Course Management

The Mickelson and Monty meltdowns at the US Open yesterday, plus mental mistakes I made in my own round, have me thinking about course management tonight.

Yesterday I shot an unsatisfying 10 over 82, with a triple bogey, two doubles, five bogeys, eight pars and two birdies. The triple and the two doubles were each set up by poor drives, but then exacerbated by attempts to salvage the hole by trying dangerous second shots.

On the triple, I pulled my tee shot into a deep fairway bunker on a par 5. Rather than just wedge out I tried to advance my ball with a less lofted iron - hoping to put myself in position to still be able to reach the green with my next shot. Instead, my shot lodged in the side of the bunker, requiring my next stroke to be a drop back in the bunker. In the end, I did well to triple the hole.

Same thing with the two doubles. Rather than just take my medicine I tried to do more with the second shot than I should have and in both cases this led to more trouble and to dropping additional shots on both holes.

But here's what has me scratching my head.

In each case, I weighed my options and played shots that I thought I could pull off. I thought that they were all high percentage shots.

So, did I mishit these shots badly?

No, none of them were perfect but neither were they terrible misses. So maybe I overestimated my ability on these three shots.

Phil Mickelson is kicking himself tonight for trying that tough recovery shot on 18. If I can't learn from my own mistakes maybe I can learn from his.

Maybe today's lesson is to be more realistic about the likelyhood of pulling off the tough recovery shot, and at the same time to be a bit more accepting of taking the medicine - difficult as it is to swallow sometimes.