Tag: Thoughts

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Golf

Golf, the game for the masses, that everyone can play and enjoy. You can play the game of golf until the day you die. People are playing golf in their nineties, and kids can start playing when they are five years old. It is the game for everyone, but is it. For what ever reason golf has always had some kind of unwritten caste system. There is really never an exclamation on why this wonderful game became this way. Even within the game, there was this elitist attitude with the general public, when it came to golf. The golf professional was looked upon as a lower class citizen, during the first third of the 20th century. During tournaments that were held at country clubs the golf professional was not allowed access to the clubhouse facilities. Speaking of the golf professional, their organization, the Professional Golfers Association of America, had in its  by laws until 1961, that in order to be a member you had to be Caucasian. Let that sink in for awhile.

Country clubs are the last bastion of I want to play with my own kind, philosophy. The unwritten rule that many clubs would not allow minorities and people of the Jewish religion is still going on, but there has been some change recently. In the last 10 years there are more  country clubs allowing in their first African American members. There are still many all male golf clubs. There are many rules at most country clubs. Women can only tee off at certain times on the weekend, usually after 11am. The clubs try to make up for this my giving women a day like on Tuesday from 8 to 11 when they have the priority. WOW. There’s the men’s grill, and other rules and regulations that do not exist in what I would call the real world. The justification for these attitudes are we paid a whole lot of money to belong to this club and we will make the rules and play with who we want to play and associate with. If this has been the policy  for years to exclude minorities in country clubs and treat women as second class citizens, why has there been this gradual change to begin to open up the doors to a more diverse group of people. We all know it has nothing to do with a change in social consciousness or attitudes. It has to with $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$. Yeah, no kidding. The country club world is hurting, and now needs more members to enjoy all those restricted amenities. This is all well and good. If this leads to more minorities being able to play and enjoy some of the finer golf courses that this country has to offer, great. If this leads  to better treatment of the female golfer, wonderful.   I am sure we may see more  of these positive changes as the golf economic crunch continues.  

This has been going on in golf for years and years, and I am not going to make judgements, or go on about golf’s apparent lack of social conscience.  My question here is, how did this simple game of knocking a little ball around to put it into a hole, develop  this elitist attitude. I am not sure, but here is what I think.  As golf became more popular over the years there was one thing discovered about golf when compared with other sporting endeavors.  Golf could humiliate you like no other sport could.   It’s so simple and looks so easy.   But when you miss that first 15 inch putt, make your first whiff, or take 10 shots to try and get out of a sand trap, before just picking up your ball and walking sheepishly to the next tee, you know that there is something wrong with this game or maybe it’s you. Now it’s bad enough to do this in front of your friends, but to do this in front of strangers, or in front of people that you perceive is  below your so called social standing, is even worse, and adds to the humiliation.  The solution is to simple keep them away, and play with your own kind, to suffer the shame with your dear friends, who know what you are going through. Let’s face it, humility is not one of the traits of captains of business. Golf is simply that game that brings out the worst and the best, out of everyone.  It is too mystifying to be believed, and impossible to explain to someone who has not been through it.  It is this lack of understanding of golf, that has led this great game to develop this caste system. See you on links.  I will be the one walking with my head down while shaking it from side to side.    

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100% Mental Golf: Rounds 81 to 85

Back from vacation and back to the golf grind.   Five rounds of golf played with one of those a scramble,  and little progress to report.   The four individual rounds ranged from a low of 75 to a high of 82.  Again trying to make this game 100 % Mental is turning out to be way harder than expected.  When you are trying to improve, which we are all trying to do,  it is just about impossible to not try and tinker with some part of the swing.  I even brought back the old shoulder control swing for about  33 holes but abandoned that again.  The address position thing I was doing is gone.   Despite by being unhappy at times with my ball striking, my lack of scoring comes down to one big work this year.

