Golf Thread

General Discussion
#581

Neat stuff. That sounds like a great way to keep up with the game over the winter. I don’t think I’ve used one of those before. The only thing somewhat comparable I guess would be the indoor golf links where you hit into the screen and use the software to play a number of famous courses. I’ve done that a few times but was never really that impressed.

My gym has a mini driving range that I can use in the winter. It’s about 30-40 yards long, and the ceiling seems to be high enough that you can get a sense of your ball flight. Not perfect, but at least it’s something when the weather is miserable.

#582

Launch monitors are really cool. A lot of great info, but it’s also easy to get too caught up in some of the numbers, especially for some people who don’t fully know how some of the numbers work together. It’s funny, even with the pros, some obsess and want to know every number for every club, and some refuse to even look at a launch monitor for anything lol.

One of the best practice tools with a launch monitor is trying to hit “to numbers”. From 50yd to 175yd, especially from ~40-110, it’s tough to hit at something without a visual reference, but it’s nice to learn a “number” to go off of with a visual aid when it comes time to hit the shot. Not too many people have their own though saki, that’s pretty cool! Shows how much you practice! I probably only saw the range twice this year outside of before a round, and excluding tournaments, 3/4 of those rounds I skipped the range then too lol.

We’ve got a trackman and a flightscope. There’s not a huge difference, but the trackman is definitely better. But also don’t forget, there’s a ~$400 monthly license fee on top of the $20-$25k original purchase price lol. There is absolutely nothing better when it comes to selling custom drivers on a driving range than a launch monitor though. It’s solely how I get fit these days, absolutely best way to determine shafts etc.

I’ve also done the Taylor Made performance labs (there are 6 or 8 in the country) where they stick little points on your body with something like 15 cameras in the room and have you hit with custom clubs. It’s basically the green screen cgi tracking system they use for movies. But it was really cool, even for me it was absolute number overload. But pretty cool how it measured club angle, approach, speed, etc, etc, etc. actually here’s a pic of the setup:

http://tapatalk.imageshack.com/v2/14/11/25/adfd9a967003aae5720bef74afded933.jpg

#583

^^ that Taylor Made thing sounds awesome!! I want to try that.

#584

sak - great golf bio! That was a good read. So are you back to hitting a draw now? Looks like it from the shot shape on your mid irons. Pretty crazy how you all of sudden lost it there for a year or two. Though that does tend to happen in this game - Ian Baker Finch, David Duval, and probably countless other pros have had that happen. Not sure if any have come back.

I know you don’t take lessons now, but did you ever work with a pro when you started playing? If not, that’s pretty fucking impressive to have a completely home-grown swing and shoot low 70s consistently. Guess it doesn’t hurt to play 80 (!!) rounds in a single season. :wink:

As for your launch monitor, what does that setup include? Are you basically hitting into a screen that measures all of the different data points? How much do those run?

Interesting bit about the Tour averages. I can keep up to about the 8 iron lol

#585

Maddog - nice pics. I’m jealous - especially with the early onslaught of winter this year.

I’ve never played in the desert, but I may have an opportunity to do so in February. Tuscon, AZ area.

#586

I did the Taylor Made thing too. there’s one here in oakville. I had them fit me for irons. It was $110 and they gave me a $50 box of TP balls and they bumped my mizuno mp67 irons 4 degrees up for me…which would have cost me another $50 somewhere anyway.

I ditched the mizunos half way through this year and switched to Taylor made rocketbladez Tour. Love them. So nice to hit an easier to hit cavity again. It was too frustrating hitting blades when i was rusty in the spring. I generally change my irons when I wear out the grooves so I will have them for a while. The finish is already coming off these Rolodex nicely :smiley:

I played with a guy in October and on a par 3 tee I had brought 2 clubs up. He was looking at my 8 iron and after I hit my shot with my 9 iron he asked me what happened to my club. I told him ‘practice’ and showed him the 8 iron was the same . He didn’t understand so I explained to him that the finish wears off after a while from repeatedly hitting balls with the clubface, and that by end of next year it will be down to the raw metal which will probably rust. It blew his mind. Was funny… He probably never practises. His clubs looked new.

#587

Hahah, too funny. Yea I’ve got muzino mp60’s I got fit for probably 7 years ago. Half the set probably still looks brand new lol. I may look into a new set this next year just to be re-fit. Which I’ll look at muzino and taylormade most likely.

