MEMBER REVIEWS: StrackaLine "The Book" Yardage + Greens Guide Member Testing! See What Members Are Saying!

[GolfWRX_Official]

We have five of our members reviewing the StrackaLine "The Book". StrackaLine's Green Reading and Yardage Books have been popular among our forum users for years and has been used by players on the PGA TOUR, LPGA, and collegiate level. Their USGA-compliant greens guides offer a level of detail and accuracy not available anywhere else for the most precise green reading. Yardage books include complete tee-to-green measurements for every hole. The members below will report back to the community about the things they noticed while testing this product. Please feel free to ask any questions that you might have, as the testers will be happy to answer them!

The testers are:

@MichiganMan

@54CW

@dmecca2

@driveandputtmachine

@thaar
 

Search for your course here and use the promo code "GOLFWRX" at checkout to get 20% off your order at www.StrackaLine.com!

Thank you to @StrackaLine for putting on this member testing opportunity for our community.

[driveandputtmachine]

Holding my spot here, I just received notification that mine has shipped, or will be shipping, but no delivery date set yet.

[dmecca2]

Excited to receive my Stracka book for my home course. Just received the shipping notification as well. Will update here when I receive it!

[MichiganMan]

Excited to get my hands on The Book for my home course. Have used the yardage books at a number of courses over the last year or so, including for the US Am qualifier this summer, but very excited to see the greens features of The Book.

[driveandputtmachine]

Luckily I was working from home today and I just got the notification that my book was delivered.  Nice very GREEN  envelope it comes in.  So I go ahead and open it up and low and behold they sent me TWO, which is absolutely amazing.  Especially considering how hot it is in Atlanta this week, the Tour Championship guys are gonna SWEAT THIS WEEK, so having a second one in case the first gets a bit wet is amazing!

 

My club is a 27 hole layout in Atlanta called Indian Hills, so the books are pretty thick, and I went ahead and ordered a yardage book holder once there were coming in. 

 

The plan is to play Saturday and Sunday this weekend and then report back with my biggest issues, which are the subtle breaks in our greens.

 

If you have any questions in the meantime, fire away!

 

[54CW]

My Strackaline book for Chambers Bay delivered today and I have a round booked Sunday AM.

 

Lots of undulating greens out there, can't wait to see if I can gain an edge on the greens this round. 

[dmecca2]

If you're reading this, you are probably thinking about buying one for a course you have never played, or maybe even your own course. I'm sure you have questions, like me, and I hope I can answer them. Questions like, do these really pick up every break on the greens, how easy are they to read, will I even use it during the round, and more.

 

I received my book for my home course, Glen Oak CC, and I was impressed with the hole map right off the bat. Things like exact downhill/uphill numbers to the fairway from every tee box, for instance, are things that I kind of knew, but never had an exact number for. Especially on par 3's where I would guess things like, "this one plays almost 1 club longer," I now know that it plays 8 yards uphill. This will help me, and would definitely help more on a course I didn't know. Back to my first question, does this really pick up every break. I was skeptical about this, because there are a lot of tiny nuances on our greens. Things that members who have been there for 20 years still get wrong. I have 2 examples. Our 5th hole is relatively flat, but there is a very tiny hump on the right side that affects putts. The Stracka book picked up that hump. Another hole, our 12th, defies gravity. The entire slope of the land is left to right, but this green just doesn't do that. This is one of those holes where the members say, "everything breaks towards the clubhouse". Sure enough, the Stracka book shows that while the back of the green follows the general topography, the front breaks the opposite direction!

 

If you're like me, you've resorted to aimpoint. So you might say, why do I need a book when I can just read it with my feet. Or, won't a book slow down play? Well, the first green image is what I use on my longer putts. When I'm not confident in my feet, or I would be standing in someone else's line, I simply opened the book, checked the numbers, and used my fingers with the appropriate numbers. Boom, saved time.

