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Divoting images Posted: Tuesday February 12, 2002 5:24 PM
Thursday, February 7 NAPLES, Fla. -- I still have divots on my mind. Two days ago I spent an hour watching tour star Scott Hoch hit balls on the range at Isleworth Country Club in Orlando. It was only his second practice session after a three-week layoff, so he didn't hit any long irons or woods. He hit about 20 shots with his pitching wedge, 20 with his 8-iron, and 20 with his 6-iron, and that was it. "All I'm trying to do today is make solid contact," he explained, hitting shot after shot with a crisp click-fffwwwt and a nice draw. "When I'm happy with ball contact, I'll start working on trajectory and shape of flight." Hoch's divots, as you might expect, were beautiful little rectangles. He went through a shag bag of shiny new Titleists, artfully excavating a patch of brown earth about 10 inches wide and two feet long. (Turf specialists call this "Tour Player's Blight.") Unlike my divots, which tend to have a rough entry wound with stolons and runners sticking out and a kind of "down-ramp" slope into the cavity, Hoch's were as sharp as if they had been made with a sod-cutter. He was able to perch each ball on the cliff edge of his last divot, conserving turf, while I need an inch or two of grass behind my last divot to ensure a good lie. I looked up now and then, but there were only a handful of other golfers practicing at Isleworth. None of them resembled Tiger Woods or Mark O'Meara, who were out in La Jolla, Calif., playing in the Buick. Hoch did stop for a moment to chat with Seattle Mariners second baseman Bret Boone, who was hitting some very nice wedge shots toward the nearest target green. "You're making some good-looking divots there," I told Boone, by way of compliment. Hoch couldn't resist the needle. He said, "Bret's never swung that smooth in an actual round." Boone laughed and shook his head. At the clubhouse end of the range we stopped again to talk with teen touring pro Ty Tryon, who was hitting short pitches to a practice green. I didn't recognize Ty at first because he was wearing shallow, wrap-around sunglasses that made him look like a comic book character. "Tell me about the million dollars they offered you to play in Dubai," Hoch said, making a sarcastic reference to media reports that Tryon, who is still in high school, had refused a Middle Eastern sheik-down. Ty looked embarrassed. There was no million-dollar offer, he said. No half-million dollar offer. "A hundred thousand?" Hoch asked. Ty's shrug said maybe. "Where does the media get this stuff?" he asked. He hit a little brush-stroke, low trajectory chip shot that rolled a good 40 feet and slid about 10 feet past the hole. No divot. No divot at all. Friday, February 8 NAPLES, Fla. -- I just opened an e-mail from Mats Only's resident pro, Rob Stanger. "In response to your divot problem," he begins, "your effort to angle the clubface to the 11 o'clock position is causing the shaft to exit the target line prematurely with the clubface already angled, creating a narrow divot. To assure a square divot, try to get the shaft exiting slightly opposite the direction that you want the clubface angled. That is, if you want to spin the ball to 11:00 (see Rob's Lesson Tee column, The Elements of Ball Flight" ), try to make the shaft exit slightly to the right of the target -- 12:15, if the target itself is 12:00. If you want to angle the clubface to 1:00, then try exiting the shaft slightly left of the target, say, 11:45. Sometimes when golfers try to angle the clubface to 11:00, they exit the shaft to 11:00, as well." He concludes, "Let me know what you think of this answer." What do I think? I think all this talk about 11 and 12 and 12:15 is making me hungry. After lunch I'll drive down the road to Ferguson's Golf Center and work on my exit strategies. In the meantime, Rob promises to put together a lesson on reading divots called, "How to Read Divots." When it arrives, I'll put it online. And since we're into reading today, I have to share a press release I received recently. It's headlined, "Ivan Morris Named Golf Nut of the Year," and comes from Ron Garland, aka headnut@golfnuts.com. The release explains that Morris, a 56-year-old commercial printer from Limerick City, Ireland, won the title with an examination score of 13,489 points plus 41,631 bonus points, which are given for various golf-nut feats. This is the one that caught my eye: "Went to the driving range at his home club this past December 30, only to find that it was closed. He found an empty range basket and picked up about 100 muddy balls from the range; then found a barrel full of rainwater, broke through the ice and washed the balls with his bare hands, and hit the balls back out into the range. 300 points." Sounds to me like Morris might be Range Rat of the Year, too. Anybody have a personal story of range obsessiveness to top Ivan's? If so, send it in and I'll share it with the GOLFONLINE audience. (Note: it's best to write between 11:00 and 1:00, but watch how you exit when you're finished.) Watch this space for another installment of Mats Only. To send John Garrity advice, share your experiences, or suggest a driving range, click here. |
