[John Burzynski]

I am gonna try an experiment next time, similar to how one plays a bump and run game.  With the bump and run, maybe from 40 yards out, you can get it there with anything from a 5 iron to a pitching wedge, ball flight dependent.


I wonder if faced next time with a 120 yard shot in the air, if I couldn't get it there on the fly as well with my normal 8 or 9 iron as with a very easy or partial easy 5 iron.  We compensate for wind all of the time without knowing the 'effective distance'.

Point being that without yardage aids, I'll bet that many times, especially after a round or two without the aids, a golfer's mind and body/swing will automatically adjust to what is needed with any reasonably chosen club.  If I am tossing a basketball or a ping pong ball into a bucket 20 feet away, my mind and arm will compensate, maybe the golf shot is the same.

[Kirk Gill]

Mr. Morrow, I think I enjoy your posts as  much as anyone's on this site.

And on this issue I agree with you.

Of course, it's easy for me to agree with you, as I'm not very good. Knowing precise distances doesn't tend to help me much, and I find that I enjoy the game much more having to try and figure it out for myself. Also, when I'm playing a "competitive" round with my friends, the stakes are low. A few bucks, or lunch, or beers. With so little on the line, I'm willing more often than not to let my own ability to judge distance be part of whether or not I come out on top. I might look at the 150 marker over there somewhere, and take that into consideration, but it's still a best-guess-timate.

But that ship has sailed, at least over here, and you're not going to ever talk folks out of walking off sprinklerhead distances, or using yardage books, or gps-distance figuring machines. For a lot of folks these tools ADD to the fun, instead of lessening it.

[Tom Huckaby]

An interesting test occurred for me at Ballyneal recently.  Those who have played it know that it has no yardage markings.  Some of the sprinkler heads are color-coded to match yardages given in a yardage guide.

Well... one of our 2nd rounds of the day, we played a match play modified chapman partners match.

My partner and I did it all by feel.  The opponents had a Bushnell and no amount of persuasion could get them to part with it.  They were just too tied to the need for distance info to play without it.

We lost the match, rather handily.  A few missed shots due to bad distance estimates did not help.

But it was exceedingly fun.

TH

[Anthony Gray]

Bob,

As time goes on, I find I also have to guage how well I think I might hit the ball.  Nowadays, 140 can be a wedge through a 7!

  I think that is the way the game was first played. You just visualized and felt the shot. Now in the weekend low-ball at least one guy has the lazer thing and one has a GPS device. I hate them. 

[Anthony Gray]

The Alcoholic has to have his shot to make him face the moment

The Drunk Driver must have one for the road

The Smoker must have his smoke after every taste of food.

The Junky needs his fix many times a day.

The list goes, but what do all these groups of people have in common? They need a ‘fix’ to get going.

  
 

   Melvyn,


       Once again you have prooved yourself to be a true scholar and connoisseur of the game!  With all these new distance aids and yardage markers, Are we playing the course or is the course playing us?



 

[Patrick_Mucci]

Bob,

I"ve always used 10 yard increments to help me gauge distance.

One thing I've noticed is that I tend to dial down, take more club and hit a more controlled shot when I'm not positive about the distance.

[George Pazin]

I guess at yardages all the time, though sometimes it is admittedly difficult to avoid the information overload, and I'm rarely more than a 1/2 club long or short - provided I hit a solid shot. That's a far bigger problem for me than estimating distances.

Guess my eyes are better than my hands....

I will say, given how much some of you guys play, it amazes me you don't know yardages cold.

[JMEvensky]

I was taught to imagine 10-yard football lines to/from a 150 marker and never really stopped.

Nowadays,I've played my home course so frequently,I'm usually accurate enough without sprinkler heads.Unfortunately,I can't hit iron shots as accurately as I can figure out yardage.

[Pete Lavallee]

I played a golf course yesterday, that I must have played at least a thousand times over the last thirty odd years. I had a third shot on a par five and found myself searching for a sprinkler head with the yardage to the hole. The more I thought about it,  the more I was dismayed by my inability to just get on with the shot at hand.

Bob,

This particular example is very interesting; was the shot a less than full one? I find that these are the shots where you really do need to "dial in the distance". If palying a full shot and you pick the wrong club you may miss by 10 yards, so now you have a 30 footer; most golfers would kill to have a 30 footer for birdie on every hole. But when you have a "wedge tweener" and you go 30 past the hole, you really feel like you wasted a golden scoring opportunity. I suspect that players who possess the talent to know, for instance, the difference between a full sand wedge and a 3/4 one by eye are the ones who want us to loose those pesky range finders!