PUTTING.   Despite my problems on the greens, which there are many, I am still able to keep my index in the low 4’s, with the latest on the 15th 4.2.  I am just not getting the ball into the hole.   The first thing I am going to change is what I do with the flagstick.  I have left it in for all putts this year.  Overall I think it helps you more than hurts but after doing it all year, I think there are two points that all the flagstick testers are missing.  All flagsticks are not created equal.  I play a variety of courses and I feel there is a difference on how some flagsticks receive a ball.  I do not think there is a standard diameter for flagsticks, but even if I am wrong,  I am not sure golf courses follow it totally anyway.  There is no question the hole looks bigger with the flagstick out.  100% Mental just kicked in.   It goes back to that old Ken Venturi saying that I have quoted before.  If the flagstick is out he trying to make the chip, and if he leaves the flagstick in the hole, then he is just trying to get it close.  So, on any putt under 30 feet, I am taking the flag out the rest of the season.   Longer putts I will decide on a case by case basis.   Sounds pretty serious doesn’t it.  The second thing I am going to do is try to make the most natural stroke for me that I can, and  not use any particular method.  The thing that got me out of my slump in 2017, and improved my putting immensely, was when I started to let my body move on putts. Since then, I have gone back and forth on this method over this 2 year period.  The problem is trying to make your body move on putts, is as bad as trying to keep it still on putts.  It distracts you from keeping your focus on making the putt.  We will see how this all goes in the coming weeks.

By now you see that the blog has a little different look and a slight change in the title of the site.   Since I am beginning to see that I am not going to find the answer after 9 years, I have decided to write about other subjects, that are near and dear to my heart.  They are Meditation, Food, Sports, and I will continue to write about Golf and the quest to find the answer.  Even though I feel I won’t find the answer I am not giving up either.   I will be playing about 4 times this week and we will see how it goes.

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100% Mental Golf: Rounds 68 to 80

I am back to the 100% Mental Golf concept and my last 13 rounds have been pretty good. Ten of the thirteen rounds have been between 79 and 74.    One 74, four 75’s, two 76’s, one 77, and two 79’s.   A couple of blips in there with rounds in the 80’s, but over all some good if not spectacular scores.   I will be taking a small break from the game as we are heading for the beach for about five days.  The season is around half way through and I feel I am back on track with the original concept.

Again putting has been a problem, but with five rounds 75 and below it has had it’s good moments.   We played South Park today and this was one of  the 75 rounds and even though I hit a lot of good putts none of them found the hole.  I did not miss any short ones today and I had two birdie putts that were between six and 10 feet that I made. I have made some adjustments to my stance and posture and I think these may bode well for me in the future.   My short game continues to be plagued by some yipping but even that has not been too bad lately.  I am getting more comfortable with my new irons and getting use to the increased distance I am hitting the ball.  We have had a good stretch of weather during this time and that has  helped.

As I head into the second half of the season, one of the things I will be working on is trying to feel relaxed during the golf swing.   Can you be too relaxed while executing the golf swing, your short game, and putting. There are lots of instructors that think you can be.  I am not too sure this is correct.   Can you be as relaxed in your body, as when you are meditating, and still make a powerful golf swing.   Certainly any tension in your body can make executing the swing more difficult.  Not to get too deep here, but is there a spirituality in playing golf, which can be transmitted to the golf swing itself.  Can a relaxed body allow you to focus better and visualize the shot better.  I aim to find out in the coming weeks.  Won’t be playing the game for about a week, with the trip coming up, so will have to wait and see.  This has been some of the adjustments I have been making at address, with removing tension from my set up and grip.  There are others but again I have only been doing this over the last 3 rounds.  Small sample size, as they like to say on MLB Now.      See you in about 3 weeks

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100% Mental Golf Rounds 35-47

I have played 13 rounds since the last blog on May 8.  It has been a bit of a roller coaster and I must say I don’t really know if I stayed the course of 100% Mental Golf. Maybe I should change the name to just 100% Mental.  Played a few courses for the first time this year such as Quicksilver, Hartmans, North Park and Highland Springs.  My scores ranged from 74 to 85.  During the stretch I have 4 rounds in the 80’s and 9 rounds in the 70’s. I had a run of three straight rounds in the 80’s from May 16 to 21.  This little streak caused some concerned, that a slump may be brewing and led to some of the things I did, which apparently helped as the next 5 rounds were all in the 70’s.

