Good luck v Bad luck

[Norrin Radd]

Now when we have a good round going and you are striking it good ,when you do eventually put one in the rough what do you find? for me if the round is going well then my ball will sat up like its sitting on a tee peg. BUT,when you are playing not so well what do you find ,me I end up on a down slope sitting right behind a big tuft of grass,or in the semi the lye is sat right down in the grass with little hope of making a decent contact on the ball.
methinks the golfing gods have a good laugh when im not on form.

 

[Imurg]

They say that good luck and bad luck even out over the year....
In which case I'm due a blinder!!

 

[Jacko_G]

Links golf teaches you that you need to be patient with bounces and kicks.

I think when you are playing poorly you look more closely at the bad breaks and bounces.

 

[HomerJSimpson]

Had a horror bounce OOB today but several huge slices of luck yesterday to pick up some cash in the roll up. Not sure there's a ledger of good and bad luck that has to balance but you have to simply take advantage when you get some fortune and try not to let it affect you or compound the error when it doesn't. Felt for a PP today who had the worse plugged lie in a bunker that was a foot from the back lip with no stance or back swing. He definitely wasn't feeling the golfing gods sense of humour

 

[ArnoldArmChewer]

Now when we have a good round going and you are striking it good ,when you do eventually put one in the rough what do you find? for me if the round is going well then my ball will sat up like its sitting on a tee peg. BUT,when you are playing not so well what do you find ,me I end up on a down slope sitting right behind a big tuft of grass,or in the semi the lye is sat right down in the grass with little hope of making a decent contact on the ball.
methinks the golfing gods have a good laugh when im not on form.

I agree 100% with you here, I played really poorly yesterday, was in a poor mood for golf, we were playing at a snails pace and every break I got was a bad break, I think that I need more positivety next round :whoo:

 

[jim8flog]

I like the saying which goes something like

"to win you have first to be lucky"

I also am a believer in that luck evens itself out over the time.

 

[Dibby]

I think it is more a reflection on personality and depends how you perceive things.

Some people take credit for the good stuff, "I was playing to that side, so the bounce would always be ok", but blame the bad stuff on being unlucky.

Some people think they are lucky when things work out, and blame themselves when something goes wrong.

Some people will take the credit and accept blame no matter the outcome, and some will say that all outcomes have a portion of luck.


Most people are a combination of these traits in different proportions and at different times.

 

[Capella]

I guess we all know days when we feel like we must have really offended one golf god or another. And others when everything just magically works and even bad shots somehow bounce into a good position. Still, I think most of that is psychological. It it the classical glass half full/half empty thing (or, as neurologists and psychiatrists describe it, the sympathicus/parasympathicus). Our nervous system is wired in a way that it can either feel positive things or negative ones, but never both at the same time. When you are on a run, you will perceive almost everything that happens as a positive. It takes a big negative impact (or several in a row) to switch gears and go into negativity. And vice versa. Once you are in a downward spiral, everything tends to look grim and negative, even if it is just a few blades of grass behind the ball which you would otherwise simply ignore or not even notice.

That is why giving positive feedback to yourself is so important. It anchors you in that postive half of your nervous system. It is why Arya Jutanagarn (who is currently ranked no. 1 female player in the world) consciously smiles before every shot as a fixed part of her preshot routine, even if her last shot was horrendous or when she is in a really difficult position.

 

[shortgame]

I think it is more a reflection on personality and depends how you perceive things.

Some people take credit for the good stuff, "I was playing to that side, so the bounce would always be ok", but blame the bad stuff on being unlucky.

Some people think they are lucky when things work out, and blame themselves when something goes wrong.

Some people will take the credit and accept blame no matter the outcome, and some will say that all outcomes have a portion of luck.


Most people are a combination of these traits in different proportions and at different times.

This

And I never understand the 'luck evens out' thing - there's absolutely no reason why it would

 

[Kellfire]

Luck isn't a real thing - it's an excuse.

 

[Liverbirdie]

Whats this bad luck thing you're on about?

Maybe its true that God does indeed shine on the righteous.

 

[patricks148]

if i didn't have bad luck, I'd have no luck at all

 

[Jacko_G]

Luck isn't a real thing - it's an excuse.

Really?

I witnessed a blocked tee shot at a par 3 that kicked off the back of a bunker, shot across the green, smacked the flag and dropped in for the "worst hole in 1 I've ever seen!"

Even the guy who did it talks about him having the worst hole in 1 on the planet. Was funny though.

 

[Curls]

It's observational bias mostly, when you're in a negative frame of mind cos things aren't going well "bad luck", let's say a bad bounce into a bunker instead of away from it, will be magnified in your minds eye. If you're playing well you see it as a challenge you can rise to, you'll get that out of the bunker and close. Afterwards you don't even really remember it was a bad bounce put you in there.

I played with a guy yesterday who had bad bounces on the first few holes and the victim was pleaing with the Gods for a change in his luck. As it happens he played well on the back, had some very lucky escapes/found balls etc and didn't say a thing about how good his luck was coming in!

 

[Orikoru]

Luck isn't a real thing - it's an excuse.

Of course it's real. If you hit a perfect shot towards the green and bounces on a sprinkler head and goes flying off into a bunker that's bad luck isn't it? If you thin an approach and it rolls straight through a bunker, pops out the otherwise and ends up 2 feet from the pin, that's a lucky shot. What else would you call it?

People do overstate it though of course. Like a shot that's already going offline bouncing further offline can't just be put down to luck.

 

[patricks148]

Luck isn't a real thing - it's an excuse.

how would you explain my Tee shot on the 1st at Kilmarnock Barassie ...

Blocked it OOb onto the railway line, it bonces about 200 yards down the railway sleepers then hit a concrete post which knocked it back in bounds about 100 yards from the green.. its a par 5 lol

if that's not luck i don't know what is