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In this video, Neil Tappin runs down the 7 biggest strategy mistakes golfers are making.
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00:00Hello everyone, Neil Tappin here from Golf Monthly and welcome to the London Club where today we're
00:08looking at the seven biggest strategy mistakes that golfers make. Now the information we've got
00:13for you in this video comes courtesy of the guys at ShotScope. ShotScope have a unit called the
00:19V2 which consists of a GPS watch that I've got on my wrist here that gives you all the distances
00:23you'll need while you're out on the golf course, plus a load of tags that you can put into the
00:27butt end of your golf clubs that allows you to track all the shots you hit during a round of golf.
00:33Now ShotScope have aggregated all of their data from all of their users to provide us with some
00:39really interesting findings and in particular in this video we're going to focus on some of those
00:44really simple mistakes that you might be making that could save you shots going forward. So guys
00:49if you're new to the Golf Monthly channel please do hit the subscribe button, give us a like if you like
00:54what you're watching and do leave comments below where do you think you're throwing away shots,
00:58how do you think you can improve, we'd be really interested to hear your thoughts. But let's head
01:02out now to the golf course here at the London Club and look at the seven biggest strategy mistakes that
01:06golfers are making.
01:1880% of missed greens are missed short so 47% are short right and 33% are short left and if you
01:26fall into the category of missing short of pin high more than you think you should then there are a few
01:33different things to consider within your own game. The first is how consistent is your ball striking.
01:38Now it will depend on your handicap as you improve your ball striking of course gets better but if
01:43you feel like your ball striking isn't quite at the level that your handicap is it can be a really
01:48quick and easy way to improve. There are a whole host of free online tutorials out there that will
01:54help you strike the ball better, will help you catch the ball and then turf and that sort of really
01:59powerful strike through impact that could make a big difference. The next point relates to your
02:05equipment. Is your equipment forgiving those slight heel and toe strikes that might be causing you to
02:11come up short of the green? If the answer to that is I'm not sure then perhaps a more forgiving
02:16modern set of irons might just help you out. And thirdly, how far do you hit each club in the bag?
02:23Obviously this is where performance tracking technology like the ShotScope V2 can prove really
02:28handy. Finding out how far you hit the golf ball on the course when you're faced with different lies
02:33and different weather conditions and you're under pressure is really useful and it can be very
02:38different to how far you hit the ball on the range hitting shot after shot from the perfect lie.
02:43The other thing is it's also worth finding out how far you carry each club in the bag because your total
02:49distance will largely depend on ground conditions whereas knowing your average carry yardages will
02:54make a big difference to knowing what club you should hit in what situation. So for instance,
02:59this is the third hole here at the London club. We have water short left, you really don't want to
03:03be coming up short. The pin is sort of just beyond halfway up the green. The front of the green is
03:08127, middle of the green is 142. So you really need to make sure that whatever you do on this hole,
03:14you pick a club that you know carries past 127 and if all you know is that you hit your nine iron
03:21around about 135 yards, well you don't know whether you carry your nine iron over 127 yards.
03:28So it's something to think about. So if you fall into that category, do some work on the range,
03:34in practice, find out how far you carry each club in the bag and use those as your go-to numbers going
03:40forward. It could make a really big difference to your game.
03:48Right, so the next one on my list relates to which club you should be using off the tee and
03:54what you're looking at here are the average distances players are able to achieve with their driver
03:58versus their three wood and usually players are giving up around about 30 yards between driver and
04:04three wood which is roughly what we would expect. What we didn't expect to see however was that players were
04:09off the tee using a three wood were only one percent more accurate. Now that's something that's well
04:16worth considering because, and it's something that we've said in some of our videos in the past,
04:20fairway woods are the hardest golf clubs in the bag to get right. Obviously small head,
04:25long shaft, you're standing a long way away from it, you've got to hit the ball a long way so you've
04:28got to make a big full athletic swing. Fairway woods are hard to get right and it is difficult to find
04:34something that you can really rely on so that you end up using it well when you need to most when you're
04:38competing out on the golf course under pressure. So there are a couple of things to consider here.
