RichL85

I am not a gambler. And leaving my company right now would, at least temporarily, cripple the department. There are only 4 of us, and one just went on medical leave for the next 3-6 months. Even if I wanted to ask for more, this would reflect pretty poorly on me with regards to the timing. Its not even a true significant pay increase. If I factor in the other perks of my current position against the new one, it is actually only a very small pay increase when I look more into it. With the added commute and the unknown regarding hours of work involved, my actual $/hr involved is more like a 9% increase at most and doesn't factor in the company vehicle and fuel perk I have now. Add in the uncertainty regarding the lawsuit, which apparently the company is already on their 3rd group of lawyers involved with that particular lawsuit, I'm not willing to risk my family's situation. Long story short, after some reflecting on both the numbers associated and my own personal feelings, I'm good where I'm at.

That's pretty much where I'm at. I don't know the full story behind the lawsuit, but the whole situation and meeting with the partners involved, I just get an uneasy feeling about the whole situation and company. On the other hand, I absolutely love my current company and the management staff above me. They treat me well, including the vehicle and fuel (in California that is a huge saving for me).

I'm stuck with a bit of a dilemma at the moment. I am not particularly looking for a new job as I enjoy my company and my current role, but I had an offer come through yesterday for a new position that wouldn't require me to relocate. It comes with almost a 20% pay increase, but about a 30 minute commute and need for another vehicle, compared to my current 12 minutes and company vehicle. The real part that worries me is that the company is currently in the middle of a lawsuit related to the sale of part of their business last year where some questionable accounting practices were discovered after the sale. I'm not sure how that will all play out but I'm pretty sure that I am not willing to take that risk.

10 and a half years of marriage, I'm definitely punching well above my weight in the relationship department. This one even (begrudgingly) agreed to move across the US with me when I took on my current job in 2019. I'm still not quite sure how I did it, and I hope she never figures it out either!

Last time I flew with my clubs it was my second checked bag, so it cost me $40 each way. This was with American. It was a work trip so they covered the first bag, I didn't push for the company to cover the baggage fee for my clubs. So like I said, if I'm playing one round during a trip, I'll just rent clubs because $80 and the hassle of getting my clubs through the airport is not worth it for just one round, maybe even two. Anything past that, I'll bring my clubs.

Interesting that a few of the things changed. I rented clubs from one of the other Disney courses in December of 2021 (Magnolia). Same Sim2 woods and hybrid, but they had M6 irons with some MG wedges. I won't swear to it, but I think it was the M6 gap wedge, with MG2 56 and 60 degree wedges, so no real complaints on the wedges. I'm with you on the weight of the iron shafts being a bit of an issue compared to the Modus 120 and KBS Tour 120 I've been playing. I believe I did comment when I posted about renting the clubs that the grips I got could have used replacing at the time, so at least that is something they seem to be looking at. I believe they gave me the TM Tour Response balls to use, but like you I brought some of my own just in case. Realistically, if I'm only going to get to play once while I'm in the area for work, I'd rent over taking my clubs with me. Different story if I'm getting to play a few rounds, so it's situational for me.

Only larger item I was looking at was the ShotScope LX rangefinder to match up with my H4. Had to cross that off the list since I got it for my birthday from the inlaws this morning. Back to the drawing board where I just want a relaxed day with the family.

I've been going to the range after work a few times this week and I can't even explain how happy I've been with the results. It's been the weirdest feeling for me to step up and not have 100 thoughts going through my head. Somewhat related to this, I think it's time to cut ties with the coach I've been working with for the past year. Nothing against him as an instructor, but it has been causing too many problems in my game. I've purposely not taken any video the last few trips to the range because I know that from a technical side my swing has flaws, but I'm getting to a place where I'm accepting that my swing is my swing.

Well, not much faster, but consistent. 108 on all three swings today. Small improvement with very little work put in so far. Hoping to see the bigger gains once the program transitions to the later phases.

All clubs in my bag are safe for the foreseeable future, but the grips are likely to get axed sooner rather than later. The standard PXG grips just aren't my favorite and I really want to go back to the SuperStroke Claw grip on the putter. The one questionable spot in the bag is the 3W, not because I have a problem with it, but more that at my usual course, I don't have a lot of need for it. There are a number of holes where driver and 3W off the tee are too long because of the dog legs, but only one hole where driver is too long off the tee, so the 3W sees at most usually two shots a round. I like the 3W and can usually hit it fine, but unless I start going to some other courses frequently, it's just an extra weight in the bag for the most part. One thing I really need to do for the upcoming season is decide on a single ball and use it consistently instead of changing every few rounds to "try something different". Hate to say it, but the coach I had been working with is definitely on the chopping block as of now.

