The post Rickie Fowler’s return to form already feels like distant memory appeared first on Golf.

The post Rickie Fowler’s return to form already feels like distant memory appeared first on Golf.

Progress came quickly: T6 at the Fortinet in mid-September; T2 at the Zozo, in Japan, in October; more consistency across virtually every part of his game. When the new year dawned, Fowler picked up where he’d left off. After missing nine cuts in the 2021-22 season, he didn’t miss a weekend in 10 starts from January through early May and finished top 15 six times. That made-cuts streak ended at the PGA Championship but he quickly regained his form, finishing T6 and T9 in his two starts before the U.S. Open. If you’re a Rickie fan, you know what came next: a 62-68 start at the U.S. Open at Los Angeles Country Club that gave Fowler the solo 36-hole lead. Was Fowler finally…back? The golf world seemingly wanted to shout as much from the mountaintops, but Fowler was reluctant to deliver the necessary sound bite.

“I wouldn’t say it’s all back,” he said ominously after his second round in L.A. “It can get taken away very quickly. Anyone that plays this game at all, you never know.”

Fowler didn’t win that week — a 70-75 weekend left him five behind Wyndham Clark, in a tie for fifth — but he did nab a victory just a couple of weeks later at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, knocking off Collin Morikawa and Adam Hadwin in a playoff. For the first time in more than four years, Fowler was a PGA Tour winner again.

This week the Tour returns to Detroit Golf Club for the 2024 edition of the Rocket Mortgage. As defending champion, Fowler should be among the favorites, but the sportsbooks know what Fowler knows: At least some of his struggles have returned, and even his +5,000 odds are probably generous. In 17 starts this calendar year, Fowler is without a top-10 finish, and virtually every part of his game has contributed to the slide. In each of the six primary Strokes Gained categories — from driving to iron play to putting — he ranks outside the top 100. “You’re seeing it throughout the bag where things haven’t been as good,” Fowler said Wednesday. His world rank, which had climbed back to 21 in the middle of last year, has dropped to 50, but Data Golf, which puts greater weight on recent performance, has him at 98.  

Form, as any golfer at any level knows well, comes and goes, and it can be difficult to pinpoint the moment it leaves you. But in Fowler’s case, his play has been unremarkable since his win a year ago. From mid-July of last year through the FedEx Cup Playoffs, he had just one top-20 finish — at the 30-player Tour Championship. As a captain’s pick at the Ryder Cup, Fowler played only two matches and won no points. He opened the 2024 season by missing two cuts in his first four tournaments.

“Obviously terrible start to the year for me coming off of last year,” he said in early-March at the Cognizant Classic, near his West Palm Beach, Fla., home. “Never got anything going on the West Coast. I don’t think we exactly had the best weather, either. I’m not blaming it on that, but it definitely didn’t help me to get things going.” He added, “I’m ready to kind of get things going back how they were last year.”

Accessories

But things didn’t get going. In his next 10 starts, Fowler cracked the top 20 just once, at the RBC Heritage, followed by two missed cuts, at the Memorial, where he carded a second-round 82, and the U.S. Open, where he posted a second-round 77. Last week at the Travelers: a small ray of sunshine. Fowler closed with a 65 that landed him a T20.

So, what’s the deal? Fowler has still been working with Harmon, his last in-person session coming at the Masters in April. But he believes his woes are stemming less from his full swing than they are from his ineffective putting; Fowler is losing 0.244 to the field on the greens, which ranks 131st on Tour. That deficiency, he says, has put pressure on him to execute other shots.

“A big part of freeing myself up and allowing myself to play better golf starts on the greens and helps when I’m making putts, which last week started to see that,” he said Wednesday. He was echoing a sentiment he had expressed at the Travelers on Sunday when he said: “You’re not seeing putts go in and it kind of adds some extra stress to having to hit greens or hit it closer, chip it close, that circle gets quite a bit bigger once you see some go in.”

When asked at the Travelers if he’s feeling frustrated, Fowler said: “Definitely not anywhere as bad as it was a few years back, but some similarities there. Having been through that and dealt with that and ultimately coming back to playing well, I can deal with just about anything.” Then he added another familiar refrain: “I think a big thing is always kind of trying to put things into perspective, family stuff, you know, with some of the guys we’ve lost part of the family out here on the Tour, yeah, it’s not that big of a deal, but we all kind of just continue to grind.”

Fowler was referring to Tour pro Grayson Murray, whose May suicide sent shockwaves through the Tour community.

