Sample of How I Use Google Earth to Prepare

I often get questions on how I personally strategize for a golf course. First, when it comes to strategy and golf we should accept the fact that it is fluid in nature. A lot of people go too far with that and use the old boxing adage of “everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face.” But by the same token I could say that “those that fail to plan, plan to fail.” I would imagine that great generals of war throughout the history of the world understood that nothing ever quite goes according to plan. But, that was no reason to not plan anyway.

This submit might be executed for casual rounds of golfing. In terms of making ready for an upcoming tournament, I could suggest spending most of your recognition on photographs around the green. In trendy, I don?T think techniques off the tee are overly complex and difficult to decide. One can commonly see wherein they want to hit most tee pictures even supposing it is the first time they have performed the direction. The greater hard approach to decide is on the technique shots due to the fact you need to understand where you may omit and this is frequently times hard to inform unless you've got certainly exercise hitting those quick game photographs around the inexperienced.

For this publish, I?M displaying a course that I?Ve performed before. In a future submit I will observe a path that I am going to play for the primary time. Here?S how I look at things the use of Google Earth. The route in query is Orange County National?S Panther Lake path.

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For starters, I deliver the ball now about 275 yards on an amazing strike with ?Ordinary conditions.? However, we should understand that even Tour players don?T constantly hit perfect tee shots and have ideal conditions. I typically give myself 20-yards, meaning that I sense comfortable with any shot that I want to carry less than 255 yards off the tee. I?M still trying to play for my ?Common swing?, but I apprehend that my average swing may additionally miss the sweet spot by way of a small quantity or may also release lower or better than I need or there might be some heavier wind in my face, and so forth.

So once I?M searching at Google Earth overviews, I?M generally seeking out where to goal off the tee and what kind of convey I ought to recover from certain obstacles like bunkers and water.

Here?S the 1st hollow at Panther Lake. You?Re probable now not going to get tons roll off the tee as it slopes uphill.

To carry that first bunker is 233 yards. I know that the left rough can lead to a funky lie, but I would rather be in the left rough than in the right fairway bunker. So the play here is to probably try and hit it straight, maybe with a tiny draw and aim at the left side of the first bunker. I figure that this drive can be hit about 260-280 yards because it’s uphill and would likely leave me with about 180 yards into the middle of the green.

Here?S hollow #2, a dogleg left par-5. I desired to peer what it might require to hold the bushes at the left in an effort to take a shortcut to the hollow.

It’s about 262 yards to carry that tree. While I should be able to carry that tree, there is little reason to attempt to do so because if I hit it down the center of the fairway, I’m still going to have about 210 to 220 yards to the hole. Obviously, being closer to the hole is generally better, but anytime I know I’m going to have between my 3-wood to 5-iron on my next shot, I want to keep that ball in the fairway because scores dramatically increase when you’re in the rough with a long club than when you’re in the rough with a short club. If this was a par-4 and cutting over the trees could be the difference between a 9-iron or a 6-iron, I would consider it. But with a long club in my hands, I want to keep this in the short grass. Lastly, if I happen to have a good tailwind on this hole, I know what the carry distance is just in case. That is in a nutshell is what it this is all about. It's not about guaranteeing that you'll hit great shots, but it is about being prepared so I can give myself a chance to hit great shots. I can always deal with lack of execution, but not giving myself a chance is a different matter.

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From there, there’s not a lot to go over as the holes are fairly simple. I want to be on the left hand side of fairway on #3 if I can do it. I want to be on the right half side of #5 if I can help it. #7 is a little tricky…a par-5 with a large wetland right in front of the green and I might have to lay-up on the second shot:

The tricky part is that the lay-up position is well off to the right and would normally be vague. Typically, I would use Google Earth to figure out where I could put the ball that would give me 70-100 yards to the middle of the green from the fairway. However, there is a 100-yard marker stake on this hole and all I have to do is shoot my rangefinder at the stake and determine what I need to hit if I need to lay-up.

I don?T start to face any other critical tee shot till the 9th hole, a 428 backyard par-4 that doglegs right with water at the proper.

