Yeah, it's different. I'm not sure I can offer much of an explanation, though. The conventional wisdom is that most players shouldn't be using long irons anyway. Add additional (5, 7) fairway woods and/or hybrids instead.

That said, if the weather holds I'm going out to the course tonight to practice and one of the things I hope to do is decide whether to put the 1 or 2 iron back in the bag so that I have an extra option on my par-5 dilemma OMG I can't fade a fairway wood shot posted above. Need to remember to bring some experienced golf balls for on-course testing.

morgan continues to struggle anytime michelle is on the same course.

tears may be involved.

With long irons it is a case of most common golfers are so much better of hitting woods or hybrids. But there is a small group of not very good golfers that hit 4-irons, 3-irons or even 2-irons quite well. By quite well I mean, not very long, but consistently with the other irons keeping the gap between each club the same more or less.

I used to have a 2-iron which I hit quite well, but as it is long time ago, I guess that it would be around a 3-iron today. I had it ordered specifically but to the same specs as the rest of my set (Toski, are they even made these days?).

The main reason there could be for keeping long irons is that you can be in the situation where you slice everything with woods, but irons you hit more straight. Then it would be beneficiary to have the longer irons when you are trying to hit the green. Fairway-to-fairway shots you can compensate for the slice and will probably get more distance and consistency from the woods or hybrids.

CAT FIGHT, imo. Pics or it did not happen

Did some research, looks like most of the better courses are at least 40 minutes from the loop area. George Dunne looks like it might be the best deal in terms of being relatively affordable and not terribly far away.

duval sighting...countdown to implosion

**** Golf...

thanks for the help for the shaft from everybody. I went and hit some at the range, and store today and was still spinning like a mofo. The clerk at teh store said the club I'm using should be going lower so it's my swing. Might as well fix that before jumping into a new shaft I think

I can't seem to hit a driver with any consistancy for the life of me. Everything else I'm fairly happy with, but it makes par 5's a bitch when your only options are 210yd 5 wood or 100yd slice driver.

Has nybody invested in some lessons with the screen/video camera/ and all that jazz? I'm thinking about grapping a package of 5 for $199, but dunno if I should just grab regular lessons for $30 a pop.

Both of those prices are very cheap if the instructor is any good at all.
I would consider posting video of your driver swing on here.
You'll get some good advice, and the price is certainly right!

I'll try to get a vid up. I just re-did my comp, and I dunno where my cam's software is but I should be able to dig it up.

Btw does it matter if they're at teh range, or can I just take a vid of some practice swings?

The rain held off this evening so I went out to the course for a practice round. I brought along a couple extra clubs and after playing conducted a little experiment on my favorite shot (see post #106 ITT).

I bagged a demo R9 3 wood and my 1 iron (couldn't find the 2 iron in my 30 second search).

I dropped several balls at the 215 mark, slightly right of the target drawn on the graphic. Conditions were very wet, so there was no roll.

3 shots with the R9 in the neutral upright setting, using every fade trick I know (slighly weaker grip & open stance, conscious effort to swing a bit outside-in) --> 2 gentle draws to just short left of the green, 1 more pronounced hook into the left bunker.

3 shots with the 1 iron, again using the "fade swing" --> 2 gentle fades, one about five yards short, one caught a little heavy and about 10 yards short. Caught the third one a little more flush and hit it straight (pulled just a hair) where it kicked into the left bunker.

3 shots with the R9 in the "right" (2* open) setting, fade swing: 2 fairly pronounced draws, 1 in the left bunker 1 just short of it. 1 dead straight block into the right bunker.

Instant analysis: Miniscule sample size, but it has me wondering why I ever took the long irons out of the bag. Always a strength, just duplicated to a pretty large extent by the 3h. The irons are more workable. It was odd that I got more draw out of the 3w in the 2* open setting than in the neutral setting.

For this weekend's play, I'm going to have a weird bag. Driver, 3w, 3h, 1i, 4-9i, Niblick, SW, 60, putter. I may end up just dropping the 3w entirely except for scrambles.

