Golfing News & Blog Articles

I developed GOLFSTR+ to help me remember to keep my leading arm straight in my backswing. If you bend your arm in the backswing it will always be difficult to consistently swing down to the ball with the exact same arm length. A bent leading arm causes topped balls or fat hits or hits off the toe of your club.

You will never see Tiger Woods swing with a bent leading arm because he still has the flexibility for a full rotation with a straight leading arm in his backswing. He, like every other professional golfer, knows that his leading arm is HIS YARD STICK to his golf ball. He has a straight leading arm in his setup and again at impact and that gives him a consistent impact with the ball.

Driving distance champions have longer backswing but hit a low percentage on the fairway. Accuracy with a limited backswing must be a critical solution for your game.

Aging Bodies Lose Flexibility
What are aging bodies supposed to do when they can’t create a backswing like Tiger and all of the other pros. Bending your elbow will often result in a swing over the top causing a sliced shot or hits off the toe of your club. If you eliminate the top of your bent arm backswing, you can also eliminate premature casting at the top.

3 Solutions to Keep Your Leading Arm Straight.
1/ Lift your leading heel slightly to allow for more rotation of your hips without shifting your body back. Jack Nicklaus and many other pros did this. Why can’t you?
2/ LIMIT YOUR BACKSWING to the point where your leading arm is NOT BENT and your FLAT LEADING WRIST is cocked for lag. Your power comes from the weight transfer to your leading hip but even more important the release of your wrist lag at the bottom of your swing.
NOTE: Even the pros normally complete a backswing with their leading straight arm just above horizontal when hitting irons. YOU DON’T NEED A JOHN DALY BACKSWING for you irons or your driver.
3/ Train your mind to limit your backswing using GOLFSTR+. Wear it while you play 18 holes to train your mind to limit your swing. [Unfortunately, it’s not legal to wear during a competition.]

Scottie Scheffler is the consensus betting favorite to win this week's PGA Championship at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Oklahoma, but the largest reported wager on the tournament is on 60-1 long shot Tiger Woods.

Jordan Spieth gets another chance to become the sixth man to complete the career grand slam.

THE BEST TITLEIST DRIVER EVER?

Who remembers the Titleist 975D? It is arguably one of the best drivers Titleist has ever made. However, many are now saying the Titleist TSi3 driver might be even better. Today, we review the Titleist TSi3 driver to find out if that is true.

TITLEIST TSi3 DRIVER REVIEW

Positioned for the better player, the Titleist TSi3 driver trades a little forgiveness for a more compact shape and adjustable weighting. The Titleist TSi3 Driver is 460cc but this is a classic example of size versus shape. The Titleist TSi3 is significantly more compact and looks smaller than it is. With the TSi3, you get flatter trajectory and adjustable center-of-gravity weighting. TSi drivers are 15-percent more efficient through the air (during the swing). If you’re looking to put a number on that, we’re talking about gains measured in tenths of miles per hour. Not nothin’, but not a lot either.

Apart from the TSi3 weight track, the most appreciable enhancement is the new face design. Titleist isn’t claiming any sort of spin benefit from its new textured face but Titleist has some preliminary data to suggest the design might assist in producing more centered impact. The research is ongoing but Titleist patented it just in case.

With Titleist TSi, there is some front-to-back MOI improvement (five percent over TS) but the most significant gains come top to bottom where MOI is up 13 percent in the TSi2 and 10 percent in the Titleist TSi3. That’s going to give you more consistent spin which, apart from generally providing more consistent ball flight, gives fitters an opportunity to fit to a lower spin number when it makes sense to do so.

Sure, everyone would love to have a Babe Ruth game-worn jersey. But that's not in the cards for most collectors, but some odd items -- with ties to sports -- can be found at auctions.

ShotScope introduces new post-round stat-packageIndividualized performance metrics on your home courseHole-by-hole performance breakdowns

The only thing I have in common with Tiger Woods is that we both want to shoot a lower score than whatever we posted. That is, unless he’s a fan of Dr. Pepper and fresh cut limes. In fact, the pursuit of better play is the element that binds golfers, regardless of age or ability. It’s with that understanding that companies like ShotScope offer a comprehensive stat-tracking platform with a bevy of advanced analytics.

Earlier this year, ShotScope launched several new devices aimed at the golfer who wants all the data but would rather not wear a watch or lug around an iPhone (or Android device). It takes longer to bring new hardware to market than to create updated software. If you own a Tesla or Smart TV, this isn’t new information. Beyond that, it underlies a fundamental value of personal technology. The device is important. But really, it’s a conduit to an entire user experience. In this case, that experience is all about finding ways to shoot lower scores.

SHOT SCOPE – WHAT’S CHANGED

Shot Scope is still in the business of GPS devices and automatic shot tracking technology. That said, it’s really in the business of personalized performance assessment and information gathering.

Getting the data is relatively easy. Ensuring that it’s intelligible and relevant to the golfer? That’s a bit more arduous.

This latest update from Shot Scope focuses on course-specific performance – and by extension, hole-specific performance. Gavin Dear, CCO of Shot Scope states, “It was our vision that golfers would be able to use these features to help them play their home course to the best of their ability and use the data provided to help with strategising out on the course.”

Can Scheffler do it again? Will Tiger contend? Who else should we be paying attention to? We answer all the big questions for the PGA Championship.

Who can win? Who has the best betting value? What props are the most interesting? Our experts look at the PGA Championship from all angles.

Fans can eat all they want with their ticket price at the PGA Championship, but the prices, especially for beer, got the golfers talking.

The four-time major winner had a mishap Tuesday ahead of his first news conference at the PGA Championship.

Here is the full set of tee times for the first and second rounds of the PGA Championship

Tiger Woods will play in a featured group with Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth during the first two rounds of the PGA Championship this week. They tee off Thursday on No. 10 at 9:11 a.m. ET and on No. 1 at 2:36 p.m. Friday.

Phil Mickelson's absence from the 2022 PGA Championship called 'sad' and 'unfortunate' by fellow golfer, world No. 7-ranked Rory McIlroy.

Rickie Fowler remains on a quest to find his old game. As Fowler tries to find his form, he faces a question others are asking: stay on the PGA Tour or defect to the Saudi-backed LIV Golf?

Does walking the course really burn more calories than riding? That’s a silly question. I think that we all know that it does. The better question is how many more calories does walking burn? For some of us, this is an important question to explore. As we roll into the new year, many of us are trying to be more active. Most MyGolfSpy readers will agree that the ideal fitness plan for summer of 2022 involves playing more golf.

Could getting fit this season be as simple as bypassing the cart barn?

Research Shows…

Like I said, most of us know that walking eighteen holes requires more energy than riding in a cart. In fact, scientists have published papers peer reviewed science journals exploring the topic.

The graphic above comes from an article in the British Journal of Sports Medicine (Murray, et al, October 2017). In the figure you can see how the various forms of golf are ranked by Metabolic Equivalency of Task (MET) score. As expected, riding in a cart is an easier task than walking with your bag on your back or pulling them in a cart. Surprisingly, the study reported that using a pull cart required more effort than carrying the clubs on the back.

I would not have predicted that. How could pulling the bag take more energy than carrying said bag? After digging a bit into the reference papers, I discovered that previous research reported that heart rate was higher when pulling the clubs than it was carrying them. I did not expect this, and it got me thinking.

It's still asking a lot for Tiger Woods to be in the mix to win a major. So he's down our list as we rank the players with a shot, the players with no shot and those just happy to be on site.