TGC Spring Tour - WGC Bridgestone

[Shardak]

I played as well as I thought possible in round one, ended with a 75 (+5). This is a tough course if you cant drive the ball straight, and that is my biggest issue. I have made some improvements recently with my driver, and it paid off in round 1. Didnt get into too much trouble.

I started today hoping to play as well as round 1, but expecting that I would probably crumble and shoot 5 shots worse at least. But I proved myself wrong by shooting a really good 72 (+2) today. I hit tons of 250-260 yard arrow-straight bombs off the tee. I must have hit 10 fairways, and really had only 1 or 2 misses where the trees messed with my 2nd shots. I was -1 on the back 9. 1 bogey on 11, and birdies on both the par 3s.

I also made a few putts (its nice to make a few that are outside gimmie range once in a while). Drained a couple 10-12 footers and one long 20+ footer.

75/72 = +7 total. Probably my best performance on tour so far, given the difficulty of the course.

[Shardak]

I sometimes also feel like there is some inconsistency with what TGC calculates on certain shots, compared to what I feel when I hit the ball. I think alot of it is due to the delay before the shot gets displayed...it gives you too much time to analyze!

In real life, you see the ball fly with no delay, so you dont have time to think "that felt like a blocky toe strike that will start right and go further right". In TGC you have that 2-3 seconds to guess what the shot will do, and if it doesnt go where its supposed to, you think the game is busted.

Sometimes those bad feeling shots end up good. The blocky toe strike wasnt as blocky as it felt, and it comes back to the center a bit. But we tend to remember the ones that feel OK but end up terrible.

I think TGC / Skytrak are pretty good. I suspect the dynamics of hitting balls inside, into a screen a few feet in front of you, causes more issues than any inaccuracy with Skytrak. I find it harder to aim into an impact screen, and its hard to chip and putt since you lack the depth perception of being there in real life. Until we get a full VR golf sim (cant wait for that), I can live with the errors that these things introduce. Its good enough now that I dont get too frustrated with it.

When things feel too off, I fire up the Skytrak range, turn on alignment mode and make sure everything is lined up perfectly (using a laser level). Then confirm the alignment by hitting some flat putts in TGC. Thats about the best I can do to restore confidence in the hardware, and its usually enough to make me believe its all working accurately.

[Ironstrokes]

There is a 40% penalty for bunker shots under 40 yards to pin.

So a 30 yard bunker shot would play like 42 yards or so.

I thought it was a 50% penalty this whole time. Lucky 10% doesn't really equate to much of a difference from 40 yards and in so probably hasn't hurt me much

[goatbarn]

There is a 40% penalty for bunker shots under 40 yards to pin.

So a 30 yard bunker shot would play like 42 yards or so.

[MainStGolf]

What do you mean by the 40% rule?

[mthunt]

Am I the only one that continues to grow more and more frustrated as these tournaments continue. I must be the only one because I don't hear anyone else noticing the differences. Before the update my short game was unbelievable. I was able to make up so many strokes around the green with my putting and chipping and sand play. Ever since the update I can not find an ounce of consistency around the green. I just continue to get more and more frustrated. Two sand shots tonight that both went in the teens and then a third one that went like 25 and it was the same swing. I had one chip that I have over 3000 backspin that should have stopped on a dime that rolled out 6-7 yards. I just can't find a consistent swing to give me the same results time after time like before the update.

And what is even more frustrating is still the shot shaping on the driver. I find that there is next to no room for error on the simulator. If you get just slightly out of that VERY narrow window you either have a banana slice or a duck hook. I'm definitely "capable" of hitting a banana slice don't get me wrong, but I played 18 IRL today and I didn't have a single one. I had plenty of baby fades, but most were dead straight or pulls. I did have a couple of pulls on the sim in the two rounds, but I had a ton of banana slices. That's frustrating because you don't know where to aim, because you don't know what shot's coming down the pike. And that's not happening IRL and so it's frustrating to come inside and see the ball going all over the place.

I was able to finally find that VERY narrow window in the second round for the most part to give myself a chance, but I sure which I could find that consistency that I was having before the update. Maybe I need to set the stimp back to the original 7 and see if that does it. I wouldn't think going up to 8 would make that big of a difference. But maybe it does. I may give that a go on the next tourney.

I went up to try and match JNPG, but I haven't played that in about a month, so there's really no need to do that I guess :-). And the 7 is probably closer to our IRL greens.

ON TO NEXT WEEK!

I don't find this happening at all. Before the update green speeds were fixed and setting putting speed in GSX only effected putting making chipping super slow. Now the greens roll out nicely. I find it closer to RL. I apply the 40% rule on bunkers under 40 yards and my set up is super consistent. No issues with the driver either.

[Bubba22]

Thanks bubba. I hit it pretty good for a change. The bogey on 18 from the front edge hurt.

Good job man. Well played! Absolutely hate those bogeys.

[mthunt]

Great rounds mthunt!

Thanks bubba. I hit it pretty good for a change. The bogey on 18 from the front edge hurt.

[Ironstrokes]

Am I the only one that continues to grow more and more frustrated as these tournaments continue. I must be the only one because I don't hear anyone else noticing the differences. Before the update my short game was unbelievable. I was able to make up so many strokes around the green with my putting and chipping and sand play. Ever since the update I can not find an ounce of consistency around the green. I just continue to get more and more frustrated. Two sand shots tonight that both went in the teens and then a third one that went like 25 and it was the same swing. I had one chip that I have over 3000 backspin that should have stopped on a dime that rolled out 6-7 yards. I just can't find a consistent swing to give me the same results time after time like before the update.