Fowler isn’t the same person who burst onto Tour in 2010 with orange pants, shoulder-length hair and seemingly limitless potential (he beat out Rory McIlroy that season for Rookie of the Year honors). He’s a family man now, with a wife and young daughter and another child on the way. Winning still means a lot but “it’s not everything,” he told Golf Channel reporter Todd Lewis this week.

When Fowler was unable to capitalize on his halftime U.S. Open lead and win his first major, he said on Sunday evening of that week — this was after shooting a disappointing 75 — that seeing Maya before he ducked into scoring “kind of takes a lot of that away, because in the kind of big picture, big scheme of things, yes, we want to win tournaments and be the one holding the trophy, but she could care less if I shoot 65 or 85.”

Fowler himself still cares what he shoots, of course. Even if his perspective has evolved, he’s still prideful and hungry; his career will be short-lived if he’s not. Can the throwback Donald Ross design that awaits him this week serve as a spark?

“It’s a fun course to play,” he said, “and especially having good memories and coming off the win last year, we’ll see if we can kind of reignite some stuff.”

The post Rickie Fowler’s return to form already feels like distant memory appeared first on Golf.

The post The *worst* golf-swing advice? This major champion didn’t hold back appeared first on Golf.

The post The *worst* golf-swing advice? This major champion didn’t hold back appeared first on Golf.

Fixing your own swing can feel impossible at times. For whatever reason, though, fixing another player’s swing feels doable. But that unfounded confidence is often misguided. Unless you’re a trained golf pro — or a really good player — doling out unsolicited swing advice should be avoided.

If you pay attention to this bad advice, it’s almost certain to hurt your swing more than help it. So, what are the worst pieces of swing advice? Three-time major winner Padraig Harrington shared some of them ahead of this week’s U.S. Senior Open.

Worst pieces of golf swing advice

Padraig Harrington is one of the biggest swing nerds in all of golf. Go to a tournament and you’ll probably see him on the range working on one thing or another. But he’s not just obsessed with improving his own swing. He’s keen to help others improve their swings as well.

With that in mind, I asked Harrington if there was a piece of advice that stuck with him as the best during his career. After a quick moment of contemplation, he admitted he was stumped.

“I actually don’t know what the best one I’ve got because there’s all sorts of things at different points in your life that really are important,” he said. “It’s easier maybe to pick up on the worst piece of advice.” And with that, Harrington cited three tips that can hurt more than help…

“Keep your feet still”

Having quiet feet during the swing is becoming less and less common at the highest levels, and that’s because active feet are a great way to generate power. If you can engage your feet properly with the ground during the swing, it’s much easier to hit the ball far. This phenomenon is sometimes called “ground reaction forces,” and it’s one of the key moves that helps players generate power.

“Keep your head still”

If you’ve ever struggled with contact, one of the first pieces of advice the uninformed will offer is to “keep your head down.” The advice comes from a well-intentioned place, and the rationale is solid: If you keep your head down longer you’ll keep your eye on the ball and make better contact. But in practice this advice is flawed. If you keep your head down too long, it will restrict your swing and actually hurt your contact.

Harrington made a video about this very subject several years back, and you can check it out below.

“Swing easy”

When you struggle to hit the ball solid, another piece of advice you’ll often hear is to slow things down. Moving the clubhead more slowly should make achieving solid contact more likely, right? Well, it might — but it’ll also cost you dearly when it comes to generating power. First, teach yourself to swing the club hard. Then you can focus on contact. If you’ve got power, it’s a huge weapon that is tough to teach.

The post The *worst* golf-swing advice? This major champion didn’t hold back appeared first on Golf.

The post LIV Golf TV partner shutters midway through inaugural season appeared first on Golf.

The post LIV Golf TV partner shutters midway through inaugural season appeared first on Golf.

As it turns out, Caffeine TV needed a jolt much bigger than LIV Golf.

On Wednesday morning, the upstart sports streamer with funding from the VC giant Andreessen Horowitz and the Murdoch family abruptly closed, citing lagging profits just months after securing LIV’s digital broadcast rights.

“All good things come to an end,” a message on the Caffeine TV website read. “We’re at the point where we are still not quite profitable, so we’ve made the decision to end the service as of June 26th as we figure out our next steps.”

The announcement marks the latest jarring development in an unfriendly media rights environment for LIV. The league’s events, aired on the CW in a revenue-sharing agreement, have suffered dreadfully low TV audiences since the league signed a two-year pact with the network at the beginning of 2023, and the streaming world has not been much friendlier, as evidenced by Caffeine TV’s sudden closure.

