This post is intended for those 5 to 7 handicappers out there. You are serious about your game, you practice regularly and may even have a swing coach or practice Golfshock drills. When you go out to play a round, you keep the ball in play 95 percent of the time and, if you have a good day, you can shoot in the mid-to-high 70’s. Congratulations, you should be proud of this accomplishment! Most beginners and many long-time golfers dream of single digit handicaps. Fortunately for you, the painful part of the learning curve is behind you. If you are content with your game, then read no further and head on out to the course. However, if you are like I was at this stage, dying to shoot under par, do these two drills I am about to show you 3 times per week in addition to your standard practice schedule and you will certainly get closer to shooting under par. When I was playing my very best and consistently breaking par, I did these drills six to seven days a week.
Before we get to the instructions and videos I want to tell you why these drills are very important at this stage of your game. You must understand that to get to the land of under par rounds, you must make a LOT of pars. This may sound silly, but when I talk to many golfers, they think that shooting under par means getting many birdies and eagles to offset bogeys and doubles that plagued the rest of their round. While it is possible to out-birdie your bogies, it is certainly not the strategy of most scratch golfers. Even on the PGA tour, the average number of birdies per round merely 3.56. The more viable strategy is to avoid bogies (or greater), make many pars, and capitalize on the few birdie attempts that present themselves after your ball lands just perfectly on the backstop of your favorite green and rolls right back to the hole. Now that we know strategically how we are going to attack this under par round, let’s take a look at some drills that will help you execute this plan.
- The Par 18 Drill
In order to make many pars and avoid bogies, you must have the ability to get up and down from EVERYWHERE. Even the best players on the PGA Tour miss an average of four greens per round and they still average under par. For them, missing a green doesn’t automatically mean that they will be over par on that hole. I believe that every golfer with the right determination can learn how to get up and down. The first drill that will help you hone this skill is called the par 18 drill. It’s very simple to do and can be made to into a very fun game if you are practicing with a friend or family member.
What you need:
- Your Favorite wedges
- Your putter
- 1 ball
- 1 practice chipping green that is not to crowded with balls and people (go early in the morning before work if necessary, it makes the rest of the day much better)
The object of the drill: The object is to get the ball up and down in two strokes, which is considered a par. You play nine holes and try to score 18. If you do not score 18, you play another 9 holes until you shoot 18 or better. If you do not shoot 18 or better in three attempts you can stop and move on to your next drill if you would like.
Getting started: Start by tossing your ball somewhere just off the practice green you are working on, trying to simulate a lie you would normally have if you missed the green on an approach shot. This could be in the rough to the right of the green, the greenside bunker, or the fairway short of the green. Take your time to prepare for the shot, just as you would on the golf course. One of the great benefits of this drill is that it mimics the pressure and the inconsistencies that you will surely encounter on the course.
After you have your first shot set up and are ready to hit, take some time to observe how the ball has come to rest on the grass. Is the ball sitting up on top of the rough as if it were on a tee or is it nestled all the way down into the soil? Take a look at which direction the grass is growing, if it is coming toward you, a longer backswing may be necessary to get the ball out of there.
Once you have assessed the lie, observe the green. I often walk from my ball back to the hole to find subtleties in the green. Is it soft or firm, sloping away or toward me, left, or right? Is there a big slope that could take my ball out of tap-in range?
Now that you have all of your data, there are two decisions to make: shot and spot. What type of shot will you use and at what spot do you want the ball to land? Your goal on every short game shot should be to land the ball on the spot you chose with the correct trajectory. I recommend a spot that is very easy to see but not much bigger than a quarter (if you are over 10 yards out it may grow to the size of a cup).
Focus on your spot and take the shot. After you knock it close, grab your putter and make your putt. Congrats you have just finished your first hole with a par! Repeat this process for the remaining eight holes, trying to get a par or birdie (a chip-in) on each hole. If you have scored 18 or better after the first nine holes, you have successfully completed to drill! If you score worse than 18, then start the drill again. You have 3 attempts to shoot 18 or better and if you haven’t shot 18 or better in those three rounds you can move on to practice another part of your game.
Be sure to give yourself a wide variety of shots. Some bunker shots, some short grass shots, some shots out of the deep rough, side hill lies, downhill lies, etc. The more variety you have, the more prepared you will be for your next round.
Watch me play a few holes of the Par 18 Drill.
2. Distance Drills
Sticking to our theme of defending against bogies, this next drill eliminates one of the most common causes of bogies, the three putt. I see so many people practice 5- to 10-foot putts on the practice green and that is not a bad thing but even the PGA tour pros only make 42 percent of their putts from 10 ft. If you couple this with the stat that pga tour pros are on average 36 feet from the cup after their approach shot to the green it becomes very clear that the putts that we should be practicing are the 30, 40, 50 and 60 foot puts. If you can consistently get these within 2.5 feet of the cup, you will all but eliminate three putts that result in bogey. If you reach a par five in two, you are assured a birdie. In addition to eliminating 3 putts, I also found that doing this drill improved my 5- to 10-foot make percentage as well. This was very surprising at first but when I dug deeper into the details, I found that my speed control was substantially better at all distances and allowed me to read greens more accurately and ensure the ball entered the cup at the optimal speed.
What you need:
- Five balls
- Your putter
- A practice putting green that has room for a 50-foot putt (16.5 paces)
Doing the drill:
Start by finding a 30 putt (10 paces). Set your five balls at this point and take your time to read the putt. Is it uphill or downhill? Which way does it break? From here you have three rounds (three sets of five putts) to generate five points in a single round. You get one point if a putt ends up within a 2.5-foot radius of the hole (if you have a standard length putter, the length of the metal shaft is about 2.5 feet so try and get all five putts “inside the leather”). You can also score points by making a putt, for which you get two points. If you score five points on your first round of five putts, great! Move on to the 40-foot putt. If you do not score five points within the round, proceed to your next set of five putts. Repeat the process with a 40-foot putt (13-14 paces), and then again from 50 and 60 feet as well. If you get a passing score on your first round of five putts at each distance, this drill will go very quickly. Stay focused on every putt and see if you can pass all four distances on your first round. Good luck!
Here is a video of a golfshock student doing the distance drill
Ok friends, that’s it. No additional mechanics to learn, no changes to your golf swing, just two fun drills that are fun to do and if done every time you go out to practice, will help you avoid bogies which we have learned is the real key to achieving under par rounds.