Broke 90 for second consecutive time

On my home course Tapton Park Golf Club I broke 90 with the same score as last time an 88. Very happy I managed to break 90 again, strange how the score is the same, but the game I played was very different to last time. When I broke 90 the first time I didn’t actually think I was anywhere near doing that I just knew I’d broke 100. So it was a pleasant surprise seeing that score. This time I knew I was close to the same score and I actually thought I’d improved upon it, not so. This round was way better than the last one, more consistency with shot striking and accuracy, increased focus for a good 80% of the time and better distance. Scorecard here.

So I broke 90 again with the same score of 88, so why don’t I sound as excited as last time when I broke 90? Obviously the first time at achieving something is more fulfilling than subsequent attempts. What would have been worse would have been scoring worse than last time, although undoubtedly this is going to happen, so I will just have to accept it. The other factor was that I actually thought before looking at my score that I got somewhere near 85 or less, so seeing a score of 88 was a little let down, but at least I still broke 90.

I remember the last round quite vividly and although I broke 90 for the first time was an amazing feeling I didn’t think I played anywhere near as well as this time. This time round my concentration and focus for a good 80% of the time was outstanding, especially after a bad shot. For example on the first tee, I had an observer and my first thought was do I let him go before me, as I’m a slow player and don’t like having anyone close behind me. I then decided NO as I need to get rid of this fear, it’s OK in winter when the course isn’t that busy, but come spring if I let people behind be through I’m going to be doing that all day.

Starting my pre-shot routine at first I was still aware of his presence, but then as I continued and hit a beautiful 4 wood shoot straight down the middle of the fairway 200 yards, I stood there for a moment admiring the shot in awe and anchoring the feeling. At this point I then realised I had two observers, at some point during the begging of my pre-shot routine I become 100% focussed on the task in hand and didn’t even realise another person had arrived let alone the other person was still there. I then remarked, “What a start, I’m happy with that” to which the observer remarked “Yeah but if there were 4 off us here you’d have duffed it 20 yards”, nice comment. This shot has now been documented into my shot diary and burned into my brain. The best thing about this is that I now have two shots of the first tee that have been beautiful, which defiantly helps getting rid of first tee nerves.

With a par on the first hole I’m full of confidence; nest tee shot with 4 wood though takes a massive pull/hook under the trees. Second shot with a 7 iron was duffed, some 30 yards, instantly I realised why and the reason was that I didn’t focus fully on the shot and my intentions. Finishing with a bogey after a good 100 yard pitch shot on to the green with a 20 foot putt.

Next hole a par 3 I hit a great 7 iron shot, leaving me with a 12 foot putt for birdie which lipped out leaving me with an easy 2 foot putt for par. Great start I’m only 1 over for the first three holes.

The next hole is where things started to go wrong, after hitting another good 4 wood shot landing exactly where I wanted it to, next shot again was great with a 6 iron, leaving me with an 80 yard shot to the green. This is an easy shot, normally, but I have issues with pitch shots with taking a divot before the ball and consequently duffing the shot some 20 yards. My practice swings are fine, I skim the grass exactly where I should be doing turn properly and don’t sue the arms to hit through the ball. Getting over the ball I don’t turn into the shot properly, swing more with the arms and try and lift the ball in the air and consequently take a huge divot before hitting the ball.

Now I’m 60 yards from the green, electing to use my 58 degree wedge and trying to concentrate more on what I need to do I still duffed the shot again. Giving myself a talking too I’m determined to not duff the next relatively easy 40 yard pitch, this time I don’t duff it but my other problem happens here which is I don’t fully commit to the shot and accelerate through as much as I should fearing the ball is going to go too far and consequently it doesn’t go far enough. I eventually ruin all my good work on one hole and ended up with a triple bogey. Thinking I haven’t ruined the whole round and resolving my mind to the fact that I can still bogey most holes and get an odd par to still have broke 90, I continue with the round.

I still manage to duff an occasional shot on the next two holes, hence getting two straight double bogies, by this time I start feeling a little disillusioned but stop myself getting down after refocusing my mind on the holes ahead and forgetting about the last 3 bad holes.

One thing I kept saying to myself was “take your time to go quicker” meaning, take my time over each shot, focus go through pre-shot routine and get ready for the intended shot. In this way I’ll hit less bad shots and thus I won’t be duffing round the course and as a result will be quicker going round. This worked, I finished the front 9 in 1 hour 35 mins, normally I’d take two hours. Feeling more confident after finishing the front 9 after seeing I’m still within reach of my target as I’ve scored a +9 on the front 9 which is the same as last time.

I now believe that taking another 5 strokes or more of my score is well within my abilities and to consistently record a broke 90 score I have three things now to focus on.

1. Make sure prior to each and every shot I’m focused fully on the task in hand
2. Practice on grass pitch shots to take divot after the ball more consistently
3. Improve my putting, although I only had 31 putts, two were three putts

Goals

1. Break 80 by end of April 2012
2. Get putting average down to 28
3. Consistently pitch taking correct divot