LIV had very little to do with Caffeine TV’s financial situation, which was tied primarily to the startup’s struggles to properly chart its profits with investors after a 2018 seed round reportedly worth $150 million. (The downside of big-time investing partners is that they often expect big-time returns.) Still, the news speaks to a central issue with LIV’s profit-generating efforts for its financiers: Hugely profitable rights deals are the oxygen of the pro sports business, and LIV doesn’t have them. Without a robust media rights agreement to pay its bills, it will be hard for LIV to ever be more than a loss leader for the Saudi PIF.

For these reasons, LIV’s decision to enter the marketplace in pursuit of a streaming partner in the summer of 2023 was seen as a considerable upside play. The streaming rights business in pro sports was (and is) booming, with hugely profitable giants like Netflix and Amazon wading into what is believed to be the entertainment industry’s most profitable market. If LIV could nab one of the big partners, or even a smaller deal with a premium streamer like Apple, it could signal to the linear TV business and the world that public perceptions were changing.

Instead, LIV signed a deal with Caffeine TV that stunned many in the golf TV industry. Few people had heard of the streamer when LIV announced the deal, and those who did knew of it primarily as a home for niche sports like the World Surfing League. Those feelings were only amplified when bizarre recording metrics from the first string of LIV events held on Caffeine TV appeared to show 2 million viewers watching LIV’s Jeddah event, or roughly the size of early-week U.S. Open telecasts on NBC.

Caffeine’s closure leaves LIV Golf without a paid streaming rights partner in the United States with six events still remaining in its 2024 campaign. The good news for LIV is that the league is not without a streaming option. LIV brought its streaming rights direct-to-consumer in 2022 and 2023 with a subscription-based product on YouTube and through the LIV Golf app, and has continued to use those services after inking the Caffeine TV deal.

The future of the media rights business remains uncertain for LIV, even as the league’s legitimately innovative golf TV production continues to improve unburdened by the commercial weight of most other pro golf telecasts. LIV could find itself in an advantageous position in an optimist’s view of the current landscape, especially if the NBA reshapes the industry by inking an expected $2.5 billion/year agreement with NBC. Warner Bros. Discovery, Fox, or some other major streamer could find itself suddenly desperate for sports rights in that scenario, and LIV would be one of the few cheaper options readily waiting in the wings.

But a more realistic view of things involves remembering the first rule of sports TV rights: You are the company you keep.

NEWSLETTER

Sign up for GOLF’s Hot Mic Newsletter!

Want exclusive golf media news in your inbox? Sign up for the Hot Mic Newsletter with James Colgan!

SIGN UP

The post LIV Golf TV partner shutters midway through inaugural season appeared first on Golf.

The post Ping launches no-cost exchange program — if you own this driver appeared first on Golf.

The post Ping launches no-cost exchange program — if you own this driver appeared first on Golf.

In addition to the standard G430 Max 10K build, Ping offered a special “HL” (High Launch) version that utilized lighter components — 19-gram backweight, ultra-light Alta Quick 35/45 shaft and Lamkin UTx Lite grip — to reduce the driver’s overall weight (and swing weight) to help moderate swing speeds increase launch and carry distance.

While the HL remains one of the most forgiving drivers in the marketplace, it came short of hitting 10,000 g-cm2 due to the lighter build. Ping announced in a recent release that some golfers “made a purchasing decision based upon the HL version having a combined MOI (moment of inertia) of 10,000 g-cm2,” so they’re creating a no-cost exchange program if a buyer wants to swap their G430 Max 10K HL for the heavier standard build.

“We realized some golfers may have concluded that the ‘HL’ version of the G430 Max 10K carried the same inertia values as the standard G430 Max 10K,” said John K. Solheim, Ping’s president and CEO. “Today, we’re clarifying that while the HL has an extremely high MOI and delivers the forgiveness and distance Ping drivers are famous for, it doesn’t reach the combined 10K MOI threshold due to a lighter backweight which optimizes the fitting for slower swing speed players. For golfers who may have purchased the G430 Max 10K HL with the expectation that it reached the 10K combined MOI, we’re offering them the opportunity to exchange their driver for the custom-built standard G430 Max 10K at no cost.