Not entirely wrong in my opinion, but you also have to keep in mind that some people won't realistically be able to hit balls due to weather, etc. Not to mention the effects of temperature on ball speed. Using dry swings with no ball is a way to normalize the field there with what is available to everyone. It also kind of sets a ceiling on potential speed. I would guess that most would see some level of speed decrease whenever a ball gets in the way of a swing.

Overall opinion is that as expected, both are very good. The height of the 348 works a little better for me since getting height on the driver is one of my concerns, but I could play either one. I like the flight and spin of the 348 a little better, but that clicky sound annoys me a bit. It's fun to see the 388 spin back with the wedges, but it leaves me longer putts because I'm not used to that action. The durability of the covers on both have been better than a lot of balls I've tried, taking some abuse in the practice bunker without much damage showing. As far as my personal opinion, I would make the 348 my gamer and adjust to the sound, but I'm cheap and for my current level, there is not *that* much difference between these and some of the other options. I absolutely will say that I like the 348 better than say the Maxfli Tour X, but at almost twice the cost, the diminishing returns kicks in and it's simply not twice as good for me. If I happened to get a job like one of the guys I got paired up with last weekend that gets balls provided by his company for free, I would absolutely switch to the 348 for the performance. But for my money, there are better options from a price/performance ratio standpoint.

Took both balls to a nearby short 9 hole course (mostly par 3s with 2 pars 4s). Longest hole is 400 yards, but six of the holes are under 110 yards. The height difference off the driver is impressive to see how much higher the 348 goes. I even see some extra height off the irons, though it's not as pronounced. I didn't take anything longer than my 5-iron today and would likely pick a ball based on the short game more than how it performs off the tee. As far as the head to head goes, the 348 beat out the 388 by one stroke, but it was back and forth throughout. The 388 spun back more than I am used to on a number of the full wedge shots, but nothing I couldn't adjust to. I actually had earphones in the whole time listening to music and couldn't "feel" any real difference between the two balls. My perception of the "feel" difference is almost entirely dependent on the sound difference between the two.

I've been busy with work trying to get things taken care of before my vacation week and then had the kids all week so I haven't hit a ball since the last round I played. Best I could do today was to set up the net in the yard and take some swings. It was a very uneventful practice session. Basically hit 3 or 4 half punch shots, then one full swing trying to work on feeling like the arms stay back as long as possible and allowing the rotation to bring them around rather than trying to create all the speed in my arms. On an unrelated note, I feel like I definitely have a visual connection in my swing that I have to figure out how to get over. The tendency of my brain is to "hit" the target I'm looking at rather than swinging through and sending the ball to a distant target. The fact that I'm usually looking at the front tip of the ball translates to my body trying to release the club and bottom out the swing right at the front of the ball. This can have varied results depending on the day. Today I just messed around with finding a spot that was a different color to focus on about 4 inches in front of the ball. Felt weird to swing and not really see the ball, but in some ways it helped. Hopefully things will cooperate and I can get out on the course next week while I'm off work.

Nobody near me had them in stock, so I got lazy and ordered three different sizes to try when I experimented with them. Not the feel for me personally. Their sizing would fit me into a Large grip, but that hurt my hands quite a bit. The small was better as far as a fit for me, but I just really didn't like the feel of the grip. It reminds me of Winn grips and I have never gotten along with them. Also, the feel of the clubs get a little weird depending on the model because of the weight of the grips.

Heating went out last week. HVAC was finally able to check it out on Tuesday and found a cracked heat exchanger and it needs a new motor. Now it's in the landlord's hands to decide what to do about it. In the meantime, it has been getting down into the 30s at night so the house has been a bit cold in the morning. Nothing like many of you in colder climates, but enough to be uncomfortable and bring out the anger in the wife and kids.

It's possible, but the score was just overall better with the V1x, even though I have more experience with the front 9. My course has three different 9's and we ended up playing a different 9 than I usually do for the back. I felt like I was swinging better on the front 9, but scored better on the back. If I had to guess, it probably is mostly just that the 348 rolls out a bit more on the greens and my unfortunate tendency is to come up short on chips and pitches anyway. Left myself easier times finishing out with the 348.

