I always recommend to those who want to play better to PLAY MORE COMPETITIVE GOLF. That's scrambles, singles, tournaments, even a $5.00 nassau with their friends. Put some pressure on your game. With that pressure comes another understanding of the rules - not because you want to, but because you HAVE TO know how to play them properly. Knowledge builds character, pressure builds game.
Eventually you'll run into a situation where you don't know what to do. We're not talking OB stakes or my ball is in casual water - we're talking something so weird that you just don't have it in memory and you don't have time to look it up. What to do in this case? Well in this case, the Rules of Golf have you covered. Invoke rule 3-3 and play two balls. Record both scores and sort it out with the committee at the end of the round. This is a very good rule to know and can be the difference between a disqualification and a 2 stroke penalty.
Right or wrong - The Committee is
Judge and jury. May God have mercy
on your scorecard.....
One thing that you must remember on this, the committee's final ruling is the final ruling. Wether they're right or wrong, there's nothing you can do because what they say goes so remember to be factual and record all information regarding the rule discrepancy all the way down to what people say! It's true - even in the case of someone hitting a provisional ball. It's not a provisional unless they say the word "provisional". Look it up. "I'm reloading" or "I'm going to hit another" does not constitute a provisional ball and will leave you hitting 4 from wherever it ends up (hopefully the fairway!).
From things you SHOULD say to things you SHOULDN'T say. Don't ever give advice on a swing, and when someone tells you they want to finish, don't say "take your time". Both constitute a breach of rules and CAN be used against you in the Court of Golf (if your opponent chooses to call you on it). We all expect the gentleman's response of "thanks" most times, but if you get a particularly competitive opponent you could end up two down really fast.
The rules of golf are there to protect the course and (believe it or not) to protect YOU from inequitable results. The color of a set of stakes could be the difference between putting you in a great position to play and being stuck behind a tree or going back to the tee. Seems worth it to me! From where and how you can drop to what to do when someone takes your ball everything is in that tiny little rule book. They're not as convoluted as everyone would have you think either. Start at the beginning and read a few pages per day. You'll go through it in no time and have a better understanding of what to do and when to do it - even save you a few strokes!
I hate to be the guy to beat a dead horse, but if you're playing the wrong equipment you're not going to improve as fast as you could. If you're playing the wrong equipment for a lame reason, then it's even worse! By far, the #1 reason people give at my demo days for not trying or buying custom fit non-branded names is the resale value. Correct, RESALE VALUE of the clubs that they're going to buy because it improves their game. Why are people so concerned with the resale value of something that they will pay PREMIUM PRICE when new just to resell it and get something "better" another year down the road.
Sure, the resale value of an off-brand component set of irons is not going to be near the resale of a big name, but they're not going to be the same price at the start either. Let's launch a hypothetical....
Say you're fit to a no-name driver with a premium brand shaft. You are smashing the ball longer than you ever have, and straighter. It's a great club. Retails for $300 just for a nice round number.
You go out and are fit for a Tayloring XM 917 (see what i did there) and are hitting it the same as the No name club. Retail is $450-ish.
That's $150 difference. $150 that can go into lessons or maybe even 3 rounds of golf!
The brand names will come down in price, but ask yourself why that happens? To make way for new things. New gimmicks. New paychecks to the tour pros who play them. All of that affects resale anyway. You can get $200 for a club when it's still new, but basically half the price of new retail and that's what you're looking at. The older it gets, the worse that ratio gets too.
Money makes the world go 'round. Ever since people started trading trinkets for items, someone has tried to think up new ways to make people part with their scratch. The saturated golf market has made us all - even me at one point - think about what we're playing and tell ourselves that we NEED the new stuff. Real talk - Technology is maxed out. These gains they're making in COR and MOI are minute at best and, very much like paying $499 to gain 5 yards over your existing equipment, not worth the effort. Things like "multi material" technology were tried before but never caught on because we weren't into gimmicks back then. Things like the hybrid iron have been around for a long time, but now they're rebranding as a "crossover" and people are biting at a premium price.
