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Joel Tadman runs through the 8 rules golfers need to follow if they want to keep double bogeys off their scorecard, with the help of data from Shot Scope.
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00:00Now the key to shooting lower scores and getting your handicap down is not
00:04making a barrage of birdies it's keeping those double bogeys or worse those
00:08destructive holes off your scorecard so in this video I'm gonna give you some
00:12strategy advice backed up by data from ShotScope that's gonna really help you
00:16lower your scores by keeping those double bogeys off your card make more
00:21pars and hopefully you'll see an improvement in your play with the
00:24beautiful Peter Milton Golf Club let's get into it now before we get into the
00:29strategy advice the first thing to acknowledge is the extent to which
00:32double bogeys are a problem I'm gonna flash up the data here from ShotScope you
00:36can see the average golfer a 15 handicap golfer is making nearly five double
00:40bogeys a round it's an incredible amount so clearly reducing the frequency of them
00:45should be a priority so let's head to the tee and see what we can do there
00:53right the first way you can reduce the number of double bogeys you make during
00:57a round is by hitting it further off the tee now I know this sounds obvious we all
01:01want to hit the golf ball further but if you look at the data from ShotScope you
01:05can see there is a direct correlation between how far you hit it off the tee
01:09and the score you end up with at the end of the hole this is a 15 handicap for
01:13example the data is clear and obvious for all to see the longer you hit it the
01:18better your chances of not making a double bogey the data tells us that being a
01:23lot further down the hole in the rough is better than being shorter than that on
01:28the hole and on the fairway so we know that accuracy isn't as important as
01:32distance so for golfers that like to choose a three-wood over a driver because
01:37it feels like it gives them a bit more accuracy and gets them in play a bit more
01:40that sort of analogy doesn't really quite work and actually the stats show that
01:44golfers aren't really that more accurate with a three-wood than a driver so in
01:48most cases I would say bin the three-wood off go with the driver and really
01:53prioritize in your offseason or when you're not playing golf when you're
01:56practicing trying to increase the distance you get with the driver there's
02:00a number of ways you can do that really easily could be some speed training at
02:04home maybe get some speed sticks maybe just improving the quality of strike
02:07that you get with a driver and they're trying to hit out the middle more often
02:11curving the ball less that's one way golfers reduce the distance off the tee if
02:15they hit big slices big hooks that's another reason why golfers don't hit it
02:20as fast try and hit the ball straighter maybe tee the wall up a little bit more
02:23to encourage more of an upward hit all these different things could help you
02:27get a little bit more distance off the tee really let it rip try and get down the
02:31hole as far as you can and that's going to reduce the number of double
02:35bogeys you make so here I'm going to beautiful 17th hole here at Peter
02:38Milton don't swing for control just give it a rip and deal with the
02:43consequences at the end it's down the left it's in the rough but that's okay
02:54because I'm down the fairway I've got a shot to the green
03:00the second way you can make fewer double bogeys is to avoid penalty areas lost
03:07balls and fairway bunkers off the tee again it sounds obvious but again there is a
03:12direct correlation between golfers that find those things off the tee and their
03:16scores because it goes up considerably actually look at fairway bunkers stats
03:20for a flash up on the screen now you're about half a shot worse off if you find
03:24a fairway bunker off the tee than if you were to find the fairway so you
03:27definitely want to avoid fairway bunkers and one way you can really assess what
03:31lies ahead and make sure that you avoid those hazards that lie in wait for you is
03:35investing in some sort of tech I've got the shotscape v5 watch here which is
03:39very nice because it gives you aerial hole maps which is quite useful so you
03:43can see scroll up and down the hole and see what lies ahead at your driving
03:47distance because that's the other thing you really need to know exactly how far
03:51you carry your driver not total distance how far you carry it because that will
03:55determine what hazards lie in wait for you down there and what they're in play
03:59for you and if you've done all the things that I told you to do in point
04:02number one some speed training maybe some quality strike training you might well
04:05hit it a bit further and therefore you need to get on a launch monitor and see
04:08how far you're actually hitting it now and recalibrate that and see what
04:12hazards lie in wait for you with your new improved distance but so you know how
04:16far you've got down the fairway you know to it you need to avoid all those
04:20things we talked about and lost balls are incredibly damaging a 25 handicapper
04:24loses six balls around not only is that very expensive but it's definitely
04:29gonna be hurting your scores but the other thing I think all golfers should
04:32develop is a go-to shot or a shot that curves one way if you've got a shot that
04:37curved one way well you know it's gonna curve that way then you can allow for
04:42that with your aim and it should take one side of the golf course out of place so
04:48if they're for me I've started to develop a bit of a fade it's become my
04:51go-to shot I'm more comfortable with that when under pressure so pretty good for
04:55this hole is out of bounds all down the left so I know I can aim down the left and