“We believe the vast majority of G430 Max 10K HL owners are extremely satisfied with the performance of their drivers and we want to assure them their decision to put it in their bags was a good one. It’s important we stand behind our products in this way. If they purchased their driver based upon a misunderstanding of the club’s combined MOI value, we want to do the right thing and exceed their expectations.”

The difference in the fixed backweights between the standard and HL is 9 grams (28 grams vs. 19 grams), but when the remaining components are added in, the overall build gets noticeably lighter. Even though the HL is designed for a certain player type, Ping wants to make right by the customer and give them an opening to own the true 10K offering if that matters to them.

Golfers will be able to exchange their G430 Max 10K HL at no cost, starting July 10, for a standard G430 Max 10K with an Alta CB Black or no-upcharge aftermarket shafts in either 9, 10.5 or 12 degrees.

Want to overhaul your bag for 2024? Find a fitting location near you at GOLF’s affiliate company True Spec Golf.

The post Ping launches no-cost exchange program — if you own this driver appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘It’s just mindblowing’: Pro sounds off on Olympics snub appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘It’s just mindblowing’: Pro sounds off on Olympics snub appeared first on Golf.

Instead, the National Olympic Committee of the Netherlands Sports Federation is declining to send Luiten, the 148th-ranked golfer in the world and 40th-ranked player in the Olympic qualification standings, and two other golfers to the games because it doesn’t believe the three stand a chance of medaling.

Doug Ferguson of the Associated Press was the first to report that while four golfers, two male and two female players, qualified to represent the Netherlands in Paris based on marks set by the International Olympic Committee, only the LPGA and LET’s Anne van Dam will compete at Le Golf National.

The National Olympic Committee of the Netherlands Sports Federation is the only NOC to have extra qualifying rules for golfers in the Olympics. To represent the country at the games, you must either be a top 100 player in the world or earn a high finish in a sanctioned tournament in the run-up to the Olympics.

This stands in contrast to the IOC’s qualifying standard of taking the top two eligible players (and up to four if all in the top-15 in either the Official World Golf Ranking or Rolex Ranking) from each country until the fields are filled to 60 players for both men and women.

The 38-year-old Luiten hasn’t finished better than T11 in his 13 DP World Tour starts this season. Both he and Darius van Driel qualified to represent the Netherlands, but neither will do so. Nor will Dewi Weber in the women’s draw.

Luiten blasted his country’s Olympic committee on social media Wednesday morning after the news broke.

“It’s just mindblowing that they say I can not finish top 8 at the @olympics, @nocnsf have absolutely no clue about golf,” Luiten wrote on Instagram Wednesday. “Also they have changed the criteria’s in dec 2023, if they had those criteria’s from the start in june 2023 I would have qualified at 2 seperate events. That’s even more painfull to me! 

“I just don’t get it! Typically Holland, they only understand the typical dutch sports, clearly not golf. So sad and painful.”

News

This is the second time Luiten has been the victim of these extra qualifications. He competed in the 2016 Rio Games, which was golf’s return to the Summer Olympics after more than 100 years when he was ranked in the top 60 of the OWGR. In 2021, Luiten was kept out of the 2020 Summer Olympics because he was ranked outside the top 200 in the world.

The NOC’s justification for the extra qualifications is that they filter out players who haven’t shown they can finish in the top-8 of the Olympic tournament and contend for a medal.

Ironically, Rory Sabbatini was ranked No. 161st when he fired a final-round 61 to claim Silver at the 2020 games and bronze medalist C.T. Pan was ranked 181st. Luiten and van Driel are expected to be replaced by Joel Girrbach from Switzerland and Tapio Pulkkanen from Finland, both of whom are ranked outside the OWGR top 350.

The post ‘It’s just mindblowing’: Pro sounds off on Olympics snub appeared first on Golf.

The post Why Bryson DeChambeau purposely mishits some shots appeared first on Golf.

The post Why Bryson DeChambeau purposely mishits some shots appeared first on Golf.

Whether it’s using 3D printed golf clubs or soaking his golf balls in Epsom salt to make sure they properly spin (among plenty of other ideas), the recent U.S. Open champ has brought the fun back to a sport that desperately needs it.

Driving

What I most admire about DeChambeau is that he’s unapologetic when it comes to improving his game, and he’ll go to great lengths to test something out — no matter how out of the box it may appear to others.

The two-time major champ recently talked to our Dylan Dethier about a number of topics on GOLF’s Warming Up. One of those things was the bizarre (yet practical) reason why he actually mishits shots during practice — and how it makes him a better ball-striker. (Ed. Note: The tip begins at the 14:46 mark in the video below, or on YouTube here).