The component approximately this hole is you can?T just blindly intention left as even in case you avoid the timber at the left, the lies are hard. Unfortunately, you may?T in reality see it on Google Earth thoroughly. However, I wanted to realize what the carry become to the very last tree on the left anyway and use it as a landmark of sorts. I realize that the gap is 271 yards to that very last tree.

Here’s where mental game plays tricks on people and creates bad shots which create bad scores.

Dr. Bhrett McCabe has often talked about asking yourself ‘In an ideal world, what shot would you like to hit?’ The reason for this is that too often golfers (myself included) try to do what I call ‘over-hedge their bets.’ In this situation, aiming at the final tree will likely prevent me from missing the water. But, it will also likely prevent me from putting myself in a good position on the approach. More importantly, aiming at that final tree is creating a mindset where I’m still focused on water and in the end, that’s likely to cause me to make a weak pass at the ball. So, not only can I screw myself over by aiming at that tree and making a good swing, I can really screw myself over by aiming at that tree and making a weak swing because my focus is divided between the water and the tree.

I feel the better play for myself would be to aim inside the left edge of the fairway.

Now, the battle is to get my mind straight so that I find the spot of where I’m aiming and determine the shot I want to hit (small fade). And I focus on that spot and the shot I want to hit and nothing else matters. If I go into the water, that’s just poor execution (and likely still some poor focus) and I can always work on that. As retired Navy SEAL Don Shipley has said, there’s nothing wrong with having fear. Fear of going in the water on this tee shot is a healthy thing. But being scared is another animal. And being so scared that you are going to aim so far left that you make it nearly impossible to hit a good shot is no good either.

This is likewise a shot that I might also need to visualize trying to hit at the using variety earlier than the round as properly, so when I step as much as the 9th tee, I've already hit this shot countless instances earlier than.

Now we get to the tenth hollow, a 530 yard par-five that is going uphill.

What I love about Google Earth overviews is that I can start to better see a theme that the architect is making with the course. Here we can see that, once again, it’s a tee shot where you can either try to cut over a small grouping of trees or play towards the fairway. To the spot I have shown is 282 yards. I should be able to hit it at least that far on a decent swing. That will leave me with 248 yards which means I can reach with a 3-wood. That really takes out any desire to try and cut it over the trees. So, my target is that kidney shaped bunker out in the distance.

This leads us to the 624 backyard, par-five 14th hollow.

This is another hole where I would not expect much roll as it is usually soft and it does have some uphill slope to it. What’s difficult about this hole as well is that missing right, even just a little, is almost certain death because it is a large hill that slopes into the fairway and will leave you with a bad lie. However, missing left is no good either.

I looked at this hole because I’ve played it on occasion when the wind was blowing very hard into me and I just found the fairway. But, I’ve also increased my distance off the tee considerably since working with Kelvin Miyahira. The point I have this hole marked to is to 280 yards which is comfortably in the fairway. I think trying to lean towards one side of the hole (left or right) is useless because missing left is only slightly better than missing right. The key here is you have to hit a good tee shot. The tee shot also throws an optical illusion at you, so I would just keep mind that I want to aim more towards the left half of that fairway bunker out in the distance and I would probably try to hit a small draw to prevent it from going right.

Finally, I end with #18, a 570 backyard par-five with a split fairway.

So, which fairway should I choose?

It’s 260 yards to carry that bunker. I think the left fairway is undoubtedly the fairway to aim at because you only have to contend with the bunkers on the right and the rough on the left. There are some trees up in the upper left hand corner, but those really don’t come into play. If they do, I can simply aim well right of them and leave myself with a good approach.

The right fairway I must cope with the bunkers inside the center and the bunkers at the right. Furthermore, I will clearly have a shorter distance to the hole (barely) if I have been to be in the left fairway. So, my intention here on the left part of these bunkers inside the middle and looking to hit a small draw.

Overall, I?M the usage of Google Earth as a manual. I even is probably wrong on a number of the strategies, however seeing that it's far a casual round I have nothing to lose and I can continually study from that the subsequent time I play the direction. There?S no purpose to over-think this. It?S just some thing I use to better apprehend a way to play the golf path. The subsequent time I post some thing on this, I will try and take a look at a golfing path that I actually have never played before and show how I could use Google Earth to give you a approach playing a route blind.

3JACK