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Congrats, man! Must have felt awesome. I'm still waiting for that glorious "everything is working" moment...

I've been able to play quite a bit over the past 10 days, playing six 18-hole rounds and one nine-hole round. All in all, I've played pretty well considering it is still fairly early in the season and that I've had exactly one range session since it stopped snowing. I had a goal of hitting a single digit handicap this season, but at the moment it is trending in the wrong direction. While I've put together some really impressive strings of holes (including scores of 38 and 39 on the front and back nines at my home course), overall I haven't put together a really low (for me) round yet, hanging out in the 83-86 range when I play OK and into the 90s when I'm playing poorly. As a result of playing more, I've bumped a bunch of my lower rounds from last season out of my calculation now, so my estimated WHS handicap has risen from 10-something to 13.3 at the moment. It's a little disheartening to move in the wrong direction, but I'm trying to take the positives away from each of my rounds. My ball striking has improved a lot since last year, but I'm still prone to losing strokes with some awful shots - tops, shanks, chunks. And with those in the back of my mind I haven't really been able to cut loose too often. Flashes of speed and distance are there, but right now I'm definitely giving up a club or more of distance just by playing a little too tightly. My goal for June is to work on going after shots a bit more, and trying to play with a bit more confidence and freedom in my swing.

Thanks! It's an older course and has some issues with water (as you can see), but we've also had a ton of rain here over the past two weeks so all-in-all it's holding up well. This is all done in Apple iMovie. I mentioned before that I have flexible tripod that is mounted to my cart handle. All of the video is shot on my phone (Samsung S10e) and then I clip the video shorter on the phone before I upload it to my computer to pull into iMovie. I then make a few other small cuts in iMovie and add cross dissolves and fade to black at the end.

Three rounds in for the weekend - Saturday Morning 9 Holes - 42 (+6) - 3/7 FIR - 4/9 GIR - 17 Putts (1 3-putt , 6 2-putts, 2 1-putts) - 1:20 Round Time Saturday Afternoon 18 Holes (Not at home course) - 47/48 = 95 (+23) - 7/14 FIR - 6/18 GIR - 38 Putts (3 3-putts , 14 2-putts, 1 1-putt) - 4:15 Round Time Very windy round and really struggled on unfamiliar greens. Also had a two-stroke penalty for not being able to find a drive somewhere in the rough on No. 17. Pretty sure the group in front of us took my ball, given that there was no where for it to go missing otherwise. We had groups behind us, so I opted to just take the penalty rather than drive back and re-tee. Sunday Morning 18 Holes - 43/43 = 86 (+14) - 6/15 FIR - 4/18 GIR (1 birdie) - 32 Putts (2 3-putts , 10 2-putts, 6 1-putts) - 3:15 Round Time Triple-bogeyed No. 17, was otherwise playing OK on the back, could have been at least a stroke or two better. Could write a bunch of commentary, but wanted to just highlight a few good shots: - No. 9 Saturday morning, pulled my tee shot left. Managed to sling two stinger 5 irons around the dogleg left and onto the green. Two-putt par. - No. 1 Saturday afternoon (downwind, downhill), caught my drive flush and totaled 304 yards. - No. 15 Sunday morning, a bad approach shot from the fairway, sunk a 50 footer for birdie. Grading out the rounds: Saturday morning - Driver Average, Irons Average, Approach Poor, Putting Average Saturday afternoon - Driver Good, Irons Good, Approach Average, Putting Poor Sunday morning - Driver Poor, Irons Average, Approach Average, Putting Good Some day I'll get "Good" scores in all of those areas during a round. Still, compared to this time last year I am playing much better, and my misses are more consistent. I'm happy with my progress. Made another video during Saturday morning's nine, this time hole No. 2. This was a blocked six iron to right rough, thinned six iron out of rough to in front of green, chip and two-putt bogey.

From my round Tuesday - Hole five, which should be a ho-hum par 4, 306 yards, but uphill. Pulled my drive left, had something like 75 yards left to pin but I was looking at a tree. Pulled out the 54, opened up face slightly and moved it forward. Nice healthy swing (and divot, as pictured) and ball just got up in time to barely clear the tree, clipping a few leaves at the top as it went by. Landed just shy of the green and ran up pretty close to the hole. Unfortunately couldn't convert the birdie, but I'll walk away with a par all day from where the tee shot was.

