Do your clubs know?

Canfordhacker

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So my new clubs are ordered and due to arrive in about 10 days. Crappy conditions today, but off my 12 handicap I find myself standing on the 14th tee 1 over gross. Ok so the rain came hard then, and I shot a 78, but my best round of the year. As my playing partner said - "Do you really need new clubs?"

How often does it happen that when clubs are misbehaving and you consider putting them on the naughty step they suddenly can do no wrong?

Gotta love golf.
 
So my new clubs are ordered and due to arrive in about 10 days. Crappy conditions today, but off my 12 handicap I find myself standing on the 14th tee 1 over gross. Ok so the rain came hard then, and I shot a 78, but my best round of the year. As my playing partner said - "Do you really need new clubs?"

How often does it happen that when clubs are misbehaving and you consider putting them on the naughty step they suddenly can do no wrong?

Gotta love golf.

It happened to me recently. I had been waiting 3 weeks for my new Irons. Final game with old clubs scored 42 points. Since buying those clubs I had been in a 3 year slump. The total score was better by 6 shots than anything I had achieved in the 3 years I had them.
I have tried to reconcile the fact that in that final round the rest of my bag was on fire.
 
Rather than praise the clubs how about gaining confidence in your swing?

It is all mental, if you leave the confidence with your old clubs you will never play well with your new ones.

This is why evidence based club changes are far better than impulse or desire based changes. Without a foundation to base the change on you can’t but help wonder if any bad days could have been better with the old set.

When changing clubs I think it’s really good to have a plan, make sure you identify all the good things about your game and focus on those rather than how well a set of clubs is doing. You will take time to adjust to new clubs, you will make mistakes and maybe score worse but with practice, assuming no negative effects (wrong shaft flex etc) you will either stay on the same improvement path or find a marginal gain.
 
Rather than praise the clubs how about gaining confidence in your swing?

It is all mental, if you leave the confidence with your old clubs you will never play well with your new ones.

This is why evidence based club changes are far better than impulse or desire based changes. Without a foundation to base the change on you can’t but help wonder if any bad days could have been better with the old set.

When changing clubs I think it’s really good to have a plan, make sure you identify all the good things about your game and focus on those rather than how well a set of clubs is doing. You will take time to adjust to new clubs, you will make mistakes and maybe score worse but with practice, assuming no negative effects (wrong shaft flex etc) you will either stay on the same improvement path or find a marginal gain.

You can over think these things way too much.

A new set comes with no baggage, and will play great, until the cheque clears.
 
Don't get me wrong, this is very much evidence based purchase (going from Ping i5 to Callaway Mavrik) with 2 * 1.5 hour fittings. I'm also conscious that I made a deliberate tweak this summer to my swing (which I am not wont to do usually!) that appears to have made a difference that is starting to feel good. I'm very much in the Positive Mental Attitude optimist camp, so the new clubs should just build on this.
 
If the clubs were fitted then be positive they are best suited for you. It sounds like you simply hit some good form. Enjoy the fact you played brilliantly for 14 holes and conditions conspired against you to a degree
 
This happened to my mate on the weekend. He was going on about the putter fitting he'd just done and mulling over the conclusion from it, then promptly went and holed putts left right and centre with his current one. "What did you go for a putter fitting for??" we ask. 'Dunno' he replies.
 
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