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MaxEntropy

 
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Everything posted by MaxEntropy

  1. The past couple weeks at work have been pretty insane. Have I missed anything? My wife has been out of town for almost 3 weeks now, so I haven't been to the gym (she has the membership, I'm a guest). My only "workouts" have been my weekly pickleball games. I'm kind of excited to get this started, but no eta that I've heard on the new app release.
  2. First round of the season in the books! @MattF and I got out at Windmill Lakes. Very pleasant day that ended up in 60's. I started well with a birdie and a par. More often than not I am very happy with a bogey on #1, so the birdie was very nice. Drove the ball fairly well, especially for first day out. Irons were pretty terrible and short game was, as expected, inconsistent. 2 very big number and too many doubles, but otherwise feel pretty good about it. Ended up with a 96.
  3. I've been playing the TP5x for the last couple years but have also mixed in the AVX and Tour B RX. Like the OP, I keep coming back to TM. Last week Dick's sent a coupon for 4 free TP5/TP5x - all they had was a four pack of TP5 (2 of which are Pix). I usually prefer the x variants, but will be interested to see how these work. I have played the Pix before, but my only complaint with them is during flight is the design generally makes the ball appear a little darker, so it is harder for me to track on an overcast day.
  4. I think I would actually prefer to do most of the stuff at home, but I will have to see what I might need to purchase if I'm going that route. I've seen reference to resistance bands and "adjustable" dumbbells. I have the bands, but may need to buy some of the other stuff.
  5. While we are in our holding pattern, I thought I'd give more details on what my current workouts look like and some insight into my psychology.... About 6 years ago, a gym near us was running a special for memberships. Included was a session with a personal trainer to help develop a workout plan. She had us splitting our workouts into blocks that we could do as much or little of as time permitted. The blocks would entail 5-10 minutes of cardio (bike, treadmill, elliptical, stepper) followed by 3 weight exercises. These weight exercises could be generally categorized as shoulders/arms, core, hips/glutes/legs. She also suggested rotating between the three exercises continuously for 3 sets instead of doing all 3 sets of each exercise back-to-back-to-back (mostly to keep us moving and keep our heart rate elevated). Getting through all the blocks she established would take about an hour and a half, maybe a little longer. I still have a picture of the sheet she created for me on my phone and reference it frequently. I believe I mentioned in my intro, but just in case, I am not a gym rat and don't like going to the gym (in fact, I rather loath it). I know I need to go, though. I can't normally last more than an hour before I get too bored, so I pick and choose which blocks to do on any given day (also depends on which machines or areas of free weights are available at the time). Pre-pandemic, my wife and I were going to the gym 3 times per week. These days, I'm lucky to make it once per week. I know this needs to change and it will change once we get going on the review. Upon reflection, I suspect much of my attitude towards working out is a result of preferring short-term gratification that things like a goal, hoop, net, base, hole, etc. provide. It is much easier for me to motivate to go to a gym when the results start becoming apparent. Unfortunately, the results just don't come when I don't go as regularly as needed. It's a catch-22: no results = little motivation and little motivation = no results. Fire away with any questions/comments!
  6. I agree with everyone on this point - maybe because we are "of a certain age." I'm hoping I can have my wife do some videos covertly.
  7. My Introduction is up. Check it out and ask questions/provide feedback.
  8. I do not have the Stack System, but I do have SuperSpeed. It will be interesting to see if I might be able to integrate it. We are supposed to have a call with Mike Carroll at some point. I will definitely ask if he has any recommendations on how best to do it.