04:59curve it to the right really understand what you go to under pressure priority
05:04is avoiding bunkers out of bounds lost balls in particular and that will
05:09hopefully reduce the number of bug double bogeys you have so I know under
05:13pressure I'm gonna better cut this from left to right and it's gonna avoid the
05:19trouble
05:24look at that absolutely perfect it's missed the fairway bunker it's missed the
05:29hazard slap bang in the middle of the fairway and I'd do very well to make a
05:33double bogey from there
05:39now one of the main reasons double bogeys occur is by golfers getting too greedy
05:44from fairway bunkers we know from the stats you're far less likely to hit the
05:48green from a fairway bunker and your scores go up considerably if you're in one of
05:53these things and I think the reason is people get too greedy and often don't
05:57get out on the first time maybe hitting a club that's not appropriate for the
06:01size of the lip hitting the lip comes back in and you're hitting again from
06:04the same place so really important to not get greedy from the fairway bunker your
06:08absolute first priority should be to get choose a club that you know is gonna
06:12clear the lip and get the ball out you're much better off being short of the
06:16green with a clear shot for your next shot than having to play again from here
06:19so on the golf monthly website there's loads of good advice about how to get out
06:23of fairway bunkers and how to play that shot correctly I'm not gonna stand here
06:26and tell you exactly how to do that but a couple of things I like to do in a
06:30fairway bunker is just grip the club a little bit tighter just pulls it away
06:33from the ground a little bit and just have the ball slightly further back in
06:37your stance that's gonna ensure hopefully you catch the ball first before the
06:41sand your intention is no different from the fairway in that regard you're trying
06:44to hit the ball first then the ground in a fairway bunker I've got a pitching
06:47wedge here which I know is plenty of loft to get the ball out of this fairway
06:52bunker so trust the loft on the club ball a smidge back in the stance and just
06:58try and catch the ball first
07:04oh pulled it but it's got out it's missed the green but most importantly it's not
07:11still in the fairway bunker I've got a shot from the third shot hopefully I can
07:14make bogey it worse and not a double bogey
07:20but when it comes to shorter shots like this around the green obviously it's
07:24important to use a club that you're most comfortable with it could be you know a
07:27chipper for example whatever club works for you but if you look at the data most
07:32ability of golfers or pretty much every ability a golfer has a lower shots to
07:36finish that with a lower lofted club like an 8 iron or a 9 iron versus a sand
07:40wedge or a lob wedge so using left less loft where you can is really important
07:45obviously if you've got a bunker to go over you might need to switch to a high
07:48lofted club to get the elevation but in most scenarios you're much better off
07:52using a lower lofted club here like I've got which is an 8 iron so ditch the
07:56sand wedge go for a lower lower lofted club obviously because that way you're
08:00going to be making a shorter swing less can go wrong with that regard less
08:03wrist hinge less technique involved versus a lob wedge where you're having to
08:08make a much longer swing far more can go wrong you want to get the ball rolling as
08:12early as you can so I've got an 8 iron here I mean this applies if you've got a
08:15decent line than rough like I've got here but it works equally well from the
08:18fairway so just really simplify the technique just get the shaft leaning slightly
08:25ahead of the ball back and through and get it running up towards the hole pretty
08:33happy with that one I do very well to make a double bogey from there so switch
08:36to a low lofted club it's going to put this odds in your favor right just a
08:41short interlude to say if you are enjoying the video please do click the
08:44like button and subscribe to the golf monthly YouTube channel it really helps
08:47us out and if you like the look of any of the shot scope products featured in this
08:50video I've put some handy links in the description so you can get your hands on
08:54those for the best price in your area right let's go and find us some more
08:57ways that you can make fewer double bogeys
09:03now this is a classic scenario that leads to double bogeys a lot of the time
09:08you hit a bad shot and you compound your error with another by going for a risky
09:13shot and it leads to a double bogey or worse I think that's the you look at the
09:17tour pros the one thing they don't do is follow one bad shot with another they're
09:22able to forget what's gone before and focus on the most important shot which
09:26is the next shot and get the ball back in play we're all gonna hit bad shots
09:30duffs fats thins shanks it happens most important thing is to put that out of
09:35your mind and focus on hitting a good shot for your next shot and in this
09:38particular shot here it's clear I've hit a bad tee shot I'm in the right-hand side
09:42I'm in the trees and the one thing you absolutely need to avoid to make sure you
09:46don't make a double bogey is those miracle shots so whether it's you know
09:50here a big slice around the trees it could be a long carry over water I'm
09:55taking on that that high flop shot over a bunker those are the shots you really
09:59need to avoid taking on if you want to stop making double bogey so in this
10:03particular situation I'm not gonna try that banana slice and try and get up to
10:06the pin or maybe through that tiny gap over there towards the pin I'm gonna take
10:10my medicine get it back in play and then hopefully it'll give me a chance to get on the
10:15green one putt two putt at worst and make a bogey there we go perfectly back in
