Pga tour event

[RASWING]

ALCON,

When attending a PGA Tour event what should we be looking at when at the event if you are there to learn and enjoy the golf …..

Sure I have been to a few events and watched my favorite players…

Practice round days I take the Casio and take video and pics and walk the holes with the players but there putting and chipping and hitting 2 off the tee finding sight lines and where the pins will be and stuff….

Ok that’s if you are playing a practice round in an AM event… you know what to do if you are allow to do that on the course and for the club championship preparations ……


So do you stay at the range and watch … tempo and rhythm as mine may be way different than theirs or do you find a guy with your tempo and rhythm and body type and watch them? Do you watch Ball flight and height of the shots?

Do you watch the short game area … Ball roll and bounce and direction on the green or do you watch the grip end of the club while they’re chipping and pitching….

Do you look in their bags to look at the set make up and what’s being used by the guys that have your swing speed and launch conditions base on the PGA tour Stat page… ?

What do you guys do …. Besidse go and enjoy the golf its not that often their around where you can learn up close?

R/
RA

[Michael Jacobs]

ALCON,

When attending a PGA Tour event what should we be looking at when at the event if you are there to learn and enjoy the golf …..

Sure I have been to a few events and watched my favorite players…

Practice round days I take the Casio and take video and pics and walk the holes with the players but there putting and chipping and hitting 2 off the tee finding sight lines and where the pins will be and stuff….

Ok that’s if you are playing a practice round in an AM event… you know what to do if you are allow to do that on the course and for the club championship preparations ……


So do you stay at the range and watch … tempo and rhythm as mine may be way different than theirs or do you find a guy with your tempo and rhythm and body type and watch them? Do you watch Ball flight and height of the shots?

Do you watch the short game area … Ball roll and bounce and direction on the green or do you watch the grip end of the club while they’re chipping and pitching….

Do you look in their bags to look at the set make up and what’s being used by the guys that have your swing speed and launch conditions base on the PGA tour Stat page… ?

What do you guys do …. Besidse go and enjoy the golf its not that often their around where you can learn up close?

R/
RA

RA,
That's a great post and great thoughts. This is a topic you will find interesting:

3D VS 2D Golf viewing:

I am going to post this up as a an article shortly

[RASWING]

MJ,
I look forward to reading it. Thanks

R/
RA

[RASWING]

Headed down to The Players in the morning to watch the guys swing and their short game work. I will report back on the day

[Matt Bryda]

Headed down to The Players in the morning to watch the guys swing and their short game work. I will report back on the day

RA,

You taking your camera?

[Michael Jacobs]

Awesome! Hope you bring your camera and take some footage

[mgranato]

If you can, and he's there, do yourself a favor and watch Mickelson at the short game area. It's treat to see a genius do his thing.... it goes way beyond technique. I got lucky at the PGA last year and got some of it on video.

[RASWING]

Guys,
I went down yesterday got there about 0700 and the range was already alive and “poppin.”... My Casio had some lines in the lens I think I left tit in he truck to long in the heat so needs repair; but I did take some swings on the smart phone.
I will load the SD card up and try to post the shots.

Here are a few observations from the day.

These guys are good…!!!! They looked so polished in the way that they dressed. They are generally nice guys spoke with a lot of the fans great interaction. They have outstanding pivots not agreessive but you can tell they make a subtle move into their back hip with stable footwork!! Knees bent at set up no one standing straight up even with the driver!!!
Very efficient swings thier pivots support a “lashing of the ball” with the club flying (freewheeling through impact… No wasted motion!! None in my opinion. They DO NOT CURVE the ball a lot.

Through the bag on the range I witnessed

Driver I say 85% (using the 150 pole in the middle of the fairway as the target) Aimed slightly closed of that and hit a ball that would look to your eyes like it started right of the 150 pole say 3 to 8 giant steps right of the target and landed on the 150 pole or just maybe 2 yards left of it…..

The biggest change in my opinion of what I noticed is how far thier 3 wood go they (PGA tour guys) hit the 3 wood a long way!!!! Off the tee and off the deck it is amazing!!! And the flight looked as if they aim a shade left with a square to square set up but it was turned left of the 150 pole... Very little to no curve on the ball...!

Off the deck there was a small brushed divot as well with their 3 woods just a bruising of the grass.

Irons where very solid with SHALLOW divots they all were taking divots but they were very shallow but they took up turf!
I walked the fairways on the course crosswalks to look at the depth of the divots after they played the shots into the greens … The closer they were to the green that divot got deeper!!

It’s a great note to know as the long clubs had divots but much shallower. The ball flight from the guys when I say no curve I mean in the sense of there was no one aiming at the 150 pole then trying to bend a pull cut to start left of it and land 12 yards to the right of it or vice verse with the Draw shot … It was more take a clock and 12 o’clock would be the target and the ball would start there and fall to either side to the 11 position or the 1 position but never farther than that!!! IMO the game has change from painting masterful pictures of the ball curving left to right or big hooks and fades….