 

My last question was, how often am I really going to use this? To be honest, I didn't use it every green. Sometimes I got up there, felt confident with my read, and went with it. Additionally, I didn't need to use it to map out approach shots, because I already know the general slope of every green. It's my home course after all. If I had the book for a course I was unfamiliar with, I would 100% use it to map out approach shots.

 

A couple of extras. They had our practice green. This was nice to practice using the book and finding where I was on the map faster. Practice makes perfect. Next, I love the yardage arcs on the course map. Knowing where 200, 250, and 300 are from the tee is huge.

 

[Jpowell2142]

Did a review/comparison to PuttView a little while back. 

 

Check it out here!

 

 

[thaar]

I received mine Thursday, but had Club Championship starting Friday so I didn't feel comfortable taking it out there as to not create any new distractions from something new and unfamiliar for me. I will be getting out this coming weekend though so I'm excited to use it. 

 

Admittedly, I don't have much experience with yardage books, so I was a bit overwhelmed and intimidated by it when I first opened it. Strackaline does have a tutorial video on their site which was useful, and they also include a quick reference guide in the back to help you understand the notations, so it's starting to make more sense now.

 

Overall, I am really impressed with the amount of detail it includes, as demcca2 noted above. The elevation changes data is going to be quite useful for me as are the green guides. There is one par 3 that has an elevated tee box, and I have clearly overestimated the amount of yards to take off - it will be interesting to see how it compares to a rangefinder with slope. My course's greens are quite undulating, and despite me playing there for several years, I still get baffled by some of my reads. There are times where my eyes and my feet don't necessarily agree, so it would be great to have some concrete data to help me sort out my putts. Another thing I really appreciate is they show the slopes around the greens, so you can better understand where to miss or not miss. 

 

I did download their app which is quite cool. If you have pin sheets available to you, you can enter them and everything will be set up for you in the app (or website). Then you simply indicate where your ball is and it will give you a read. You can do this on the fly too, but that may take a bit of time. You can also print them out which is a nice feature if you want more accuracy for the pin placements or have gone through the two books they provided.

 

 

The one potentially negative thing I did notice is that it hasn't been updated recently as my course had modified their bunkers a couple years ago on a couple holes. It's not a terribly big deal as they don't typically come into play for me, but it could definitely matter for other players. Might be a good idea to include the date the topography was taken on the book. I'm sure it's tough to keep up on course modifications for the thousands of courses they have information on without someone letting them know. They are currently redoing one of the par 3's, so next year it will change again.

 

I'll report back next week when I get a chance to put it in play. 

Edited August 28, 2023 by thaar

[MichiganMan]

My book is scheduled for delivery tomorrow. Going to try and get out Friday afternoon or maybe Sunday evening to give it a test. I've got the Club Championship the weekend after Labor Day so I'm excited to give it a test before going for trophy #2.

[driveandputtmachine]

So I played my first round with my book on Sunday.  It was 9 million degrees and 9 million percent humidity on Sunday.

 

I decided to approach this "test" by going through my normal green reading process, pick out a target and then step back and check the book.   There were at least three times I was off, one time by not a little bit.   There are plenty of places where I my greens are easy to read, with a lot of slope on them, but my main desire to see with Stracka was to see the places where I am not sure of my read, or I could get fooled or feel something completely different standing over the ball as I did from behind reading it.  Overall I know it saved me one shot on a long putt where I adjusted my aim from 60 feet by about 5 feet and two putted hitting my first to 3 feet instead of 8 feet away.  One other putt I did make, but it was from 20 and not sure if I would make that putt super often even knowing the break.

 

I plan on testing the app a few times this weekend too, and seeing what it says about where to aim vs where I think I should as this past Sunday was just book vs what I see.

 

Overall on very subtle breaks I see where this will help me quite a bit, on larger breaks I haven't had a ton of trouble picking out the proper line.

 

With the temps supposed to be a lot lower this weekend I am hoping to get out and play at least twice and hopefully I will hit my approach shots into some areas where the break is more subtle.

