After a few discussions regarding proper etiquette on the golf course, the big takeaway for a lot of people is the importance of taking care of the golf course. It’s one of our biggest priorities to leave the course in better shape than you found it. So in today’s blog, we are going to explain the top three ways you can take better care of the golf course you are playing!

#1. Repair Your Divots

In the south, every golf cart has sand to repair your divots. A divot occurs when you hit the ball and then the ground, although it can also happen when you chunk a shot…but I digress. If you are playing on cool season grasses, your divot should actually come out in one piece. Go fetch your divot, and put it back where it came from. You should step on it and try to reconnect it to the ground. If you are playing on warm weather grasses, the grass will not come out in one piece which is where the sand comes in. Dump some sand in your divot and then smooth it out with your foot so when the mower comes by, it won’t get sand in the blades. If you can, repair some other divots while you’re at it. You should go back to the club house with 2 empty sand bottles.

#2. Repair Your Ballmarks

Especially on bent grass greens, you can get some really big ball marks on the green. To fix your ball marks, locate the high part of the ball mark, or the back of it, take a golf tee or a ball mark repair tool and push the prongs in at a 45 degree angle toward the middle of the ball mark and push straight up to 90 degrees all the way around the ball mark. Then tap it down with your putter or your foot. If you are close to the hole, use your putter. Also, try to pick up your feet while you’re on the green, especially if you have soft spikes. Also, repair your ball mark and a few others if you see them.

#3. Rake Your Bunker

During the last couple of years when golf has become really popular, golf courses were taking the rake off the golf course to avoid the spread of illness. They were telling people to just give yourself a good lie in the bunker and don’t rake it. Since a lot of people started playing golf during this time, newer golfers may not know about this common courtesy to other golfers. Very simple, forward and back with the rake and smooth over the foot prints.

Golf is called the gentleman’s game for a reason! It’s extremely important to not only take care of the golf course and leave it better than you found it, but it’s also about helping out your fellow golfer and having courtesy for those playing behind you. We hope you found this informative. Feel free to comment on ways you make your golf course better!

Here’s the situation.

You are around the green and you have a basic little pitch shot. You want to loft it on the green and have it roll out very little. Most people will take out their sand wedge for this shot but how do they feel about that. Probably very little confidence. If you are lacking confidence with this shot, you may want to change your strategy a little bit.

Ideally, remember the less loft you use, the less skill you need. So, if you can putt it, putt it. If you can’t putt it, you should probably chip it. But if you need to get the ball up in the air higher or maybe have a higher skilled shot, you may have no other option than to pitch it. Most recreational golfers are going to pull out a sand wedge attempting to hit a higher lofted shot that will land softly and roll out very little. However, when executing that type of shot, the golfer is going to need to put a lot of energy and acceleration into the shot to get it to go high enough. With this amount of energy being put into this particular shot, if you make less than solid contact, the results can be catastrophic!

There’s an easier way to do this…pull out your gap wedge.

The gap wedge is what the pitching wedge used to be. The gap wedge is actually preferable to get the ball on the ground sooner and have it roll out a little bit more. You might notice that if you make less than stellar contact, you might still not be in terrible shape. The idea is that with a less lofted club, we are going to see less catastrophe with our misses. Remember, nothing beats practice. Take a dozen balls out to the range and practice chipping with the different lofted clubs. You may notice that your misses are much better with the gap wedge than the sand wedge. Let us know if this helped.

There are a few ways to use an impact bag but I would like to talk about one of the ways I like to use it. First off, I want to talk about why we use the impact bag. The first impact bag was invented by a guy named Dr. Gary Wiren. Written on the first impact bag was the words “The Moment of Truth”. What this means is that when you are using the impact bag, the moment of truth is when we strike the ball, right at impact. We really like to use the bag mostly for those who tend to “scoop” the ball, both during little shots and full shots. This is usually what happens when golfers, sometimes unconsciously, try to lift the ball in the air by trying to get under it. What we actually want to happen is to strike the ball with our handle (and hands) leading the clubhead at impact. When you see pros hitting shots on the range and during a round, their club is still descending when they make contact with the ball which is why their divot is ahead of the ball.

One of the most important principles to adhere to while using the impact bag is to swing the club slow and intentional in order to get the correct impact position. I also would recommend aiming for the center of the impact bag with your club head.

Good Impact Position!!!

Poor impact position

There are 3 drills I would recommend to do while using the impact bag. Image and description of each drill below.

Lead hand on the club only with the wrist bowed or flexed.

2. Trail hand only drill where the trail wrist is cupped or extended.

3. Both hands on the club swinging slowly and intentionally to create good impact position and weight transfer.

Ultimately, the purpose of this drill is to get you transferring weight into your lead leg early and also get a feel for good impact position.

If you’d like to purchase an impact bag, click here.