Yup, excuses don't fix the problem. Last round I had three three-putts in a row (my only three putts of the round). The cause wasn't the greens, but rather a loss of mental focus - I was frustrated with my previous shots and blasted my first putts way past the hole on the first two holes, and then got timid and left the first putt on the third hole well short. Good stuff, as always, @edteergolf.

Jason is wonderful. All of my interactions with him, either through Sub70 or Diamond Tour, have been so far beyond what I would expect. Hands down awesome customer service.

I rolled quite a few putts with that model at the local shop right after it came out. I think you'll love it. Balanced perfectly in my mind.

Upstate New York is gorgeous. I spent a summer in Cooperstown and was lucky to play a few courses around the area, nothing fancy, but incredible views galore.

I did not add any weight. It dropped from D5-D6ish to D2 with the new Star Sidewinder grip I put on it. It currently is playing about 44.75", as the grip cap on the Star is apparently slightly shorter than the GP NDMC it replaced. To be honest, I never loved the feel of the driver at stock swingweight as it always felt too heavy, especially once I added the HZRDUS Yellow. This just feels better to me, faster feeling as well.

I've played 54 holes with the shorter driver and, while I can't say it's solved all my driving problems, I feel like it's helped some. Definitely feels less like a telephone pole and easier to control.

Still mediocre! **surprised, but not really surprised face** In all actuality, though, I have gotten a lot better and more consistent. I fixed my setup over the winter, as I was previously standing way too close with toe down, and cutting across the ball with my stroke. Led to all sorts of distance control and start line problems. I feel like I've really improved my lag putting and start direction because my stroke and impact location is much more repeatable. I really am loving the new-to-me Spider X, which at the same length as my old Spider Tour, just feels so much better in my hands. I need to reduce the number of three-putts per round, as I currently am good for three or four. I'd like to attribute this somewhat to me being the first off on the course most days. I typically play around and through the maintenance staff, so I play a few holes with uncut, dew-covered greens, a few holes with fresh-cut wet greens, a few with drier, uncut greens and finally a few with cut, dry greens. And because my course doesn't mow the greens in order, it's not uncommon to change between all of the available options in just a few holes.

I have several noticeably bare spots in my backyard from the last two year's worth of training, and I only use sneakers so I'm sure it'd be worse with spikes. During the winter I do the protocols in the garage on concrete. I've made some pretty spark showers before bouncing the sticks off the concrete.

One of my favorite things about golf - it's all relative. I played so well the last two days and shot 83/84 . Not to mention @THEZIPR23 is doing this with brand new to him clubs!

- 45/39 = 84 (+12) - 9/15 FIR - 5/18 GIR - 35 Putts (3 3-putts , 11 2-putts, 4 1-putts) - 3:15 Round Time Third day in a row of walking 18, and it is hot and humid here, similar to July and not late May. I'm wiped. I didn't sleep well either, so today was a grind! Starting to get a semblance of a driver swing. I only had one really bad drive today (wonderful duck hook), and I got two slight draws out past 250 which would have been a miracle a week ago. I still am not hitting the center of the face at all, and I know I'm leaving a lot of distance on the table with poor strikes. I also did a poor re-gripping job when I shortened the shaft Saturday and the butt of the grip is twisting during my swing, so that needs to be fixed. Irons weren't nearly as good as yesterday. Wasted three strokes with worm burners, and shanked a wedge near the end of the round to waste another stroke. I unfortunately had three three-putts in a row, all for double-bogeys, that was the cause of the 45 on the front. Lapse in focus - I got upset at myself and played poorly for a few hole stretch until I settled down. A very successful holiday weekend of golf for me, and gives me a lot of hope for the rest of the season. Just need some more time on the range.

Cabbage looks interesting. Might have to try that. Anything goes great with bacon in it...

Got to try out the Old Smokey with a pork shoulder! Seemed appropriate for Memorial Day. Sous vide from frozen, 161 degrees for about 18 hours with 1.5 percent salt in bag. Pulled from sous vide and rubbed with yellow mustard, New Mexico red chile powder and garlic powder. Smoked with a couple chunks of hickory for about an hour at 250-300ish on the Old Smokey. Basted once with a mixture of G. Hughes sugar-free BBQ sauce, ketchup, Sriracha and juices from the sous vide bag. Served with sugar-free coleslaw. Ate way too much and am now lying in bed resting .