Bryson DeChambeau explains the reason he purposely mishits shots

While amateur golfers like you and I accidentally mishit shots off the heel or the toe, DeChambeau says he’s prone to do it on purpose during his practice sessions — all with the intent of helping understand the parameters of the miss.

When asked by Dethier how often he’ll screw around in practice with different types of shots or mishits, DeChambeau was quite candid.

“I’ll do it every single day. It’s a couple shots, and then I go back to what I’m doing good,” he says. “I want to know the parameters. If I know what the toe is, a little bit of heel, [and the] center, then my brain gets calibrated to what it needs to do.”

DeChambeau then goes onto demonstrate a purposeful mishit — with the image below showing how far on the toe he sets up to the ball.

“For example, if I super-toe this, I know that, even if I miss the golf ball, that ball’s still going straight,” he adds. “All I care about is where that ball’s going, I don’t necessarily care about the strike.”

DeChambeau then shows how a heel ball looks before hitting a normal, center-face shot — which helps him understand his dispersion depending on what type of ball contact he makes with the club. Put simply: he’s calibrating the center of the clubface by testing the parts around it.

“It just helps me know [for me],” he says. “But everybody’s got to experience it on their own.”

You can watch the full Warming Up episode with Bryson DeChambeau below, and get other great golf tips by following GOLF’s YouTube channel.

Rukket Sports Pathfinder Impact Mat

$69.99

Are you looking for a golf training mat to help your golf game? The Rukket Pathfinder Impact Mat was designed with input from professional golfers and golf teachers to help players of all abilities improve their game. The strike mat tracks club face alignment and helps ensure clean contact with the ball while the foam pylons can be used to keep your swing on plane. Use all four pylons to practice hitting straighter shots or remove pylons to practice hitting draw or fade shots. It’s the most versatile golf swing practice mat available and works with every club in your bag! Features 2-in-1 golf swing training mat combining the features of an impact mat / strike mat and a swing path trainer to help golfers quickly identify and correct common swing problems like hooks and slices. It’s a golf swing impact / strike mat to help identify and correct club face alignment. Use the “velvet” turf to ensure you’re making clean contact with the ball. It’s also a golf swing training aid to help with swing plane alignment. Use it to fix a slice or a hook, and to practice hitting draw and fade shots. What’s in the Box (1) Rukket Pathfinder Impact Mat (4) Foam Pylons (1) Instruction Booklet Product Specs 25in x 13in x 0.8in RUKKET FAIR PLAY GUARANTEE & LIFETIME WARRANTY: At Rukket Sports we know you came to win. We also understand that in order to win you need to train hard, so that’s why we’re proud to offer the Rukket Fair Play Guarantee & Lifetime Warranty for no-risk purchasing plus outstanding USA-based customer service!

Buy Now

View Product

The post Why Bryson DeChambeau purposely mishits some shots appeared first on Golf.

The post On an Indian reservation with no golf course, juniors are still finding the game appeared first on Golf.

The post On an Indian reservation with no golf course, juniors are still finding the game appeared first on Golf.

This was in the 1980s. Basketball and wrestling were Long’s sports. The only course that he set foot on was a 9-hole, sand-greens layout that local residents had scratched out of the badlands. Few people played it. Long never did.

“But as kids, sometimes, there’d be a little tournament,” he told me by phone the other day. “The adults would pay us five bucks to rake the greens.”

Then, as now, every dollar counted around Pine Ridge. 

One of the largest reservations in the United States, covering more than 11,000 square miles, the home of the Oglala Lakota Nation is a starkly beautiful expanse that doubles as a source of gloomy socio-economic stats. Its population of approximately 19,000 ranks among the poorest demographic groups in the country, with an unemployment rate north of 80 percent. Life expectancies are short. Crime counts are high.

The second-youngest of nine children, raised by a single mom, Long went to college, a rarity among his peers. His plan was to become a teacher. But on a visit home, in his early 20s, he crossed paths with a friend who was working as a police officer. A few ride-alongs later, Long switched his focus to law enforcement, patrolling tribal land, a path he followed for nearly 30 years.

The job was by turns gratifying and grim.

“Alcohol is illegal on the reservation, and a lot of the crimes are alcohol-related,” Long said. “Assaults. Domestic abuse. Homicides. Many of the deaths were people I knew growing up, so that was challenging. It was important for me to find ways to separate myself from work.”