I know “The Master’s” champ does it but to me its seems easier to build a solid confident game around one shot that would fit all stock shot boring golf as my friend was saying at the range he said it was boring to see them it the ball so straight …

I said” they have to score!!’ And to score IMO the iron shot that starts at the target and falls to either side maybe 3 to 4 yards and you know which way is YOUR predominant side that it will fall is a much better way to score in the 2012 golfing days !

Now for the short wedge shots they all SWUNG 3 quarter with their wedges never saw one guy get past the top of the shoulder with thier hands. Most of them used their hands to the TSP.
So the look was if the wall was in front of their club head it went up the wall back down the wall then left of the wall… their wedge shots landed just right or at the target on average….

In the short game area the biggest take away for me again was there is very little NO force across the shaft in there chipping (they couldn’t stop the ball) all of it was controlled AOA with mid sole bounce; shots first bounced on the green with some spin to check the ball to dampen the speed then the rest was a tad bit of release to the hole or just past the hole…

IMO we shouldn’t use the word chip as much as the all them make a pitching motion short, medium or long…
The technique looked like a slightly opened face rotated open. Then a soft back wrist break and a small toss of the shaft releasing the entire back wrist bend… None of that sharply up then down with the trail wrist bent… just didn’t see it as much!!!

Now for the warm up routine that I noticed to prepare for a round… I will use a # time Major Champ that’s cool to say I saw so many guys out there that have Majors!!! Golf it great!!! For a guy that’s about to play in my levels major (South East regional military invitational) next week it was great to see and understand what they’re doing!!
But back to the routine...LOL!!

So Paddy is who I watched

First some brief stretching then he swung this bat like looking thing maybe weighted…. Then he took out his wedge looked like a sand or gap and hit some pitch shots to nowhere just pitch shots talking relaxed and jus was hitting them… Then he took out what looked like a short iron… what I thought was interesting is he hit maybe 10 balls set up square and aim down the center of the range; then he aimed square but at a target on the left; then did the same thing aim to the right … and he did this through the rest of the bag…. He ended his warm up with driver then a short iron…. Then he went to the putting green.

So that’s the range….. Then I walked 6 holes with Rory, Nick Watney , Scott Piercy (SP), and Ken Duke

(Ken Duke is a nice guy his caddie gave me a powerade just tossed it to me… I was very chatty with them I will get to it the things they shared and yes they did answer a few of the questions I asked…)
Rory can hit the ball forever he was easily the longest in the group (he has another gear) …. And I thought Nick was long club for club he was 15 yards past him Scott P has a great game!!! To me none of them played with a weak grip Cory Pavin weak but wasn’t strong as Azinger or Trevino.
It’s somewhere in the middle…
Mike J,
*I made it a point to stand on the face on very and watch the “Golfers Bow Tie” with the driver and 3 woods off the tee every one the “GBT” was behind the ball at impact and when they struck shots off of the ground was on top of the ball.

*I asked Rory about his bunker game “the number one player in the world said to me mostly he was trying not to still be in there after his first attempt at getting out” Not get it close which at his level he is but what he said was I’m trying to get out!

*I asked Nick what was his thought on the long Par 3, 8th hole He said “long Par 3 Get to the center just get on”

*I asked Ken D what was his driving thought he said “I don’t expect to miss it so just swing the thing”

*I asked Scott P on the number 6 hole around the greens the rough is thick not high he said “ I just try to keep the face open on the back and make sure I maintain the loft through the rough “


Also they played very strategic off the tees and the flags are center of the greens so didn’t see much strategy into the greens yesterday.
Saw a lot of mapping and verifying thier slope and drainage flow books and greens charts but other than that a bunch of sand shots and pitches and putts.

Also back to a point MJ made in another thread … They HYDRATE … every player was drinking water non-stop and a bunch of Powerade

I went with many more players and yes I followed Phil but he only played 3 holes started to rain.

I sat at the first hole and watched them( The Players) tee off and then I walked to the green on two to see the short game work. I’ve been blessed to play the course a few times so I know the lay out so I just like watching them get around the course.

Spoke with a few of the teachers as well…. And a special treat I spoke with Dr. Bob about his new book that I’m reading on the tablet so that was really cool…. I made a mention to Sean Foley as he was working with Hunter Mahan about understanding the D plane and his AOA and he said “if that’s all a golfer knew they would need much more”

Let me see if I can load the video and pics from the phone. Thanks for allowing me to share

[mgranato]

Just like being there. Thanks for sharing, Raswing.

[Matt Bryda]

Thanks RA!
Looking forward to the pics!