  9. Introduction First of all, a huge thanks to MyGolfSpy and Fit For Golf. I was very excited about the prospect of this test when it popped up – as an aging golfer, anything I can do to improve my strength and flexibility should prolong my golf “career.” My name is Blake. I am currently 56 years old and live in Akron, Ohio. We are fortunate to have no shortage of quality golf courses within about an hour drive. The biggest downside? Winter. I haven’t set foot on a course since early November, and we likely have about another month until we can play. I started playing somewhat seriously after I graduated from college and got my handicap to the 15-18 range. Life happened and I took about a 10-year break where I only touched my clubs a couple times. As my kids got older, I started playing again and really got bit by the bug and have played as much as I can for the last 8-ish years. For the last few years, that has been about 50 times on the course (~30 for league nights + ~20 additional rounds). Last summer was a very good season for me – I broke 80 for the first (and second) time and got my handicap as low as 7.4. Currently, I am sitting around 11. The strengths of my game are most definitely short game and putting, but my scores are mostly dictated by how well I am driving the ball (i.e. keeping it in play/avoiding penalties). I can salvage a score around the greens, but my best scoring days are when driver behaves. I am long for my age/handicap as Arccos has my current driving average at 253 yards. This is down about 10 yards from my peak after finishing the SuperSpeed review in 2020. (This drive ended up 299 down the middle) I have followed Mike Carroll on Twitter for a few years and almost pulled the trigger on his app a couple times, but just never really got around to it. The program offers a variety of plans depending on your goals. Since we will more than likely not be starting until around the time golf starts again, I will be focusing on the “In Season” plan. This is subject to change without notice, of course. In general, my fitness level is decent for my age, but I am overweight. I am about 6'1" and currently weigh around 235 lbs and was as low as 210 lbs in 2019. 210 isn't bad for my frame. In 2018-19, my wife and I were going to the gym 2-3 times per week and, even though I did not really pay much attention to what I ate, I seriously tracked the amounts in my FitBit app. A trip to Vegas and the pandemic were my undoing. These days, we don’t make to the gym as often and I don't eat well. For family health reasons, my wife has been out of state for the better part of 3 of the last 6 months. I struggle to eat healthy when left to my own devices, mostly out of convenience. During the off-season last year, I started playing pickleball at least once per week. I enjoy it and it is a better cardio workout for me than anything I do at the gym. I also referee for a youth basketball league during the winter, which also helps keep me moving and is a decent cardio workout. My wife has a gym membership that allows me to tag along for free and I can do band and medicine ball work at home. My goals/expectations for the program are (in my perceived order of importance): 1) Increased strength 2) Improved flexibility 3) Weight loss I know Fit For Golf is not a weight loss program, but I am hoping it will be a welcome side-effect of doing more regular workouts.
  10. I'm with you. Almost everyone also has a putter with striking similarities in appearance to the Spider line. Why have there been no lawsuits?
  11. If you guys only knew.... I suppose "good" is a relative term, right @MattF. I shouldn't pick on him, he did beat me by about 10 strokes at Torrey on his sim just after Christmas.
  12. I'm somewhat similar. I generally hit my hybrids ok, but can't hit a 5i anymore. In trying to find a suitable replacement, I got a 7w, but that is basically the same distance as my 3h. In general, the 7w is straight as a string and nice and high. I'll be looking to try either a 5h or a 9w at some point this year. Like many of the others, I just don't have the opportunity to hit a 3w much. I still like having it in the bag and am pretty good with it, though.
  13. The second it stops being fun, I will likely stop. Even when I'm playing poorly, the "fun" for me is to see if I can turn it around and at least close pretty well. Unfortunately, there are just those days that nothing I do will turn it around. It's still fun, though. Last summer was sort of an exception - I went through a nice hot streak mid-summer with 2 rounds in the 70's (had never broke 80). I was starting to think I had it figured out and my handicap dropped to around 8. Even though I know better, I allowed my expectations to become unrealistic, so when the inevitable bad rounds came, I was not mentally prepared for them and my attitude showed it. Won't happen again.
  14. Has anyone ever tried these golf balls? I received an email this week about a deal on them (unfortunately, the deal did not include their "tour-level" offering). I decided to look a little deeper and found that they are manufactured by the South Korean tire company Nexen. Even though my gamer is currently TaylorMade (although I've played Srixon a couple years and will be starting this year deciding between TP5x and Tour B RX), I feel tire makers like Bridgestone and Sumitomo (Srixon) are better suited to make decent balls than some random start-up or OTC. If they don't make their own polymers, they have established relationships with suppliers that should allow them to be more demanding on specs and quality. They also have a great knowledge of rubber and polymer science that should allow them to get to the "decent ball" level pretty quick. The only downside I could see is that the tour offering is priced at around $50/dozen, so the motivation to try them is not quite there for me, but I still find them intriguing (strange name aside).