[TX Golf]

So a question for all you guys. I am playing two top one-hundred courses this weekend for the very first time and have been thinking about this issue of yardage markers. When I play my home course, I usually just walk and hit because I have a general idea of the actual yardage.. Now the question. How many of you when playing a Top 100 course for the first time and possibly only time would be willing to play without knowing the yardage on your shots. I figure if I only have the chance to play the course once, I would like to at least give it my best shot. Anyways, curious as to what you guys think. One of the courses has no yardage markers at all so I guess I don't have a choice there.

Robert

[Melvyn Morrow]

Robert

You have no choice you must play them first without yardage info. Then play them again with all the aids you want. 

New courses and you want to kill the fun by using aids – don’t be mad allow enough time for 2 rounds, hopefully the second will also be without  distance markers.


Anthony

We should always play the course, use the markers then you are played.

As for me the only marker I will use is in the 19th i.e. the pint jug for my  beer with the single malt chaser (double of course).

[Bill_Yates]

Tom Doak

"...lots of forced carries over water or bunkers..."

I agree with you that the ground game takes away the need for "precision" and introduces the need for "feel." 

Therefore, I would also add that in the U.S., almost every hole presents a "forced carry" over soft unpredictable turf fronting the green, making us always play the ball in the air.  Your firm and fast designs are the cure.

[TX Golf]

Melvyn,

I understand what you are staying, but being a scratch golfer I won't have fun if I am over and under clubbing shots all day long. I would love to play each of them more than once, but the courses aren't exactly accessible on a normal basis, and my gracious host was only able to arrange for 18. I would love to do it the other way around.... play the first time with aids and then from there on out guestimate the yardages. I guess I have a day to contemplate what I am going to do on the course that has markers.

Robert

[Melvyn Morrow]

Robert

Enjoy the day whatever you do.

There will always be other courses to play 36 holes - but the first 18 must be non aided - no distance aids, so you can get a true balance of your game. Not the other way round, because your mind will already know distance - so use the aids on the second 18. 

[TX Golf]

Melvyn,

I will absolutely enjoy the weekend, and think I have decided  to go aid free on the first course (Olympic Lake) and just see how it goes. As I mentioned earlier the other course doesn't even have markers so I obviously will go aid free. It will be a blast and I hope that I hit em well. As many people have stated, hitting solid, properly shaped, golf shots is more important that having the exact yardage. Thanks for the convincing.

Robert

[Tom Huckaby]

Robert:

I guess it doesn't take a Sherlock Holmes to figure out the other course you'll be playing!  You'll enjoy both of these for sure.  At the latter you will have a caddie, so you're gonna have to tell him NOT to give you distances if you want to play that the Morrow way.  It surely can be done, and will likely be a lot of fun.

Please do report on your experiences.  Each course you are playing has some pretty interesting optical issues, with hills and illusions and the like...  Don't tie yourself to score expectations and it should be one hell of an experience.

TH

[Melvyn Morrow]

Tom

The 'Morrow Way' indeed, no it’s just the forgotten way. 

Robert

As Tom mentioned lets have an update on your experiences and I wish you a great week-end. My wife's maiden name is Warren so don't let the family down.

[TX Golf]

I will definitely give a report... but believe it or not guys the other course is not SFGC. One of my better friends happens to be a member at SFGC so I have had the opportunity to play out there many times, yet this will be my first experience at Olympic Lake. I will make sure to take many pictures (I checked with both courses and it is allowed) and give my opinions on them. I don't want to give the name of the other course as there might be some other cool information being discussed about it on this site in the near future. I am going to wait on that one before I make any of my own comments. I am not trying to be sneaky but want to hear what is said about it before I make any of my own comments. Thanks again guys.

Robert

[Tom Huckaby]

I will definitely give a report... but believe it or not guys the other course is not SFGC. One of my better friends happens to be a member at SFGC so I have had the opportunity to play out there many times, yet this will be my first experience at Olympic Lake. I will make sure to take many pictures (I checked with both courses and it is allowed) and give my opinions on them. I don't want to give the name of the other course as there might be some other cool information being discussed about it on this site in the near future. I am going to wait on that one before I make any of my own comments. I am not trying to be sneaky but want to hear what is said about it before I make any of my own comments. Thanks again guys.

