Just wanted to say ‘hello’ and introduce myself as one of the more recent students to join up. This is an exciting place; I hope I have a small fraction to add to the benefit of others to offset in part what I expect to gain from yours and John’s expertise and the expertise of others on this forum, pursuing the same quest. What brings us together, I assume, is both a love and respect for the game, and a burning desire to excel at it while having it reveal to us its mysteries; and in doing so to learn something more about ourselves. Looking forward to your contributions and hoping that I have something to add as well from time to time,
Welcome Jules…if you have any questions drop them here…the search engine works quite well too. There have been a lot of good topics covered by many so far…so if in doubt post a question and if it hasn’t been answered before we will do our best to help you out or we can point you in the right direction to a link to look at which may also help answer your question
Redd,
Thanks for the birthday wishes…the older I get the better I used to be I do smell a comeback again soon if I can get some off course personal stuff sorted with an ex who is a pain in my behind 5 years later-
12 months or so and with a bit of luck and work I can pull a bigger Lazarus than Stricker has if all things fall into place- stranger things have happened. I am in the right place to do it here at ABS
Picture: On this day 28 years ago- boy that makes me feel old now
For those wondering why that blond haired guy with the tan is in that birthday cake photo— it’s his birthday too today --55 candles for Greg…12 less for me
Thanks for the wishes- crap weather and been inside all day working on our next project for ABS students on the forum – The Vault-- you are gonna love that when you all get the keys to that magic kingdom
Hugo
I just want to express my gratitude and highlight your enormously open heart. There could be many others who could contribute here but you stand out tall. Thank you very much.
I would also like to express my gratitude for your participation in these forums. I know there are other professionals enrolled in this program and I am quite sure none of them have achieved the level of success you have, but you still take the time to help all of us who trying to learn this difficult game. The insight you have shown us into how the game is really played and how it feels is truly priceless. Where else could we ever hope to obtain such advice?
Do you mind sharing more on how to get away from the bunker? My ball striking is getting better now but I could easily take more than 2 strokes when I got trapped in the bunker Thank you…
I turned on the telly and watched a couple minutes of the Pebble Beach event. Are they really setting the courses up this easy? On 17 guys are hitting 7 iron? I was there when Nicklaus hit a 1 iron there… and it was always a long iron even without wind. Marino hits a little wedge into 18… 40 feet left of the hole. Goydos I watched hit a seven iron from the middle of the fairway on 15, blow it way right of the green into a bunker on the wrong side. Molder dumps a wedge into the bunker short of the green on 18 from 100 yards. I really don’t see how they are shooting the scores they do.
Holmes hits it left into some deep looking rough on 16, and then hits an 8 iron out right at the pin and stops it on the green and taps in for birdie. Grooves don’t seem to be making much of a difference. High rough should mean you are not stopping the ball on the green.
How did Spyglass play when you were out there? I’ve played there many times, and that was always the course that would eat the guys up. You wouldn’t see many pros shoot under par there… I was surprised to see the guys eating it up and shooting 64 and 66 over there. Can’t be playing anything like what I remember. The 16th at Spyglass was a par 4 that played so long it was often two woods to get there. I would guess they are hitting short irons in there now.
When I played Pebble pro-Am from ('97-'05) Spyglass was definitely the hardest of the group of courses on the rotation. It played long… 16th hole was driver and a 3 iron at least… The 11th hole was unreachable, yet I saw a bunch of guys on there in two this week. The 1st hole was unreachable and now guys are eagling that… Any score under par there was a day well spent.
The 17th at Pebble they always use the forward tee because the back tee is actually shared with the tee of hole 4…so to get crowds around the tee and not hold up play much, they move it forward. Whenever I played it was 6 or 7 iron…I could only imagine smacking a 2 iron at it like Watson did in 82 before his famous chip in.
The weather makes the greens extra bumpy and tough to putt on but they are overly frightening at the pro-am as they set it up to get the amateurs around. The entire tournament is based around the amateurs as you would no doubt be aware of when you watch the telecast and all they seem to show is the celebs or people who have affiliation with CBS by way of a TV show or the football telecasts…
It’s actually a little sad that they play that event at this time of year. The fairways and greens just plop and the ball barely runs, so where it hits is where it stops. You will hopefully get to see an entirely different course come June for the US Open…the sloping fairways will be running and driving the ball on the fairway will be much tougher. Plus the greens won’t be as receptive and with the greens being so small hitting greens in reg will be a much tougher task. Plus you won’t be able to shortside yourself and expect par as a score…That’s why Tiger killed them there back in '00. He drove it well…he hit his irons well and putted his brains out. Throw in some funky weather in summer time and anything under par should be a good score for the Open…unless Tiger decides to shoot 15 under again!
I will be doing some short game stuff over time in this area under the separate chipping/pitching/putting heading… that area should cover it all…in the meantime
bunkers are normally soft…so the bounce of the club MUST be utilized to propel the ball… any club face too square will just make the leading edge dig straight into the sand and the ball will drop a few feet in front of you.
The clubface needs to point at the target…THEN…take your stance AND grip…aiming everything left…feet/hips/shoulders ALL LEFT of the target…open the face to the target and THEN take your grip… If you just twist the face open with your hands and forearms at address then it’s all null and void, because your forearms will resist that and just return back to how they naturally hang down and at impact and because of this the face will not be open whatsoever.
We aim left and open the face to where we are aiming so we use the back/rear of the club—the BOUNCE-- that is what spring boards the sand out from underneath and propels the ball forward.
I also like to think of a ‘U’ shaped swing— a shallow swing…(wider back and thru)… this also helps promote the work of the bounce of the club
a ‘V’ shaped swing - (more vertical up and down)…steep lift and chop down promotes digging and is not advised except in buried lies or firm sand or in certain circumstances where we are really looking for elevation in a hurry (but this takes some practice and the correct bounce on the club to pull this off)
Start off with those thoughts… you really can’t go wrong with those ideas to work with…remember the ball doesn’t exist…all we are doing is shifting the correct around of sand based on the distance we need to carry the ball-- the club is working down and under the ball and the sand is throwing the ball out… we need bounce of the club to work in our favor for this to occur on a consistent basis… and… we need to be open to our target line with our stance and swing along our stance alignments…so we can give the ball/sand a slicing action to help with elevation and using the bounce correctly… the ball will still fly straight at the target because that’s where we have the club face pointing…even though we are aiming and swinging towards the left
It wouldn’t hurt for a bit of weight to be on the left side… I think however the open stance sort of gets you in this position without having to go too overboard with feeling it much
Would much rather weight forward than weight back because we need to work the club under the ball…weight back is asking for mr smiley on the ball from leading the edge in (if they were still made of balata)
Consider the 10 yard bunker shot two, how hard are you swinging through? Like if the ball was on the fairway, would it be equivalent to say a 30 yard flop, or more, or less?
I do smell a comeback again soon if I can get some off course personal stuff sorted with an ex who is a pain in my behind 5 years later-
My ball striking is getting better now but I could easily take more than 2 strokes when I got trapped in the bunker 
Thank you…