[avg_joseph]

Their books are the bomb!!!  Used one in an event in April and made a putt that my partner saw breaking the other way.  Combined with AIMPOINT I've become a MUCH better putter overall this year!!!

[54CW]

 

First Round with Strackaline Yardage Book 8/27 

18 Holes at Chambers Bay - Sand Tees

 

 

I am thrilled to be selected to test Strackaline yardage books. Strackaline books check all the boxes for details I want on the course without pulling out my phone. Right now I use Arccos with a Caddie Link now so I'm keeping my phone in my bag 90% of the time. I am also eager to learn more about the math of g

 

I was preparing myself to write a comprehensive review after one round but it will take a few more rounds to put together a full review. I took it out mainly for green reading with this first use so here are my initial thoughts as a first time user. In the next couple weeks I will have a chance to play another full round or two to give more feedback. 

 

The Yardage Book: 

• The copy itself is clean and easy to read. 
• Paper stock seems high quality, nothing about these seem cheap.
• Print job is well done with no pixelation or illegible numbers or details.
• For how much detail and information is in the book, it was very slim. Did not add any bulk in my pocket.
• Page numbers are Hole numbers to it was quick to navigate to any hole I was playing.

Course Information:

• If you are not playing from  back tees, I recommend doing some homework and jotting down yardages for tees you will be playing from. Math on the fly for me is not ideal.
• Hole 1 & 13 have been changed, 1st from par 5 to par 4 and 13 from par 4 to par 5. This was done last year and my copy of the book was not updated with these changes. This mostly impacted hole 1's tee yardages.
• Practice green near first tee box was featured in it's first couple pages is a nice touch, it was easy to find a flat spot for warm up.
• Sprinklers as references are very helpful around all greens, I highly recommend using them as starting points for green reading.
• On about 5 putts I saw break on the map that I didn't recognize on course, it was very helpful.
• Having a slope number and color gradient on major slopes is incredibly helpful with walking off putt lengths and having multiple references to base a read off of. I don't think I can just eyeball it anymore.

Thank you for reading, I will continue to update this thread as I get more familiar with using Strackaline yardage books. 

 

[MichiganMan]

I wanted to break down my Stracka review into two parts, since The Book has two pages for each hole: an overview page of tee-to-green and the green grids. First, I’ll go over my thoughts on the tee-to-green features. Then, I’ll add separate thoughts on the green grids and my experience with those.

 

Tee-to-Green

The first feature I love about the tee-to-green page is the elevation numbers. The elevation numbers in red indicate a downhill shot and the numbers in green indicate an uphill shot. Having those on the tee boxes is great because you can easily calculate those numbers into the yardages. The bottom of the page will show all of the available tee boxes on the holes and then with a marker (T2, T3, etc) show how much yardage to deduct for the forward boxes. For example, on the first hole at my course, the left bunker is a 291 carry from the gold tees, but from the back box it’s 20 yards downhill, making it a 271 carry. However, from the blue tees (T2) it’s also 20 yards closer, so now it’s only a 251 carry. Since a lot of courses I play here in North Carolina have considerable elevation changes, I really appreciate having that feature readily available.

 

 

Additionally, when you look at the fairway the elevation numbers will be present throughout the hole as the elevation changes. Sometimes that’s every 50 yards, sometimes that’s every 25 yards. One thing that I’ve found is that these numbers have been VERY helpful in choosing the right club to play into the greens. They’re especially helpful on par 3s as well. Speaking of par 3s, the book will show the yardage to different sections of the green, which is awesome for those times you get a tucked pin.

The books will have faint lines arched throughout the page that will show yardages from the tee and yardages from the green. These are helpful when you’re playing the hole for a number of reasons: 1) you can kind of get an idea for how far you want to hit it off the tee and 2) to cross reference with the slope numbers.

 

Overall, the tee-to-green page is great. There are a lot of really helpful features that I’ve utilized. Distance numbers to bunkers, carry numbers over bunkers, numbers to different sections of the fairway, different sections of greens on par 3s, the ability to display slopes in the fairways with the small arrows, the elevation numbers. There really are a lot of great features in the books.

