Another Cut

[markwarne]

On the vein of a thread earlier in the week, my target for the calendar year of reduced handicap is moving on nicely.

Started the year on 24.6 and moved around a little in the mid 23's for a about 6 weeks.

Now after three or four comps, big in roads are being made and my latest cut is to 20.8 which I am well chuffed with.

My target for the year was / is to get to 18.

I can think of several reasons why it is coming down and would be interested to hear what to others think in terms of how to improve:

1) Custom fitting of my driver - made a huge difference, less whippy, more control.

2) Short game practice - using my regular balls (ooer missus) as opposed to range pebbles, spending a good 30 mins each time I'm up the golf club just honing those little tiddlers from about 10 - 20 yrds to the pin has made a huge difference.

3) Confidence in putting - spending a little more time lining up and focussing on not leaving them short.

Looking forward to my next cut (hopefully)

 

[Smiffy]

It's the short game practice that will get you down Mark.
No question.
Keep practicing it...much bigger benefits to be had than bashing balls down the range.
Trust me. I'm a doctor

 

[janmolby]

Hi Mark, maybe you'd be a good person to ask this off seeing as you're kind of in a similar situation to me. I recently joined the local golf club & have just received a 24.3 handicap. I'm hoping to play twice at the weekends & at least once during the week from now until mid-October. I scored 23 points on Saturday & had 17 points after 13 holes on Sunday when I had to leave.

Now I know that's hardly great scoring but I played well on some holes & made some stupid mistakes too which with a bit more experience I might be able to stop from happening. I'm planning on getting some lessons in the next few weeks & I was wondering what people thought would be reasonable progress to expect by the end of Autumn, handicap wise?

 

[CrapHacker]

Hi Mark, maybe you'd be a good person to ask this off seeing as you're kind of in a similar situation to me. I recently joined the local golf club & have just received a 24.3 handicap. I'm hoping to play twice at the weekends & at least once during the week from now until mid-October. I scored 23 points on Saturday & had 17 points after 13 holes on Sunday when I had to leave.

Now I know that's hardly great scoring but I played well on some holes & made some stupid mistakes too which with a bit more experience I might be able to stop from happening. I'm planning on getting some lessons in the next few weeks & I was wondering what people thought would be reasonable progress to expect by the end of Autumn, handicap wise?

Impossible question tbh. But if you concentrate on minimising the errors, and not letting an error stay on your mind when you do make one, then your handicap will look after itself.

Once you've had those lessons you might be able to make more solid targets

GL

 

[jammydodger]

Just want re-iterate Smiffys views...short game practice is where it's at.

Spend as long as you possibly can doing short game practice and your h/c should take care of itself. Give yourself little challenges while doing it too , like dont move onto the next part of your practice til youve holed a chip from where you are. Maybe when putting keep playing until you either hole everything or at worst all your putts get past the flag.

Set little targets to keep your mind concentrated and put a bit of pressure on yourself to replicate on course pressure

 

[Twire]

Well done mark, going in the right direction.

 

[HomerJSimpson]

Putting and short game (including bunkers) will get your handicap down for sure. However I'd also focus on my course management as it sounds like you are frittering shots away. If you take every hole as a par 5 it will take pressure off trying to par every hole. What you lose on the longer par 4's and the 5's you can claw back on the 3's and shorter 4's

If you shoot level 5's you'll play to 90 and clean up off that handicap. It also means that if you hit a bad shot you'll be more inclined to play more sensibly and use the shot in hand (on a 4) to get out and then focus about getting onto the green

 

[mono217]

I feel shots come off your handicap aroudn and on the green.