We talked about the importance of keeping your playing statistics. Sometimes it just seems tough to keep track, but once you get into the habit, it pays for the inconvenience 100 fold.
Once you have started , the next step in the process is evaluating your stats to help you improve your game. Naturally, the key in this process is that you evaluate your stats based on your playing ability. Over time, 10 rounds at the least, you will develop your averages. With these averages, you then have to determine what is good, mediocre or poor in each category, and then set your goals for improvement. Another good thing to have is to know what the stats averages are for your handicap.
Once you know what your personal stats are and the averages for your handicap, you can now set your goals for maintaining your handicap, and then for lowering it. Knowledge is valuable, as it allows us to make good decisions based on fact, not on feelings, emotions, and especially not on guessing.
Let's say that you feel that you are driving the ball pretty well. The fact that you are hitting only 2 fairways per round, even though the distance is long, tells you that you are not driving the ball well and actually need to improve it.
Putting stats on the PGA Tour are based 100 percent on the ball being on the green. A ball on the fringe, even if you putt it, does not count as a putt or a GIR, a green hit in regulation. However, I have always counted a putt from the fringe as a putt and thus also as a GIR. To not count a putt from the fringe, I believe, distorts my putting stats as well as my GIR number, which I feel more accurately reflects my round and my shots. Since putting is widely accepted as one of, if not the most important stat, I believe if I putt, even from the fringe, it should count as a putt and as a GIR. But I do not count using a putter (called a Texas Wedge) from way off the green, instead of hitting a pitch or chip shot, as a putt.
So, customizing or making your stats reflect your needs, as long as they are reasonable and will help you improve and reach your goals, is just fine. Remember, we're talking about your goals and improvement. If you have any doubts about your stats, talk it over with your PGA Pro. The key here is to keep accurate stats, evaluate them honestly, and set attainable and reachable (likely in small increments of improvement) goals.
The Surge!