Unlocking a New Level

Today I felt like I unlocked a new level in my golf game. It's difficult to describe, but the work from the last few days is really starting to show.

Again I worked on mixing shot trajectories between fade, straight, and draw throughout my clubs. At some point while taking swings I realized that I could pull out a perfectly straight shot on demand. Or if desired I could hit a weak fade. Or perhaps I wanted to just slice the hell out of the ball - to maybe work around trees. Or maybe I wanted to hook it with my driver - not that I've ever seen a hole where I'd need to hook it with my driver - but I could do it.

I think it was around the time I hooked my driver - on purpose - for the third time that I realized I could turn around and fire away a perfectly straight bomb on the next shot with my driver. Then I could hook it again, followed up with another straight shot. And if I wanted to hit a low, piercing-through-the-wind drive, I could pull that out of my back pocket on demand.

In the past if I hooked it I would get a little worried. A second hook would make me nervous. A third hook would freak me out, and I'd spend the rest of the time trying to figure out why I was hooking. Today a hook didn't happen unless I wanted it to. That's different. It's liberating.

Granted, hitting targets exactly as planned is a whole different beast. I also have to better understand how distance is affected. How much distance from my normal straight shot do I lose with a fade? It seems to be about half a club to a club with an average fade (5-10 yards), but if I need to bend it around trees I might be losing 2 or more clubs of distance (20 or so yards).

This is exciting for me. It's always exciting when hard work starts paying off. I've taken a lot of swings in the last 4 days, and my body is feeling it. My upper back is on fire right now in the area of the Latissimus Dorsi. I've probably made 1,500 swings in 4 days, maybe more. My hands are swollen too. As much as I hate doing it when I'm feeling good about things (I like to take advantage of "good" feel in golf) I'll probably take tomorrow off to give my body some recovery time.

Between the recent putting improvements (that are holding) and the work I put in the last few days I'm hoping this is the beginning of the next phase of my game. If so, then perhaps the new goals I'm thinking about for the rest of the year aren't so outrageous after all (top 10 GCAT nationals, qualify for FSGA Mid-Am). We'll see. This is a fun journey.