One of those ways wound up being golf. Long’s introduction to the game came through colleagues on the force, who invited him to fill out a foursome in a scramble. It wasn’t love at first swing, but it was love soon enough. Weekend rounds became Long’s regular escape. The more he played, the more he grew attuned to golf’s connective power. A catalyst for friendships, the game opened the doors of opportunity, too.

If Long had his way, more people at Pine Ridge would have benefited from it, especially kids. But golf carried no weight around the reservation.

“I could probably have counted the number of people who played on one hand,” Long said.

His own son, Tristen, learned the game when he was 9, in the early 2000s, and went on to play on scholarship at Dickinson State University, in North Dakota. But like his father before him, Tristen was an outlier at Pine Ridge.

“Most kids on the reservation play basketball, and a lot of them go into the military,” Long said. “Nothing wrong with that. But I wanted to show them some other options, give them something to do that would keep them busy, stay out of trouble, and they’d learn some valuable skills along the way.”

Years flew by. In 2017, Long retired. He is 56 now, and golf retains a firm hold in his life. That hasn’t changed. What’s different these days is that golf has found purchase at Pine Ridge. Though the sand-greens course has been gone for decades, and there’s no other place to play on the reservation, the seeds of the game have sprouted in the badlands. Under Long’s stewardship, junior golf has taken root.

His efforts began at Red Cloud High School, where he signed on to coach three years ago, mustering enough interest to fill out rosters for a boys’ and girls’ team. Then, last fall, he broadened his campaign by launching a First Tee program, the first at Pine Ridge.

Funding for it comes from a USGA grant, which covers equipment and assorted incidentals, but the energy for it is supplied by Long, a one-man operation, running classes and clinics at three of the 13 schools on the reservation. It was slow-going at first.

“Some schools were receptive,” Long said. “But others hesitated because they don’t know about golf at the First Tee. I’ve had to explain it to them. It’s not just about the game. It’s about honesty, integrity. There’s a lot more to it than just hitting a ball.”

More than 200 kids are now part of the program, learning swing fundamentals and life skills in barebones indoor and outdoor facilities. Mostly, Long makes use of high school gymnasiums, and a field next to a church as his practice range. When schedules allow, he drives his pupils to the nearest green-grass course, 24 miles away, in Nebraska.

His payment comes in signs of progress. One girl in his program, now in her second year of playing, qualified for the state championship and has earned a scholarship to a community college. Long’s daughter, Ruth, 11, who is also in the program, finished second this month at a South Dakota Golf Association junior event.

In golf, as in life, nothing is promised. But possibilities abound. Just this week, Long was offered a second coaching job — at Lakota High School — a role that he’ll take on, even as he continues to grow the First Tee program. In Long’s wildest dreams, local leaders would find money to build a modest golf course on the reservation, a ready outlet for recreation and a portal to bring more kids into the game. But he’s realistic.

“At minimum,” he said, “I’d love for us to have a putting green and a driving range.”

The post On an Indian reservation with no golf course, juniors are still finding the game appeared first on Golf.

The post Golf’s most accurate driver shares 3 keys for hitting more fairways appeared first on Golf.

The post Golf’s most accurate driver shares 3 keys for hitting more fairways appeared first on Golf.

NEWPORT, R.I. — Joe Durant is one of the straightest drivers pro golf has ever seen.

Most years on the PGA Tour, Durant’s driving accuracy was over 75 percent, with his high-water mark coming in a 2015 where he hit 82(!) percent of his fairways. Despite being one of the shorter hitters on Tour, Durant was inside the top 10 in SG: off-the-tee for five straight years (2004-08), and he kept himself inside the top 70 until he graduated to the Champions Tour in 2014

Ten years later, it seems not much has changed for the four-time Tour winner. As Durant prepares for the 44th U.S. Senior Open, he’s parked in the middle of the range at Newport Country Club. Two alignment sticks are on the ground in front of him as he sends ball after ball soaring into the distance.

Durant is a range picker’s dream. Right as the balls leave the face of his driver, there’s little doubt where they’re headed. Each ball lands within a 15-foot circle, or so it seems. It’s as if a machine is swinging the club for him. He could hit a fairway the width of a sidewalk.

After he finishes his practice, Durant insists he’s been struggling with his swing of late, although it’s tough to tell after the consistency he displayed. Nevertheless, the 60-year-old is happy to share his secrets for hitting fairways.

1. Check your lines

For Durant, solid ball striking starts before he ever takes the club back. That means nailing his setup.