My only criticisms of the tee-to-green features would be 1) limited number of specific yardages in the middle of the fairways (i.e. no markers for sprinkler heads) and 2) no green depth/width numbers. I do understand they’re mapping out thousands of courses and the sprinkler heads are probably unrealistic but that was a small bummer when I purchased one of the yardage books for a US Am qualifier this summer (USGA had a local rule banning greens books). The book was still very helpful but just made for some extra work on my end during the practice round. Even something as simple as green depth/width would be great.

 

Green Grids

There are 3 different grids for the greens but I mostly utilized the second one which has what I’d call a “heat map” of slope with different colors for different slope severities. I found that one to be the easiest to use from a “where am I on the green” standpoint because I found it easier to match where I was with the slope on the page. I am not an AimPoint guy, so I actually didn’t understand what the first grid was. But, after reading another reviewer’s experience, I can understand why that first grid with the slope percentages would be very helpful.

 

Typically, I consider myself a pretty good putter, but I’ve really struggled this year. Probably the byproduct of playing a little less (2 kids under 4 will do that to you). That said, I was really excited to have the green grids as a little assist in my green reading. I found that on putts where the break was obvious, I didn’t really reference it much. I just trusted my eyes, feet, and course knowledge to make a confident read/stroke. However, there were a number of putts where the break was pretty subtle, or my eyes and feet weren’t on the same page. On those putts where I was less certain, or altogether unsure, I would reference the book for clarity. In my experience, when I’m unsure of the read I tend to have a hard time making an aggressive stroke and, often, default to a tentative “lag it close” stroke even on makeable length putts. The book not only allowed me to get more confident in my read, but also allowed for those tentative strokes to go away. So far, small sample size caveats apply, I’ve made more of those putts than before and that’s really what I wanted more than anything.

 

 

 

Pros:

-        Easy to understand

-        Elevation numbers

-        Yardages to bunkers/hazards

-        Yardages to carry bunkers/hazards

-        Ability to display slopes in fairways

-        Yardages to different sections of greens on par 3s

 

Cons:

-        Limited specific yardages to the green (no sprinkler head numbers)

-        No green depth/width on the tee-to-green pages

-        Could be too much information for “feel” players

-        A few of the back tee boxes are missing

 

Overall, The Book is awesome. Could it be more detailed tee-to-green? Sure. But at the end of the day, we’re not on Tour and just having the ability to get a yardage book for so many courses is a massive benefit golfers everywhere. I would honestly recommend them to anyone who is looking for additional knowledge of the courses they play. As mentioned previously, I used mine in a USGA qualifier earlier this summer when the slope feature on the rangefinder was disabled and still having those elevation numbers in the yardage book was so helpful. I have the regular yardage books for probably half a dozen courses and will continue to utilize them (and the greens books when allowed) during tournament play.

Edited September 7, 2023 by MichiganMan

[StrackaLine]

On 8/25/2023 at 1:41 PM, dmecca2 said:

If you're reading this, you are probably thinking about buying one for a course you have never played, or maybe even your own course. I'm sure you have questions, like me, and I hope I can answer them. Questions like, do these really pick up every break on the greens, how easy are they to read, will I even use it during the round, and more.

 

I received my book for my home course, Glen Oak CC, and I was impressed with the hole map right off the bat. Things like exact downhill/uphill numbers to the fairway from every tee box, for instance, are things that I kind of knew, but never had an exact number for. Especially on par 3's where I would guess things like, "this one plays almost 1 club longer," I now know that it plays 8 yards uphill. This will help me, and would definitely help more on a course I didn't know. Back to my first question, does this really pick up every break. I was skeptical about this, because there are a lot of tiny nuances on our greens. Things that members who have been there for 20 years still get wrong. I have 2 examples. Our 5th hole is relatively flat, but there is a very tiny hump on the right side that affects putts. The Stracka book picked up that hump. Another hole, our 12th, defies gravity. The entire slope of the land is left to right, but this green just doesn't do that. This is one of those holes where the members say, "everything breaks towards the clubhouse". Sure enough, the Stracka book shows that while the back of the green follows the general topography, the front breaks the opposite direction!