Also passed on an opportunity to play next week at a private course that's been a long time fixture in the Golf Digest list of the top 100 U.S. courses. To borrow Roberto DeVincenzo's famous quote, "what a stupid I am".

I've been addicted to this free golf game on the internet. www.wgt.com World Golf Tour. They took HD pictures from thousands of vantage points, so its like you are actually playing the real course, looks very sharp. WGT is going to host the virtual US open soon,on a virtual Bethpage, qualifying starts may 25th. Feel free to add me to your friends list, BolloxInBruges is my name on there also.

Went up and watched my uncle in a tournament today at Union by London, Ont. I never realized how sickning some of the greens are at some private clubs compared to the public courses I play. I'm ~34 putts on my public courses, and I think I'de be lucky to get 50 @ union. Not a single flat-ish green.

He had a kinda a crappy putting day and put up a 83. But the kid in his group was 17 y/o and put up a really impressive 79 for the course.

Getting some lessons from him starting this week, so hopefully I can get my drives under control.

for anyone looking for more/lots of spin with their shorter irons and wedges the Nike One Tour is ridiculous. No wonder Tiger can spin the ball so much.

took the Mrs. to the range. She managed to hit the ball and have it hit her in the shin. Not sure how that's possible, but I laughed.

that is hilarious. only thing i can come up with is teeing the ball up high and hitting it with the shaft instead of the club face and somehow hitting her shin?

lol.

side note: hopefully she had no pain from it?

Anybody played Belterra casino in Indiana? How's the course? I have a comped round there next week if I feel like going down.

Also anybody have a suggestion for a good public courses in and around that area? Might hit up another one while I'm down there.

Was playing a round with JA Sucker and he is hitting a 3 wood off the tee. He actually takes a full swing and hits the ball backward about 1.5 yds.

I had previously thought that such a result was impossible.

Went out and got instructions tonight. Can't believe how much of a difference the slightest thing can make. I had a massive slice with my driver, that was sneaking into my 5 wood lately, with the odd mi**** of my irons.

Most of my swing was fine, but apparently I was swaying back and forth laterally with my hips trying to get power instead of getting a good hip turn. So I switched that and got my hands a little further ahead. And immideatly I was hitting way straighter. Like 20 yard fade max with about 50% of them going straight as an arrow 280-290yds. Opposed to 80 yd slice w/ 20% going straight-ish

So is there anything bad about having a driver that is longer than what is probably needed? Just bought a driver and it seems to be a lot longer than my previous driver.

Will I need to adjust or anything? I hit it well in the simulator but not the same as hitting it outside.

Not sure why but this video really simplified things for me and helped me out so I figured I'd pass it along.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJ3wN...eature=related

So I've been doing some video work lately and have been trying to deal with some swing plane issues that I've been having. Finally downloaded an analysis tool and, voila, looks like I've found the problem.





The funny thing is I knew I was way over plane and had already been feeling like I had adjusted and was super laid off. Now I can't wait to get back to the range and get this sorted out...

On the middle picture, shouldn't the club head more or less be pointed down to the ground, it looks like it is pointing a bit forward.

Maybe it is just me that is a bit crosseyed.

Well I'm lifting the club straight into the air after the first picture (accompanied by an evil dip of my head/spine), so the club is actually pointing more at the ground than it would if I stayed on plane. Will be interesting to see where it is when I get it on plane all the way back as I've obviously built in some compensating moves with my current swing in order to get the club on the ball.

Edited to add my setup for reference:

Anyone care to recommend some golf balls?

I'm a single digit handicapper and generally play courses with fast greens that require solidly struck shots to have your approach shots sit tight. I prefer feel and spin (lots) to distance.

I've been playing the Nike Tour Accuracy 2 Spin for about a year now (bought a bunch of boxes on clearance a while ago) but I'm running out and cant find them anywhere. I'm not super excited about spending $45 a box for 6-8 dozen of Pro-V1s.

Is there a ball in the $20-$30 range that compares to the old TA-2 spin? I suppose I'm fine with the NXT Tour balls, but they arent as soft and dont spin as much as I'd like.

Thanks in advance.

i realize these are outside your price range but idk maybe you can find them cheap somewhere