“If you can make sure that you’re stacked, which means you don’t have crisscross lines, you can hit it solid,” Durant says. “When I struggle, like I’ve been struggling for the last month or so, my lines have been kind of crossed. My shoulders are going too far one way, my lower body is going too far the other way.”

Another way to visualize this is imagining you have alignment sticks pointing toward the target through your shoulders, hips and feet. In order to get yourself in position to hit a solid shot, you want all of these lines pointing in the same direction stacked on top of one another.

“You’re trying to get everything parallel,” Durant says.

2. Use alignment aids

As Durant hits shots on the range, he keeps two alignment sticks on the ground in front of him. One is inside his ball, while the other is parallel to it just outside the ball. Each serves a specific purpose.

“I’m trying to make sure that my footline is parallel to the inside pole,” Durant says. “And then the outer pole that I use is, it’s kind of like a guide for the club. If I can take the club along the same path on the takeaway, take it along the path, I’m in good shape.”

Durant says he has a tendency of sucking the clubhead inside on the takeaway, so the outside alignment stick gives him a visual to take the clubhead back along during the first part of his swing. If he can do that, he knows he’s taking the clubhead back on the correct path.

3. Tee it low

Generating as much distance as possible is a popular strategy among pros these days, and that usually involves teeing it high and swinging up on the ball. But when you want to promote accuracy, it’s in your best interest to tee it low.

“My launch is a little bit lower than average, but I try to take spin off of it in other ways so it chases out there,” Durant says. “Just try to squeeze it out there. When I’m under pressure I’m gonna tee it lower and try to squeeze it out there with a fade, and I tend to control it a little better, too. Everything for me is built around control, because I’m never going to overpower anything.”

Durant may not be the longest hitter, but he knows his strengths — and he does everything he can to maximize them to the best of his ability.

The post Golf’s most accurate driver shares 3 keys for hitting more fairways appeared first on Golf.

The post What’s the difference between a good caddie and a great caddie? 2 pros explain appeared first on Golf.

The post What’s the difference between a good caddie and a great caddie? 2 pros explain appeared first on Golf.

To those who have never done it, carrying a golf bag can be distilled into a simple blend of math and brute force. It can be taught to anyone, learned by anyone, and executed at a high level by those with even the most rudimentary knowledge of golf. Show up, keep up and shut up. Learn the greens and the yardages along the way, and before long you’ll be at a level rivaling even the most gifted pros.

But caddies know the work is much more than mental math and trapezius muscle strength. No, they’ll tell you, caddying is psychosomatic and deeply intuitive. Being a good caddie involves getting the absolute most out of your player at all times, and getting the most out of your player involves understanding much more than green slope and fairway cant. It involves understanding their competitive makeup and psychological strengths, their strengths and weaknesses (both real and perceived), and how all those things can be manipulated to deliver the lowest possible score.

But don’t take my word for it, take it from Joel Stock and John Limanti, caddies to both Will Zalatoris and Keith Mitchell, respectively, who joined GOLF’s Subpar podcast to discuss all things live on the bag. Stock and Limanti both have lengthy resumes in the PGA Tour caddying world (Limanti’s LinkedIn profile defends this point), and during their conversation with hosts Colt Knost and Drew Stoltz, they broke down the qualities they say separate caddies who are capable of yardages and 5-mile walks from caddies who are capable of lifting their players to PGA Tour success.

“You caddie like you’re not afraid to lose your job,” Limanti said. “Meaning, you’re gonna tell them exactly how you’re feeling, and never just kind of agree.”

As Limanti says, honesty sounds like a simple piece of the caddying world, but it looks very different in actuality.

“They could try and talk you into something,” said Limanti. “So you have to really stand your ground, and caddie like you’re not afraid to lose your job. You might say something that might make ’em upset, but it’s the right information, and so sometimes you have to be really straight forward. I feel like just being very honest with yourself in the situation, that’s huge.”

Stock agreed with Limanti’s read, but also shared another piece of advice.

“I would say be prepared,” Stock said. “Know the golf course. I don’t care how many times you’ve been there, walk it. See what kinda shape it’s in. See if there’s anything new.”

There’s no substitute for preparation, which is also why former caddies like John Wood and Jim ‘Bones’ Mackay have become such valuable assets to the preparation-obsessed world of golf television. In fact, there are a few interdisciplinary overlaps, Stock says.