After the 3rd round in the 80’s, and it being the worse at 85, I decided that I had to do something a little different.   I decided to concentrate on my breathing while getting ready to hit the ball and during the swing itself.  Now this is not something that is new, but I did put a little different twist on it.   When reading about breathing and the golf swing the advice is to inhale on the backswing and exhale on the downswing.  I did not follow this rule.   I did not try to time my breathing with the golf swing  at all.  I just tried to follow my routine and swing.   My swing may have started when I was beginning my exhale or when I was in the middle of inhale.   I did this for all phases of the game, long game, short game and putting.  The results were quite good, with the very first round  coming in at 74.  The next 3 rounds were good also, 75, 76, and 77.    Then on Memorial Day at Highland Springs I got away from it and had a bad front nine of 5 over par and made another philosophical change that seemed to right the ship and shot 2 over on the back, to end with 79.  The front nine was a major putting problem with 21 putts contributing to the bad score. For now I am not going say what that philosophical change was.  What does this all mean?  I am not too sure.    Thinking of breathing during the golf swing may not be  better than any other swing thought that we usually do.   I am not quite  sure why I stopped the process on Monday.    Have not been able to play the rest of this week because of very unstable weather and I think I needed a little break anyway to mull all this over.  In the coming 2 weeks there is not going be a lot of golf played because next week I am  heading to San Diego to see the grandkids.  Maybe I will ask them, especially the 4 year old.

So where do I go from here and how does this affect 100% Mental Golf.  I will probably play 3 more rounds of golf before a I leave for San Diego and hopefully will learn more. I will go back to the breathing and on the next blog I will talk about the philosophy change whether it works or not. Feel like I am coming down the home stretch here.  Rounding 3rd and heading for home.  Just don’t know if I will be safe or out.

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100% Mental Golf: Rounds 27-34

I have played 7 rounds since the last blog and not much progress has been made.  I did have 2 good rounds, a 76 at Fort Cherry and a 76 at Rolling Acre which has a par of 73.  The other 5 rounds were all in the 80’s at the familiar places, Scenic Valley and Fort Cherry, with one round at Pheasant Ridge.  The weather has not been too bad but we are getting rain at least every 2 to 3 days and I must admit I feel that I  have been playing soggy courses forever. This really isn’t an excuse for the bad rounds but it does get old having to clean your ball almost after every shot. I had the 76 at Rolling Acre this past Sunday and it was by far the best ball striking day of the year.  I hit 14 greens in regulation and made 3 horrible iron shots, that led to the 3 bogies.  My putting was not bad but obviously my ball did not find the hole on all those birdie putts. I thought this was going give me some momentum for the week, but both on Monday and Tuesday my game was off and it was hard to tell why. It is still very hard not to think the old fashion way of looking at your swing, when things go wrong even when you know that this is not the answer.    Let’s go back to the Sunday round which was a great ball striking day, and look at those three bad shots.  This may show what 100% Mental golf really means.

I had parred the first 4 holes and came to the 180 yard par 3 fifth hole.  The conditions were chilly and damp.  The hole is slightly uphill.   Even though the pin was cut on the left I chose to cut a 5 iron because I wanted to get the ball in the middle of the green. I was not flag hunting here and this was good thinking.  What was bad thinking, was that the 5 iron was not enough club in those conditions.  I closed the club down at impact and hit a dead straight pull about 35 yards left of the green .  Even with the over the top swing, I was not green high and the pin was in the back.  If I  would have hit a draw 5 iron or  cut the 4 iron, I am sure the results would have been better. From that point my play was stellar but missed about a 4 foot birdie on 8 and a twisting downhill left to right 12 putt on 9 to shoot one over on the front.   The 10th hole is a par 4 and I hit a nice drive down the right side of the fairway.  The pin was cut on the right front of the green and I had about 150 yards to the pin. I took dead aim at the pin which was a mistake.  I did not have a good picture of the shot and hit it way right almost 30 yards off line.   I parred the next 4 holes.   They moved up the tees on the 15th hole a par 5 and after two good shots I was about 40 yards short of the green on the right and the pin was cut on the mid right of the green.   The problem was my ball was on a pretty good down slope.  I tried to hit a high shot and wound up chunking it about 20 of the 40 yards.  Even though I was close to the green and should have played a more conservative shot which would have gone lower and slightly left of the pin and would have wound up around 8 to 20 feet from the pin depending on how far the ball had gone.  Then I went on to par the final 3 holes.

