2 ways to use the tee box that make golf (a little) easier

Two frames of a golf hole at Harbour Town Golf Links

Golf is hard. Not sure that’s considered a particularly revolutionary or controversial take, but it is something worth reminding ourselves of from time to time, because it can help us focus on doing all the little things that can help make golf a little easier. Necessity, after all, is the mother of invention.

Along those lines, let’s talk about tee boxes. Specifically, how you can use them to help you hit more fairways, and therefore, have more fun.

1. Peg it left, aim it right

The hole we’re looking at here is the 6th at Harbour Town Golf Links, one of my favorite courses on the planet. It’s a pretty straightaway hole, with a waste bunker left and OB flanking both sides. But just because the hole is straight, that doesn’t mean you should aim straight down the middle.

If you tend to hit a draw, or your miss is a hook, aiming straight down the middle means overdoing your stock shot will leave you in trouble.

Instead, come at the fairway from an angle: Peg on the left side of the tee box, and aim down the right side of the fairway. Hitting across the fairway means that as the ball travels, it’s crossing over more of the fairway’s surface areas.

2. Peg it right, aim it left

Slicers or faders, by contrast, should do the opposite. You never want an overcooked shot to be in trouble, if you can avoid it. That’s why any golfer who tends to hit shots left-to-right would be well served coming at the fairway from the right side of the tee box, and aiming down the left side.

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Luke Kerr-Dineen

Golf.com Contributor

Luke Kerr-Dineen is the Game Improvement Editor at GOLF Magazine and GOLF.com. In his role he oversees the brand’s game improvement content spanning instruction, equipment, health and fitness, across all of GOLF’s multimedia platforms.

An alumni of the International Junior Golf Academy and the University of South Carolina–Beaufort golf team, where he helped them to No. 1 in the national NAIA rankings, Luke moved to New York in 2012 to pursue his Masters degree in Journalism from Columbia University. His work has also appeared in USA Today, Golf Digest, Newsweek and The Daily Beast.