TheCanadianBogeyman

I've been thinking about starting to walk more courses to get a bit more active. I would have a problem carrying a full 18 due to some back issues, so I was looking at push carts. I figured I was set to buy a 3 wheel swivel, but then I came across this 4 wheel swivel from CaddyTek. CaddyTek CaddyCruiser ONE Tour – Caddytek I was wondering if anyone has any experience with it, or thoughts on how the mobility and stability would be vs a 3 wheel swivel?

I wouldn't worry about getting them fit before your irons, as long as you keep the gapping in mind. For example, if you intend to be looking at irons that are more traditional lofted, you might go with a 52, 56, 60 wedge set up. Where as if you are looking at sets that are stronger lofted, than maybe you'll be looking at a wedge set up more like 48/50, 54 58. I made that mistake a couple years ago, playing 52 gap wedge. I was getting back into the game, looking at game improvement clubs, and didn't realize that the PW of the set I was getting fit for was 43. I ended up with a huge gap, and for that year closed it by slotting in a 48 wedge. The problem was I didn't have room at the top of my bag with 5 wedges at the bottom. I bought some new wedges this winter, knowing that I was going to get fit in the spring again for irons, but I was a little smarter about it. Now my PW is 44, and my GW is 50. I put the 50 in the bag because I was pretty comfortable with a PW 46-43, and didn't mind if I had to get it bend a degree or two to get my gapping right, and all the iron sets I wanted to try had PW with lofts in that range. You can definitely have lofts adjusted, but you may run into problems if you have a 10 degree gap and are bending clubs to close that much of a span.

Does anyone else have trouble syncing following a round. I have a H4, and after each round, I have to try multiple times to connect the unit to my phone so I can sync rounds. The app will either crash, or the unit won't connect, or it will say connected, but not give me the option to sync rounds. I am always able to fix it, but it usually involves a sequence of restarting the H4, restarting my phone, and/or restarting the app, sometimes several times. Although I have always been able to fix the issue, it is getting really tiring to have to go through this at the end of every round.

True. I get the purpose, but it's incredibly dated. Most of the time, you need two way communication in healthcare. With the exception of emergency pages, usually when someone gets a page, the first thing they do is grab a phone and call back to ask for more info on why they were paged. It's just very redundant.

I would agree that it's most likely your swing that has faltered a little. For reference, my driver swing speed is 95-105mph depending on how my body if feeling that day. I have played low compression and high compression balls. I'm sure that there is a difference in overall distance, but after a year of playing around with different balls, neither end of spectrum made a significant change in my scores. I typically shoot mid 80s to low 90s, and my swing is nowhere near consistent enough for it to make a dramatic difference which ball I play (from off the tee that is). Now, I play what ball I like the feel of most. Lately that's been the TM tour response stripe because I like the alignment aid. It shaves off more strokes putting for me, and I've seen no appreciable distance loss from playing a chrome soft X or TP5X (other balls where I liked the alignment aid). I did go through a period off the tee where I had balls dropping out of the sky when I was working on getting rid of my slice. Just as gavinski91 said, once I got on a sim, I found that my spin rate was super low. After shallowing out my path, I was hitting spin rates of around 1100-1400. I changed the loft on my driver, and kept working on the swing, and things worked out. Lastly, I don't know if this applies to you, but my last few rounds have not been as good as the beginning of the year. I'm loosing the draw I worked so hard to get over the winter and am making worse contact. I'm pretty sure it's because in the spring, I was fresh off of weekly practice on my swing mechanics. Now, I have played weekly, but not done any meaningful dedicated practice in almost 2 months. So it's easy for your swing to change if you aren't paying attention. YMMV.

I can understand where you are coming from. But I work in public healthcare, where some people still use PAGERS! So I'm never too surprised when technology isn't where I think it should be. I imagine its mostly about cost/profit issues. I'm sure they CAN make something that works better. But I'm also sure that it would be prohibitively expensive for a lot of golfers. I would guess that Shotscope and Arrcos are the results of what tech is affordable, that also, technically works, even if it isn't optimal. Speaking as a Shotscope H4 user, I can say that I don't find it cumbersome to use. It's become habit for me now, and part of my pre-shot routine when I am standing behind my ball to tap the sensor. So much so that I occasionally will wonder after a shot if I remembered to tap my club at all. I usually do have to edit post round, and I find that more of a chore, but I usually am out only by a shot or two where I pushed the wrong button for number or putts or a penalty stroke, and then to go put in my positional shots and ensure the GPS picked up the shots just off the green properly so my putts per hole are correct. I've no doubt that it will improve, but I would be surprised to find a meaningful improvement in the next couple of years at the same price point.

