ShortGolfer

As a slow swingers using soft golf balls I put hardly any wear on my clubs. I now look for like new clubs.

I've always been that terrible athlete that doesn't get picked. I can't swing heavy shafts. But, I was the top player on the chess team of my High School. Never lost a match in high school. I went to an Ivy League school and lost a bunch of games every Tuesday night. Member of three academic Honor societies. I found a set of YouTube videos that explained how to set up a driver swing that answered all my questions. It took just one week for me to learn the new swing! Twenty practice sessions and three rounds of golf. 9/9/18=36 holes to become comfortable with the new swing. I easily moved on to learning my 3HL from what I learned hitting driver. The fitter was surprised that my swing allowed me to hit a 3HL off the deck despite a very slow swing speed. Now driver and 3HL are working great. It wasn't just a few weeks ago.

It is hard to learn good ball striking with irons off mats but it makes a huge diffence in being able to play good golf iby not wasting a lot of energy digging up the ground before hitting the ball You can't really tell bouncing the club head off a mat into the ball. It is easy to tell the difference on grass by comparing strikes off a tee versus off the ground.

I just look for the best deal on a club, buy it, and see if it works for me. I play ladies flex, which means that good deals are there to be had. It can also be hard to find specialty grinds in ladies flex. Ladies flex wedges can often be found with pristine faces as women typically use soft balls and slow swings which wear down club faces much slower. They may also take better care of their clubs and not abuse them. It may not be hard to re-shaft a ladies flex clubs head if you play steel shafts. Steel shafts are easier to work with than graphite shafts which can be damaged by twisting under heat application.

The expensive shafts were worth it. The fitter selected a ball flight that would allow me to hit and hold tiny postage stamp greens from 100 yards when I was first fitted, to 130 yards today! I could now make birdies on short Par 3s, 100 yards or less. I'm too short to use stock ladies clubs.

I simply use less lofted clubs and shaft lean. The most used club in my bag after the putter is my Callaway MD5 52* gap wedge with a KBS TGI 60 shaft. It isn't a distance club! It is a club for digging out of the rough as well as chip and pitch shots around the green. Accurately pltching the ball in the middle of the fairway is a quick way to play golf. I assume that the center of the fairway will give me a decent approach shots and in many cases it is. I've put an old SW in the bag and it is what it is. A reliable club from 37 yards with my high fade. I took out the 60* because I couldn't get the distances I needed. Instead I rather have a low bounce and a high bounce 58.

Those are three bags of wood mulch, not golf clubs. But point taken about storing golf clubs in the trunk of the car for safety. It is also faster to put the push cart and bag in the trunk if they will both fit, as they do.

I have a made in Japan Nissan Cube that has a surprising amount of storage space in the trunk. I can fit my Ti Lite Push cart and put my bag filled with clubs next to it. It will also hold five 3 cubic ft bags of cedar mulch or 15 cubic feet of mulch. Three additonal bags will fit on the rear seat.

Got in my early morning round between 7:30AM and 9AM, 90 minutes. Three lost balls, so the score wasn't great, but made one short Par 4 in regulation. First lost ball was a push to the right into the high rough. 2nd was a lost ball in mowed rough--must have fallen into a hole or something. And the third was another push into the trees while the guy was sitting on the mower next to the green, waiting for a few minutes for me to play the hole. I was able to make the 2nd attempt onto the green. There was an early morning twosome in walking in front of me that only seemed slow because I was pushed by a guy in a cart behind me. Someone loaded the wrong course data for the GPS! So that wasn't functional. Most likely because the park has two courses and they loaded the other course twice. Didn't need any more clubs this morning playing from the Senior tees. Approach shots were mostly hole high, but off to the right of the green. The last approach shot was blocked by a tree. My 7 iron shot clipped the top of the tree and fell short, though it did go through the tree. Another club would not have helped. I didn't consider slicing the ball around the tree, as this practice round was mostly about my new driver swing. Made a couple nice drives down the fairway. I'm pleased with how much better my new driver swing works, even with the lost ball today. I have power leak right at the end. I need to throw the club at the ball at the very end. It is a new motion so I often forget. It's only ten days, after all. If I forget I get a decent fade that ends up at the right side of the fairway. But, if if I properly execute the new swing, I'm getting a lot of time in the air and distance. 😀 It is much better for me to learn driver on the course, as none of the Tee Boxes on the muni are flat, despite the course being called the "Flat Nine."😆 The course is flat relative to the other courses built in the rolling hills of Connecticut.