Club manufacturers build a lot of clubs. Thousands. They send them all over the world and put all sorts of stickers and designs on them for rack appeal. Anyone who has tried to re-ell a club out there and done it, consider yourself lucky. A quick search on some popular sale and auction sites will show pages and pages and pages of the same club. Manufacturers know this, and they're the only ones making the money hand over fist. They advertise and pay players top dollar to play their gear all so hopefully you'll believe what they tell you. Ontop of that, you get to advertise for them for FREE with all your branded gear.
Bottom line, if it helps you hit the ball farther and straighter then by all means buy it, brand name or no. Just be sure you're testing everything before you do it and not JUST paying for a name. It's all smoke and mirrors and a good club builder will tell you that first hand. Go see your local guy and try some things out. I know you'll be glad you did.
Let's chat a little about the new ruling by golf's governing body. No longer will scores played alone be able to count towards a players handicap. Why? The reasoning is to curb "sandbagging" or posting higher scores in a bid to get more strokes during handicapped tournaments when a player is actually better than their 'cap.
In my opinion, this is one of those times where a new rule is not needed but rather where the old rules need better implementation. How does the USGA intend for this to be policed? What is in place to keep Player A from going out with a buddy or just with a random person and still posting a score that is not accurate? In a word - NOTHING. Very much like other hot topics of politics and rules, there is nothing to stop an evil person from being evil. They don't follow the rules anyway, like this is going to stop it? Short of verifying every single score, the ruling only serves to anger and penalize those who would follow the rules. I play a lot solo. I count every single stroke on rounds that post to my handicap, even when I'm the only one on the course. I take pride in what I shoot and constantly strive to be better. I'm as upset as anyone else when an 18 handicapper at my club posts a 73 in tournament play. "Best day I've ever had" they say. Sure it is. Still, it just sits in my gut the wrong way about this new ruling. Now when I - and honest to a fault golfer - get the chance to spontaneously play because my wife has last minute plans with her girls, I need to make sure I'm paired up with someone in order for my round to count. I've had some bumper days alone too. Days where everything clicks and I'm just in the zone. No more.
I suppose I should be glad though - those rounds won't count and my handicap might balloon. That being said, it would no longer be an accurate representation of my abilities as a golfer. It will be my abilities on days when I was able to find someone to golf with. If last year is any indication, I'll be south about 15 rounds of golf for my handicap. Some high, some low. Not a great cross section when you only get to play maybe 35 rounds in a year. *sigh*. Come on, USGA. We're supposed to be growing the game, not making it annoying.
So we talked a little last time about the types of grips... Thing is, grips are expensive. Well, some are. Still, we can't just spend a bunch to re-grip and then spend a bunch more to get them changed if we don't like it so what do we do? Well, at The Club Nut we work with you to dial in exactly what you need. I use air to dial in the size for your grips and allow a "grip demo" if you will. Once the size is dialed in, then it's onto the double sided tape, or you can just use them as is. Observe!
Grips are an overlooked item in golf. Most players basically let them go because they're buying new equipment every other year and just trading them in. the problem with this is that standard isn't always standard. Most clubs come with a branded version of the Tour velvet grip. It's a great grip, don't get me wrong, but there are so many other options out there. You're only a quick shopping trip from getting the best grip from you and being the most comfortable in your game.
There are so many options out there for different shapes, sizes, colors, textures and even weights. Don't get sucked in by the one size fits all.. Why do companies put the same grip on? Because they're cheap and a decent all around grip. Remember: Retail sales are about what fits most people and what they can sell the most of. One size fits most is never going to get you the game you want. Take a watch below if you're new to the golf gripping game or even if you have some years under your belt. Maybe you've never thought about your grips.
Most of the subject of fitting and club choice is centered around shaft flex. There have to be 10,000 articles on the internet for this if there's one, so why write another one. There is a method to my madness, and I feel that with some exceptions, shaft flex and manipulation thereof is misunderstood. More often than not, the words "you swing this fast, so we'll put you in a ____ flex". While that is important, using swing speed as the only indicator of needed flex will leave the player with potentially only half the performance they COULD have. The reason being: tempo is a large factor when determining equipment needs.