 

If you're like me, you've resorted to aimpoint. So you might say, why do I need a book when I can just read it with my feet. Or, won't a book slow down play? Well, the first green image is what I use on my longer putts. When I'm not confident in my feet, or I would be standing in someone else's line, I simply opened the book, checked the numbers, and used my fingers with the appropriate numbers. Boom, saved time.

 

My last question was, how often am I really going to use this? To be honest, I didn't use it every green. Sometimes I got up there, felt confident with my read, and went with it. Additionally, I didn't need to use it to map out approach shots, because I already know the general slope of every green. It's my home course after all. If I had the book for a course I was unfamiliar with, I would 100% use it to map out approach shots.

 

A couple of extras. They had our practice green. This was nice to practice using the book and finding where I was on the map faster. Practice makes perfect. Next, I love the yardage arcs on the course map. Knowing where 200, 250, and 300 are from the tee is huge.

 

Great feedback @dmecca2!!!  Thank you for your support!

[StrackaLine]

On 8/27/2023 at 10:35 AM, Jpowell2142 said:

Did a review/comparison to PuttView a little while back. 

 

Check it out here!

 

 

Great in depth comparison!  We pride ourselves in being the best book in golf!! We wouldn't have 600+ collegiate teams as customers if we weren't! 

[StrackaLine]

On 8/28/2023 at 12:10 PM, thaar said:

I received mine Thursday, but had Club Championship starting Friday so I didn't feel comfortable taking it out there as to not create any new distractions from something new and unfamiliar for me. I will be getting out this coming weekend though so I'm excited to use it. 

 

Admittedly, I don't have much experience with yardage books, so I was a bit overwhelmed and intimidated by it when I first opened it. Strackaline does have a tutorial video on their site which was useful, and they also include a quick reference guide in the back to help you understand the notations, so it's starting to make more sense now.

 

Overall, I am really impressed with the amount of detail it includes, as demcca2 noted above. The elevation changes data is going to be quite useful for me as are the green guides. There is one par 3 that has an elevated tee box, and I have clearly overestimated the amount of yards to take off - it will be interesting to see how it compares to a rangefinder with slope. My course's greens are quite undulating, and despite me playing there for several years, I still get baffled by some of my reads. There are times where my eyes and my feet don't necessarily agree, so it would be great to have some concrete data to help me sort out my putts. Another thing I really appreciate is they show the slopes around the greens, so you can better understand where to miss or not miss. 

 

I did download their app which is quite cool. If you have pin sheets available to you, you can enter them and everything will be set up for you in the app (or website). Then you simply indicate where your ball is and it will give you a read. You can do this on the fly too, but that may take a bit of time. You can also print them out which is a nice feature if you want more accuracy for the pin placements or have gone through the two books they provided.

 

 

The one potentially negative thing I did notice is that it hasn't been updated recently as my course had modified their bunkers a couple years ago on a couple holes. It's not a terribly big deal as they don't typically come into play for me, but it could definitely matter for other players. Might be a good idea to include the date the topography was taken on the book. I'm sure it's tough to keep up on course modifications for the thousands of courses they have information on without someone letting them know. They are currently redoing one of the par 3's, so next year it will change again.

 

I'll report back next week when I get a chance to put it in play. 

thank you for the great feedback!  We will make sure to get into your course and do a complete quality control check of each holes to capture any changes.  The book is ultimately meant to give you confidence in the reads you are usure about.  Appreciate your support!

[StrackaLine]

On 9/4/2023 at 9:50 AM, MichiganMan said:

I wanted to break down my Stracka review into two parts, since The Book has two pages for each hole: an overview page of tee-to-green and the green grids. First, I’ll go over my thoughts on the tee-to-green features. Then, I’ll add separate thoughts on the green grids and my experience with those.