10:24play I can pitch it on from there and hopefully a double bogey won't be on the
10:28card now another way you can absolutely reduce the number of double bogeys you
10:36make during a round is by developing a fail-safe greenside bunker technique we
10:42know looking at the shot scope data the about half as likely to
10:45get up and down from a bunker than you are anywhere else around the green so
10:48it's imperative that you have a technique that gets you out every time you know
10:53high handicappers in particular struggle with this shot and often hitting it into
10:56the face come back down and you're hitting again from a greenside bunker and
10:59that's where your scores really start to go up so have a look on the golf
11:03monthly website loads of really good advice about how to get out of greenside
11:06bunkers every time maybe think of adding a bunker specific club to your bag
11:10there's a few out there there's one from ping that ping bunker that was recently
11:13launched developed specifically for bunker so if you really struggle from
11:17bunkers I'd consider investing in one of those but in terms of your strategy
11:22obviously you need to get it make sure you get it out but really don't focus on
11:26getting too cute with these shots just focus on getting it out don't go
11:29chasing those tight pins so for there this particular shot you can see the pin is
11:33quite tight to me here on the front of the green I'm not gonna be messing around
11:36with that I'm gonna make sure I'm getting it past the pin give myself a putt back
11:39for a par who knows I might hold it but at least I won't be making a double bogey
11:43so make sure you get it out don't get too cute with it give it some speed
11:54perfect it's a little bit past the hole but I'm okay with that I might well make
11:58that putt for a par but hopefully I won't be making double bogey
12:05now another cause of double bogeys is too many three putts during a round poor lag
12:10putting specifically leads to unnecessary strokes on the green so you really need
12:14to develop a system that allows you to control your distance and allows you get
12:18the ball close to the hole from long range and reduce the chance of three
12:22putts again loads of tips on the golf monthly website to help you with lag
12:25putting but one drill I've found that works for me I'm a 2.5 index golfer
12:30that I do a lot in practice is this one in what I'm going to demonstrate now so
12:34what I like to do is I just like to roll apart about 30 foot away there's a
12:37little mark down there so I'm just gonna try and roll this ball towards that mark
12:43down there so that's around about 25 30 feet and then what I like to do with
12:47these next two balls I want to try and hit this first one just past it and there's
12:51a second one just short of it because that really develops that sort of the
12:55micro changes you need to make in your feel and your calibration to get adjusting
13:00to different distances so I know that I want to just try and get this one just
13:04past that ball pretty happy with that one just passed it and I want to get this
13:12ball just short of the first one or you could do it you could try and get the
13:19ball in between the first one and the second one which make it even harder so I'm
13:24developing that sort of sense of feel and distance control try and get it in
13:31between those two balls which I've failed miserably and I've hit it way too
13:34hard but try that drill just try to put a ball down there get one short one past
13:39just develops the sense of feel and distance control and hopefully on the
13:43course will manifest itself into better lag putting and fewer three putts
13:50now I think one of the easiest ways you can make fewer double bogeys is to
13:55improve your putting from short range specifically that three to six foot range
13:58if you look at the data from ShotScope 25 handicappers are only making 48%
14:03putts from this distance whereas PGA Tour players are making up at 85% and why I
14:08think this is one of the easiest areas to improve is that it doesn't require any
14:12physical strength or flexibility or speed it's literally just about moving the
14:16putter a very short distance and squaring the putter face to your intended
14:20target every time but also you can pretty much practice short putts anywhere at
14:24home on the carpet on a practice putting green pretty much wherever you want
14:28there's always room to be able to just work on getting the club face back to
14:32square every time and one drill that I think was really going to help golfers
14:35with this particular issue which I learned from my friend and colleague Joe
14:40Ferguson who's a PJ Pro is rather than practice putting to a hole on the
14:44practice putter green practice putting to a tee that is going to obviously make
14:49the target smaller and therefore when you're on the course it should increase
14:53your margin for error so rather than practice put into a hole really focus on
14:57trying to hit the tee peg see if we can do one here for you there we go right in
15:03the middle of the tee I'm very happy with that one obviously that would have
15:04gone in the center of the hole but if you do just miss the tee you really
15:09focus on that tee it's a narrow target if you do miss it like that that may well
15:13have lipped in on the right hand side so focus on practice putting to a tee from
15:17three to six feet that should hopefully help you hold more from short range and
15:21three putt less which means fewer double bogeys so that concludes our look at the
15:26ways you can stop making those destructive double bogeys I hope you
15:29enjoyed the video big thank you to people Milton for hosting us here today and as I
15:33mentioned earlier I'll put some links in the description where you get your
15:36hands on some of the shot scope products feature in this video but that's all
15:39from me from Peter Hamilton I'll see you next time
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