The post Remember this formula from inside 100 yards and you’ll be a better golfer appeared first on Golf.

The post Remember this formula from inside 100 yards and you’ll be a better golfer appeared first on Golf.

There’s a time and a place for working on your golf swing, of course. But the point of golf isn’t to grind on our technique on the range. The goal is to play on the golf course — and ideally, play well.

The good news is there are certain things you can do to improve your chances of shooting a good score with the game you have, just by being a little smarter with how you manage it.

Here’s a great example from GOLF Top 100 Teacher Nick Clearwater.

The first thing you need to understand is the concept of dispersion patterns. Don’t worry, it’s pretty simple.

Imagine hitting 25 balls to one target. Toss out your worst five or so shots, and what you’ll be left with is a relatively circular area where all your shots landed. That’s your dispersion pattern.

When you go the the golf course, you shouldn’t be aiming at targets based on where your best shot will land. You should aim based on keeping the most balls in your dispersion pattern safe.

For a green like this, that means aiming left and slightly long of this pin.

Some golfers may not have the time to find exactly their own dispersion pattern, so that’s where coach Nick Clearwater comes in. Based on data from his GOLFTEC students, he’s offering a simple rule that can serve as our guideline for shots within 100 yards:

The inside 100 yard formula

If the pin is tucked on the left or right side of the green, giving yourself a 10-yard buffer probably means aiming at the middle of the green. Don’t get greedy. You may not think it’s a good idea at the time, but you’ll enjoy the results.

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The post 3 keys to elite iron play, according to 3 PGA Championship winners appeared first on Golf.

The post 3 keys to elite iron play, according to 3 PGA Championship winners appeared first on Golf.

TULSA, Okla. — The greens at Southern Hills are small, elevated, and slope off in a variety of different directions. The man who walks away with the Wanamaker Trophy this week will need to excel in multiple different areas, but above all else: They’ll need to throw darts with their irons.

“You’re going to need to be really good with your iron game this week,” says GOLF Top 100 Teacher Justin Parsons, who coaches Louis Oosthuizen, among others.

“There’s some room to move it off the tee, but the greens are very small,” adds fellow GOLF Top 100 Teacher Drew Steckel.

With that in mind, the question then becomes: What makes for a good iron player? Especially at the top of the sport, what separates the very good from the great? That’s the question I posed to three different major champions ahead of the 2022 PGA Championship. Here’s what they each had to say.

Rory McIlroy: Club up and swing easy

2014 PGA champion Rory McIlroy comes into the year’s second major off the back of two top-five finishes, and fifth in Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green. This week, he says his key to improving his iron play is to identify and practice two specific weaknesses in his game: Approaches to left pin positions, and making sure not to swing too hard.

“I’m trying getting comfortable taking a club more and hitting it easy,” he says. “Left pins is something that hasn’t been a strong suit of mine this year, either. That showed up in the stats, so trying to practice getting comfortable to left pin positions.”

Justin Thomas: Learn to work the ball

When the 2017 PGA champion was looking to upgrade his iron game, he went to a higher power. After playing with Tiger Woods for the first time, he asked him, quite simply: What could he be doing better?

“He said, ‘You don’t move the ball enough,'” JT said Tiger told him. “For me it was like, he’s pretty good, I should probably try it.”

Ever since, Thomas spends more time hitting different types of shots — draws, fades, high and low — on the driving range. When he’s on the course, he’s trying to pick a specific shot to work it into the pin. It doesn’t just give him more control over his golf swing; it allows him to attack more pins that were previously off limits.

Collin Morikawa: Find the best miss

Morikawa, the 2020 champion, is one of the best iron players on Tour — indeed, of his generation. But even so, his philosophy is simple: Don’t only think about the good shots. Think about the best place to miss your approach shot. Small mistakes are OK, he says. They’re going to happen. The best players know how to avoid the really big ones that will ruin your round.

“Even though the rough is pretty penal and the ball sits down, sometimes the rough might be better if it gives you more green to work with,” he says. “You might be able to run it up onto the green, or maybe a bunker is going to be a better angle. It’s just figuring out where you’re going to give yourself the biggest target to be able to play from on your next shot.”

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The post 10 tips to hit more approach shots onto the green appeared first on Golf.

The post 10 tips to hit more approach shots onto the green appeared first on Golf.

Taking a long walk to the green with your putter in hand is such a good feeling. Hitting more solid approach shots simply makes golf more fun — and it lowers your score, too.

Here’s how proper planning, good technique and specific practice can help to improve your ability to hit greens and enjoy more of those stress-free walks.

1. Know your carry distances

Proper club selection is huge when determining whether your approach shot will hit the green. It may sound obvious, but so many golfers don’t get the message.

When you’re calculating your distance averages for each club, it’s crucial to know how far each club carries in the air before it lands. This is how you’ll know if you’re able to carry a bunker, or a hazard.

It may be a little depressing when you find out those numbers, but remember: It doesn’t matter how far you hit each club, it matters that you know how far you hit each club.

2. Make practice swings ‘real’

The time and attention you pay to your practice swings pays off. One of the challenges of golf is that each shot requires a different length club that requires adjusting to. Taking a practice swing that allows you to adapt, quickly, and hitting the ground with your club to simulate ideal contact, will help your shot turn out the way you want.

3. Practice on similar lies

Along those lines, make sure you take your practice swings on a lie similar to the one you’re about to hit from. If your ball is on an uneven or varying lie, you should try to replicate this as much as possible, so you can adjust as necessary.

