Forward for Fun

For those of you who follow our blog, one of our guest posters is Shawn Augustson, a student at the College of Golf and writes the blog Golf with Shawn and has shared with us some of his recent lessons. Here is one such post for the benefit of MyScorecard members.

We have many different reasons why we like to golf. Some find it as a way to relax, others enjoy the challenge… but the common denominator is that we all find it fun. This leads me to the question that if we want to have fun, why do we set ourselves up for failure at the first tee?

I have friends who like to stretch the course out and play as far back as they can. “I want to get my money’s worth and see the entire course”, is what I have heard time and time again.

The simple reality is this. They do not have the skill set to play from the distances they “feel” they need to play at. They start off with high hopes but after a few holes there is a lot of complaining, self-doubt, and threatening to quit the game forever.

This could all have been avoided and they could have had much more fun had they moved up to a tee that was more comparable to their game.

We need to change our mindset and play the game where we can score and have fun. When I was attending the College of Golf, Dr. Wilson, PGA Master Professional, and Director of Golf would challenge us to play from the first set off tees. “If you can shoot par or better there, then move back one set until you shoot par or better from there, etc.” he would say to us.

The Tee It Forward program has a really good yardage recommendation based of the players average drive distance:

Driver Distance Recommended 18-Hole Yardages
275 6,700-6,900
250 6,200-6,400
225 5,800-6,000
200 5,200-5,400
175 4,400-4,600
150 3,500-3,700

If you are finding that the game of golf is becoming frustrating, my challenge for you is this… with your next round of golf, move up one set of tees from where you normally play from. Move it forward and have fun. See you on the tee at Westchester Golf Course!

From the Forward Tee’s then Beyond

Shawn is a member of MyScorecard and is currently a student at the Keiser University College of Golf in Port Saint Lucie, FL. He’s undergone superb improvement in his game, dropping his index from a 19 to a 9 in just under 12 months. Below, posted from his blog Golf with Shawn, is one his lessons regarding his dramatic improvement.

PGA Master Professional Dr. Wilson has stated at school several times for us to play the forward tees, “Shoot Par there, then move back”. You can read one of his articles on Facebook titled “Learning to Play, Learning to Score” .Golf Ladies Tee

The first time I heard him say it, that is what I wanted to do. The hard part was getting the rest of my foursome to tee off with me. EVERYONE wants to play the tips and tournament tees. I had found it to be hard to be the only one to play around the middle tee ground. A lot of times the group would tee off then forget about me.

Recently with some of my closer friends at school I have been able to convince them to do this. During these “practice rounds” I have started to notice something more and more… there have been a lot of smiles, laughter, and good vibes throughout the round. With my golf game I have noticed more improvements with my swing and ball contact. Something has just clicked, and all the lessons I have had at school I am starting to feel the difference in my swing and contact with the ball. Continue reading “From the Forward Tee’s then Beyond”

The 25 Cent Putting Lesson

For those of you who follow our blog, one of our guest posters is Shawn Augustson, a student at the College of Golf and writes the blog Golf with Shawn and has shared with us some of his recent lessons.

One of our favorites of his recent articles is The 25 Cent Putting Lesson, a tip he learned while working with Class A LPGA Tour Professional Donna White. We’re reposted it for you below:


I made a little image so you can view this drill, it’s not to scale but gives you an idea of what I am talking about. Donna had me place a quarter on the green, and then I put my ball on top of the quarter (later on, I moved the quarter above the ball just as a reminder to look for it).

Improve your Putting
The red lines in the diagram are for distance. So If I bring my club back two positions, I then need to take it forward five positions on the follow through.

After impact with my ball I need to look for the quarter and hold the follow through position, not immediately look up for the ball. When I see the quarter, then I can turn my head slightly and use my eyes to watch the ball roll into the cup.

To get my rhythm, I slightly hover the club (not ground it) behind the ball and count one. My backswing is a count of two and my forward swing is a three count. So when I putt, in my head I am “One, Two, Three”.

Beginners will see marked improvements in their putting, and experienced golfers will recognize the important fundamentals in this lessons. We would expect everyone to benefit from putting it into practice.

Tracking Your Game to Improve your Performance

MyScorecard members have a diverse array of experiences as well as stories and lessons that we can all learn from. One of our members, Shawn Augustson, is a student at the College of Golf and writes the blog Golf with Shawn. In this post he shares some of his most recent lessons.

In order to improve your golf game and become a better player, it’s essential to have an updated strengths and weakness profile. Keyword being UPDATED… you will want to continually track your progress. If someone were to ask you how your game went and you replied with “It was alright. I hit my irons well, but the rest of my round was bad.” This would be an analog response. You want to be thinking DIGITALLY, and be more specific. This is what will help you improve.

I will give you an example, I am a student at the College of Golf in Port Saint Luce, FL. In my swing fundamentals class with Dr. TJ Tomasi (Golf Magazine Top 100 teacher) we had to track the digital information from each of our rounds and be able to compare them to a tour player. When I would look at my putts and see that I was 2 putting across the board I thought I was bad at putting.

Percent of Putts Holed by DistanceAs I began to track other statistics from each of my rounds I discovered that my putting was not the problem because my first putt was always from around 30 Feet! The problem was with my approach. I wasn’t getting to the green in regulation and when I was on the green I was barely there. According to Dave Pelz and the extensive research he has done, any putts from 15 feet and beyond your best case scenario is 1 in 10 for holing it, even for the tour player.

My putting turned out to be alright because I would lag putt and then tap in. From the distance I was coming from this was good. With this information, I was then able to start looking at my decisions from 100 yards, and make better choices in order to get on and be able to one putt. Continue reading “Tracking Your Game to Improve your Performance”