The big benefit of assembling your own clubs is the ability to spend as much time as you need to get it right. Lead tape can be added to the head to determine the exact swing weight required. The shaft can then be pulled and the lead tape replaced with tip weight. My XXIO iron heads have a convenient flat shelf to affix lead weight. I add hot melt to over the tape, and use a heat gun to reflow the hot melt. Hot melt can be used to increase SW by a tiny amont. I strongly recommend getting an air compressor to blow grips on and off. That will make it easier to experiment with ideas like counter-balance weights in the butt end of the shaft. My eight iron is 1/8 inch long. I may look into that during the winter.

I play at Goodwin Park in Hartford During the Spring of 2014, the City of Hartford contracted the Connecticut Section PGA to serve as the consultants to help restore the course operations to its heyday. Under guidance and restoration of its original design, the course returned to excellent conditions and customer service. Goodwin Park offers excellent opportunity to play golf at a quick pace and learn the game.

Wear Depends or male incontinence products. When my wife passed I donated the adult diapers to the food bank as it they are highly valued. I've worn them myself for colonoscopy inspections to avoid soiling the car.

I mowed the lawn and finished at 9AM this morning. I've been taking it easy in preparation for tomorrow's round. I did 18 on Monday with a full bag in less than 3-1/2 hours walking a hilly course in 90 degree/50% humidity weather by drinking water on every hole and waiting in the shade for the golfers in front of me. I've revised my course management philosophy to favor quick play versus fewer strokes as that is what everyone wants on the private course I play. Why risk blowing up the hole when I can take an easy chip out of the rough back onto the fairway with my trusty gap wedge? I see so many golfers trying to hack their way out the rough, obviously aiming at the green, with such a tiny chance of it getting there. Much better to put it in the middle of the fairway. Then I can hit approach shot that, if its not on the green, is within range of a "Texas Wedge" or putter. My misses are close enough to roll the ball up a well mowed fairway nearly to the green.

Brutal weather forecast tomorrow in Hartford Connecticut. Planning half a set from the Senior Tees for a quick round on the nine hole North Course or Flat Nine. No bunkers. 6 club set. Driver, 7iron, 9iron, AW, 52* gap wedge, and putter.

Slow motion swings in the back yard to engrain a new pattern. I use Callaway foam golf balls to insure the motions are correct. I watch the flight of the foam balls across my back yard. My back yard is convenient for a lot of short practice sessions all day. Not enough room for fast swings, even with foam golf balls.

There is a 9 hole semi-private golf course near the New England Botanical garden, where I was showing roses. For $20 I got to fill out a foursome while the roses were being judged. None of the guys could putt, though one guy tried really hard. Winning trophies in rose shows takes precedence over practice, so the only on course practice I had was another nine hole round the previous week in Rhode Island, also during Rose show judging. I was able to dial in my putter and makea nice ten foot put with a good line down the center of the hole with the right pace! The only one of us to do that! Most likely I wouldn't be playing golf as a stroke survivor if I couldn't putt. Just to many strokes involved in the score. I could practice putt every day if I didn't have other stuff that needed to be done. But growing three hundred roses is a lot of work, so I'm trying to downsize my garden to a hundred quality show roses. I have a lot of grip strengh from pruning roses and pulling weeds. I'm resting after mowing the lawn.

I just did this by learning a new swing for driver and fairway woods. A somewhat complicated setup but a simpler swing that is more intuitive to my thinking. I understand all the setup pieces so I can adjust when things go wrong as well as know what I forgot in a senior moment. I did twenty practice sessions and three rounds of golf in one week to learn a new driver swing. I practice efficiently with lots of very short practice sessions in my back yard with foam balls to watch the ball flight. I have two courses to practice. The Flat Nine for driver. $14 for nine holes. Public golf course. No bunkers but ball eating high grassy areas around wide fairways. Some holes share a common rough. Logically the player who is ahead should go first to keep up the pace of play. More efficient use of time than hitting on the range with lousy range balls. I can practice all my clubs under course conditions and learn the distances for all of them. I can swing a 60 but the ball simply doesn't go far enough with a good strike for a place in my bag. 58 is the highest loft in my bag. Another is Private course with fast greens. I'm surprised how far the fall will roll through certain areas of rough. Beautifully maintained bunkers for wedge practice. Very punishing hazards. Especially the back of greens. The course is up against a busy street so they want to discourage "flying the green" all the time. They had me go out as a single to learn the game. I think they gave me a vote of confidence by pairing me with a fast twosome yesterday. The lady has been playing twenty years and she was teaching a young fella how she hits approach shots around the complicated green complexes. I think they only thing the two had in common was their love of golf. Play with players as good as you aspire to be.

I play SGI irons.They are really forgiving. Which means that I'll top the ball and the ball will roll a long way on the fairway, close enough to putt the ball onto the green! Which makes chipping out of the rough onto the fairway a smart strategy. If I chip out the bad drive only cost me one shot.