04:42Firstly, is your fairway wood a golf club that you really can rely on? If it is, then fine,
04:47keep it in the bag. If it's not, then perhaps you go down a different route. Perhaps you leave the
04:52three wood behind, carry a five wood, use something that doesn't quite go as far but you do feel
04:56confident using and confident using under pressure. And the other point about the data that we've seen
05:01here is that if you're going to not go for driver in order to use something that you know you can hit
05:06straight, then make sure that you take a club that you do know you can hit straight so you would
05:11expect to be far more accurate with your fairway wood off the tee than just one percent over your
05:17driver. Guys, there's real food for thought there in terms of your strategy off the tee. What do you do
05:22when there are bunkers in play like there are here, when there's trouble up there that you need to avoid?
05:28Do you go with, do you just stick with hitting driver and take your chances or do you try and hit the
05:32fairway with a more of a safety option? If you go for the latter, make sure that you choose something
05:38that you are going to hit the fairway with more often and for the majority of people out there
05:43it might not be their fairway wood.
05:50Okay, so the next point relates to how aggressive your strategy is when playing into the greens.
05:56And what we're going to do here is we're going to take a look at the number of birdies players are
06:00making on average versus the number of double bogeys players are making on average. And we're
06:04going to split the numbers up based on different handicap categories. So what you're looking at here
06:10is the average number of birdies per round. So for category one player, two birdies per round,
06:15category two, it's roughly one birdie per round. And then once you get above a handicap of about 12,
06:22really golfers are not making very many birdies at all. But conversely, take a look at the double bogey
06:28numbers. So handicap zero to five, roughly making one double bogey per round. Category two golfers are
06:35making two double bogeys per round. And then above category two, again, the double bogey numbers really
06:41increase very quickly again. So the point here for a lot of players, the fastest way to improve
06:47is not to make more birdies, but to make fewer double bogeys. And in the situation that I'm in here,
06:52this is a really good highlight of exactly where players go wrong. So the flag here on the 18th
06:58green on the heritage course at the London club is perched way over on the right hand side. It's a
07:02real sucker pin. And by going for it, you really are bringing bogeys and double bogeys into play,
07:08no matter what your handicap. And I think for a lot of golfers out there, especially higher handicapped
07:13players, it is worth thinking about playing golf to the centre of the green more often. So what I would
07:20suggest to you to do is, next time you go and play golf, try and play to the centre of every single
07:25green. Whenever you're faced with an approach shot to the green, it doesn't matter if you've got 100
07:29yards or 200 yards in, aim for a point on the middle of the green. That's where the GPS watch comes in,
07:35really handy. It gives you yardages to the very centre of every green. Work to those yardages,
07:40try and hit the middle of every green, and then take a look at your scoring averages. Take a look and see
07:45what's happening to your birdie percentages versus your bogey and double bogey percentages. Because I
07:50think that for a lot of players, taking the flag completely out of their mindset might improve all
07:56of those numbers. It might help them make more birdies, but it will definitely help them keep
07:59bogeys and double bogeys off the card more often. So in this situation, really I need to be avoiding
08:06that flag on the right hand side, aiming for the middle of the green, trying to make par,
08:11taking double bogey certainly out of play entirely. Right, let's give it a go.
08:22Well, my miss is definitely a miss to the right. I've aimed for the centre of the green. I've pushed
08:26it a fraction, but I'm still left of the flag. I'm definitely not in any bother, and it's that
08:31sort of thinking that can really save your shots out on the golf course.
08:4682% of putts hit from outside five feet are left short. It's an incredible stat from the ShotScope data
08:54that we've been given, and it is based on what people are doing whilst they're competing for real,
08:59and it's something well worth thinking about in your own game. Now, Dave Peltz did a bit of research
09:04a few years ago that said that the ideal pace at which you should be hitting your putts is to get
09:08the ball rolling about 18 inches past the hole. That's where I've got the T-peg here. That means
09:14the ball will be rolling fast enough to roll over any imperfections on the green without being bumped
09:18offline, without going too fast and putting you in danger of three putting or lipping out if you hit
09:23the putt on a good line. So pace control is a really crucial factor when it comes to your success
09:30on the greens. Now, there are a whole host of really great drills that you can do to hone your
09:36putting speed. So placing a tease around the hole in a box to make sure that you get that ball rolling
09:42just past the hole. The more work you can do on your speed control, the more likely you will be to putt
09:48the ball just past the hole. And if you can do that more often, chances are you might just hole a few
09:53more putts.