And what is even more frustrating is still the shot shaping on the driver. I find that there is next to no room for error on the simulator. If you get just slightly out of that VERY narrow window you either have a banana slice or a duck hook. I'm definitely "capable" of hitting a banana slice don't get me wrong, but I played 18 IRL today and I didn't have a single one. I had plenty of baby fades, but most were dead straight or pulls. I did have a couple of pulls on the sim in the two rounds, but I had a ton of banana slices. That's frustrating because you don't know where to aim, because you don't know what shot's coming down the pike. And that's not happening IRL and so it's frustrating to come inside and see the ball going all over the place.

I was able to finally find that VERY narrow window in the second round for the most part to give myself a chance, but I sure which I could find that consistency that I was having before the update. Maybe I need to set the stimp back to the original 7 and see if that does it. I wouldn't think going up to 8 would make that big of a difference. But maybe it does. I may give that a go on the next tourney.

I went up to try and match JNPG, but I haven't played that in about a month, so there's really no need to do that I guess :-). And the 7 is probably closer to our IRL greens.

ON TO NEXT WEEK!

I hear you on the greens, I set my stimp to 7 as that mimicked the roll on my carpet in the garage and just now getting the feel for it, think I was too used to hitting it hard when it was defaulted to 6 for us before we could change it after the update.

I played great the first round, hit most of the fairways and greens and felt like I could have scored even better. Second round was a different story, I was all over the place with my driver and irons, but just hit great chip after great chip to save it and ended up with a lone birdie and double bogey (annoyingly on one of the fairways I actually hit that round, 125 out, bad iron, bad chip and a 3 putt took care of that for me haha) and the rest pars and that was probably the best I possibly could have scored that round with how I was hitting it.

Ive been trying to get used to playing with the short chip correction OFF to continue to feel it out and after taking the time and just recently zoning in my distances with it, I'm actually impressed and starting to enjoy it more and more. Sure you can still get the odd low spin reading on what was seemingly a well struck chip and/or get stuck on that very short chip that will never read....but Ive been getting lucky the last few rounds and have had nice readings and have been able to whack a putt though the rough on a few of the non reading short shots and get lucky to get within the 6ft. I will say it is nice getting the little extra spin on some of the shots under 20 yards as you cant really get above 1900 with the chip correction ON with those shots. Hopefully you can get a little more consistency with it soon, took me a crap load of practice in the last few weeks to finally get a little used to it. Just gotta trust the distances and assume its going to read the right spin as I feel it does most of the time. Cant wait to see what the "super putting mode" fix SkyTrak_Seth said they've been working on give us.

I do still feel like on some courses the greens take off much more than others for whatever reason (excluding approach shots hitting into a downhill slope that obviously will take off). On a lot of courses the only thing that seems to want to hold the greens are my 8 iron and under and I usually hit the ball pretty high with solid spin. I felt these greens were decently receptive but I'm gonna post a video of me elsewhere on the forum of me playing a round at the new NGLA national course that I saw Craig just recently ranked #1 on his top 100 course list (finally knocking off Whistling Straights) and anything over a 8 iron there just barely seems to want to hold the green at all.

On an additional note, I did end up scoring pretty solid on NGLA so may try to post it on the HB forums as well so the designer can see it. I like how enef56 posted my video over there when I played his course "Havasu Falls" (im also gonna do a play through on your new course as well soon). I don't think the designers always check over here to see how we are enjoying their creations. Something I definitely appreciate about Enef. Gotta imagine it has to be good showing them some love over there with playing their courses, definitely cant hurt our chances of getting more and more protee friendly courses (even though I know we have some great representatives fighting the good fight on that over there all the time)

[Tekbud]

For some reason I was thinking the default was 6 on the greens?

Maybe your launch monitor is out of alignment somehow? I would try just hitting some drives on the driving range of JNPG as a test to compare.

[MainStGolf]

Am I the only one that continues to grow more and more frustrated as these tournaments continue. I must be the only one because I don't hear anyone else noticing the differences. Before the update my short game was unbelievable. I was able to make up so many strokes around the green with my putting and chipping and sand play. Ever since the update I can not find an ounce of consistency around the green. I just continue to get more and more frustrated. Two sand shots tonight that both went in the teens and then a third one that went like 25 and it was the same swing. I had one chip that I have over 3000 backspin that should have stopped on a dime that rolled out 6-7 yards. I just can't find a consistent swing to give me the same results time after time like before the update.

And what is even more frustrating is still the shot shaping on the driver. I find that there is next to no room for error on the simulator. If you get just slightly out of that VERY narrow window you either have a banana slice or a duck hook. I'm definitely "capable" of hitting a banana slice don't get me wrong, but I played 18 IRL today and I didn't have a single one. I had plenty of baby fades, but most were dead straight or pulls. I did have a couple of pulls on the sim in the two rounds, but I had a ton of banana slices. That's frustrating because you don't know where to aim, because you don't know what shot's coming down the pike. And that's not happening IRL and so it's frustrating to come inside and see the ball going all over the place.

I was able to finally find that VERY narrow window in the second round for the most part to give myself a chance, but I sure which I could find that consistency that I was having before the update. Maybe I need to set the stimp back to the original 7 and see if that does it. I wouldn't think going up to 8 would make that big of a difference. But maybe it does. I may give that a go on the next tourney.

I went up to try and match JNPG, but I haven't played that in about a month, so there's really no need to do that I guess :-). And the 7 is probably closer to our IRL greens.

ON TO NEXT WEEK!

[Bubba22]

Great rounds mthunt!

[gene438]

I should have known that my real life golf nemesis would slither in here and make a comment on my misery.

[Mel Gallia]

You forgot " Old"

[gene438]

Not sure what to say... How do you explain following up a stress free round of 77 with a pain filled, struggling round of 90..... I have no explaination.... Can only say I feel like somebody beat the hell out of me.. Tired and sore......