Emerald Valley is a rough place. Played it once with my son who plays golf at the University of Oregon. He tells me EV (as the locals call it) is the toughest of the three courses the Ducks use for practice in the Eugene area which includes the Eugene CC. Watched the Duck Invite there last spring and the winning score for the 54 hole event was -3. And those college kids can play golf!!

Should think about going up there once a month or so and play 18 or 36 holes depending on the number of daylight hours. A stern and fair test of golf. A good measure of your progress on a tournament ready course.

Best of luck with your endeavor.

My thoughts are you should work backwards from the green and start to build confidence, Read Dave Stockton unconscious Putting and short game and start to let the mechanics go. Play with some freedom and start to visualise more.

Of the distance getting woods (the 4 to 1 woods,) the 4-wood is the easiest, the straightest, and the most forgiving, while still offering distance. Miller often teed off with it in actual competition. Sarazen used it to hit the “shot heard around the world” off the fairway, which was the double-eagle at the Masters.

It should be relatively easy it master the 4-wood quickly. Once the 4-wood is mastered to hit both teed up shots (tee up relatively low,) and none teed up shots, the 4-wood swing pattern can be carried over to the Driver swing with the adjustment of not “swinging down” with the Driver, as with the 4-wood. This is done basically with less weight shifting onto the leading foot with the Driver than the 4-wood. The hands at the moment of impact for the Driver are around the back of the ball, while the hands at the moment of impact are somewhat in front of the ball for the 4-wood, so as to hit the ball on the downward part of the clubhead swing arc (like for irons) in what can be called a more “delayed” hit, or delayed release of the wrists for the 4-wood.

The primary objectives of the 4-wood shot are to get accurate and straight shots with a decent amount of distance. This is gotten by precise hit on the ball with stillness of the body at impact, and letting the club get the distance naturally. This is a good prioritization of objectives for the driver until the driver swing is mastered. Accuracy and straightness are the objectives to place over distance. Hitting the ball precisely on the sweet spot with a squared clubface will promote distance. A straight line is the shortest distance to the green, while an off line drive will add to the distance needed. Distance is not that hard to get if the swing is efficient (rather than powerful.) It has been demonstrated (in my book) that to go from 210 yard drive to a 300 yard drive, the clubhead needs to be swung “only” 30 yards further. This had been posted in detail in a few of my prior comments posted on this website, so it will not be repeated to keep this comment short(er) unless there is any request for a detailed and thus lengthy explanation. Of course, there is the physics law of the Conservation of Angular Momentum, which can be utilized to get great increases of distance for “free” by increasing clubhead speed without adding any power. This has also been post in several past comments.

I think you’re doing a great job Dan, both with the website and with your game. There’s no such thing as a bad day — just another lesson to learn from.

Good luck on the next tournament.

Please let me apologize about that. I wish I had more time to update the site, write more blogs and keep data flowing out consistently. To be honest, a lot of it has to do with the fact that it has been high summer time and the sun sets around 9pm and by the time it’s dark and I’m home I am usually thinking about just food and bed before starting another day. Now the it’s starting to get darker earlier it’s easier to do some website update work in the evening. Perhaps I need to focus less on replying to emails and more on the site, especially if not having daily content is a turn off. I hear your points and have taken them to heart and will do my best to begin updating the content more often.

Pat B, I would love to talk with you about a site reformat. cheers!

Thank you for following,

Dan