09:59It's often said that when it comes to pitching, you're better off leaving yourself a little bit
10:03further back so that you can make a full swing. The idea being that if you make a full swing,
10:07you can make a more committed swing and the results ultimately will be slightly better. But the ShotScope
10:14data doesn't actually back this theory up. What you're looking at here is the average proximity
10:19to the hole data for shots hit from 50 yards versus shots hit from 80 yards. And both from the fairway
10:26and the rough, players are hitting the ball closer to the hole from closer to the green. It's something
10:33well worth thinking about in your own game. If you've always tended to lay up to a further yardage, well,
10:38perhaps just consider it. Perhaps keep some stats of your own to find out if you are hitting it closer,
10:44from further away, because it might be that you aren't. And if you aren't, then a little bit more of an
10:48aggressive strategy off the tee or from the fairway with your lay up shot might pay off, might pay
10:53dividends. So the shot that I've got here, this is just around about the 62 yard mark. This would be a
10:59fiddly shot for me, but perhaps I'm better off hitting a shot from here than I am from 30 yards further back.
11:05Let's give it a go. A little bit long, but I'll take it.
11:22Should you be carrying hybrids or long irons at the top end of your bag? It's a question that every
11:27golfer needs to ask themselves. And as far as the shot scope data goes, it's fairly inconclusive for
11:33lower handicappers. So for category one and category two golfers, it really does depend on
11:38the individual and the individual's game. But as the handicaps increase, so hybrids tend to be far
11:44more successful. And I'd say the cutoff point seems to really around about the handicap of a 13 mark.
11:49Golfers with handicaps of 13 and over tend to be more successful with hybrids. For a 20 handicapper,
11:56facing the sort of shot that I'm facing here of around about 180 to 200 yards, a 20 handicapper is
12:03almost twice as likely to hit the green with a hybrid as they are with a long iron. It really is
12:09food for thought. And I'm sure it's something that a lot of you out there have considered and thought
12:12about in your game. If you are a high handicapper carrying long irons, just be wary. Think about it.
12:18Keep some stats of your own. Find out how successful you are from further out from the green. If you find out
12:24that you're coming up short a lot of the time from further out with your longer irons, perhaps it's
12:29worth swapping out your three or four irons for hybrids instead.
12:38And finally, are you more likely to miss right or left off the tee? It's really invaluable information
12:45to know. So the ShotScope data reveals that for the majority of golfers out there, they are more likely
12:50to miss right. It's 58% right versus 42% left. And it's really about knowing your game and understanding
12:58your shot patterns, understanding where you are most likely to miss. Now, the best players in the
13:03world, they don't always hit great shots, but what they do understand is where not to miss and they
13:09understand what they're most likely to do. You could bring that into your game. So a hole like this,
13:13this is the 10th hole here on the Heritage Course at the London Club. You cannot go left off the tee.
13:19And if you are a player that is more likely to miss left, you can build your strategy based on that
13:24knowledge. You can say to yourself, OK, the mistake I'm not going to make is I'm not going to snap and
13:29hook one into the water. That's where the card wrecking score comes from. For me, that water on
13:34the left here is a huge danger. Whereas if you're somebody that misses more often to the right,
13:39you'll know that water on the left hand side is not such a big danger and you can take a more
13:44aggressive strategy. I know that in my game, I'm much more likely to miss right than I am to miss left.
13:49So I'm confident and happy with driver. That's what I'm going to hit here. And having a simple
13:55strategy based on what you are most likely to do can really help your game. It's about managing your
14:01misses and going from there. It can make a huge difference.
14:14As predicted, I've missed it slightly to the right hand side, but I'm fine. I'm in play
14:18and I can attack the green from there. So there you have it. Those are the seven biggest strategy
14:22mistakes that golfers make based on the shot scope data. And there are some really fascinating
14:27insights in there. I don't think it matters whether you're a category one player or if you're just
14:31starting out on your golfing journey. There are some really simple findings in there that could
14:36help give you some guidance on the best and quickest way to possibly improve your game. Guys,
14:41please do leave comments below. Is there anything that you want clarification on? Is there any more
14:45information you want from the stats? We'd be more than happy to help out wherever we can.
14:50Please also hit the like button if you like the video. But for now, from the London club, it's goodbye.
14:57I don't know.
15:09The time to take a couple of days to learn the game.
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