Key Game Plan Decisions Golfers Needs

Welcome to Bingley St. Ives. For this video, in partnership with Motor Caddy, we’ve got Tor caddy Billy Foster. He’s going to be calling on all of his experience from caddying for the likes of Seve Bayesteros, Darren Clark, Lee Westwood, and right now, Matt Fitzpatrick. He’s using the Motor Caddy, M5, GPS, electric trolley, and he’s going to share all of his best advice to help you strategize around the golf course. OK, Billy hit the fairway as always, of course, but still quite a long way to go. So you come up to a shot like this. First of all, how far have we got? Well, we’ve got 165 to the front, 182 to the flag kit. So you know, normally 182 for a pro golfer would be a 79. Let’s say for example, Today you’ve got a factor in, yeah, you’re probably at a couple downhill, so 180, the weather conditions, the temperature, it’s going to go at least 5 yards less, you know, a little bit of breeze into us as well. So it’s going to be, you know, probably 10. So I’ll be looking at least 190, which all of a sudden changed it from A7 iron to a really good 6 iron. So that’s what you’ll be looking at. Looking at your landing areas, obviously the Green’s pretty soft today, so you would be looking at landing to two or three yards short of the old. So then you’ll be going 187’s my landing number, which still is just a nice 6 iron. So you get different scenarios. You know, if the pin was on the front, let’s say there was water short and this is where a lot of guys still make mistakes. They were going right. Well, I’ve 180, you know it’s a 7 iron because I want to land it 180. But actually you know because the pin’s on 6, you’re going over water. So you’d be looking to land it at least 5 yards past the hole. So you’d be, you know, you’d be adding it 185, which would probably change it from A7 iron to A6 iron, because if you’re a good 79, lands on the front spins a bit, you’re in the water, so you’re protecting yourself in a little bit past to the fatter part of the green and taking the hazard out of play. But right now for you, it’s a good solid six side mate. Cool. So often though, amateurs come up short on a shot like this probably for two reasons. Ego. We think we hit the ball a lot further than we do and also just general quality of the strike. Would you err on the long side and really get to know your yardage is essentially all day long? I mean, I’ve caddied in probably 3000 programs over 40 years, you know, and you know, like I said, the the two mistakes you always see is the alignment’s always shocking. It’s always 20 or 30 yards, right? So always try and pick something online with where they’re hitting it and get the club pointing at your target that’s on the ground, might be a divot or a tea peg or something. And then just step in square to your club first so you will automatically align yourself a lot better. But yeah, definitely the strike of the shot is key. You know, it’s amateurs don’t really know how far they fly every club. But I mean if you went on the practice ground and hit a load of seven nines and said, well, I I fly my 7 iron 150, you know, and you might have 155 here, well guess what I’m going to get a good seven iron but you miss strike it a lot. So I’d always recommend it in one club mode and swinging it smooth instead of trying to smash the lights out of it and hoping you’re here at the sweet spot which you might do one in 10. But as amateurs we do. So I would always say use an extra club, swing it smoother and then you know, if you if you pin high, you’re obviously going to be a lot closer. Even if you’re left or right, you’re going to be a lot closer to the whole than if you’re 15 yards short. So it’s simple maths really. In most instances is it better just to aim for the middle of the green? Almost forget about the flag, If you’re an amateur, you aim for the middle of the green every time. You’re going to give yourself a lot more parts for birdie, aren’t you? No, it’s not just amateurs. I mean Kennifer, Matt Fitzpatrick, and he has a chart that he’s religious. You know, if the pit the pin’s got four from the left, he’ll never hit out the flag because he knows his dispersion with say A79 might be 9 yards. So we’d always 5 yards right of the hole. So even if he tugs it, but it’s still going to be on the left side of the green, you know. So yes, always here in the middle of the green. The best players. Nick Faldo always talked about the cheese wedge, he called it. So he would say where the pin is and he’d have a wedge around the flag and he would try and hit in the cheese wedge right or left of the hole depending on which side of the green the flag is cut. So the best players in the world, again, limit the mistakes and keep it in the fat side of the green. OK, I’m certainly not one of the best players in the world, but I’m going to limit my mistakes. So is it 6 iron? 6 iron it is, yeah. OK. There you go. All the best. Good luck, son. I made it. Thank you. So there you go. If you are in a situation like this, it’s a mid iron, long iron in. Make sure you know your numbers. Aim for the middle of the green and whatever you do, if there’s water, a big bunker, do not go flirting with it. Hit the centre and give yourself a putt. OK Billy, this is an absolute classic. We’re over in the trees, got a little bit of a window here, we can come out sideways. Plenty of options, but what’s the right one? Yeah, well, as you can see, I’m in my usual spot here on the 9th floor at Bingley. Another pull up off of tea. Yeah, I mean you do have a few options here. I think I’ve learnt a lot of different options off the great Sevi Ballesteros, but obviously you’ve got four options. The easiest one is to just chip outside woods. You could actually go between this Bush and the first tree and just that would be the the safe shop. Just pop some out, short the bunker and you can still get home in three on this par five. You do have an option up here to the left where you could hit a high cut if you saw desired, but I don’t really see that reaching the green, so