Largely due to chipping it close. I've gone to using the Maltby PTM GW around the green if I don't need to clear anything and have some green to work with and I've been getting pretty good with it. I am starting to hit more greens than I used to, but I'm still working on getting reasonable length birdie putts. I'm really bummed because the ball I lost on No. 12 (150-ish par 3) I struck really well but I lost it in the sun. Didn't see it drop or hear it drop. Had I been playing with someone I'm sure we would have found it, but I had to assume it went OB left because I looked for about three minutes and didn't find anything around the green. Ended up taking a drop - kind of set the back nine off in a bad mood. I've been setting up off the toe as well, was actually considering going the opposite route and trying some closer to the heel to promote me staying in my posture and not lunging as much. On 18, after the top (which was off low heel), I was basically on my tip-toes. Not going to hit many good shots with weight distribution like that. Also, planning on bringing a water bottle and maybe some snacks for my next round. By 14-15 walking starts to take a toll on me.

- 38/45 = 83 (+11) - 7/15 FIR - 5/18 GIR (1 birdie) - 31 Putts (2 3-putts , 9 2-putts, 7 1-putts) - 2:45 Round Time This goes down as one of my better rounds ever, and probably my best ball striking round of my life. I struck the ball extremely well on the front with most every club and really only had one or two awful shots. Went to the course with a few new swing thoughts and they really helped. Back nine didn't go as well, still struck the ball well, but got a little hooky and had two shots sail OB left that hurt my score. I started to get tired near the end again, and ended up shanking an approach on No. 16 and topping a drive on No. 18. Remove those two penalties and wasted shots and I had a legitimate chance to break 80. Driver still isn't good at all, but the irons are coming along nicely now. My balance is all out of whack with the driver, and I need to figure out how to not end up with my weight falling forward in my downswing. It's causing all my drives to be off the heel, the good ones being OK cuts or baby fades and the awful ones being low-left spinners.

Awesome! Sounds like it was a lot of fun.

- 43/42 = 85 (+13) - 10/15 FIR - 7/18 GIR (1 birdie) - 36 Putts (4 3-putts , 10 2-putts, 4 1-putts) - 2:45 Round Time FINALLY! I sorted out the gremlin in my swing and was able to get the ball off the tee box today, and I struck a handful of really great irons, also. All I was thinking about today was making sure I was bent over less and had good weight distribution in my setup. Helped immensely. Only threw away two shots - a topped six iron on No. 3 and a finesse shank from about 110 on No. 10. Had a birdie on the front and reeled off four-straight pars on the back nine before I started getting a little wild off the tee and that hurt me on 15, 16 and 17. Sadly, two of the 3-putts were after hitting the GIR. Need to clean that up! Would have been a pretty great scoring round for me had I not had those bad putting holes. Still not hitting the ball spectacularly, but this gives me a lot of confidence moving forward. I ordered a flexible phone mount to attach to my cart, and I videoed hole No. 1, which I parred. I have a ton of respect for people who do full course vlogs, it takes a lot of time to even do one hole. I don't think I would want to do a whole round, but I may do a hole here or there as the season goes just for fun.

I chopped 1/2" off my HZRDUS Yellow this morning, bringing it down to about 45". Dropped swingweight from D4-D5-ish, to about D2.5. No real reason to try other than to experiment. Can't get much worse with the driver.

Precision, but not accuracy, apparently. Just need to move it a ball over. On the other hand, I found the reason for the dreaded s-word in my game as of late...

I think a road trip to Sycamore, IL and Sub70 is in your future...

First full go around for the year at the home course today. We had a ton of rain over the weekend, and the course had been closed since Sunday, I think. Most of the fairways were as long as the rough and pretty wet. Everything was all carry. - 45/47 = 92 (+20) - 3/15 FIR - 3/18 GIR - 34 Putts (2 3-putts, 13 2-putts, 2 1-putts, 1 chip-in) - 2:45 Round Time (Love being the first off...) I'm starting to hit better shots, but right now everything is either pretty good or just awful as I work through the swing changes from my lessons. It's one thing to put them in place on a range, but on the course it's a whole different ballgame. I still really struggled mightily today getting off the tee for the first 15 holes. And unfortunately it really carried over to some shots from the fairway where I had my fair share of clanked tops and even a few dead shanks. Ugh. Looking back on the ShotScope data and it's pretty ugly. Putted really well on the front nine, not as good on the back. Chipping was pretty good all around again. So there are some bright spots. And on the last three holes my driver started to wake up a little, finally registering a 245-yard carry on No. 16. Hoping to play a few times over the long weekend, and hoping more swings continue to work the kinks out.