The mystery to me was my bad play on Monday and Tuesday.   But then, when I think about it, I went back to some physical remedies that I did not really need to do.  I am not going into what they were.  It does go to show you just how brainwashed I am when it comes to trying to “fix” your golf game when it does not need really fixing.  Bad decision making leads to bad swings.  Once that gets better then the scores will come.  See you next week.

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100% Mental Golf: Rounds 20-26

Played seven rounds of golf since the last blog, and I am floundering a bit, and it may have been because of the last blog.  Lets get to the numbers: Fort Cherry 85   Scenic Valley 78   Ponderosa 77     Fort Cherry 79    Scenic Valley 77    Ponderosa  78    Scenic Valley  78.  Other than the horrendous day at Fort Cherry  the rounds were obviously consistent. If I wanted to be hard on myself, I could say, consistently lousy.  The weather was not great, mostly dark and dreary with some rain here and there, cool temperatures but with little to no wind.  The weather was not the issue.  The Fort Cherry round was a total disaster but I managed to right the ship to the point of making 5 pars and 2 bogeys on the last 7 holes.  Fort Cherry’s par is 70 so I was 13 over after 11 holes and everything was bad.    The rest of rounds were ok  with the normal things from keeping me scoring better.  We all know them.  Putting and short game, with some bad decisions mixed in.

What does the last blog have to do with all this?   I wrote, does 100% Mental Golf mean you totally ignore the physical side of the game.  My answer was no and I explained that I was making sure I was turning my body on my swing and gave this credit for my really good round of 75 at Scenic Valley.  Four days later I follow this round up with one of the worst of the year.  I repeat the question.  Does 100% Mental Golf mean you totally ignore the physical side of the game?  Now my answer is yes.  Now again this is for just us poor pathetic single digit handicappers who are stuck on the number.  How to get to a single digit handicap and be miserable, is another blog altogether.   I am not going to defend this position today, because maybe it will change again, but after the last 7 rounds, I don’t think so.  Obviously turning my body did not help me at Fort Cherry.  In the last blog I made the comment that there is a difference between thoughts and feelings.  Who cares.  Neither one is worth a good crap for very long on the golf course.  It boils down to the body and mind and how they function together.  I think now that some of our preconceived ideas about the golf swing, short game and putting are not right for our own particular golf game.   I am not going to get into specific examples, because this could change  by next week.

We will see what happens over the next few rounds.   I feel there should be 3 golf books that need to be written.

  1.  How to Become a Single Digit Handicap Golfer (At Least a 12)
  2.  How to Become a Scratch Golfer or Die Trying
  3.  Putting:  Get the Damn Ball in the Hole Any Way You Can

See you next week.

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100% Mental Golf: Rounds 16-19

Able to play four rounds last week, and it was quite a week.  Played Indian Run 78, South Park 76,  Victory Hills 86, and Scenic Valley 75.  I played Tuesday through Friday, and I managed to sandwich in that 86, among the other pretty good rounds.  The conditions were not too bad, with only a very windy day at Indian Run, which made the 78 a better score than it would seem. So what happened at Victory Hills.  Very fast greens, that were unexpected, and I  was never really able to make the adjustment.  I had 39 putts for the day, but I was on the fringe 2 other times, and 3 putted, but technically only counted as 2 putts.  My ball striking was really good for the first 10 holes, especially the driver. My iron game was off just enough to give me some longer putts, and the score was 8 over after 10 holes.  Then for 4 holes my ball striking just deserted me, and even though I struck the ball better on the last 4 holes, it was a little too late.   I had not played this course for about 3 years, and even though I know the course pretty well, the greens caught me by surprise.  The other odd thing, this was the first course this year, that was playing hard and fast through the green.   On that bad stretch on the back nine, the ball was rolling into trouble to compound the bad ball striking.

