Tiger Woods announces new golf-entertainment business venture

Tiger Woods is getting into the golf-entertainment business with a new business venture that will compete with the likes of TopGolf, Drive Shack and other venues that marry traditional golf with cutting-edge technology.

TGR, Tiger Woods Ventures and PopStroke Entertainment Group Thursday announced they have entered into a strategic partnership.

Founded in 2018, PopStroke is a technology-infused golf-entertainment concept featuring professionally designed putting courses and food and beverage.

PopStroke currently has one facility in Port St. Lucie, Florida. Locations in Scottsdale, Arizona, and Fort Myers, Florida, currently are under development, and several additional sites are planned for 2020 and beyond. TGR Design and Tiger Woods will be responsible for designing the putting courses at all future PopStroke locations.

Why do Japanese golf courses have two greens on every hole?

During Monday’s Japan Skins, the high-powered foursome of Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, Hideki Matsuyama and Jason Day were presented with a challenge at the fourth hole: Play to the left green or the right green — dealer’s choice. Woods took aim at the right green but misfired, hitting a pull that ended up directly between the right and left greens.

“That was such a bad shot,” he said, exasperated but trying to stay light-hearted on the broadcast. “I tried to hit a cut and pull-hooked it!”

Up near the green, he adjusted his plan, chipping instead to the left green, where he rolled in a putt for par.

It’s not rare for a course to feature a hole with an alternate green. No. 8 at Pine Valley, No. 13 at Streamsong Black and No. 4 at Cabot Cliffs are three high-profile examples. But many courses in Japan, including this week’s Zozo Championship host course, Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club, have two such greens on every single hole.

The two-green system originated from a desire to keep greens playable across different seasons. Because Japan has hot, humid summers and cold winters, they could use a different grass type on each green to allow for options based on the weather. Tyler Pringle of American Golf notes that summer greens would typically feature bermuda or zoysia, while the winter greens would favor bent grass.

Advancements in turf management mean that two greens with two different grass types has become less necessary at many courses. Still, many in Japan and some others in South Korea maintain two greens on every single hole. There are benefits to having double the greens, of course. Twice as many putting surfaces means half as much wear and tear. It means no need to reduce greens fees for aeration periods. It also frees up one green per hole for required renovation or maintenance, and it provides some variety for course regulars.

18 holes.
36 greens.

All 18 holes at Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club have two greens, a common practice in Japan. pic.twitter.com/j1BJxDGF0y

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) October 23, 2019

There are also drawbacks, of course — twice as many greens means twice as much maintenance, which means increased budgets and transfers indirectly to more expensive golf. Still, the dual green phenomenon is something different. This week, Zozo Championship competitors will see action on both the left and right greens at No. 4, though not at the same time like in the skins game. Collin Morikawa, for one, was amused by the dual greens.  “I don’t know a place that has two greens unless you’re playing soccer golf,” he said. You can see more examples of the double-greens below.

SOURCE:  Golf.com

 

Five things the best golf instructors see in your swing that you don’t

Walk the range at a tour event and you’ll see a squadron of instructors capturing video, with the teacher and player huddling to figure out which magic adjustment might make the difference between first place and 50th on a given week. It’s certainly interesting to eavesdrop on what they’re discussing—in fact, it’s why we’ve been showing swing sequences in Golf Digest since the 1950s. But hearing about Dustin Johnson’s key to hitting his 4-iron incrementally better is only going to help you so much.

What does a top teacher see when he or she looks at your swing? And what kind of things are you missing when you have your buddy shoot you from down the line during your next practice session? We asked three top teachers—Jason Guss, Jason Sedan and Tom Rezendes—for the fundamental things they look at in an initial swing lesson, and how changing your focus to those things instead of the “prettiness” of your move will make you get better way faster.

“Can we all be honest with each other and accept that virtually nobody has the genetic gifts to roll out of bed and swing like Adam Scott or Anne van Dam?” says Rezendes, who runs the NorCal Golf Academy in Walnut Creek, Calif. “The important part to remember is that you don’t HAVE to do that to play well. A trained set of eyes sees what adjustments you need to make for you to swing your best, not necessarily look like a swing model.”

1. What your face angle is during your backswing

Where the face is pointing during the whole swing might be most under-paid-attention-to fundamental in golf. “Almost every good player has either closed the face or is about to when they come out of the transition at the top,” says Jason Guss, who runs the Jason Guss Golf Academy at Hawk Hollow, in Bath, Mich. “Players who struggle don’t have it square ever, or they’re even opening it at the start of the downswing—which causes a whole other chain of events. If you’re looking at your own swing or any other, is that face angle looking down at the ground when the club is halfway down to the ground on the downswing? I like to help players get keyed in on the face instead of the wrist movements that produce it because those wrist movements are so small.