Got out to play 18 before the sun went down yesterday. Played the 388 on the front and 348 on the back. It was a little cool in the 40s and 50s throughout the round with 5-10 mph winds most of the day. I'm not a fan of the clicky sound of the 348 off the wedges and putter, but at the end of the day, it was a good amount longer off the tee and I scored better with it. Comparing best drives on each side, the 348 had one that was 17 yards longer, but the 388 did have the highlight shot of the day on the par 3 5th. Back 9 was 4 shots better than the front, so even though I like the sound and feel of the 388 better, the results seem to favor the V1x for me.

Took a few dry swings after my range session yesterday. Up a few mph to 107 now with no real training so far. Considering this followed a gym session, PT appointment, and range session, I like seeing some small improvement so far.

I was advised not to do any speed training for the first 6-8 weeks of the program I'm currently going through. Apparently I'm supposed to learn to swing correctly and use all of my body instead of just my hands before we start worrying about ramping up the speed. Realistically, I'm expecting to see a decent bump from the movement sequencing alone. My current issue is that my arms outrace the torso, so my chest rotation is from the arms pulling me around instead of the torso pulling the arms. We will see. I know I've been focusing on trying to keep my arms as patient as possible at the range and so far I'm starting to see an extra club or more of distance with a few recent tweaks. It's a struggle for me to fully click with the idea that swinging hard has nothing to do with swinging fast.

Went to the range yesterday to try some things out and it felt extremely strange. Learned plenty of things from the K-vest analysis I had done a few weeks ago, so I'm starting to work on fixing the timing of things. Also turns out that I was way too close to the ball. Like, 5 inches too close, so that put a lot of things out of order. Found out that I was setting up something like 12 degrees open as well. It was just a mess. So went about taking easy swings focusing on setting up the correct distance from the ball, doing everything in my control to feel like I was lengthening my spine, setting up more square, and going from there. Hit a few off the toe to start, but was starting to get it figured out. It felt like it was helping to allow me to turn through the shot rather than flipping at the ball, but I didn't get any video. The person I'm working with mentioned that my game may take a bit of a dip while we start to work on physical limitations so I don't want to be overthinking the swing too much right now. Just stick to working on basics and setup and if the ball goes the right direction great, if not, it will get there. Plenty of places to make improvements.

Likely stupid, but legitimate question. Are we going with playing speed or "let it rip" speed. I ask because last week I had another session and when hitting drives, my swing speed was averaging 95mph, and I know a huge part of this is mental and sequencing. We also took the ball away and took some swings. Basically, just swing for the fences with no worries about the consequences. Three of those swings averaged 104.7. That's a fairly large difference for my starting speed. Feel free to change my starting speed if that makes more sense. I'm honestly just not sure if this is all about max speed, or actually useful playing speed?

Took some time at the range today to see where my swing was at. As expected, things weren't too good. Nothing too horrible, just a work in progress. In the first stages of working on things, so it's expected for things to be out of sync until I can reorganize the new movements. Just mostly taking easy swings and focusing on a few specific things. After that spent some time with the Titleist proto balls over on the putting green and short game areas. I'm in a weird spot on those things. I prefer the feel and especially sound of the 388 (ProV1), but it would honestly be a much bigger adjustment to the extra spin compared to the 348 (ProV1x). The 348 just has a bit of a harsh clack sound to me, but I like how it performs in the short game. I'm used to some roll out, so it's closer to what I am familiar with, but I definitely like the tactile experience of the 388 better. I've been dealing with sick kids at home so haven't had the chance to play some full rounds with them yet. I suspect that the V1x will be a better performing ball for me, but we will see how it goes. Durability has been good on both balls with them only showing small amounts of damage after taking some abuse from the wedges.

So to give a small piece of info, I'm going to be working with a physical therapist nearby that specializes in sports performance and primarily golf. To start with, we went through the MyTPI assessment and used a K-vest to get all of the important pieces of my swing measured. It was not a good swing day for me, but it did show the areas where I need work. The first couple of weeks are going to be mostly various stretches to increase general mobility, then moving into working on strengthening the necessary stabilizers for the golf swing. Finish up some overall specific strength training. The whole program is going to be 12 weeks, so my game will probably take a hit for the first few weeks until I can relearn to sync the swing up with the newer movement. Sequencing my swing should give me a solid speed boost even without the other pieces, so it will be fun to see where I can get to.