 

Tee-to-Green

The first feature I love about the tee-to-green page is the elevation numbers. The elevation numbers in red indicate a downhill shot and the numbers in green indicate an uphill shot. Having those on the tee boxes is great because you can easily calculate those numbers into the yardages. The bottom of the page will show all of the available tee boxes on the holes and then with a marker (T2, T3, etc) show how much yardage to deduct for the forward boxes. For example, on the first hole at my course, the left bunker is a 291 carry from the gold tees, but from the back box it’s 20 yards downhill, making it a 271 carry. However, from the blue tees (T2) it’s also 20 yards closer, so now it’s only a 251 carry. Since a lot of courses I play here in North Carolina have considerable elevation changes, I really appreciate having that feature readily available.

 

 

Additionally, when you look at the fairway the elevation numbers will be present throughout the hole as the elevation changes. Sometimes that’s every 50 yards, sometimes that’s every 25 yards. One thing that I’ve found is that these numbers have been VERY helpful in choosing the right club to play into the greens. They’re especially helpful on par 3s as well. Speaking of par 3s, the book will show the yardage to different sections of the green, which is awesome for those times you get a tucked pin.

The books will have faint lines arched throughout the page that will show yardages from the tee and yardages from the green. These are helpful when you’re playing the hole for a number of reasons: 1) you can kind of get an idea for how far you want to hit it off the tee and 2) to cross reference with the slope numbers.

 

Overall, the tee-to-green page is great. There are a lot of really helpful features that I’ve utilized. Distance numbers to bunkers, carry numbers over bunkers, numbers to different sections of the fairway, different sections of greens on par 3s, the ability to display slopes in the fairways with the small arrows, the elevation numbers. There really are a lot of great features in the books.

My only criticisms of the tee-to-green features would be 1) limited number of specific yardages in the middle of the fairways (i.e. no markers for sprinkler heads) and 2) no green depth/width numbers. I do understand they’re mapping out thousands of courses and the sprinkler heads are probably unrealistic but that was a small bummer when I purchased one of the yardage books for a US Am qualifier this summer (USGA had a local rule banning greens books). The book was still very helpful but just made for some extra work on my end during the practice round. Even something as simple as green depth/width would be great.

 

Green Grids

There are 3 different e. However, there were a number of putts where the break was pretty subtle, or my eyes and feet weren’t on the same page. On those putts where I was less certain, or altogether unsure, I would reference the book for clarity. In my experience, when I’m unsure of the read I tend to have a hard time making an aggressive stroke and, often, default to a tentative “lag it close” stroke even on makeable length putts. The book not only allowed me to get more confident in my read, but also allowed for those tentative strokes to go away. So far, small sample size caveats apply, I’ve made more of those putts than before and that’s really what I wanted more than anything.

 

 

 

Pros:

-        Easy to understand

-        Elevation numbers

-        Yardages to bunkers/hazards

-        Yardages to carry bunkers/hazards

-        Ability to display slopes in fairways

-        Yardages to different sections of greens on par 3s

 

Cons:

-        Limited specific yardages to the green (no sprinkler head numbers)

-        No green depth/width on the tee-to-green pages

-        Could be too much information for “feel” players

-        A few of the back tee boxes are missing

 

Overall, The Book is awesome. Could it be more detailed tee-to-green? Sure. But at the end of the day, we’re not on Tour and just having the ability to get a yardage book for so many courses is a massive benefit golfers everywhere. I would honestly recommend them to anyone who is looking for additional knowledge of the courses they play. As mentioned previously, I used mine in a USGA qualifier earlier this summer when the slope feature on the rangefinder was disabled and still having those elevation numbers in the yardage book was so helpful. I have the regular yardage books for probably half a dozen courses and will continue to utilize them (and the greens books when allowed) during tournament play.

Great review and feedback!  Thank you for your detailed review and support.  As you stated, the books that have sprinkler head yardages are meant for the tour players.  We will make sure to go through your course to capture the missing back tees.  Thank you again. 

