Hitting Greens, Missing Putts

As my friends know all too well, I am not a good putter. I tend to miss easy short putts and turn birdie attempts into bogeys far too frequently.

That trend continued this weekend as I had 35 putts Friday (20 on the front with 4 3-putts) and 37 Saturday. On the bright side I seem to be doing well 2 putting from a long distance and my long putts are not that bad. On the down side, I seem to have no ability to make a straight 5 foot putt, including one for birdie Saturday.

I did read something this morning that might indicate what my problem is. Basically getting my arms too far away from my body which makes them go every which way instead of being locked into a single unit with my chest and shoulders. I'll go practice keeping my arms in tight and see if that helps some. I know that the short game is an area where I can improve greatly and cut a lot of strokes off my score and I do practice it more than I practice hitting full shots so it's not for a lack of effort.

Both days I shot a 94 (48-46 Friday and 47-47 Saturday). I thought I played much better on Saturday, playing a course that's a little more difficult. I hit 7 fairways, 8 greens in regulation and had 7 pars. Unfortunately the other 11 holes pretty much stunk. Averaged double bogeys there. If I turn them into bogeys I shoot 83. I tried 3 times in a row to tee the ball high and hover my driver behind it, trying to make sure I swept the ball off the tee and all three times I rocked back and ended up topping all 3. Went back to my normal tee height and went back to bombing drives. My best 2 drives were a long par 5 dogleg right where I cut the corner big time and left myself only 148 for my 2nd shot and the 18th hole where we had the wind at our back and I hit one 325.

As for the new irons, I am crushing most of them way farther than I expected. On Friday I hit a 5 iron dead into the wind uphill from 163 and flew over the green. On Saturday I had a 133 9 iron and a 148 8 iron that both flew well over the green. I think maybe I wasn't taking the wind into consideration enough on those. My gap wedge is a little short right now, still trying to figure out what the full distance is for that. All in all, I love hitting them, love the trajectory and the ball flight, it's all good, I'll get it figured out.

This Saturday is our 8-man trip to the Irish Course at Whistling Straits. Time to get my shit together.