Robert

AHA!  You said Top 100-type, unmarked, with the assumption it's near San Francisco... so SFGC was a good guess at least!  But duh, you told me a few weeks ago where you'd be playing.  Does that course really have no markings?  Anyway please do report about your experiences, and feel free to be general and vague re the 2nd course.  In terms of playing without distance aids, I will be very curious (a) if you are really able to do it at Olympic given the markings are everywhere; and (b) how it effects your game.

TH

[Anthony Gray]

  Once again golf imitates life. If you are anal off the course you are the same on. If you need aids to make judgements off the course you need aids on.

      Lasers, GPS, Lines on your ball,..........Why the need for so much help?


      Where is the romance with aids?

[Tim Gavrich]

I'd estimate that at most one tenth of one percent of all golfers are good enough to need to know how far they are from the hole or some other golf landmark to a yard's precision.  I'm a scratch player on a Division III golf team and I know I don't need to know whether it's 152 or 153 yards to the hole.  I'd say that 150 or 155 is relevant to me.

I never walk off yardages either.  If there's a yardage marker nearby I'll look at it for sure, but I always eyeball the distance between it and my ball.  And I'm almost always accurate to within a yard or two.

I think the fact that yardage finders are allowed in tournament golf is an atrocity.  When I'm playing with my teammates and they pull out their cheater devices, I always guess the number that they're being given, and I'm almost never off by more than three yards or so.

[Sean_A]

I reckon people know where I stand on the issue.  However, my biggest reason for not wanting yardage aids is because I think courses get dumbed down by archies.  If golfers have all the info then I believe archies will eventually not bother trying to deceive golfers with clever use of bunker size and shapes, clever use of the ground and clever use of angles.  I think we have already come to the point where archies stick in bunkers at certain and predictable distances, turn fairways at certain and predictable distances and try to make courses at minimal length.  Its the whole mentality of yardage which invades the game.  It has become far more important than it should be and the balance of distance and and good design is out of whack.  I think archies need all the help they can get in creating good golf courses and yardage markers/machines don't help.

Ciao

[Melvyn Morrow]

Sean

Very well said, and spot on.

Golf has become bogged down with this insatiable craving to know yardage from outside sources. A corruptible addition, that is taking the fun out of the game, if not for the addict then certainly, for others on the course.

You have to wonder if all these guys who ‘Need’ their distance information to play, have to use ‘Numbers’ in the bedroom department – I can just imagine it - one, two, three, four drop my trousers to the floor, five, six, seven, eight – oh hell, what’s next, Darling where have I put my notes on Numbers. Expect your partner has accepted your Fourplay, but is she happy – the only advantage I could see by using the numbers may be that you achieve some staying power by keeping your mind off the subject in hand.

Enjoy your Numbers

[Norbert P]

   Play with 5 less clubs and it will change the swing on most shots. That's one way to keep the game interesting by negating the obviousness of the yardage/tool equation and add the variable of how the land around your target will accept/reject a shot for a fateful result.

  I've spoken with a shaper who puts deception into his work, admits that most folks will have the yardage, but still insists that by putting the miscues into the land, these efforts will, at the least, enter into the mind for another swing thought.

 One thing that I don't like about players knowing yardages is that it comforts them.   Golfers seem to hate to be w/o info and are annoyed when these trappings are not furnished.

 GPS!?, Lasers!?  Next time I go golfing I'm taking one more club - a framing hammer.

[Anthony Gray]

Sean

Very well said, and spot on.

Golf has become bogged down with this insatiable craving to know yardage from outside sources. A corruptible addition, that is taking the fun out of the game, if not for the addict then certainly, for others on the course.

You have to wonder if all these guys who ‘Need’ their distance information to play, have to use ‘Numbers’ in the bedroom department – I can just imagine it - one, two, three, four drop my trousers to the floor, five, six, seven, eight – oh hell, what’s next, Darling where have I put my notes on Numbers. Expect your partner has accepted your Fourplay, but is she happy – the only advantage I could see by using the numbers may be that you achieve some staying power by keeping your mind off the subject in hand.

Enjoy your Numbers

   Melvyn,

    As I stated above ...... Where is the romance?

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