You got a great fitting deal for $110 in the Taylormade lab, I think ours usually charges $300 for the full process. But they whole lab thing is in a bit of limibo. It’s now going to be run by a private individual (at least the majority of them are) and he’s changed the pay/incentive structure dramatically for the fitters. So the guy in Nashville that was great at it, instantly left based on the new terms as did others at different locations. It’s a bit of rebuilding, which taylormade as a whole is doing a LOT of given all the recent fallout with club promotions, Dick’s, etc. so we’ll see how the transition goes. But I always recommended the fitting labs just for the fun on the process. I think a launch monitor is probably just as good to fit clubs with.

Man, 4 degrees UP, what were they set at before. That had to dramatically effect where you were making contact with the ball and flight pattern. Bet it made a worlds difference.

#588

I’ve never worked with a pro. Just figured it out. Started a kid and developed a good swing. Was never good as a kid though. Got serious at about 21.

The launch monitor measures loads of things. It has a camera in it and takes two photos of the ball at super high speed and calculates ball speed , spin, side spin, which then turns that data into ball flight, carry roll , shape, height etc etc.

It outputs it on a screen on the machine itself, or you can live connect to a computer for output there on software, or just use the vector and take the data of using a USB key. That will be good in the summer if I take it to the range to gather data (wireless, battery) and then bring the USB home , but I really don’t see me doing that. Seeing Ball flight is fine. In winter hitting into a net you can’t see flight so that’s why I bought it. Don’t want to groove a fault all winter.

It’s a vector x. It was $4000 new. Now you can find them on eBay for anywhere from $500 to $1500.

Theres always a new ‘gotta have it’ fancy launch monitor every few years. Used to be Vector. Then $4000 flightscope and then $20,000 trackman and now it’s the $7,000 FORESIGHT GC2. Silly.

Here’s a couple of the output screens… There’s also a range software that is a full screen flight simulator.

http://theaposition.com/jimgolfrank/wp-content/uploads/sites/11/2010/02/screen2.jpg


http://i375.photobucket.com/albums/oo193/sakimano/Screenshot_2014-11-25-22-22-37_zpsnuuqtwh8.png

#589

Neat stuff. That sounds like a great way to keep up with the game over the winter. I don’t think I’ve used one of those before. The only thing somewhat comparable I guess would be the indoor golf links where you hit into the screen and use the software to play a number of famous courses. I’ve done that a few times but was never really that impressed.

My gym has a mini driving range that I can use in the winter. It’s about 30-40 yards long, and the ceiling seems to be high enough that you can get a sense of your ball flight. Not perfect, but at least it’s something when the weather is miserable.

#590

Launch monitors are really cool. A lot of great info, but it’s also easy to get too caught up in some of the numbers, especially for some people who don’t fully know how some of the numbers work together. It’s funny, even with the pros, some obsess and want to know every number for every club, and some refuse to even look at a launch monitor for anything lol.

One of the best practice tools with a launch monitor is trying to hit “to numbers”. From 50yd to 175yd, especially from ~40-110, it’s tough to hit at something without a visual reference, but it’s nice to learn a “number” to go off of with a visual aid when it comes time to hit the shot. Not too many people have their own though saki, that’s pretty cool! Shows how much you practice! I probably only saw the range twice this year outside of before a round, and excluding tournaments, 3/4 of those rounds I skipped the range then too lol.

We’ve got a trackman and a flightscope. There’s not a huge difference, but the trackman is definitely better. But also don’t forget, there’s a ~$400 monthly license fee on top of the $20-$25k original purchase price lol. There is absolutely nothing better when it comes to selling custom drivers on a driving range than a launch monitor though. It’s solely how I get fit these days, absolutely best way to determine shafts etc.

I’ve also done the Taylor Made performance labs (there are 6 or 8 in the country) where they stick little points on your body with something like 15 cameras in the room and have you hit with custom clubs. It’s basically the green screen cgi tracking system they use for movies. But it was really cool, even for me it was absolute number overload. But pretty cool how it measured club angle, approach, speed, etc, etc, etc. actually here’s a pic of the setup:

http://tapatalk.imageshack.com/v2/14/11/25/adfd9a967003aae5720bef74afded933.jpg

#591

^^ that Taylor Made thing sounds awesome!! I want to try that.

