Complete hybrid set delivers astounding results....

4/8/12 Saturday. Yesterday afternoon I played the easiest nines holes of golf ever in my experience. Not the best, the easiest, not the most fun, the easiest, that sums up the playability of the complete hybrid set that I now have in the bag. I scored a gross of 41 (5 over par) in the nine holes played with the hybrid set. My first plan when they arrived was to get on the range and hit balls with my six and eight irons and then compare the shots with the equivelent hybrids.

I had no idea what the hybrids would feel like or any expectation of what the effect would be when hitting balls with them. The day was a very hectic one and I had a 40 minute window in the early afternoon to get on the practise range without the regular set in the car. No matter I know my distances well enough to get an idea and lined up and started hitting balls. After twenty I was not Gobsmacked but totally confused, never has hitting a ball been so easy and the effect so good. Okay the promo for the clubs did say more distance and straighter shots many clubs do. That the ball way scooting 15-20 metres longer after impact was a surprise that had me reeling.

If you had practised like I have for almost four years, got to a twelve handicap and tried out most club types getting a five to ten metre increase with new sticks would be more believable. When ten shots with each stick go fifteen to twenty metres longer than usual and effortlessly how surprised would you be? Exactly and my first reaction was to want to get home grab the irons and return to the range. Instead I took my time finished the weeks tasks and headed out for nine holes. How convinced was I that these clubs were going in the bag? Not 100%, I played the nine holes with the factory plastic still on the club heads as the pictures show. I was hedging my bets and if they failed the test I was going to sell them in almost pristine condition.

When I got home after the nine holes as soon as the pictures were taken the plastic seal was off and the set is ready for action. I hit #3, #5, #6, #7, #8, #9 and PW during the round. The defining moment was a 140m shot to the green with a 7 iron that hit the green and finished on the back edge with a one and a half metre roll. Took the #8 Hybrid out for its first hit then, the ball dropped on the green and stopped three metres to the right of the pin. There was a bit of a breeze behind me, even so my usual easy eight iron is 125 metres not 140. There was another follow on effect from the hybrid use and that was the driver off the tee became o easy to accommodate to after playing each hole. The hybrids felt like the Cleveland Tour Launcher (440cc) driver, so light and the swing speed so much faster. As I got used to the hybrids stepping onto the tee and swinging the driver began to benefit from the similarity in feel.

Thankyou for your time and attention. :Hit ‘em straight all” 

 Geoff

Still losing the fat....

Diet Supplements available here make an offer... http://www.quicksales.com.au/buy/auction.aspx?itemid=15243678

4/8/12 Saturday weigh in for the fifth week of taking the diet supplements. I have got a digital set of scales now, whilst the weight loss does register on the older scales the read out is difficult to get an accurate figure. The total weight on the scales this morning is 102.5 kg and a picture is included in the post. A bit of a surprise as I did not feel as though I had exercised enough during the week and was expecting a negligible figure to show for the week.

That puts the total weight loss in five weeks since beginning to to take the diet supplements at 6.5kg from 109kg. My meals during the week included several beers on Saturday night at a 50th birthday as well as canapes and hors d'oeuvres. During the rest of the week it was coffee with toast and cheese and twice fried (Olive oil) eggs and toast for breakfast, 2 x ham cheese sandwiches for lunches and Chicken Marsarla 3 times for dinner Steak chips and egg for dinner and Stir Fried curry noodles for dinner on Friday night as well as a couple of beers at the golf club.

After seeing this result my confidence at getting to less that 100 kg is strengthened. The reduction is gradual and there is no discomfort as a result of taking the diet supplements. I will set a target of 92 kilograms which is what I weighed in 2002 as the ultimate target. Seeing as I have not had any growth spurts since then that would be a very acceptable weight for me. This figure is 10.5 kilograms below my current weight so it may take two to three more months but that is certainly not a problem.

Not carrying the 6.5 kilograms gone so far on my frame is already a vast improvement in physical comfort. It is especially noticeable after a couple of days golfing that my energy and physical condition are still up for more. 

 Geoff

Winning with ugly golf is better than losing ...

30/7/12 Monday. After the erratic day at Naracoorte on Saturday fronted up on the home track for the Sunday 29th of July competition. It was the first qualifier of the Gallerie Trophy and a Monthly Medal round. Proving that no matter how ugly your golf is, the score is what separates the winners from the losers not how pretty your game is.Won the day with a 77 Nett and 89 off the stick. The NTP was mine on Sunday missing the  Putting on the day (27) went well enough with 29 putts and Ryans Run for the best back nine score was picked up by myself.