[dmecca2]

I would like to add an additional review. I used the book for 2 rounds last Friday and Saturday. I started to trust the book more during the round and learned how to quickly find where the pin was and where my ball was. I started to make putts and when combined with solid ballstriking, it was incredibly helpful to just know that I had the perfect read every time. I tied the course record on Friday and Saturday fired another solid 3 under par round. I am a true believer in the accuracy and ability this book gives you to read the greens.

 

One negative I had was that my father had a difficult time seeing the arrows on the more detailed image. Not much you can do there, as the small size is required by the USGA and the arrow size needs to be small to capture tiny breaks. Additionally, we had some work done on the back of our 15th green and I forgot. Blindly trusting the book at this point, I missed by a pretty wide margin. It was honestly a shock, because the book had been perfect up to that point. Again, nothing they can do there.

[vandyfan]

I ordered a Strackaline book for my club this week based on this testing so far. Thank you guys!

 

Update: I got it! I am not an official tester but played on Sunday and even though I struck the ball fairly poorly I had 29 putts (tied for my fewest putts on this course through 16 rounds). The one qualifier is I only hit 11 greens in regulation so I was about 2-3 greens below my average so that probably helped me get closer to the hole, etc. But I did have 4 birdies on the day which is about 2 more than average. 

 

Our club has greens that I find exceptionally difficult to read so this was very helpful. I canned a 50 footer that I read going one way and the book said the other and I trusted the book. I can't say there was a putt out there that didn't break the direction the book indicated. I am still learning the severity based on the % slope and distance between the topo lines but overall and impressive debut. 

 

 

Edited September 11, 2023 by vandyfan

[MichiganMan]

Played in the club championship over the weekend and wanted to add a couple items after some additional work with the book. As a note, our club has 36 holes with 18 holes having bent grass greens and 18 holes with Champion Bermuda.

 

1. In my experience, the greens books are more dependable on the bent grass greens. They are still reliable on the Champion Bermuda; however, anybody with experience putting Bermuda greens knows there is grain that bent grass doesn't have (some strains more than others). As a result of that, sometimes even though the books are right the putts don't follow through because the grain just doesn't allow the ball to move the way it should.

 

2. I continue to find the books to be incredibly reliable on putts where I have a hard time discerning with my eye which way the ball moves. Had a couple putts over the weekend that my eye saw moving one-way and the book had moving the other. I trusted the book every time and made a good share of them. Just need to get better at trusting them and making confident strokes. As previously mentioned, that's a problem for me that I'm trying to work on.

 

3. I think the biggest distance that I find the books to be helpful is between the 10-25 foot range. The range where if you can get the read right, you can make your fair share. Short putts I've always been pretty confident and long putts the make percentage is so low that it's more about lowering the 3-putt %. But for me and my game, I've noticed a pretty significant increase in confidence on those mid-range putts.

 

Although I didn't win, it certainly wasn't because of the putter and I will continue to recommend the books to anyone who asks. They're great!

[BagofToast]

I use these for collegiate competitions so thought I’d throw my 2 cents in here.  
 

They are very useful tee to green, especially if you’ve not played the course before. Perfect for picking targets, things you can carry or can’t reach etc. 

 

Now onto the green grids. I personally only really use the first one with the slope percentage on it. I find the accuracy of the slope to be VERY course dependent. At our home course it is very good, but at a course  we played last season they were not very accurate at all. Makes using it kind of sketchy because I don’t know if it’s right or not. That’s where practice rounds are helpful. 

 

These are the situations I use the book most (in order) 

1. Good and bad places to miss on the green, what is dead and what I can 2 putt or get up and down. 
2. Where to place tee shot. Particularly useful if I haven’t played the course. 
3. Uncertainty of read. If I’m not too sure on the read I’ll pull the book out to get a better idea. 
4. Confirmation of read. If I have a read but not 100%, I’ll confirm what I’m thinking with the grid. 
 

Hope that’s useful to anyone considering them. Overall I would recommend them. 

