I agree that we should play golf not golf swing to play and score well

[Javs]

https://golf.com/instruction/tiger-woods-old-advice-play-smart/?utm_campaign=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&utm_content=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&utm_medium=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&utm_source=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&utm_term=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&amp=1

[Josh Parker]

Agree 100%  So many different ways to swing and different abilities/limitations out there.  

I don't chase the "perfect" swing but I am chasing a consistent one!

[Javs]

3 hours ago, Josh Parker said:

Agree 100%  So many different ways to swing and different abilities/limitations out there.  

I don't chase the "perfect" swing but I am chasing a consistent one!

Yes, agree. I believe that is the main takeaway. Know your swing and own it. Play within yourself and play the way you play. Just don’t get paralyzed by over analyzing the golf swing while trying to play a round. Over analyzing destroys the ability to score. Dance with the girl you brought. I find it even more rewarding to find ways to shoot 70 on days the swing is not all there. Yes, going low is fun, but saving rounds when the swing is broken is even more rewarding to me. 

[RickyBobby_PR]

1 minute ago, Javs said:

Yes, agree. I believe that is the main takeaway. Know your swing and own it. Play within yourself and play the way you play. Just don’t get paralyzed by over analyzing the golf swing while trying to play a round. Over analyzing destroys the ability to score. Dance with the girl you brought. I find it even more rewarding to find ways to shoot 70 on days the swing is not all there. Yes, going low is fun, but saving rounds when the swing is broken is even more rewarding to me. 

This is typically the difference between mid/high handicaps and the better players.

the high handicaps look at result and think they made some different swing because the ball went left instead of right or vice versa. So they try something different and so on during the round.

[Josh Parker]

5 minutes ago, Javs said:

Yes, agree. I believe that is the main takeaway. Know your swing and own it. Play within yourself and play the way you play. Just don’t get paralyzed by over analyzing the golf swing while trying to play a round. Over analyzing destroys the ability to score. Dance with the girl you brought. I find it even more rewarding to find ways to shoot 70 on days the swing is not all there. Yes, going low is fun, but saving rounds when the swing is broken is even more rewarding to me. 

100% 

Some days the wedges and scrambling just show up to save those types of rounds.  

[Javs]

12 minutes ago, RickyBobby_PR said:

This is typically the difference between mid/high handicaps and the better players.

the high handicaps look at result and think they made some different swing because the ball went left instead of right or vice versa. So they try something different and so on during the round.

Agree and I even think that a lot of higher handicaps worry about result before they even swing. One cannot execute when swinging in fear. I think they would play better by swinging with commitment to the shot at hand and not the result. 

[RickyBobby_PR]

42 minutes ago, Javs said:

Agree and I even think that a lot of higher handicaps worry about result before they even swing. One cannot execute when swinging in fear. I think they would play better by swinging with commitment to the shot at hand and not the result. 

Agree

[KC Golf]

On 11/23/2023 at 7:38 AM, Javs said:

Yes, agree. I believe that is the main takeaway. Know your swing and own it. Play within yourself and play the way you play. Just don’t get paralyzed by over analyzing the golf swing while trying to play a round. Over analyzing destroys the ability to score. Dance with the girl you brought. I find it even more rewarding to find ways to shoot 70 on days the swing is not all there. Yes, going low is fun, but saving rounds when the swing is broken is even more rewarding to me. 

Interestingly, even some PGA pro winners get obsessed with their swing and try to strive for perfection and it ruins their game.  

I think sticking with what you got (within reason) and enjoying the game for what it is.... just fun and time with friends is the best way to score well.

[cksurfdude]

On 11/23/2023 at 9:57 AM, Javs said:

One cannot execute when swinging in fear. I think they would play better by swinging with commitment to the shot at hand and not the result. 

Yep. Attended a mental game clinic a few years ago (Golf State Of Mind by David Mackenzie - really excellent, highly recommended) where one of the main takeaways .. meant really for players of any skill level .. is...