The rest of the rounds were pretty good, the Scenic Valley round being the best of the year so far. The putting had it’s moments, which almost made me grade it B, but it was still too erratic to consider good overall.  Does 100% mental golf mean that you totally ignore the physical side of the game.  After all it is 100% mental.  My answer is no, and I am not too sure how I reconcile the concept,  other that to say feelings are different from thoughts.  I have always felt that the golf swing is a turn back and a turn forward.  Even though my ball striking has been good this year, I felt the swing just did not feel right.  The last round of the week at Scenic Valley I made sure that my body was turning and it was controlling the arms and not the arms controlling the body.   I did not try to get the club in any type of position at the top, all I did was turn by body away from the target on the backswing and then turn toward the target on the downswing.   This led to some of the best ball striking of the year.  During the round I was aware of turning the body but I still was concentrating on where I wanted the ball to go and the type of shot I was trying to execute.  In other words even though I was aware of turning my body more, I did not get into the typical things that I think many golfers get into when they hit a bad shot.  Thinking swing easier, swing in balance,  don’t overswing, smooth transition, and lead with the legs.   There is a lot more here but I think you get the point.  Every bad shot and mean every bad shot, is caused by a lack of awareness of the conditions, trying to do a shot you are not capable of, playing the wrong type of shot, picking the wrong club, or the circumstances of the situation, like trying to beat your best score or win a match or hole.  What it is not, is some flaw that has developed mysteriously in your swing.  There are certain principles of the golf swing which must be obeyed but there is a very wide leeway on how to go about these principles.  There is nothing that you have to be very specific about.  The three principles of the golf swing  are 1) Your body must turn.  2) You must lift the club some way with the hands and arms. 3) The belly button must pass the ball before the hands and arms on the forward swing.   That’s it.  Of course there are things you must do before you swing the club, but as far as the swing itself that is all there is.

This week looks like another 3 to 4 rounds should be played  with weather issues maybe making that number less.  The scores are going down some.  The index dropped from 4.7 to 4.1 for the first 2 weeks of the handicap season.  For me putting will be the key.  Still having some issues with that but we will see how all this progresses.  See you next week. Oh, by the way, does anybody out there know who won The Masters this week, I’ve been kind of busy and  just kidding.  What a great weekend of golf.

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100% Mental Golf: Rounds 12 thru 15

Four more rounds are in the book since March 28th.  Played at Fort Cherry 76, Indian Run 80, Scenic Valley 80, and Beaver Valley 76.  The 80 at Indian Run was a pretty good score with winds at about 25 to 30 miles per hour all of the round.  I did play 9 holes at Mt. Lebanon yesterday, where I hoped I learned some things about playing 100% Mental Golf.

Again putting was a big issue, although there were some good moments with the book end 76’s, especially the round at Beaver Valley.  One of the things I did which seemed to help, I changed my routine. Most of the bad putts were me reverting back to my old routine, and then not starting over and being frustrated rather than thinking about making the putt.  Every thing else with my game has been A-Ok.   The hardest thing about this whole process is still looking at my swing when a shot goes wrong.  I feel like I am getting there, however.   Let me give you some examples of where poor thinking or a lack of thinking is what really affected the shot not some obscure swing flaw.   Let’s start from the tee box and move through the rest of the hole.    The biggest mistake is hitting driver when less club would do.  Number 2 is hitting the wrong type of shot.   Remember there is nothing wrong on a particular hole of trying to hit the ball straight rather than a fade or a draw.  For the rest of the hole whether a par 5 or a par 4  it is under estimating the effects of the lay of the land.   You would think playing in Western Pennsylvania my entire life, that I would get this.   First of all, I am not sure that the current thinking on how to play uneven lies is even correct.  I have written about this in the past, particularly the ball below your feet shot.    Other issues during the course of the hole is choosing the right club and how the ball is sitting in the grass.  All I can say is, when you figure things correctly, 99% of the time you will hit a good shot.    If you have figured it wrong, or are not aware of something, then the shot will go awry.  This is particularly true of the short game.  If you plan the shot correctly then you will most likely hit a good shot.    If you are hitting it high when you should hit it low or vice versa then the shot will be less than average.

Then there is putting.   The ultimate mental madness, which can freeze your brain and make you dysfunctional.   Here is what I did different, which got me putting a little better, especially on the medium to long putts.  I always looked at the hole when I made my practice stroke.  But my real stroke never seemed to be like my practice stroke.  I have tried putting when looking at the hole and this does not work for me.  Believe me I have tried everything when it comes to putting.  Now I look at the ball and then look up on the practice stroke, just like the actual putt.    Now the strokes feel exactly alike and this started to give me a little more confidence when putting. Plus I seemed to be able to see the line better.  This week looks like another 4 round week.   Remember it’s not your swing.  Remember it’s not your swing. Remember it’s not your swing.