Practice swings are often your one and only time to adjust to the situation at hand, and when solid contact is a necessity, make sure they count.

4. Understand your aiming tendencies

Being a laser-like aimer is really important on approach shots, as is knowing your aiming tendencies.

Assuming you hit the ball relatively stright, your clubface should be pointing towards the target, and your feet, hips, shoulders, forearms and eyes all parallel to it. Most right-handed golfers tend to aim too far to the right and come over-the-top. That’s my tendency, but I now know that when I aim correctly, it feels a little more left than I might expect.

5. Know when to play safe

There is a time and a place to aim directly to the pin, but consider when you may be able to gain a stroke without taking on the risk of disaster.

For example, when a pin is tucked behind a bunker, it’s often smarter to just play to the center of the green. When in doubt, play to the middle.

6. Proper ball position is key

Ball position is one of the most important fundamentals in golf, because it directly affects contact and direction. Your swing could be perfect, but if your ball position is too far forward, it would be very common to hit the shot fat or pull it. Having a repeatable set up routine can be a big help in assuring perfect ball position for your approach shots.

7. Never short-side yourself

Short-siding yourself (where you miss the ball on the side of the green that is closest to the pin) is one the the biggest course management mistakes. When you don’t have much green to work with between your ball and the pin, you are typically forced to play a difficult pitch that stops quickly, rather than a simpler shot with more room for error.

Unless you know your approach shot is going to be perfect, always favor the side of the green that is the most open, and will lead to a short game shot that has lots of green to work with.

8. Know which clubs launch, and which clubs roll

Some clubs are better at launching high with more spin, which means they’ll roll less. Others tend to hit and run more, based on your clubhead speed.

Clubs that tend to fly higher and softer would be a higher-lofted fairway wood, hybrid or short iron.

Lower-lofted irons are more likely to land and release, so you may be need to plan to land the ball a bit shorter to allow for this roll. There’s a time and a place where both can help you, so make sure you stock your bag with a couple of each.

9. Use the grip as an aiming reference

All clubs in your bag have different lofts, so when you set them on the ground, they all look different.

Lofted clubs tend to look more open, in my opinion, and because clubface is the most important factor in direction, it makes setting your club properly on its bottom really important.

If you struggle with this, I’m a big fan of using the markers on the grip, or shaft, as a reference point. Sometimes looking at the leading edge can confuse some golfers; the grip, if it’s aligned correctly, can be a better reference point.

10. Know the slope

Greens are built with drainage in mind when it rains so that the course can return to playable as quickly as possible. If you know the tilt of the green you can use this to have your approach shots roll closer to the pin. Knowing this tilt in advance can be extremely helpful to have more short putts.

There are lots of great GPS apps out there, but I’m a GolfLogix ambassador (an affiliate company of GOLF.com) and that app really helps me find the different slopes on the greens, and use them to my advantage.

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The post Do this drill for more crisp and compressed iron shots appeared first on Golf.

The post Do this drill for more crisp and compressed iron shots appeared first on Golf.

If you want to take your game to the next level, you’ll need to learn how to compress the golf ball. What is “compression,” though? Some describe it as “one of golf’s best feelings.” And while that’s true, there’s a technical element to compression as well.

In the simplest terms, compression is when you deloft the club (typically an iron) at impact, hitting down on the ball and compressing it into the turf. As GOLF Top 100 Teacher Joe Plecker explains, “this combination of factors creates a metric instructors call ‘spin loft,’ which measures the difference between the dynamic loft of the face and the attack angle of the club at impact. That’s the feeling of compression.”

All of the best players in the world compress the ball at impact, and you should aim to as well.

However, compression is not easy to achieve for the average weekend hacker. Many recreational players “scoop” the club through impact, and they lose distance and spin because of it. But there is a way to teach yourself the proper fundamentals for compressing the ball.

Check out the video from Top 100 Teacher Andrew Rice for more.

Start with your shaft parallel to the ground with your lead wrist bowed and the clubface pointing to the ground. Now, take the club to the top while you maintain that clubface and wrist position.

From the top, continue to hold that position and hold it until you make contact with the ball. If you’ve held the position all the way to impact, you should strike down on the ball and compress it into the turf.

Work on this drill at the range if you struggle with compression and your ball striking is sure to improve.

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The post Deal of the week: Lag Shot Golf training aids are 15% off until Christmas appeared first on Golf.

The post Deal of the week: Lag Shot Golf training aids are 15% off until Christmas appeared first on Golf.

In this new GOLF.com series, we call out the latest and greatest deals on cool gear, accessories and apparel available in our Pro Shop. All of these prices are live at the time of publication, but act quickly, because we can’t guarantee they’ll last forever!

The Lag Shot training club is a showstopper … literally. It’s a whippy 7-iron that pretty much forces you to “load the club,” and teaches you to generate more lag. Lag Shot makes a wedge and a driver version too.

By practicing with this club, you’ll engrain consistent tempo and rhythm and actually see results based on ball contact (not just practice swings). If you’re casting the club, or rushing at the top of your swing, this club won’t allow you to actually hit the ball. Our game-improvement editor, Luke Kerr-Dineen, has this product on his wishlist this season, so you know it’s the real deal.

Until Christmas, this training aid is on sale for 15% off. Get it for yourself to keep your game sharp this off-season, or get it as a belated Christmas gift for the golfer in your life. Either way, this is a deal you definitely don’t want to miss.

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