When the swing is initiated, the shaft is loaded. Someone with a fast tempo will aggressively load the shaft requiring a firmer flex than someone with smooth acceleration to achieve the same kick through the ball. In addition, swing speed can increase with the proper flex or decrease with improper fit. The only way to find the right shaft is to hit the club and evaluate the feel. There are really no numbers to distinguish a standard for "reguar" and "stiff" across manufacturers. The closest comparison scale would be CPM or Cycles Per Minute. In this way, an exact number for each shaft can be recorded and each flex designation can be compared and the proper fit can be achieved. So this is all old news to you... OK no worries... but we're here to talk about why this is important.
Many studies have shown that swing speed decreases slightly before impact. It's a byproduct of physiology for a normal swing. The AMOUNT that it decreases differs depending on where that shaft is around the impact area and how you release your hands. Shafts flex and re-flex during the swing. Usually, with a driver, that shaft is flexing towards the ball slightly and is releasing all it's energy into the ball through the clubface. This is done by "Braking the swing" or "throwing the club" as some teachers will describe it. You may have also heard "hitting against a strong left side (right handed)". Explanation is for right handed golfers. Just flip it for lefties - What this means is that as the swing motion happens, the left leg becomes the pivot and essentially puts the brakes on the swing, allowing the arms and wrists to create MORE speed as the energy transfer moves through the grip and shaft and into the ball. The best way to illustrate this is to use a trebuchet - a medieval device used to hurl large objects very far away. "But why not a catapault?" you ask? Because a catapult is a fixed fulcrum and just using the flex of the shaft to hurl the ball. The trebuchet has moving parts that perfectly mimic the golf swing --- well, if you turn it upside down. Watch below it's the best to illustrate what i'm talking about. While you view, imagine the wood arm of the trebuchet is your arms and wrists, the rope is the shaft of the golf club. Notice, as the energy peaks, the trebuchet arm STOPS but the rope keeps moving and releases the stored energy (and the rock) ultimately hurling the object 100s of feet. Turn it upside down and you'll realize that this STOP point is roughly the same as in a golf swing. Your arms just keep moving forward because let's face it - if you stopped a full golf swing like that, your shoulders would probably dislocate and you'd blow out a knee.
The next video is this notion in practice. Long drivers, and Dustin Johnson being the best example. Notice the lag of the club and right at the bottom, the player puts on the brakes with the left leg, throwing that club through and that poor ball can't do a thing about it. Notice the leg straightens and his foot even moves back a little bit. the hips PAUSE then keep moving through. It's an upward motion to stop the swing, very much like (if you turn this video upside down) the downward motion of the weights in the trebuchet. If you flip the top video upside down, the mechanics are the same.
OK so what does all this have to do with shaft flex? Well, a proper swing is how you get the shaft to flex and a proper swing is how you get the shaft to transfer power. If this is something you can't do - bad knees, bad back, just slow speed in general -- you need a shaft that will load and unload easier and help to get the maximum performance out of your club. Having a shaft that is too stiff means that even if you're aggressive in loading it, you may not be able to have it UNLOAD properly since you have to maintain that speed and put the brakes on aggressively. That stiffness will cause it to unload the power early - robbing you of distance. Same with a shaft that is too flexible. At the point where the brakes go on, it may have way too much energy and will not unflex efficiently to transfer that power, resulting in loss of distance and accuracy.
So what does all this mean? Well - OEMs make "whole flex" shafts as I like to call them. R, S, Firm, X, etc. They have no interest in getting particular with a shaft because it doesn't fit the market. They want to sell as many clubs to the widest array of people. An R flex will most likely work for you, but between R and S there are a multitude of flexes. Maybe removing 1/2" from the tip is a perfect stiffness for you. Maybe your optimal is JUST UNDER R flex? Just Under or over Stiff? Maybe it's just adding 1 swingweight point to your driver, making it the perfect flex and weight. Remember, lighter isn't always better and faster.
See a competent fitter and hit some different shafts. Even message me for some brain-picking if you want. The difference between hitting more fairways and hitting longer drives doesn't simply rest in a new $500 driver. It may be just taking that old trusty club and adding a little tweak. Use the money you save for beer.
I always recommend to those who want to play better to PLAY MORE COMPETITIVE GOLF. That's scrambles, singles, tournaments, even a $5.00 nassau with their friends. Put some pressure on your game. With that pressure comes another understanding of the rules - not because you want to, but because you HAVE TO know how to play them properly. Knowledge builds character, pressure builds game.