Not a bad return of winning results on the day after being battered hard in past weeks on neighbouring courses. My golf was ugly  as far as the structure of the round went. Playing well off the tee again and putting well enough a few poor chips did not help and the most damage to the score was from the fairway shots. Two lost balls knocked the charge towards playing to Par off the rails. One in particular was a great shot but a club too much that went straight to the green, over it and into the native bush surrounds. Dropped a club played a provisional and it landed a couple of metres from the pin. 

All of the day there was no feeling of stability in my game. This week will be spent refreshing my game brain, that seems to be the problem. Concentration lapses is what is the cause of this erratic game play. On making an error with a stroke the following shot is played correctly and the rest of the hole is played effectively and efficiently. It is not that concentrating is a problem it is the maintaining of the focus in rounds that is causing the most damage. Together with one fault that I do not seem to be able to get the better of at the minute, getting the distances of my clubs settled. 

Not choosing the correct club and hitting the ball too long or too short has been put down to playing unfamiliar courses in the past month. Yesterday on my home track though it was blatantly obvious that the club selection on the front nine was out of sync with the actual distances I hit the ball. On the back nine there was an improvement that resulted in GIR's and obviously the NTP won on the 16th hole is one testament to that. Apart from refreshing my mental golf a concerted effort is needed to get on top of the club selection for fairway shots. This will be interesting with a complete hybrid set arriving in coming weeks. I will start with a clear slate with the new sticks to establish their distances.

The next two weeks are a Par round on the 5th of August and Stableford on the 12th of the month. Then the first Qualifier for Club Championships on the 19th as well as the second round of the Gallerie Trophy. Then the 26th of August is the second and third rounds of the respective Qualifying rounds. While my golf is not at its best currently. It was still better than the rest of the club opponents in the last competition. There is going to be some serious work in store on the practise fairway and greens in the build up to the club championships.

Thankyou for your time and attention, Geoff

Cloned golf clubs they work...

27/7/12 Friday. As a golfer one of the enjoyable facets of the game is looking at, playing with and thinking about new golf equipment. Especially the clubs available, with such a large selection of different clubhead designs available all espousing technological improvements with their release.Perhaps it is a throwback to my teenage years when I enjoyed getting a tube of glue and putting together the various bits in the model aeroplane kits because today I enjoy making up club sets. Cobbling together old iron set sitting in their box and swapping shafts and club heads into different variations. This is easy to do no workshop required at all moving between the kitchen, lounge room and the dining table I can quickly put a set of irons together or regrip them.

Which bring me to the next point once all of the old clubs lying around have been taken apart, swapped over and put back to the original configuration, what do I do next? Having sparked up my interest and got into the experience of constructing my own version of a club more material is needed. When it comes to golf, my money is best spent on playing the game the rest is just a casual hobby that is additional fun. So the best alternative is to purchase the second and third tier golf equipment manufacturers components to make my own set.

Here is where I found the nasty side of golfing, the various opinions on major brands and the lesser know equipment manufacturers quality, performance and ethics. Some opinions I read were so unashamedly biased it appeared to be only lacking one thing and that was endorsement from an advertiser. It was this that made me committed to not supporting only major equipment suppliers, I do not accept extreme almost fanatical ranting against anything as it makes me want to know why an opponent is shouting over the voice of the target.

This one I found a reasonable and balanced review http://www.golf-club-revue.com/golf-club-clones.html

Here a comparison trial was done between two golf clubs performance original and a clone,

http://www.mygolfspy.com/clone-golf-clubs-vs-name-brand/

And another discussion piece http://www.livestrong.com/article/273091-about-clone-golf-clubs/

From ValueGolf.com (a supplier of cloned equipment) is this description

“Clones are something very common in the world today – chances are you’ve seen or use some type of cloned product every day. Just a couple  examples: Computers: Just about every computer out today is a clone of the original IBM. Remember the cost of the original IBM computers? Not cheap. So an alternative soon followed: less expensive components without the ridiculous mark up combined to make a computer of similar quality at a fraction of the cost. Some of those clone companies even progressed to be their own established brand names, like Dell. Some clone golf companies have become their own established brand too, Tour Edge, Nickent for example.“Compare to” products: No doubt at the grocery store you’ve seen a product that says “Compare to….(brand name)”. Cereal for example. I know personally, because my cholesterol is a little bit high, I started eating Kashi Heart To Heart brand. Not a bad tasting cereal, but expensive at $5.00 a box. Then I discovered Wegmans “Heart Essentials”, which in my opinion actually tasted better, and was half the cost. 
Guess what I buy now? The same principle applies to golf clubs.
Yes, there are many examples of cloning today, and golf clubs are no different. "

Whilst I will always look at, trial, consider and purchase the so called First Tier golf equipment manufacturers products at the same time I will continue to purchase the lesser known golf equipment suppliers products as well. Thankyou for your time and attention. “Hit ‘em straight all”

 Geoff