Pre-round practice: 90 balls at driving range. Absolutely crushing the ball, dead stright, over the far hill in back of Four Seasons. The only club I struggled with was the 3 wood. I’m consistently hitting low, harsh hooks, with my driver occasionally as well. The repetitious swinging through 90 balls made my back ache and tighten up for my golf round. Next time, limit practice balls to around 40.
15 Holes
1st time playing at PGC. The round started decent. Decent iron play, mixed results with the driver. Better driving day than last outing at DW. Putting was poor, no feel, rushed strokes, lost focus, not judging speed well. If there is any excuse for my poor putting it would be the difficult slope of the greens. Very challenging, hilly, unique course made things difficult for us amateurs, especially, it being our first time there. I basically stopped keeping score after the atrocious 15th dogleg right. I deposited 4 balls into the drink that ran along the entire dogleg. At this point in the round, we were exhausted from walking the course and our backs were completely fried. We decided to call it and headed to the clubhouse. Overall it is a solid, challenging course. We will definitely be back.
Estimated Score: 96
Notables
Solid ball striking with my irons, off the tee, especially on par 3s.
Practice
Lighter grip on putter for more feel and fluidity in stroke. Smooth, lighter stroke with my driver. It seemed I was swinging way to hard on most tee shots.
Reflection
Now that I own an iphone, I’m able to record my swing on video. So, I recorded my swing using a 6-iron and learned a lot about it. Technically, I’m pretty content with how far my swing has come, compared to the state of it a few months ago. The things that need addressing are:
1st time playing at PGC. The round started decent. Decent iron play, mixed results with the driver. Better driving day than last outing at DW. Putting was poor, no feel, rushed strokes, lost focus, not judging speed well. If there is any excuse for my poor putting it would be the difficult slope of the greens. Very challenging, hilly, unique course made things difficult for us amateurs, especially, it being our first time there. I basically stopped keeping score after the atrocious 15th dogleg right. I deposited 4 balls into the drink that ran along the entire dogleg. At this point in the round, we were exhausted from walking the course and our backs were completely fried. We decided to call it and headed to the clubhouse. Overall it is a solid, challenging course. We will definitely be back.
Estimated Score: 96
Notables
Solid ball striking with my irons, off the tee, especially on par 3s.
Practice
Lighter grip on putter for more feel and fluidity in stroke. Smooth, lighter stroke with my driver. It seemed I was swinging way to hard on most tee shots.
Reflection
Now that I own an iphone, I’m able to record my swing on video. So, I recorded my swing using a 6-iron and learned a lot about it. Technically, I’m pretty content with how far my swing has come, compared to the state of it a few months ago. The things that need addressing are:
- Shortening up my backswing
A lot of rotation is not a bad thing, except it seems I have a really long backswing.
My club shaft ends on an extreme downward angle, and it believe it should end parallel to the ground. - Premature lower body rotation
I’ve been popping the ball up lately and it seems that during the downswing, my hips are well past the square position of the ball, at the point of impact. With that, I’ve wasted all the generated power from my hips, which makes my arms/hands play catch-up, resulting in a weak uppercut. I believe this b/c I was hitting my 6-iron, and the trajectory was similar to that of a pitching wedge. The trajectory of the 6-iron should have projected outward on a stiff line. - Head movement
For 85% of the swing, my head remains motionless. It’s the last part of the downswing, right before impact, that I lift up my head and body. It’s almost as if I’m standing straight up from a sitting position. There’s a lot of tension and it could be another reason for the pop-up trajectory.