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100% Mental Golf: Round 2

Played the second round of the year on Friday, under similar conditions with temperatures in the mid to upper 40’s with a little more wind this time.  I shot 79 but this was a totally different round than the last one.

The Good.  Ball striking was good again although not quite as good as the first round and I solved the pitching problem  with some alignment adjustments and a grip change.  When I line up for a pitch shot of 20 to 40 yards I feel that I am aiming about 4 to 6 feet left of really where I want to go.  Probably I am aiming right on, but this is my perceptions of things and I am fine with this because the results were great.  In fact I pitched one in the cup for a birdie on the 11th hole which really jumped started the round.  I got it up and down numerous times during the round. I went to my putting grip for these shots and this seemed to help. I have done this in the past with good results.  My putting was better especially the short putts.

Problems:  A horrendous start to the round.  I hit a beautiful drive off the first tee but then from there it was one thing after another.  A four putt on the first hole and then one mental error after another led to double bogey, bogey, double bogey, bogey start.  Then I slowly but surely righted the ship and even though I missed 2 rather short birdie putts on 9 and 10, the pitch in birdie on 11 got the round going, to be able to shoot one over on the last 14 holes.  One of the problems all day even as the round improve was to visualize the shot.  I could not draw the ball all day.  Early in the round this got me in trouble but then I tried to do it later where there was no trouble on the right and I still could not do it.   My mental process improved during the round as I did not make or look to make any swing changes and I started to play better.

Round 2 is in the books and it was kind of a strange round.  The wind was a factor but overall it felt good to right the ship.  When I was 6 over after 4 holes I thought maybe I was headed for a round that might not break 90.  As we were going  over to the 5th tee I was thinking, wow, this is really going to look good on blog.  100% mental you betcha, baby. There might be a possibility for a round this week but it is a toss of the coin.  See you next time.

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100% Mental Golf: Round 1

This was my 3rd round of the year but the first round where I felt totally committed to  Golf is 100 % Mental.  First let me tell you what these posts will be about.  They will be description of the rounds on a very basic level.  I find that reading about or listening to shot by shot descriptions of rounds to be very tedious and boring.  The round will be divided into two parts.  The first part will be the good. The second part will be labeled problems, those things that kept the round from be being better.  I will not elaborate much on the  problems or what I think caused them.    I plan on making these posts be very positive.   I may go into a little more depth when I find the solution to the problem but until I do, I am not going to go into the why of the problem.   I played last Tuesday and the conditions were coolish but calm,  with temperatures in the mid to upper 40’s and the course was  very damp and muddy.  The greens were pretty good considering the time of the year.  I shot 80 which at Scenic Valley is 8 over par.

The Good.   My ball striking was very good considering I had not played for a solid month.  Out of 14 drives I only hit three that got me into trouble and my recovery out of the woods was so good on one particular hole, that I birdied it.  I had three birdies and the putting was good as two of the birdies putts were  between 20 and 25 feet.   My iron game was good along with my chipping. My visualization process for the long game worked really well.  I will elaborate more on this process as the season goes on, when I think I have a process that really works.   For this Round number one I was seeing the shots very well especially off tee.

Problems.   Putting, yes the putting was good and bad.  I three putted twice from inside 30 feet, and missed 2 really short putts after some pretty good chip shots.  The thing though that kept this round from being a mid 70 round, which would have been  pretty remarkable considering the time of year, was the failure to execute the 25 to 45 yard pitch shot.  Twice it took me not 2, not 3, but 4 strokes to get down from approximately 25 to 40 yards, which led to 2 of  3 double bogies.  These negated the 3 birdies, to say the least. The mental process failed me for these shots and I will see if I can correct this miserable problem.

So round one is in the books.   I did not have any swing thoughts, made no swing adjustments during the round, and was happy with my mental process for  putting even though I had my ups and downs on the greens.  There may be a chance to play at the end of the week but not too sure.  See you next time and happy golfing.