Range Practice
Was able to go to the driving range today with Zach. We each hit a large bucket of balls and I got to focus on my short game. My wedges were so bad on Saturday I wanted to get a lot of balls through them to build back some confidence.
Wedges
Specifically, I have been having trouble hitting my 58 degree wedge clean. I’ll often strike the ball with the blade instead of getting the ball in the lower center of the club face. Blading it sends the ball skipping across the green or will launch the ball clear over. This is partially due to the clubs not being 1” extended like my other clubs, but likely due to limited practice.
Today I focused on keeping my hands forward which de-lofted the club. This exposed the club face more to the ball which made striking easier. I’d imagine this would take a considerably larger divot, but I was hitting off turf so it is difficult to say how well I was striking the ball.
I also experimented with backswing length. When de-lofting the club it was considerably more difficult for me to take larger swings, but honestly anything past 3/4 didn’t seem to add much distance. I practiced 1/4, 1/2, and 3/4 swings with the 58 degree, and then did the same (although not as many attempts) swing lengths with my 52 degree. I noticed that my 3/4 swing 58 and 1/4 swing 52 are about the same distance. Unfortunately I did not have a range finder so I couldn’t dial in exactly how far each swing was going.
Driver
I attempted to hit driver but I probably only hit 5 balls with driver. A few weeks ago I changed the loft on my driver to “Higher” which likely added an additional 1.5 degrees of loft (started at 9.5 degrees, so likely at around 11). I was popping drives up in the air and it was frustrating me so I put the club back in the bag and just continued to work on my wedges.
Overall it was a good session. I have a lot more work to do with my wedges, not to mention my ball striking with irons and then my driver, but this was a good start. I need to remember to bring a range finder next time so I can really dial in distances in anticipation of my next round.