my personal shot would be between the two trees you can see in front. And the way I’d go about it, I’d always try and Plumb Bob. Or you’d always see Justin Rose doing something like this where he he holds the club up and he tries to pick the dead centre between the trees. And it just so happens that I’d always try and choose something online in the middle of the gap there, like this leaf is in the perfect position right in the middle of them two trees. So I would always try and align the club face to the leaf. So now I know that club face is pointing perfectly in between the two trees. Obviously play it off the back foot a little bit because you want a little low chaser and I would try and drive that low hard through the middle of the gap and chase it in there, obviously with a bit of a drawer because you need to shape it round there a bit. But that personally that that would be the shot of my choice. If you’ve got, you know, any sort of low handicapper or pro would would normally go for this shot right here and chase something up just short the green or if you get it perfect you could knock it on the green. I’m sure the grand senor would be he’d have a birdie put from here, no problem. He’d have a bogey put from the middle of the fairway, but he’d have a birdie put from here. I’m no savvy, but I’m tempted. I’ve got to take this on. You’ve got the right club there, right? Well, yeah, that should be good. Yeah. OK, so we’ve got that leaf as over the leaf. Alignment. Nice low punch under there, right? I’m channelling my inner Justin Rose here with this. OK. Careful as it might bounce back and hit, you always chip out sideways. Ladies and gentlemen, I’m glad I could be here as the Guinea pig to show you that it’s not always the best thing to go chasing the tricky recovery shot. Chip out sideways, get it back in play. Unless you’re a good player. Like, like I said, good players. We’ll go for it. You should have chipped it out. It’s fun. OK, Billy, how far have I got? All right, let’s have a look. Kip OK, we’ve got 85 yards to the flag. OK, so that’s not a full wedge. What you do in this kind of situation, again, you’ve got to, you’ve got to know your landing numbers. Looking at that flag again, it’s it’s tight left, so I’d be recommending don’t knock the flag out because if you pull it a little bit, you’re going to be in the deep bunker left. So you’ll be aiming two or three yards to the right of the hole. I’m probably looking to land it pin either. The greens are pretty soft. Again, you need to know your yardages and and the only way to do that is, and I’ll tell any juniors, the best way to make your game much sharper. Don’t spend so much time bashing drivers and long irons. I would spend certainly half your time hitting wedges or hitting a lot of chips around the green. So the more you practice your short game the better. So you get the lights of Phil Mickelson. He used to. He’d just like put towels down on the range, 70 yards, 80 yards, 90 yards, 100 yards, 110. And you try and land it on the towels, you know hundreds and hundreds of balls trying to land it on that spot. So you dial in your wedges and you can you get to a stage where you can land it within two or three yards of that towel every time. And that’s what makes champions great. By having a a really sharp short game the likes of Luke Donald got to number one in the world Cos Immaculate wedge player. Zach Johnson’s got a green jacket and a Claret jug. Unbelievable wedge player. And even though you don’t bomb it 320 yards, it just goes to prove that great champions have great wedge player. OK, reasonably straightforward from the fairway. There’s a juicy bit of rough over here so I just want to see what you think about this lie. All right, Billy, this one, well, it’s pretty juicy. It’s not great, is it? How does this change the shot that we’re able to play? Well, let’s see, we’ve got, say we’ve got 90 yards here. You can see it’s a wet lush, thick grass lie. So this is going to come out dead. So, you know, if you were playing you would you’d probably say that might be even be playing 110. So you’d be really thrashing a big lob wedge or trying to dig out a sand wedge because it’s going to come out at least 10 or 15 yards dead. But on the other hand you get, you draw a line that’s maybe two or three feet to the right of that. Let’s take that one for example. So that is like burnt wispy grass. You got a little wispy, tough to grasp behind it. That is a potential exoset, so that really could jump 20 yards, at least 20 yards further than it normally would go. So he’d be looking to really probably bring the flight down that and chip one in there and get it running out because you’ve got no control over that. And that happens a lot. You know you might get. I’ve caddied for well, I remember one with Darren Clark in in Holland. Really dry, wispy grass and need like 190 yards. Well that’s a six iron. But it was such a dry, wispy lie. He actually had a pitching wedge and it just comes out with no, no spin on it whatsoever like a bullet. And it literally went 50 yards further than a normal wedge would go because it was so fiery and wispy grass. And you get the grass between the club 1st and the ball no spin on the ball and it just really it’s like a bullet and he hits it on the green 490 yards with a wedge and that’s the difference between a juicy wet thick grass lie or the wispy little bit of grasp behind it exercise and and it’s reading the lies and only experience can tell you to read lies. You know it’s like the semi rough you might be just a a normal semi rough lie. Well that’s so if you’ve got 180 yards that’s always going to come out five to 10 yards soft because it’s in the first quarter of and it is reading lies and and on the experience can teach you that over the years. Good stuff. So there you go. Make sure you do read the lie, because as we’ve just heard, whether you’re in the fairway, that nice little wispy one, or in the cabbage here, that completely changes the shot that you can play, especially when it’s a little pitch