Knowing When to Swallow Your Pride

A little lesson in course management the hard way

At my tournament at Willamette Valley Country Club, I started having a lot of issues off the tee. It felt like everything else was clicking but I couldn’t consistently hit my driver at a certain point, I started shoving the driver to the right, and even if I overcorrected, I just couldn’t land it back in the fairway.

Because of the course layout every time I shoved it right, I found myself in the trees, which would automatically add a shot to my score having to punch out or not having a direct route to the green.

On a couple of shorter holes and doglegs, I hit my hybrid and hit it very well and straight, even with a slight draw. I still went back to a driver on the longer holes with no success.

I wish I could say I learned a lesson and dropped down to the hybrid to keep my ball in play and finished strong. I didn’t.

After the round when I went back through my scores, I estimated by staying with the driver and continually pushing my ball into the trees it added 10 strokes easily to my round. Choices have consequences and I continued to make poor choices.

This doesn’t mean that I should drop the driver as soon as I hit a poor shot with it. I need to learn about making on-course adjustments, and if the adjustments aren’t working make a switch to something that will keep me in play.

Course management is not always a strength, but I feel like this project and examining my rounds has made me more aware of my choices.

What do you do when you don’t have part of your game working correctly?