Playing Iron Shots

When playing your iron shots to the green, accuracy and control are
much more important than distance. Perhaps you can do your maximum swing
and hit a 7 iron 150 yards, but can you do it repeatedly and make it go
straight? You might hit better shots by taking more club and less
swing. Forget the macho thing, it won’t make your score any lower!

Consider this chart out of Ben Hogan’s book. Hogan could hit a 7 iron
a maximum distance of 160 yards. But, in competition, he played it at
135 yards. Why did he intentionally give up the yardage? Because he made
more birdies this way! You might have heard interviews recently with
both Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson in which they both admitted working
on hitting more “knock down” and “punch” shots into the greens for
better accuracy. I don’t know about you, but if Hogan, Woods, and
Mickelson have applied this strategy with success – I’d give it a try!