I think it's worth it to at least try in a fitting. I hit a 3H and 7W about the same carry, but the 7w is a much steeper landing angle. I feel like I am much more confident stopping the ball on the green with it.

I think you should keep them. You may be able to pick up a used set for less money, but as you said, these are fit to you. So you might not hit the other set as well, and if you only play infrequently, then it's going to be that much less enjoyable. If you were buying a set each year, then I might say sell em, but presumably you intend to play golf for a long time, and those irons will be just as good in 5 or 10 years, and who knows how much more you might be able to play in years to follow. I would look at it like owning a classic car. You might not drive it as often, but it's a treat every time you do. If it were me, instead of feeling guilty that I don't get to play them that much, I would be smiling every time I got out because I was playing with clubs that I really liked.

I there needs to be another shot type available. Par 5s aren't really meant to be on the green in two, so even if you're not not intending to be on the green, it is most likely still a full swing shot. As I understand it, positional shots don't count the distances in AVG/PAVG right? And most of the time I would say that my second shot into a par 5 is representative of my full swing distance.

Sometimes it just takes a while for people to learn. I used to be that guy. Lying to myself because I was trying to fit myself into a certain product I wanted. Now I would rather brag about being on the fairway even if its because I'm playing game improvement irons. I'm thinking about picking up one of the Ping ChipR when they come out to see if it can help my scrambling. Anything to help my game these days.

I didn't know whether to like or hate this comment. I have not put a single positional shot in. Somehow I completely glossed over that as a thing to do. Thank you very much for that info, although now I'm dreading going back through my rounds and trying to remember which shots were positional and which were just bad. Would you put in a second shot on a par 5 as a positional shot if you were not trying to reach the green?

I think it depends on how much ahead he is finishing. For example, if I have a partner who is just off the green, and is walking back to the cart to grab his putter, or if he isn't ready to take his shot, I will happily putt to keep pace of play moving. But I'm not walking up to the green when I have playing partners still hitting their approach shots. Or if they are chipping and ready to go in a reasonable amount of time, I'm not trying to hit before them just to finish up the hole first.

When you use distance to guide your club selections, are you using the average distance, or the performance average? Or somewhere in the middle? I have a considerable difference in both those stats. For example, I would say I carry my 7 iron around high 150s to low 160s. According to shotscope, my average distance for the club is 145, while my performance average is 172. If I were hitting to a pin at 145, I would never pull out a 7, as I could fly the green easily if I hit it well. But I also wouldn't think to pull out the 7 if I had a pin at 172, because I feel like I would have to muscle the hell out of the club to get it there.

I definitely intend to pick up a ChipR when they are available. I chip ok, but not often close enough to one putt. Without a doubt I have the most success with a 9 iron bump and run, but I don't ever feel comfortable hitting it with the sole flat on the ground, and any time I move closer and have a more upright club, I tend to blade it. So I'll be giving the chipper a try and see if it can shave a few strokes off. If it does, I could easily remove my 3 wood or possibly one of my higher lofted wedges.

I joined the shotscope family this year with the purchase of the H4. I've played about 20 rounds with it so far, and really enjoy going through all the statistics about my game. I'm trying to find the best way to go about taking advantage of all those numbers to actively improve my game. Do you guys mostly use the performance stats to guide your practice in terms of which areas to focus on? Do you use them to make on course decisions (ie. if most of your drives are missing right, do you aim more to the left to compensate)? Do you just enjoy looking at the stats but don't really use it to change your game at all?

I used to only have one or two brands back when I was younger and liked certain brands because of what or who I associated with them. Now I just play what works. I tend to get along well with Callaway drivers, so I usually try those first when I'm in the market for a new one. Irons I try everything I can get my hands on. Wedges I have had great luck with Cleveland (particularly the CBX lineup/evolution has been great). Ultimately, I am no longer brand loyal, I just try and fit the club to my game.

I've tried a number of grips over the last two years. I definitely prefer a softer grip over a cord grip. Can't get along with any wraps. The Winn Dritac isn't bad, but my two favorites are golfpride CP2 pro, and the Lamkin Sonar+. The Lamkin has the perfect balance of softness without ever feeling mushy.

Agreed. I tried moving the ball way forward in my stance last year to hit more up on the ball. All it did was exacerbate my slice because of the where I was hitting the ball in my swing arc. I ended up moving the ball back to original position, and working on my swing consistency and path. Wasn't until I worked out a lot of other flaws in my swing, that I saw an improvement this year from moving the ball a tiny bit forward to hit up on it more. Shallowing out my path was much much more beneficial and made a much bigger impact on my launch conditions.