in from about 90 yards. OK, Billy, 250 yard par 4, slightly uphill, It’s drivable. Now, normally I’ll just reach for the big dog without even thinking about it, but what should were you doing on a whole like this? Well you got annoying limitations Kit, you know. Don’t get me wrong if the best players in the world or even your yellow handicappers would would easily knock it on the green here with a probably a three wood you know. So if you’d average club golfer to me personally you look at the the widest bit of the fairway which is short of the cross bunker which is probably 175 yards. So why wouldn’t you get a 5 iron or A4 iron or whatever lay it short of the bunker to the widest part of the fairway. Leave yourself a little 5060 yard. Chip up the green birdie. Put worst case scenario, par. Or if you put like Edward Scissorhands. At least you’re making a 5. But but I know what the Eagles are like. A 20 handicappers. Whatever. I can knock it on this green. Well of course you can. But guess what? You might knock it on the green one in 50. The other 49 are going in the trees left and right. You’re losing your ball, maybe finding a couple of chops. You’re making double triple bogey from just being your ego getting the better. So you’ve got to know your limitations of your own golf game. What kind of ratio are we working on? Then say, realistically, you’re going to knock it on or around the green here. How many times out of 10 to make it worth your while taking it on? You’re going to be looking at 7:00 or 8:00, aren’t you really. You know, you’re going to even good golfers, scratch players, your two handicappers, whatever they’re going to, they’re going to make a couple of bogies, a couple of double bogies by going for the green. And they might make four or five birdies, you know, But you’ve got to know, play to your own strengths and just eliminate the the I always remember Tom Watson. So you’re winning open championships by limiting your mistakes, not by in glory shots and making more birdies. You win torments by eliminating your mistakes. So they’re less mistakes, obviously, the better the score. So just finally on this whole, when it comes to the lay up, obviously we’re focusing on the wider part of the fairway. That’s what you want to hit it to. How much are you thinking about what second shot that leaves as well and making sure that’s a number or a shot that you’re most comfortable with. Yeah, sure. I mean when I’m walking golf courses, working for Fitz. Exactly. I’ll, I’ll walk down. I’ll look at the zones of roughly where you want to hit off the tee might be between 260 and 280 and that’s the widest bit of the fairway which will leave you you know maybe 1:40 to the flag which would be a pitching wedge or maybe a 99 into a little bit of breeze and you might want to hit down the left half of the fairway if the pins tucked behind a bunker on the right say for example. So you know on this all I would say you know if the pin was back right you’d as a decent player you’d be looking up the left half of the fairway to leave you in a better angle in. So you look at these, certainly the zones off the team, the the yard is between like I say 260 and 280 then it’d be a three wood for fits into that area and then you’re looking at the pin position where the wind is, etcetera to to leave yourself the best angle of attack. So that goes without saying. So brilliant. So there you go. When it comes to drivable path wars, leave the ego at home. Aim for the fat bit of the fairway. Leave yourself a nice easy second shot onto the green. You can always make birdie without going for it. OK, Billy, we’re just off the edge of the green club selection and shot selection. Vitally important with these little finesse shots, isn’t it? Yeah, I see it’s, it’s changed a lot over the last 20-30 years. The modern player, the modern young players, whatever they’re mis agreeing the first thing they do is reach for the log wedge every time. You know, and like I say, you know, I caddy for Seve for all those years and he never had a log wedge. His maximum loft was 56. And you know, the players of that generation, your Ian woos them, your Faldos, your Bernard Langers, Sevees, etcetera, Greg Norman’s great chippers. And that seems to have been been a bit lost with everybody just reaches for the log wedge. I’ll have Phil Mickelson. But as you see, you’ve got a fairly straightforward chip here. So why would you want to land a log wedge halfway to the hull? You know, it might get a soft bounce, it might scoot on it might have a bit of side spin on taking it away. So how I was brought up from that generation was try and land it on the green as soon as you can with less loft. So you’ve got to judge what you can land it say 2 yards on the green with a straighter face club. I’d I’d. I’d see this as a pitching wedge. So you just pop it on the green and then the ball will run end over head and and track like a put instead of having too much spin and relying on the right bound. So I would say a pitching wedge for this particular shot landing it 4 feet on the green. Sir. Let’s take that lob wedge, the lob wedge, then get rid of that snap it in half. OK. Never, never need a lob wedge do you a fan? No not really. Good. Let’s try pitching wedge. See you again Pitching wedge. So a little bit short, get it just running a bit, just land it three or four feet on the green there and just get it running towards the hole kit. Pretty good. Yeah. Spot on for for distance really, Yeah, just just just pulled it a little bit but landed in the perfect spot and you know it was online, it had a chance to go in. Great stuff. So anytime you are around the greens, use as little loft as you can to get the ball running as quickly as you can and you’re sure to get a more consistent outcome. Thanks for watching, some fantastic advice and amazing insights from Billy Foster there. That’s all for this video in association with Motor Caddy. Make sure you use those tips next time you’re on the golf course, and I’m sure you’ll shoot loads under your handicap.