#592

I did the Taylor Made thing too. there’s one here in oakville. I had them fit me for irons. It was $110 and they gave me a $50 box of TP balls and they bumped my mizuno mp67 irons 4 degrees up for me…which would have cost me another $50 somewhere anyway.

I ditched the mizunos half way through this year and switched to Taylor made rocketbladez Tour. Love them. So nice to hit an easier to hit cavity again. It was too frustrating hitting blades when i was rusty in the spring. I generally change my irons when I wear out the grooves so I will have them for a while. The finish is already coming off these Rolodex nicely :smiley:

I played with a guy in October and on a par 3 tee I had brought 2 clubs up. He was looking at my 8 iron and after I hit my shot with my 9 iron he asked me what happened to my club. I told him ‘practice’ and showed him the 8 iron was the same . He didn’t understand so I explained to him that the finish wears off after a while from repeatedly hitting balls with the clubface, and that by end of next year it will be down to the raw metal which will probably rust. It blew his mind. Was funny… He probably never practises. His clubs looked new.

#593

Hahah, too funny. Yea I’ve got muzino mp60’s I got fit for probably 7 years ago. Half the set probably still looks brand new lol. I may look into a new set this next year just to be re-fit. Which I’ll look at muzino and taylormade most likely.

You got a great fitting deal for $110 in the Taylormade lab, I think ours usually charges $300 for the full process. But they whole lab thing is in a bit of limibo. It’s now going to be run by a private individual (at least the majority of them are) and he’s changed the pay/incentive structure dramatically for the fitters. So the guy in Nashville that was great at it, instantly left based on the new terms as did others at different locations. It’s a bit of rebuilding, which taylormade as a whole is doing a LOT of given all the recent fallout with club promotions, Dick’s, etc. so we’ll see how the transition goes. But I always recommended the fitting labs just for the fun on the process. I think a launch monitor is probably just as good to fit clubs with.

Man, 4 degrees UP, what were they set at before. That had to dramatically effect where you were making contact with the ball and flight pattern. Bet it made a worlds difference.

#594

While we’re discussing golf tech, any recommendations for iPhone apps for swing analysis? I may hit up the range over the long weekend, and I’d be interested in collecting some swing data via my new phone if possible.

#595

Eh, I’ve used V1 golf on iPad before and it’s okay. I personally wouldn’t put any stock “swing analysis” in a program. I just want to see frame by frame video, and maybe be able to annotate a little overtop of it. But in truth, an phone is a little too small to see much of what you want (club head angle etc).

I think I’ve said it before, but for GPS and score/round tracking I do like Golf Shot a lot. It’s like a one time $20 fee, but it’s been well worth it. Shows arial overlay for gps etc, but also tracks score per hole, penalty strokes, scramble performance, putts, gir, etc. I enjoy looking back at that a lot.

#596

I LOVE V1. Great for video, frame by frame, drawing lines to keep an eye on what you’re doing.

However only worthwhile if you know the golf swing, and your golf swing. Otherwise it’s just fun to see yourself (although most people when I show them their swing on the V1 they are repulsed lol. Most people don’t realise how shit they are/look.

#597

V1, eh? It’s five bucks. I’ll buy it.

#598

While we’re discussing golf tech, any recommendations for iPhone apps for swing analysis? I may hit up the range over the long weekend, and I’d be interested in collecting some swing data via my new phone if possible.

#599

Eh, I’ve used V1 golf on iPad before and it’s okay. I personally wouldn’t put any stock “swing analysis” in a program. I just want to see frame by frame video, and maybe be able to annotate a little overtop of it. But in truth, an phone is a little too small to see much of what you want (club head angle etc).

I think I’ve said it before, but for GPS and score/round tracking I do like Golf Shot a lot. It’s like a one time $20 fee, but it’s been well worth it. Shows arial overlay for gps etc, but also tracks score per hole, penalty strokes, scramble performance, putts, gir, etc. I enjoy looking back at that a lot.

#600

I LOVE V1. Great for video, frame by frame, drawing lines to keep an eye on what you’re doing.

However only worthwhile if you know the golf swing, and your golf swing. Otherwise it’s just fun to see yourself (although most people when I show them their swing on the V1 they are repulsed lol. Most people don’t realise how shit they are/look.