I used to play only a 5 wood because I couldn't reliably hit a 3 wood off the deck. My swing speed isn't that fast, around 100mph driver. But I never really liked hitting the 5 wood off the tee if my driver was having an off day. This year I have switched things up. I now have a 3 wood in the bag for tight fairways off the tee, and a 7 wood in the bag for off the deck. I tried a 5W in my fitting, and while I did sacrifice some distance from the 5W, it wasn't much (maybe 5 yards on average, 7-9 yards on a perfectly flushed hit with the 5W). But the difference was that the 7W was so easy to hit. I'm sure my average yardage wouldn't be much different in real life, as I hit that 7W way more consistently. So now I play a 3W/7W setup and am liking the results. If I am further than a 7W distance from the green, I just accept that its out of reach for me, because the chances of me hitting my 3W flush while under pressure aren't great.

I have something like the Nickel retriever on the end of my putter. I don't know the brand, got it at the local golf shop for like $5. I've had recurrent back injuries over the last few years, and last summer when I picked golf back up I tweaked it picking a ball out of the cup. So I headed down to pick up one of these. I still CAN bend over, but usually if I need to touch the ground (ie. placing a tee) I squat down rather than bend at the waist. Putting one of these on has been great for me. Just means I have to bend over that much less during a round, which means my back feels that much better after. Honestly, when I read this thread, initially I was pretty shocked at how mad people were getting about these devices. But although I always take care to pick up my ball gently, I know not everyone would. When I think of the number of people I have seen leaving cigarette butts on tee boxes, not raking bunkers, not fixing divots, not fixing pitch marks on greens, or abusing golf carts... well ya, I can definitely see people wrecking cups with these devices. Bottom line, if it helps you, great! But like anything else on the course, respect your surroundings and take care of where you play.

I never used to warm up before a round. However, I've had recurrent back injuries over the last few years, and if I don't warm up first now, I'm very stiff and tentative for the first few holes. I always grab a small bucket of balls, and hit gap wedge (usually some pitches moving into full swing), mid iron, long iron, and a couple driver. My striking doesn't improve any, and I'm not trying to work on anything in my swing, its just a progression that gradually lets me ramp my speed up to a point where my body feel comfortable at full speed going to the first tee. Sometimes I don't even use the full bucket of balls, I just quit when my body feels loose. Then I hit the putting green for whatever time I have left before tee off and try to get the speeds and my start line down.

My truly great shots usually come when I get into 'well, screw it' mode. My last one was while I was playing a particularly poor round a few weeks ago. Stepped up to a par 4 halfway through the back 9, and over drew the ball into the rough, then toed my approach to the side of the green into a sort of grass bunker. Now I'm about 3 feet below the level of the green, which is about 7-8 feet away from my ball, and short sided with the pin only a yard and half from the fringe. I said screw it, and proceeded to hit a perfect flop shot. Straight up in the air, dropped down and spun to 6 inches from the hole for a tap in par save. My playing partner burst out laughing, because of course I would hit an amazing shot like that when my score is already trash.

I've grabbed average carry distances a few different ways. First, when I got fit for new irons, I did a gapping session with the fitter when they came in. Second, where I live, with it snowing all winter, indoor golf is the only option for half of the year. You can either pay to play a round or hit balls on a sim range. So every couple of months, while practicing, I will do my own gapping session. It's not perfect, as they aren't top quality sims, and I'm not using my gamer ball, but for my level of consistency, it's close enough that I can make a good approximation on course. Lastly, I have been using a shotscope GPS this year to track my game. It only gives me total distance, but for example, if I think my 7 iron carries about 160, and my measured total distance is 165-170, I know I'm not far off of what I think my carry distance is.

My PW is 44. I had a problem with gaps when I played a 52/56 wedge setup. This year I have changed to a 50/54/60. Between my 50 and my PW is a little more of a gap than I like, but I find if I choke up on my PW by about an inch, then its a perfect middle distance. I've also been experimenting with a wedge matrix from PW down, and it has helped me become more consistent with all my yardages on those wedge shots.

I recently got more honest about what I needed in my bag vs what I thought I wanted. Over the last couple months, I have replaced my 4 iron with a 4 hybrid. For me that's about a 190-195yrd carry. My 3 wood carry is about 220-225 off the tee. I'd love to be able to hit it well off the deck, but the reality is that it just doesn't work most of the time. While I really like my 4 hybrid, it has a pretty long roll out. I tried a driving iron, but that was worse for roll, and harder to hit. Eventually after me trying to make something work, my fitter had me try a 7 wood. Magic! It carries around 200-205 for me, but the landing angle is almost what my 7 iron is, and it's way way easier to hit off the deck than my 3 wood. I've only had it in the bag for a couple of rounds so far, but it is fast becoming a go to club.