“Like Johnny said, tell the truth. I’m not gonna be right every time, but you want me to do the best job I’m gonna do,” Stock said. “It doesn’t mean I’m right, but I’m gonna tell the truth.”

To hear the rest of the caddie pair’s interview with GOLF’s Subpar, check out the link here.

The post What’s the difference between a good caddie and a great caddie? 2 pros explain appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘I don’t want power, I want precision’. How to reimagine the bump and run appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘I don’t want power, I want precision’. How to reimagine the bump and run appeared first on Golf.

Like most amateur golfers, I typically default to using some sort of wedge when I’m around the greens — usually a 60-degree (lob wedge). But the problem with doing that is it puts more pressure on me to be nearly perfect in my execution.

Sure, there’s a time and place when attempting to hit a flop shot can be fun (despite how difficult it is for a mid-handicapper like myself), but most of the time, just hitting a simple bump and run is the way to get your ball close to the hole.

Short Game

For instance, just the other day I was hitting balls with my father-in-law around the short-game area. We were both using our lob wedges and we both struggled to find any sort of consistency. That’s when I ditched the damn thing and decided to go to a bump and run instead — which led to me taking his money on our closest-to-the-pin challenges.

The best thing about the bump and run is that it’s nearly foolproof. Whether you’re an experienced pro or just a beginner, everyone can usually keep the ball low and watch it roll.

In a recent lesson with GOLF Top 100 Teacher Mike Dickson, he showed me a new way to hit a bump and run. While the trajectory and roll looks the same, Dickson had me reimagine my club selection — and the results were absolutely lethal.

Reimagine the bump and run by expanding your club selection

In the video above, Dickson explains how so many golfers work on their full swing to hit the ball better, but when they get near the pin, they often see scores balloon because of poor club selection.

“We get by the green and, all of a sudden, we start choosing the wrong tool,” he tells me. “So we want to get the ball on the ground, and this is very common, everyone grabs the club with the most loft in the bag because we’re close to the green.”

Wedges

Dickson points out the difference in loft between the putter (which typically has 3-4 degrees of loft) and the lob wedge (which has 60 degrees of loft), and how players generally misuse the latter while around the putting surface.

“If you’re just off the fringe [of the green], you’ll probably putt it,” he adds. “If I take one step back, though, I’m going from 4 degrees to 60 degrees? That doesn’t make any sense.”

This is where Dickson says more players should experiment with unconventional club options while around the green.

“So we’re going to do a bump and run,” he says. “A short chip is going to be a pitching wedge, a medium chip is going to be an 8-iron, and the long chip is going to be a 6-iron.”

Wait, what? Dickson’s really suggesting I use either an 8-iron or a 6-iron from about 35 feet from the pin? That’s not somewhere I would have arrived on my own, but his logic checks out. Let’s get it!

“We’re going to start with the 8-iron, so what I want you to do when you hold the club up is zero out the left wrist,” he explains. “We do that by putting the grip right underneath the thumb pad instead of under the heel pad. This is the only shot we’re going to grip down on.”

The image below shows how this should look.

Next Dickson has me address the ball, making my setup mirror that of a typical putting motion.

“Pull your elbows in slightly, and then bow to the ball. We’ll probably be about 10 inches away from the ball with our toes,” he instructs me. “The heel of the club is actually up off the ground, so less of the club is going to grab.”

As I hit my shot, I use a backswing of about 20 percent, which ensures the ball goes about one-third of the distance to the cup, and then rolls the rest of the way.

Short Game

Finally, Dickson explains what most amateurs do wrong when trying to hit a bump and run.

“People don’t get close, so I want to get that shaft more vertical,” he says. “I don’t want power here, I want precision.”

By rethinking your strategy around the greens and expanding your toolbox of club options, you’ll have more shot types — including the bump and run — to get your ball to finish closer to the hole.

TaylorMade Qi10 Max Custom Hybrid

$279.99

Introducing the Qi10 Max Rescue. Experience TaylorMade speed with the forgiveness of Qi10 Max, delivering your easy-to-hit tool for replacing long irons. MAX FORGIVENESS Extreme perimeter weighting and ultra-low CG create versatility and max forgiveness with the Qi10 Max Rescue. This user-friendly design is engineered for high launch and long carry distances. LARGER CARBON CROWN The larger carbon crown creates a strategic advantage for optimal mass redistribution and enhanced forgiveness.

Buy Now

View Product

The post ‘I don’t want power, I want precision’. How to reimagine the bump and run appeared first on Golf.