"Confident shot on a conservative line"

Still trying to fully internalize that and make it happen on the course, but definitely working on it!

[Javs]

12 minutes ago, cksurfdude said:

Yep. Attended a mental game clinic a few years ago (Golf State Of Mind by David Mackenzie - really excellent, highly recommended) where one of the main takeaways .. meant really for players of any skill level .. is...

"Confident shot on a conservative line"

Still trying to fully internalize that and make it happen on the course, but definitely working on it!

Perfect! See the shot you want to hit and have no negative thoughts about the result. Just focus on the shot at hand. Your pre-shot is where you get focused and then over the ball just execute. Accept the result and do it all over again.

[RickyBobby_PR]

1 hour ago, KC Golf said:

Interestingly, even some PGA pro winners get obsessed with their swing and try to strive for perfection and it ruins their game.  

I think sticking with what you got (within reason) and enjoying the game for what it is.... just fun and time with friends is the best way to score well.

For amateurs there is going to be a give and take. If there isn’t a lot of time to practice then identifying the one biggest thing that can help them play better golf sooner is the way to go. 
 

For pros that mess up their game it’s usually from chasing more distance. Smylie Kaufman. Rory after watching Bryson bomb it off the tee, then he realized how unreliable and unpredictable the swing gets when chasing more speed/distance gets can be he went back to his normal swing.

Then you can look at a Jason day who wanted to keep playing on tour but didn’t want to deal with the constant injuries, especially to the back, rebuilt his swing to not have a restrictive hip turn. After a year of working with Como his swing was in a great place and he won

[Javs]

3 minutes ago, RickyBobby_PR said:

For amateurs there is going to be a give and take. If there isn’t a lot of time to practice then identifying the one biggest thing that can help them play better golf sooner is the way to go. 
 

For pros that mess up their game it’s usually from chasing more distance. Smylie Kaufman. Rory after watching Bryson bomb it off the tee, then he realized how unreliable and unpredictable the swing gets when chasing more speed/distance gets can be he went back to his normal swing.

Then you can look at a Jason day who wanted to keep playing on tour but didn’t want to deal with the constant injuries, especially to the back, rebuilt his swing to not have a restrictive hip turn. After a year of working with Como his swing was in a great place and he won

I agree largely with your assessment. However, there have been many Pros and top Amateurs that have had success (success is different to each individual). Then decide to chase a better swing. In their quest, they start to follow advise, a vision or a coach. They in turn lose the ownership of their own swing and game. Fundamentally they drift away from the very essence of what gave them their success. They then fall into no man’s land and lost. Often losing confidence and having to try to return to the original process. Some never regain the magic. It is a very tricky thing when people at the higher levels of the game tinker. 

[cksurfdude]

1 hour ago, Javs said:

Perfect! See the shot you want to hit and have no negative thoughts about the result. Just focus on the shot at hand. Your pre-shot is where you get focused and then over the ball just execute. Accept the result and do it all over again.

Yeah thx .. out on the course also been starting working on moving my focus "external" onto the target...

..which I guess is the flip side of the coin that's "play golf, not golf swing"

 

[Javs]

11 minutes ago, cksurfdude said:

Yeah thx .. out on the course also been starting working on moving my focus "external" onto the target...

..which I guess is the flip side of the coin that's "play golf, not golf swing"

 

Agree that is the key point. See the target (not just the flag or a general area). See exactly where you want the shot to finish. Example off the tee, not just the fairway. Pick a real target. I see many guys screw up lay ups on par 5’s because they get sloppy and do not commit to a real target on the lay up. The old saying aim small miss small is the approach I like. 

[Golf2Much]

For us mere golf mortals, there's more than one way to skin a cat (maybe a better analogy would be defeather a birdie).   