  15. Thanks, gentlemen! Fortunately, I don't feel (or act) as old as the calendar says I am.
  16. What is happening in pro golf right now seems strangely familiar to me.... Please allow me to digress. In the early- to mid-90's, the American open-wheel racing organization known as CART, was on the cusp of becoming very popular. They had a good mix of oval races, natural terrain road courses, city street circuits, and the Indy 500. TV ratings rivaled NASCAR and international interest was starting to make a dent in Formula 1 (to the point that the FIA took steps to limit what CART could do internationally). The then owner of Indianapolis Motor Speedway (Tony George) thought he should have more say in the future direction of the series. The CART board (mostly made up of team owners) didn't agree. Eventually, Tony George founded his own series (IRL) and effectively locked the CART teams out of the Indy 500 by guaranteeing 25 of the 33 starting spots to IRL teams. Without their showcase event, the CART series started to wither - TV packages were hard to come by (without the 500), ultimately resulting in having to buy time to get on TV. Without the big-name drivers (Andretti, Unser, Fittipaldi, Rahal, etc.) the IRL struggled to gain any traction. Eventually, the 25/8 rule was relaxed and the CART teams slowly started going back to Indy - the lure of the 500 was too strong. Neither series exists anymore. Roger Penske was able to buy the speedway and the series that was formerly known as the IRL for pennies on the dollar. Now we are back to having a unified series, but nobody watches or cares. There are not a lot of direct parallels that I can see, but I believe the existence of both tours will hurt pro golf just like the existence of two "premier American open wheel racing series" was not viable. Never mind the amount of fans that were chased away by the "war" - eventually all the vitriol gets tiring. If anyone else is familiar with this story, I will admit my bias for CART and my recollections are likely clouded by that preference (in addition to being 25-ish year-old memories). I don't watch much golf on TV anymore - just the majors, so I don't really care much about LIV/PGA. Maybe that makes me a casual fan, but wars like this are stupid. In this case, the Rahm's, Phil's, DJ's, etc. are going to be the clear winners ($$$$), but the fans will likely lose.
  17. I once played a course in Luxembourg that had a front 12, back 6. Presumably the new calcs would better be able to handle strange things like this.
  18. At least you have an excuse. Major swing changes can have that effect. I nearly tied your score earlier this year without any changes.
  19. Got out with @MattF and @DiscipleofPenick for the last planned round of the year at Windmill Lakes. I finally figure out what I have been doing with my irons the last few months and hit them better than I have in a long time. All but 1 or 2 were very solid. The problem with that was I was long on quite a few greens. Driver was mostly well behaved, short game was pretty gross, but given all the leaves on the greens, I didn't really care. Ended up with a +14 84, which I will gladly take at this course.
  20. By this time of year, I am usually ready for a little break, if for no other reason than to clear my mind. Sometimes I am guilty of having too many thoughts going through my head that will usually reset with a little break. In about a month I will be ready to go again and be looking forward to spring. I hate that I have no way to do anything other than putting practice. Our garage and basement have too little head room for full swings with any club, so it is not unusual for me to not touch a club until the weather breaks in the spring.
  21. I did manage to get another league 9 in last night. It was 43 degrees with a decent breeze and a very soft course when we tee'd off, so a little brisk. Other than the first hole, driver was very good. Putter was also very good as I made a couple lengthy putts. Irons were very meh and short game was average. Ended up with 6 bogies and 3 pars. Given the conditions, I will gladly take that score for the last round of the year. It started snowing about 3 hours after we finished and we have an inch or 2 on the ground right now.
  22. While we theoretically have another league night left, the weather for next week is looking pretty iffy so last night may have been the last round for the year. I played pretty well and shot a +6 41 with a birdie. Putting was kind of sketchy - I lipped out a 10-footer for birdie and missed two 3-4 footers while making a 35-ish footer for birdie. Distance control was very good on long putts, I just struggled to get the short putts started on the proper line. Approach game was mediocre, as usual. Driver was good and short game was pretty good although the greens were very soft and I my brain could not convince my body to hit the ball a little further than I would typically want/need to.
  23. I ended up in the swail. It's deep enough I could not see the surface of the green on my second shot and came up a bit short with the chip. Got my easy par, though.
  24. I've had a couple eagles on par 5's and a hole-in-one, but I have never had an eagle on a par 4. I HAVE 3-putted for par on a couple par 4's . The putt @DiscipleofPenick made on the hole was damn impressive. It broke 3-4 feet and if it missed the hole, could have ran a looong way by. He had perfect line and speed.
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