PGAProfessional.com Blog
If one must have one, I guess...

Question:

My wife swung at the ball on the tee box and missed. She swung a second time and it went in the hole (par 3) is this a hole in one?

Eugene Jeanson
Brownsville, TX

Answer:

Hi Eugene,

No, it's a birdie (the first stroke counts). But talk about covering the full spectrum of possible performance in the shortest time... wow! All the way from a whiff to a hole-out from one swing to the next. Go figure. Thanks for visiting PGAProfessional.com and best of luck with your game. MB

That reminds me of something that happened to me one time (not the whiff part ). I was playing a par 4 that was a 90 degree dogleg left with the second shot over a lake. Being the thinking golfer that I was I played a long iron off the tee to be more accurate... and proceeded to pull it into the lake. I had to drop out in thick rough on a steep downhill slope back toward the lake, and the green was on much higher ground on the other side of the lake than where I was standing (if you could call what I was doing standing -- more like fighting to keep my balance and wishing I was a mountain goat). Anyway, good thing the shot was only 120 yards or so. I made good contact with my wedge and holed the shot. Weirdest birdie I ever made.

If any of you have a really weird birdie or lower in your history that seems like a worthy tale to tell .

At this year's Monterey event there were some negative comments about Poppy Hills and some positive comments about Monterey Peninsula Country Club. It has been many years since I have played MPCC, but it was always my favorite course on the Monterey Peninsula -- and the best greens I ever putted on in my life (didn't actually help me MAKE any more of the putts but the experience was a 10 on a 10 scale). So I would agree that MPCC rocks and it's really great that it is back in the tournament. But Poppy Hills is a great golf course too. If it doesn't drain well or something, just fix it, right? I have always thought very highly of Poppy Hills, so I would cast a vote to keep it in the mix as part of the event somehow, even if just rotationally. Thumbs up for Poppy.

Question:

If my index is 13.2 and my playing partner is 7.8, should he be giving me 5 or 6 stokes in a match play event? I think it should be 6, he believes it should be 5.

William Ross
Palm Springs, CA

Answer:

Hi William,

Always refer to the tournament committee for administration of competitions. But I suspect that in most cases the course handicap is used, which is a whole number, and which will vary from one course to another. So that means how many strokes you get will vary from course to course too.

In informal cases, like betting situations, you'll have to decide matters like this through negotiation between yourselves (e.g., though you each have concrete indexes one of you may be more "on his game" lately than the other, or one of you may be hungover or recovering from food poisioning, a hangnail, etc. -- not to give you any creative ideas for attempting to sway the negotiation via "modified reality"). Looking at it from a simple math perspective seems sensible. If you round off the indexes then yours would be 13 and his would be 8 (5 strokes difference). And if you round off the difference between your indexes (13.2 - 7.8 = 5.4) it's still 5. So from the math perspective your playing partner is correct. (Unless you make a huge stretch to assume that any fraction of a stroke (.1 or more) means you should get a whole stroke. That seems ridiculous to me -- like the phone company charging you for a full minute when you only used 4 seconds.)

Again, always refer to your tournament committee for specific details. And your local golf association -- in your case the Southern California Golf Association (SCPGA) -- can help you with matters of this type also. Thanks for visiting PGAProfessional.com and best of luck with your game. MB

Grooves shmooves... snooooze.

Speaking of grooves, though, here's an idea. Professionals should have to start playing with NO grooves on ANY club -- completely smooth faces side to side and top to bottom.

It would actually have very little impact in most situations where the grass was short and dry. But where the grass was long and/or wet HOOAH! The ball would shoot off the face in much more random directions, making the game even more unpredictable and exciting -- like what most golfers typically experience.

I can just hear the interviews... "Well, luck just wasn't with me today."  Oh... wait... that sounds kind of like what they say already, sometimes. Nevermind, I guess.

Previous

Golf Instruction with Mark Blakemore - PGAProfessional.com

Work on any part of your game with PGA Professional Mark Blakemore, author of this website, in person at two locations in the east bay area of San Francisco. Or get the books (see below or in right column).