed to add up to -4 or better (statistical probability before breaking par = 4%)

In other words, I needed to combine two things—lots of birdies and few mistakes—that I only achieved on rare occasions.

During late August and early September 2018, I started making a ton of birdies (3.75 per round over a 20-round stretch). Knowing I was going to go out and "get mine" had a big effect on my mindset toward breaking par, but even with that in my back pocket, it still took a h3ll of a performance for me to get over the hump.

One fateful week in the middle of September, I played the following tournament rounds:

• 71 (E) — 4 birdies, 2 bogeys, 1 double (real letdown here, as my game was SO tight except for 1 bad wedge to a terrible spot above a tough pin)

• 72 (E) — 4 birdies, 1 eagle, 4 bogeys, 1 double (again with the fkn dubs)

• 71 (-1) — 6 birdies, 3 bogeys, 1 dub (and it took 2 unbelievable putts and 1 incredibly lucky bladed wedge off the FLAG—not the pin—to get it done)

This was probably my ~600th lifetime round of golf, and I had shot even par at least a dozen times before I broke the glass floor.

The bottom line for me is that I never do any better than +3 on my bad holes. H3ll, I rarely do better than +6 on my bad holes. And as long as this is the case, breaking par is going to be a rare event because I'll have to come through with a superlative birdie performance in order to get the job done.

Based on the OP's description, he needs to make more birdies. (Don't we all?) But I also think eliminating dubs and adopting a "par or die" mindset is effective here.

This will resonate with the guys who've played tournament golf—you simply can't squeeze a bogey out of many better players. They may not blow you away with ball striking, yet when you count up strokes, they're somehow saving par every d*mn hole and also making 1 or 2 birdies to cover up whatever mistakes they happened to make.

It's nice to be the guy who makes 6 birdies, but if we're talking about breaking par on the regular, I'd rather be the guy who doesn't make mistakes.

[Celebros]

???

In the post where I listed the course rating for my home course I posted, and I quote, "70.7 from the Men's tee and 72.6 from the Tips, Par 71." I then satisfied your query into the accompanying slope ratings and you're going all "Deep State" on me, lol.

I'm not whining for you to give me a reason I haven't broken par, I just thought it was odd that I was a 1.2 and hadn't, as in my experience as a golfer, most of the people at roughly the same handicap (or higher) have and was curious if anyone had been lower without breaking par (of which several posters seem to have conveyed a similar experience).

[Celebros]

Thanks for sharing! Hopefully I get over the hump soon!

[nsxguy]

Yes, you did. For some reason the 70.7 stuck in my mind. And there have been quite a few posts in between. My apologies.

So now we've got 70.7 and 72.6 and 123 and 130. I figure I know which slope belongs to which rating.

So which tees do you play regularly ? I'm guessing the 72.6/130, no ? Or do you switch off ? Or did you tell us that somewhere before as well ?

 

Again, why not just post a pic of your GHIN and then ALL will be clear ?

[MtlJeff]

Remember though he said he trended down to 1.2, not that he has been a 1.2 for like 10 years. It would be very weird for a long term 1 index to have NEVER broken par. But if i understood i think the OP was like a 3-4 before this season, which is more believable. I know 4 indexes that have not broken par in a loooong time

But you can easily be a 1.2 for like, a season, without breaking par. Its not really that crazy and happens a lot at tougher courses. Handicap is just 10 of 20 scores.

My handicap is literally 1.3 right now (yeah yeah...i typically play off about 0.0 in midsummer but Montreal Octobers and Novembers are cold and crappy ). These are my last 20 scores

76-73-75-79-76-73-73-75-77-74-85-81-78-81-74-78-76-75-75-77

I didn't even shoot par once and had 3 scores in the 80's, and am a 1.3.

[Celebros]

About 50/50 regarding tees on my home course. T-Scores on my GHIN are all from the tips on my home course, plus a couple other rounds. Close to half of my last 20 rounds are on other courses though, so not sure my GHIN card will help much.

[phil75070]

It means his scores that count, best 8 of the last 20, average no more than about two strokes higher than the course rating, not par.

[Barfolomew]

ok I get it now lol....

[Celebros]

Got down to a 0.7 without breaking par (I added a couple more even par rounds since this thread started), but finally did it! lol

I shot a 69 this past Saturday (2-under, -1.6 differential).

[MtlJeff]

well yeah but now you're a 0.7 and you've only broken par once....

: )

 

[SNIPERBBB]

If you look at the exceptional score odds for your index, you're looking at about one in twenty chance of breaking par.

 

Unless you're on an easier rated course like mine,69/121, you're cap doesn't have you breaking par much. At a now 2.6 I've been under for 9 many times, shot even a few and been under,69, once. Did shoot 66 from the senior tees Saturday though

[Celebros]

I'll continue working to rectify that, lol.

[grantc79]

I'm a 2.7 never broken par