Confessions of a Hacker – Shaping your shots
I’ve always been a touch envious of club golfers who have a real ‘bread and butter’ shape of shot. Whether it is a fade (the more likely case) or a draw, these players can simply set up towards one edge of the fairway, secure in the knowledge that the ball is extremely likely to bend back towards the centre of the cut surface. It certainly seems like a better way to go than aiming up the centre and being unsure about whether any ‘miss’ is likely to be left or right. Indeed, the summer of 2001-02 was one where I hit fades almost exclusively and reached my all-time low handicap of six.
This shouldn’t be a revelation to many of you. Over half a century ago, the great Ben Hogan once said: "You only hit a straight ball by accident. The ball is going to move right or left every time you hit it, so you had better make it go one way or the other." Others may well have made comparable remarks before that time, but his is the one that resonates most to this day.
I went out to Yowani Golf Club on Sunday morning with this thought in mind. However, a couple of years of wildly erratic shots veering off in both directions gave me no real feel as to whether a fade or a draw was better suited to becoming my ‘stock’ shape of shot. The only way to find out was to experiment during the round and see if one method stood out as the easier one to consistently replicate.
Using the architecture of each hole as my guide, I started by trying to hit draws off the 10th (our opening hole of the round), 11th, 12th and 13th tees. The resulting two snap hooks, one smothered iron and one slight pull didn’t exactly fill me with confidence that a draw was going to be easily leaned upon in the future. Not that any of this would have come as a surprise to Hogan, who came up with another famous quote on this subject: "I hate a hook. It nauseates me. I could vomit when I see one. It's like a rattle-snake in your pocket." Further attempts to hit a draw off the 1st, 2nd and 4th tees didn’t end much more happily than their predecessors.
A fade was therefore looking the more likely play before I’d even attempted to hit one. Not that this was necessarily a problem. Jack Nicklaus carved out the greatest major championship career of all time by following the Hogan edict and playing almost exclusively with a fade, albeit that he worked hard on a draw for most trips to Augusta). Lee Trevino hit fades, as did Hogan himself. In more recent times, Tiger Woods has often resorted to hitting ‘baby cuts’ when his driver goes awry. Those four men have won 47 majors (and counting) between them; suffice to say, you can play a consistent fade and score well if the rest of your game is sound.
As it panned out, the deliberate fade was significantly more successful. There are still a few teething issues to be sorted out regarding stance, alignment and exactly how open the clubface should be at address (a couple of times I barely opened the face at all and promptly crushed one straight into the left trees), but by and large it kept the more disastrous shots at bay and gave me a legitimate hope of scoring well on the hole.
If your game hasn’t already revealed itself as being more receptive to a fade or draw, how do you work out which one is the easier shot for you to hit? There’s only one sure fire way to find out – grab a bucket of balls at your local driving range and try to hit deliberate slices and hooks with say, a 5-iron and a fairway wood. Pick out a target such as a 150-metre marker and try to hit slices and hooks that start well wide of the target but bend their way back towards this mark. Which method feels more comfortable? Which one gets the ball more consistently headed towards the target? And which method offers a lower likelihood of disastrous results?
My Sunday finished with 36 stableford points, a reduction in my handicap to 16 but most importantly of all, a new shape of shot that feels much more repeatable and will hopefully help the handicap head further south. Until next week, happy Easter and enjoy the spectacle that is Augusta National and the US Masters.
Previous ‘Confessions of a Hacker’ columns:
(1) Seeking help, (2) Racking them up, (3) Holding your nerve, (4) Five-foot putts, (5) Letting the Big Dog eat, (6) Slow play, (7) Trust the yardage , (8) Learning from low markers, (9) Learning from high markers, (10) Playing in the sandpit