With my wife out of town, I was bored, so I downloaded sixteen years of my scores from the GHIN system into a spreadsheet.  I sorted by year, looked at averages, highs, lows and other general trends.  What I found is that with the exception of one year where I broke my neck and had to learn to play golf again, my annual average score changed less than one stroke over that period.  During that time, I had two shoulder surgeries, broke my neck (doner bone, two plates and six screws holding it in place), had my left knee replaced, aged sixteen years and a whole host of other aliments.  Looking back from the start to now, I can say my game changed 180 degrees.  The things I used to do well, I could no longer do and visa versa.  I carried a driver just so I had somewhere to hold my towel and putted Sam Snead side saddle because I couldn't putt.  Now, I hit 75% of fairways on my narrow home course and putting is one of my strengths.   All of those changes yet, my overall average score basically stayed the same.  

I scored the same by did it in different ways.   I was lucky that other parts of my game stepped up when I couldn't consistently execute on others.  So I agree that you need to embrace who you are, what you are capable of and finally enjoy the ride. 

[Kenny B]

On 11/24/2023 at 12:22 PM, Javs said:

Agree that is the key point. See the target (not just the flag or a general area). See exactly where you want the shot to finish. Example off the tee, not just the fairway. Pick a real target. I see many guys screw up lay ups on par 5’s because they get sloppy and do not commit to a real target on the lay up. The old saying aim small miss small is the approach I like. 

One of my biggest changes over the years has been recognizing what yardages get me into trouble and playing off those.  It's one of the reasons I rarely use a laser distance to a back pin.  I'm not that good at controlling distance on approaches or layups.  It seemed that every time I knew the distance to a back pin, I went over the green.  Now, I want to know the distance to the back of the green and pick a club (or shot) that I know won't go that far.  Same for layups.  As for left and right I generally hit straight but the errant shot pops up more frequently than I'd like, so I aim fairway- or green-center unless it's a pitch shot.  I don't make many birdies this way, but I also eliminate a lot of doubles or worse.

[Kenny B]

1 hour ago, Golf2Much said:

For us mere golf mortals, there's more than one way to skin a cat (maybe a better analogy would be defeather a birdie).   

With my wife out of town, I was bored, so I downloaded sixteen years of my scores from the GHIN system into a spreadsheet.  I sorted by year, looked at averages, highs, lows and other general trends.  What I found is that with the exception of one year where I broke my neck and had to learn to play golf again, my annual average score changed less than one stroke over that period.  During that time, I had two shoulder surgeries, broke my neck (doner bone, two plates and six screws holding it in place), had my left knee replaced, aged sixteen years and a whole host of other aliments.  Looking back from the start to now, I can say my game changed 180 degrees.  The things I used to do well, I could no longer do and visa versa.  I carried a driver just so I had somewhere to hold my towel and putted Sam Snead side saddle because I couldn't putt.  Now, I hit 75% of fairways on my narrow home course and putting is one of my strengths.   All of those changes yet, my overall average score basically stayed the same.  

I scored the same by did it in different ways.   I was lucky that other parts of my game stepped up when I couldn't consistently execute on others.  So I agree that you need to embrace who you are, what you are capable of and finally enjoy the ride. 

I'm trying to figure out how you are scoring basically the same if you've mastered the driver after using it as a towel holder and putting is a now strength when you couldn't putt before.  Your game sounds a lot like mine, and sure, over the past 16 years I've lost quite a bit of distance.  That has offset some of my improvements, but even if I still played the set of tees I did back then, my scores are much better than just one stroke on average.  What part of your game seems to be lacking now?

[Golf2Much]

20 hours ago, Kenny B said:

I'm trying to figure out how you are scoring basically the same if you've mastered the driver after using it as a towel holder and putting is a now strength when you couldn't putt before.  Your game sounds a lot like mine, and sure, over the past 16 years I've lost quite a bit of distance.  That has offset some of my improvements, but even if I still played the set of tees I did back then, my scores are much better than just one stroke on average.  What part of your game seems to be lacking now?