2. How your technique matches your intention

What you’re trying to can (and should!) have a huge impact on what your swing looks like. “Students send me video of swings all the time and my first question is always the same—what are you trying to do here?” says Jason Sedan, who runs Fore Door Golf at Lake Winnipesaukee Golf Club in New Hampshire. “Most amateurs record a swing on the range, and it’s just a random swing that came after a random practice swing. But every shot should have a goal, a shape and a speed at which you’re trying to swing, and rehearsals that are about that exact thing.

“The next part is that the speed you swing changes a lot of the relationships within the swing. A video of a player making a smooth swing with a pitching wedge can tell a way different story than one where he or she is smashing a driver. You want to look at the full context, not just for one move you want to tear down.”

3. The underlying cause of your main swing problem

Putting an ankle brace on for a broken finger isn’t going to be very effective. Which means you need to look for the main source of your issues. “The phrase ‘over the top’ is one a ton of amateur players read and hear about, and a lot of them accurately see it about their own swings,” says Sedan. “But the way they go about fixing it doesn’t address the fundamental reason it’s happening. You probably see it as a swing path issue, but the swing path issue is a symptom, not the problem.

“If an over-the-top swinger just tries to flatten the club in transition and swing more ‘from the inside,’ all you’re doing is creating a swing that produces weak blocks to the right. Does that ‘fix’ the over-the-top? I guess so, but it just moved the problem into a different box. If you don’t address the open clubface that produces most over-the-top moves, you’re not addressing the problem.”

4. The movement of your swing in 3D, not 2D

A golf swing moves in three dimensions, which is hard to see on video. “You’ve heard of ‘angle of attack,’ but what does it really mean? And it’s so hard to see without a TrackMan or a trained eye,” says Guss. “But angle of attack gives a lot of clues about your bad shots. A player could be hitting these low hooks with the driver because he or she isn’t getting the weight transferred to the lead side. Ball position and swing direction work together. If you want to hit a higher shot or tend toward a fade, you adjust that ball position forward, which moves the swing direction left and the angle of attack upward.”

5. How your body segments work together to produce speed

“Most players (and a lot of teachers, to be honest) are focused on the basics—grip, posture, alignment—because those are the easiest to see,” says Rezendes. “There’s a place for that stuff, of course, and a place for launch monitor data like clubhead speed and distance, but I’m watching for a swing’s kinetics—how you produce force. What is making you do what you’re doing in your swing, and how is it impacting your shots?

“For example, how centered your thorax is over your pelvis has huge ramifications for how much energy you can deliver into the ball. And if your hip joints are working correctly in conjunction with your pelvis, that’s a major differentiator between good players and players with less skill. Good players turn ‘into’ the trail hip joint instead of rotating the whole pelvis in the backswing. That might seem like a subtle difference, but it’s why Cameron Champ hits it the way he does instead of the way you do. He’s producing more energy, not finding a set of swing positions.”

SOURCE:  golfdigest.com

Unlucky golfer’s ball was so deeply embedded even the rules official couldn’t believe it

It might be the most annoying thing in golf. It’s in the top five, at the very least. You hit a shot that, by all accounts, wasn’t that bad, only to find it embedded deep in the ground.

That happened to one unlucky golfer this week, and even the official giving the ruling couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

It came during the first round of the Molly Murphy Crowley Collegiate Invitational in Portland, Oregon. A golfer from University of California—Davis’ women’s golf team hit an approach shot that embedded itself so deeply in an area near the bunker that it was almost underground entirely.

The rules official, after pointing out where the ball was, took a picture because of how rare a sight it was.

Christine getting help for an embedded ball, one that even Steve the rules official says is so rare he wants to get a pic of it! pic.twitter.com/mhWUmi0NZJ

— UC Davis W Golf (@UCDavisWGolf) September 30, 2019

Lots of golf fans were asking what the ruling would be in this situation, and while I’m no rules expert, under rule 25-2, it would appear that because this ball did not embed in a “closely-mown area through the green…fairway height or less,” it’s good old fashioned play it as it lies.

Presumably, she would’ve had to take an unplayable, though. Either that or opt for a shovel.

25-2. Embedded Ball Rule

If a player’s ball is embedded in any closely-mown area through the green, it may be lifted, cleaned and dropped, without penalty, as near as possible to the spot where it lay but not nearer the hole. The ball when dropped must first strike a part of the course through the green.

SOURCE:  Golf.com