[StrackaLine]

On 9/8/2023 at 8:14 AM, dmecca2 said:

I would like to add an additional review. I used the book for 2 rounds last Friday and Saturday. I started to trust the book more during the round and learned how to quickly find where the pin was and where my ball was. I started to make putts and when combined with solid ballstriking, it was incredibly helpful to just know that I had the perfect read every time. I tied the course record on Friday and Saturday fired another solid 3 under par round. I am a true believer in the accuracy and ability this book gives you to read the greens.

 

One negative I had was that my father had a difficult time seeing the arrows on the more detailed image. Not much you can do there, as the small size is required by the USGA and the arrow size needs to be small to capture tiny breaks. Additionally, we had some work done on the back of our 15th green and I forgot. Blindly trusting the book at this point, I missed by a pretty wide margin. It was honestly a shock, because the book had been perfect up to that point. Again, nothing they can do there.

tying the course record with our book!!  That is huge dmecca2.  Thanks for your support and keep it up!!

[thaar]

I finally got out with the book for a round (I forgot it the one day I intended to use it 🤦‍♂️). I primarily used the green guide for putting and approach shots, aside from a couple shots that were uphill or downhill to determine how much yardage to add/subtract. I found it to be really useful despite me knowing the course fairly well. It certainly made me think more about where to aim on my approach shots/where not to miss - this will certainly help with course management moving forward.

 

I still don't have the green guide quite dialed in to fully understand the severity of slopes to get my line, but that will come with time. As MichiganMan noted, there were times my feet and/or my eye had a different line, and need to learn to trust the book to make a confident stroke. I need to work on is keeping my intended line with a good stroke on those times where my feet/feel don't agree, but I'll get there.

 

I would love our course to have pin sheets for our tournament as that would be incredibly useful to set up the green guides beforehand and print them out, but I'm not sure they'll go that far. I'm still going to ask. 

 

Overall, I will certainly continue to use the book as I think it will really help improve my scores. My goal next year is to win our Club Championship so this will play a good role in that, so long as our current champion gets on the Korn Ferry tour to give everyone else a chance 😂 - this year, he won by 15 strokes over 3 rounds at -16!

[vandyfan]

Again, I am not a tester but I am LOVING my book (greens only). The only time it gets dicey is when you have those locations that almost look like the bermuda triangle (just arrows going EVERY single direction) I have not quite figured out what to do there but that only comes up once or twice a round and that is me picking nits, honestly. The book has been right pretty much every time. 

 

See the blue center section for the kind of bermuda triangle area I am referencing. We have two-three greens like this so it gets dicey if you are putting across this ridge. 

Edited September 26, 2023 by vandyfan

[thaar]

That's awesome to hear. I have only used it one more time, but it certainly helps eliminate any doubt in my swing, aim, or line on the green to allow me to put a confident swing/stroke on the ball. I tend to be a bit self conscious on pace of play since I myself like to play pretty quickly, so there are times I feel like I'm spending too much time with the book trying to best understand it. I feel like it will get better with time though and be part of my routine. 

[FuzzyKnuckles]

Anybody have experience with the app? Thinking about buying it since I do not have a home course and play new courses all the time.

[stryper]

19 hours ago, FuzzyKnuckles said:

Anybody have experience with the app? Thinking about buying it since I do not have a home course and play new courses all the time.

As a previous tester, I posted some of my thoughts here:

 

https://forums.golfwrx.com/topic/1877552-member-reviews-strackaline-ultimate-member-testing-experience-see-what-members-are-saying/#comment-24231795

 

[johnsomp]

Is there a way to look and see when a particular course was added Or last updated? My course had some changes and I wonder if they are covered.

[MichiganMan]

On 9/28/2023 at 9:32 PM, johnsomp said:

Is there a way to look and see when a particular course was added Or last updated? My course had some changes and I wonder if they are covered.

 

When you go to the website there's no way to see when the books were updated. My course was completely renovated in 2019 and the books have been completely updated to show the changes to the golf course, but I think the only way you'd know for sure is to reach out to @StrackaLine directly.