The Plate Spinning Continues

UK Handicap; 3.5 USGA Handicap; 4.8

My golf has become just like a circus act in many ways recently. You could make this argument for many reasons; it can make you gasp, it can make you laugh, and there is always an element of danger just around the corner. The real act that it has started to portray is the plate spinner’s act; each part of my game is a plate, and I’m trying to keep all the different plates spinning at the same time. I can’t take my eye off of any individual plate, or it will come crashing to the ground.

In the last few weeks I’ve been concentrating on the chipping and putting plates, as they were in difficulty. Over 6 rounds I averaged 36 putts per round, and there were lots of fat or thin chips. Now that I’ve spent a bit of time focusing on these plates, they are now spinning with renewed vigour; my last 3 rounds have averaged 33 putts per round, and I have not played a fat or thin chip in that time. Problem solved. Well, actually no, because no sooner have I sorted this problem than my tee shots and irons into the green have gone completely off game. When I was struggling with my putting, I was at least hitting an average of 12 greens in regulation (G.I.R) per round. Now I have the putting sorted, I have gone and hit 9 and 5 greens in regulation respectively in my last 2 rounds.

There was one round in the middle (last Sunday) when I had both the putting (33) and long game (13 G.I.R) in synch, and all the plates were in control and I could enjoy it. That game needs to become the norm rather than the exception, in fact seeing as I always aim for 32 putts and 14 G.I.R, I still need to shave off a couple of shots, but the principle was there; there was no one part of my game destroying the round.

The game I played yesterday was consistently awful, there were no disaster holes, it was just regular bogeys all the way round. When you only get 3 shots to play with all round, starting bogey, bogey, bogey, bogey, bogey, par, bogey, bogey isn’t particularly inspiring.

Having done some analysis of the bad shots, I’m confident the lesson I have scheduled for Wednesday can easily resolve this. Other than my driver, there is no one club that was giving me major problems – I was missing greens with them all. What was interesting to see was that of the 13 greens I missed that weren’t down to the conditions or course management, 11 of them missed left and 2 right. This actually makes me feel a bit better, as it is quite likely there is just one thing I am doing wrong, if I was missing greens because of a combination of every type of bad shot (fats, thins, pulls, hooks, pushes, slices, shanks, and so on), then I would be quite worried. However, the vast majority of misses are pulls, so it could be something as simple as my alignment.

The bottom line of these plates starting to slip are that I have gone up 0.2 to 3.5, which means I am now playing off a handicap of 4 for the first time in 9 ½ months. My US Handicap has also gone up dramatically, as I replaced a one under par 70 from 20 rounds ago with a pitiful 84 from yesterday.

I’m sure things will pick up again when I get the irons and driver plates spinning properly again, I just need to make sure I don’t take my eye off of any of the other plates in the meantime.