It was another beautiful day in southwestern Ontario with a daytime high of 19 and nothing but sunny, blue skies. Working from home with my last meeting ending at 3:30, I fought the urge to finish work early, and left for the range at 5, still getting to enjoy hitting balls in shorts and a tee shirt for only the third time this spring. I repeated yesterdays process of warming up with 10 shots with my SW, then hitting 20 balls each with my 5, 6, and 7-irons in increments of 5, moving to the practice green to chip my last 40 balls from various distances.
SW (+6): usually my strongest club, my SW was average at best today. Blaming it on not warming up adequately, I only hit 5 of 10 shots on target, blading two (+4), and hitting two to the left of the target (+2) for a score of +6 on 10 shots.
7-iron (+18): my 7-iron was a disaster today, and will remain a focus. I hit 10 of 20 shots on target , missed one to the left and one to the right (+2), but bladed an astounding eight shots (+16). I believe the cause was more mental than physical, as I only bladed three of my fifty non-7 iron shots on the day. The opportunity is to focus on not getting frustrated after bad shots.
6-iron (+13): the results with my 6-iron were slightly better, hitting 10 of 20 on target, missing five to the left, two to the right (+7), and shanking three (+6). Overall, I was striking the ball well, though I did struggle with my accuracy. While my focus is currently on improving bull striking, continuing to monitor trends such as todays tendency to pull my 6-iron to the left will all me to make adjustments to my swing on the range, and my strategy on the course.
5-iron (+11): my 5-iron was my best club on the day, hitting 11 of 20 on target, missing five to the left, two to the right (+7), shanking one, and blading one (+4). Notably of the eleven hit on target, over half were hit pure and among my best shots on the day. My positive results were a great improvement over the previous days efforts where my 5-iron was by far the worst club in my bag. Hitting my 5-iron well will be a major key to improvement in my game.
Chipping: I chipped 40 balls with my SW from around the green, getting good trajectory on the majority of my shots, only blading a few and hitting a few more off the toe. Where I continue to struggle is with my distance, hitting the ball past the pin more often than leaving it short. Until I’m consistently chipping the ball within one putt distance (10 feet), it will remain a focus on the range after hitting balls as it represents a major opportunity in improving my scoring.
Overall, it wasn’t my best result, and I predict +48 will be among my higher scores during my 70-ball range sessions, however I was encouraged by the improvement in my chipping and 5-iron. I also made a slight improvement overall, hitting 36 of 70 balls on target. I’m going to get in one more range session tomorrow before taking a hiatus for 5 days due to a work trip, and will continue to focus on the same four clubs and chipping for one more session.
Breaking Ninety 