When’s the last time you gave your golf game a thorough self assessment to find where you need to improve the most?
Most Golfers can not give themselves an accurate assessment about their golf game because they do not diligently track what they do well and what they’re inconsistent with. They just go out on the golf course and play. If they hit a good shot … “that was a good shot.” If they hit a bad shot … “I am so inconsistent!”
After the round is over there is no self assessment on what they did and didn’t do well. There is no tracking of “maybe I shouldn’t have tried to hit my 3 hybrid to the green on hole 4. Come to think of it, I hit my 3 hybrid five times during the round and twice I hit the golf ball into the water. Plus, one time I hit into a bunker that took me two shots to get out of. So my 3 hybrid directly led to 3 extra, unnecessary strokes. Or better yet … I swung my 3 hybrid 5 times but it actually cost me 8 strokes.”
Above I am using the 3 hybrid as an example … it could be any club in your bag causing you to average 1.6 strokes every time you swing it. Yes, each time you swung that club on the course … it cost you the equivalent of 1.6 strokes … 5 swings; 2 penalty strokes; 1 extra shot trying to get out of the sand you shouldn’t have been in … 8 strokes.
Take that example and apply it to money. If every time you spent $1 at “Store A” it actually ended up costing you $1.60 … wouldn’t you be wary of continually shopping at “Store A”? Wouldn’t you rather shop at “Store B” where you get $1 worth for every dollar you spend?
Now apply this to your golf game. Have you ever tracked the stroke value of each golf club in your bag? What is the stroke value each time you swing your 3 wood? How about your 3 hybrid? How about your 7 iron?
Most Golfers don’t do anything close to that self assessment. Which is just one reason why they stay inconsistent for their whole golf career. These Golfers rely on the commonly used self assessment technique of: “that was a good shot” or “why am I so inconsistent?”
How do you find the stroke value for each golf club in your bag? To give you an example:
As a great way for a PGA Tour Player to find their Strengths and Weaknesses, we created a stroke value system to use. We can say that ideally a realistic perfect score on the golf course would be a 54 … a birdie a hole, or basically hitting each green in regulation and then having 1 putt per green.
So if a Tour Player plays 18 holes and scores 72 … that Tour Player’s stroke value per swing would be 1.33. Each swing he took was worth 1.33 strokes. Knowing this, the Player can go back and list each swing by putting a value next to the club they used for that shot. At the end of the self assessment – they would add up and average each club to find it’s stroke value to see where their Strengths and Weaknesses were during that round.
Now this Player sees that his Driver had a 1.1 stroke value; 3 hybrid had a 1.3 stroke value; 3 iron had a 1.4 stroke value; 4 iron had a …
After looking at these numbers, what should the Tour Player do? One thought would be to go work on the clubs that had the highest stroke values. Another thought would be to think about the situations he hit those clubs to see if they were the best clubs to hit in all those situations … plus going over his PLAN to see if he made the correct choice on where to play that shot because not playing a shot to the smartest place could directly effect how confident a golf swing you make (and confidence is a big part of consistency).
So now this Player has a true self assessment on how he hit each club as well as his PLAN on the golf course. Doing this for one round is powerful … doing this for two rounds is more powerful … doing this 10 to 20 times a year is off the charts.
Because if you did this 10 times a year and then found the average stroke value you had per club … you would then have a continuing self assessment throughout the year on where you are seeing improvements and where you need to focus your practice. This way you could spot problems just as they are starting … rather than after they have blossomed into bigger issues that are harder to fix.
Unfortunately, the self assessment techniques used by most Golfers usually comes down to: “I am so inconsistent” – “I wish I could hit my Driver better” – “I’m a pretty good putter”
When it really should be: My Driver’s stroke value is 1.1; my 3 wood is 1.6; my 7 iron is 1.2; my 40 yard shot is 1.3; etc.
So My Question For You Is – Are You Ready To Start Getting An Accurate Assessment On Your Game?
The Monkey never truly has a self assessment of their golf game as they would rather look towards Golf Magazine for their next golf swing tip
The Player understands that they first need to know the stroke value of every club so that they can track where they need improvement in their quest to improve their Weaknesses
Go ahead, come to GMS and learn to become a Player
Regards,
Marc Solomon
