Alfred Dunhill Links Championship

Another week has passed us by and that means another week closer to Christmas, I'll know when this will be read as I'll hear the collective groans across Kent! As we creep into October, one of the more favoured events on the European Tour took place; the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship.

This was Alfie Plant's second outing on the European Tour and was a little more familiar setting as most of his amateur career was played on the links courses. With 3 rounds of 73, Alfie put in a solid performance but a cold week with the putter unfortunately meant he was to miss the cut.

The defending champion, Tyrell Hatton, proved his class by knocking in 4 rounds in the 60's to defend his crown and take a 3 shot victory from Ross Fisher who missed out on the chance to shoot a final round 59.

Pro's Tip

The best players will tell you that the key to lowering your scores is a good shot selection around the greens. If you can get used to analysing the shot and coming up with 2 maybe 3 different ways of playing it you'll be getting up and down more regularly.

The easiest way to do this is using different trajectories and so Rob headed out to the practice area to demonstrate...

Whenever I am faced with a short game shot I always look to analyse what I'm faced with before I decide what club I will be using. I first look at the lie; can I get a lofted club underneath it if need be or will it require a club with less bounce so that the ball doesn't go shooting across the green.

The next thing I look at is how much fringe/rough grass have I got to go over? if there's not much then I may be find it easier to play a chip and run for example. Then I get to the green itself, how much green have I got to work with (less green may require more loft and vice versa). Doe the green have any major slopes that need to be considered, if it's downhill then you will need to adjust your landing spot accordingly, likewise for uphill and side hill.

Take this shot, for example, the ball is lying pretty good so contact shouldn't be a problem. I've got approximately 10 yards of fringe grass to go over so I would be inclined to think that a more lofted shot is the way to go. Looking at the green I have, again, about 10 yards to work with but the major factor in this shot is the big slope at the front of the green and the pin is cut just a few yards past that. 

All of these things would make me lean towards my 56 degree wedge because I've got so much to carry before until the green flattens out. You could play this shot with a slightly less lofted wedge like a 52 degree but you may need to land the ball on the slope and so relying on a good first bounce.

On this shot, the ball is lying good again so striking should be fine, we've got just 5 yards of fringe grass to go over and about two thirds of the green to work with. Again, we need to take the slope into consideration here and for this shot the green is running away from us so a slightly heavy handed shot will see the ball end up quite far past the hole.

This type of shot I would look to play a chip and run, using something like an 9 iron because it still has a bit of loft on it so that the ball can grab the green a little to slow it up before completing it's journey by running up to the hole. The only reason I wouldn't use a lofted wedge here is simply because if you slightly misjudge the landing spot the ball could finish someway short of the hole and leave a long putt.

If this has got you intrigued about the short game then why not book yourself in with either Rob or myself and we can take a deeper look.

Contact us here.

Callaway Fitting

Don't forget to put your name down for the Callaway Fitting Day on Saturday 21st October. We'll have our Callaway expert, Alex Hunter here at R&CPGC with his van full of clubs for you to try and his Trackman in a search to improve your game.

Alex will be here between 9:00am and 2:00pm so if you would like to reserve a half hour slot with him then please let us know in the ProShop so we can arrange it.

Book a slot here.