The part of my game that has been an issue is my iron play.  It started before I reviewed the Callaway Paradym X's this year (which I still have in my bag).  I sought professional help and took a lesson three or four weeks ago and I'm hitting them a bit better.   As I told the instructor, it took 67 years to develop these swing flaws, it's going to take more than 67 days to get rid of all of them!  It's funny, during one point of our lesson he asked me if I use my physical limitations as an excuse causing doubt in executing the shot.  I chuckled and repliied "no, I expect to make every shot!"  At least I know I don't have to work on my confidence!   

I'd also say my chipping and putting has been a little off lately as well.  For me to score, they both need to be really good.  When you rely on those two parts of your game, being just slightly off can have a significant impact on your scoring.  I'm used to hearing "F*&%ing Norm" from my playing competitors when I chip up close and one putt.  Even though I chipped in twice on Saturday, I haven't been that consistent.  My putting is off just a hair too.  All I know is that I've burned so many edges in the last two or three months, I've made the hole bigger for the groups behind me.  I've been experimenting with different golf balls, so that may have a slight impact as well.   

The downside of living at the end of US 1 is that we have one golf course that has marginal practice facilities.  That includes a small putting green, an even smaller chipping green and a 6 or 7 bay netted in area for full swings (about 50 yards long).  There's really no where to really work at my game.  

I'm fighting through it and hope to first get out of GHIN soft cap hell then return to an index I'm more accustom too.   

[Kenny B]

1 hour ago, Golf2Much said:

The part of my game that has been an issue is my iron play.  It started before I reviewed the Callaway Paradym X's this year (which I still have in my bag).  I sought professional help and took a lesson three or four weeks ago and I'm hitting them a bit better.   As I told the instructor, it took 67 years to develop these swing flaws, it's going to take more than 67 days to get rid of all of them!  It's funny, during one point of our lesson he asked me if I use my physical limitations as an excuse causing doubt in executing the shot.  I chuckled and repliied "no, I expect to make every shot!"  At least I know I don't have to work on my confidence!   

I'd also say my chipping and putting has been a little off lately as well.  For me to score, they both need to be really good.  When you rely on those two parts of your game, being just slightly off can have a significant impact on your scoring.  I'm used to hearing "F*&%ing Norm" from my playing competitors when I chip up close and one putt.  Even though I chipped in twice on Saturday, I haven't been that consistent.  My putting is off just a hair too.  All I know is that I've burned so many edges in the last two or three months, I've made the hole bigger for the groups behind me.  I've been experimenting with different golf balls, so that may have a slight impact as well.   

The downside of living at the end of US 1 is that we have one golf course that has marginal practice facilities.  That includes a small putting green, an even smaller chipping green and a 6 or 7 bay netted in area for full swings (about 50 yards long).  There's really no where to really work at my game.  

I'm fighting through it and hope to first get out of GHIN soft cap hell then return to an index I'm more accustom too.   

Yes, very similar games!  My worst part is also irons not being consistent.  I used to be horrible at chipping and putting, but turned that around about 10 years ago.  Now my best rounds are when I do both well.  It is amazing that one day I can see the line of the putt and the ball goes in, and other days I think I see the line and miss... sometimes by more than just burning edges.  I mostly play the same course, so I know the breaks but I guess that's golf!  

I've been to Key West... long drive from Naples, but it was great to see the area.  Didn't play golf there; only played in Naples and Marco Island.

[fixyurdivot]

I do think many golfers WAY OVER analyze their swing mechanics.  It's really easy to do given the myriad of DIY sources on our electronic binky's. I mainly focus on a few key mental/swing thoughts with the primary focus being solid strikes.  I also keep my expectations low so as not to be disappointed. 

[rkj427]

I found this on another site a few years ago and saved the link in my favorites, and it still works today.

Kind of makes it easy to realize that K.I.S.S is still the best way for most to have success.

https://www.golfwrx.com/639511/what-you-can-learn-from-steve-elkington/?utm_source=Front&utm_medium=Featured_Latest&utm_campaign=GolfWRX_OnSite&utm_content=unused