Last time out on the Flat Nine my GPS died after the first hole and I eyeballed the distances. Shot my low round for the course of 43, two better than my previous best. It helped a little that I just got driver working last week, but still.... Yesterday I got my 3HL working. 😀 I also shot 43 at Buena Vista without a GPS. My course low at this very short executive course is 42. I learned to play with the five clubs in my Avatar. 4, 7, AW SW, and putter. I get my eyes checked every year.

I got elbow tendonitis hitting a cheap mat. I now use a Fiberbuilt mat. I took a winter off from swinging for recovery. Graphite shafts are known to be better at reducing the stress on the body that steel.

Private membership isn't for everyone. I talked to someone who said he didn't have the necessary social training, so they refunded his money. My father taught me the basics of behaving yourself on the golf course in the 1970s. I'm pretty good as a social golfer. I play better when I play with others versus practicing as a single. Better decisions and a bit more focus to make good shots when I'm part of a foursome. The three golf courses I play have distinctly different social communities. Not that one is better than the others. But it is quite obvious when socializing on the course.

You may want to compare the 3HL vs the 3W to see which gives you the longest distances. When and where I play is factor as well. There as some places where the ball rolls really well. I expect the ball to roll farther after the dew has evaporated. As the club head speed goes down the optimum loft goes up. When I was a tiny kid my 5 iron went farther than my 3 iron. I didn't have enough CHS to use the lower lofted 3 iron! It took me forty years to understand why?

My fitter was surprised I could elevate a 3HL off the deck with a very low swing speed. It was slow enough that gapping wasn't an issue. The goal was to get the ball down as far down the fairway I could with a reasonable dispersion.

https://www.usga.org/content/dam/usga/pdf/2019/rules/Explanation for Each Major Change in the New Rules of Golf for 2019.pdf 33 page document explaining the 2019 rule changes https://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/rules-hub/topics/unplayable-ball.html If you are in a situation where you don’t want to or don’t think you can play your ball, you always have the option of taking relief under the unplayable ball Rule. You are the only person who can decide that your ball is unplayable, and this can be done anywhere on the golf course except when your ball lies in a penalty area. If your ball is in a penalty area, your only relief option is to take relief under the penalty area Rule. When you decide that your ball is unplayable, you have three relief options, all for one penalty stroke. Your first option is to go back to the spot of your previous stroke and play again (stroke and distance relief). Your second option is to go back as far as you’d like and drop on the line from the hole through the spot where the ball lies (back-on-the-line relief). Your third option is to drop anywhere within two club-lengths of where your ball lies, no closer to the hole (lateral relief). If your ball lies in a bunker, you must remain inside the bunker under options two and three. You also have a fourth option for an extra penalty stroke (two penalty strokes total) which allows you to go back on the line and drop your ball outside the bunker.

I had a lot of anxiety about being able to swing driver. I played on a short course with narrow fairways that only had one hole that had wide fairways. I talked to a guy who said it was the worst course ever after telling his wife to put down 12 strokes on the 2nd hole. He only plays it because it is his wife's favorite course. I found a new beginner course to play. The Flat Nine in Hartford. It has two sets of tees. Whites and Seniors. If I top my drive I can pick up the ball and try again from the Seniors without slowing down play. I was able to find a new driver swing in just one week! I found a set of YouTube videos I could understand that answered all my questions. I watched the over and over so I didn't miss anything. I was able to squeeze in twenty practice sessions and three rounds of golf in one week to learn the new swing. Two on the Flat Nine and another 18 hole round on a private course. Success! I now have a consistent driver swing that goes well past the Senior Tees. 😃 Sometimes the ball flight is a little high and I lose distance but as long as it is in the fairway I'm happy with that. Now the goal is to play a lot before winter so I can setup driver automatically without thinking about it. It sounds like you need to find someone who can teach you. I used to teach older adult men and it sometimes requires a lot of patience on the part of both the student and the teacher. I used to tell myself I literally get paid by the hour. To me it wasn't a waste of time if someone was willing to learn. Maybe that is why it only took me one week? 😀 I figure it is normal to have a lot of doubts. I had a brain stem stroke 25 years ago and continually surprise myself on what I have been able to learn! My goal was initially to be able to play a short course from the forward tees. That is what I told my fitter. I can now walk 18 holes in the heat and humidty and make consistent swings to play quickly! Yesterday I spent ten hours working on my rose garden. Normally I don't have enough energy to prune that many roses but I think my recent golf success helped! I'm downsizing my rose garden to have more time playing golf. Giving away roses for free to those willing to dig them out of the ground. I happy to give away the easy care roses and keep the fussy high maintenance roses for my garden.