A few weeks ago, I cam across a poll of amateur golfers with the following two options to the following question; if you could choose an improvement in your golf game which would you choose?
- Extra distance
- Sharper short game
What surprised me was the responses that the seemingly simple questioned recorded. As a golf professional I have a pretty solid all-round game, but when I was a junior golfer, I had massive problems with distance and not only from the tee. I would generally record a driver distance of about 230-yards and a 7-iron distance of 135 yards (both carry distances), these yardages barely changed even when I was playing off a 3 handicap, but what I did possess was a wicked short game, which more than made up for it. It is for this reason that I found the responses so interesting.
The poll was easily won by “extra distance” with people mentioning that if they could hit the driver further, and their irons further they would not need to have a high-level short game, as the distance they would have left to greens would be greatly reduced. Resulting in a driver and a short iron into greens, rather than a driver and a long iron or fairway wood. The logic to me seemed a little odd. If you watch the professionals on the top tours, the longest drivers are necessarily, if rarely the winners of the tournaments. It is the guys that can score that win big pay cheques and prestigious tournaments, none truer than The Masters as possibly one of the most demanding courses for a fine short game in golf.
I hold my hands up, long hitters have won The Masters, they have turned the course into little more than a driver and a short iron, but it is their skills on and around the greens that make them winners.
I will never forget possible the longest amateur golfer I have ever seen, he could hit the ball the proverbial country mile, but his short game was atrocious, which was why he never made it to the satellite tours of the UK and had to get a job in the local supermarket and give up the game at the professional level.
Compare this to perhaps one of most endearing memories of my original home course and a gentleman that was 86 years old. The gentleman had a handicap of 18 and would regularly play to that handicap. He could only make 150-yards from the tee and would hit a couple of fairway woods from his drive to the green and two putt at worst.
A 300-yard drive is only worth hitting if you can put the ball in the hole with your putter.
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