The topic of carrying lighter bags is a popular one this time of year.
The best wear is the best and all of us can manage a pencil bag and race pace, but most of us are still out there with carts and full sets of bags and doing the rest of our business for the year.
After ten years of writing about it and not realizing anything about it, I tried this at Moretown to add something different to a round of golf in January and do something for the club.
On the surface, six clubs may seem like a lot, but you'd still probably come up with eight since most of us can afford the full allowance.
The banker of only six clubs is that a) you will constantly find yourself “between clubs” b) you will tell yourself and your playing partners, and c) you will still ride the club even if you hit it perfectly , also gets you onto the front edge of the green.
On the other hand, your scores will be pretty much the same as if you managed through a full quota, and you'll quickly build up a certain level of confidence with each club.
You'll also love how lightweight the bag is, which will quickly make you question why on earth you're carrying 14 clubs around 18 holes.
Decision time. These are my clubs of choice…
1) Drivers are non-negotiable. If you think you'll be hitting 14 tees in the depths of winter using a 3-wood or hybrid or even a “long iron,” you're better than me.
What you want, what you don't have to worry about, is to get yourself out there as much as possible. The modern way of thinking, as we've all learned in recent years, is to lean it as far forward as possible and take your chances from there.
We said this as amateurs, comparing ourselves to touring pros, and even though we barely did any extra yard work, it sounded great.
2) Another non-negotiable is putting. If you were to choose three clubs, you could take away the notion that you're good enough to push through with a sand wedge.
But if you have six clubs, use them and turn one of them into a putter. This gives us four clubs to cover a 10-foot putt and a 250-yard drive.
3) You also need a club to get out of trouble. You might think you're good enough to avoid La tiger's bunkers in St Andrews, but you're not.
Personal preference is the 64° Callaway which will definitely make sure you get your ball out of the sand. This really plays into other areas of the course, it's also great when faced with LOB shooting and no green situations, but it can also get you into all kinds of situations when you take it outside of your comfort zone Interesting attractions.
For the average golfer, who isn't so paralyzed by short game issues, a wedge of about 54° should be ideal. Then you can also tick about 80 yards.
4) Think about the par 3s at your local club – does a certain club loan out two or three of them? While the general gap is about 10-15 yards, you now need to cover at least 25 yards per club.
You need a club for all long par 4's and 5's, but not too niche, like a 5 wood, it won't give you some kind of flexibility.
My personal choice is again a 6 iron. For a normal person this would probably be a 5 iron or higher hybrid, but I can definitely contradict that at least I can pour it 170 yards and get a par 3 out of a winter tee Rod.
5) It gets easier from here as we don't want any clubs next to each other so a 7 iron isn't an option so we end up behind an 8 or 9.
For me it's 8 so we have a club that will give us something like 145-150 and we can maybe do fashion/fat in the 130 area. Who doesn't mind their 8 iron? Even I can't fault the 8 irons on the finger of accusation.
6) Then we got stuck in something of a wedge. It's a weird club and I'm overthinking it.
The A (approach) wedge and pitch wedge both enjoyed the green light ahead of the big day before settling on the higher wedge. In hindsight, this was a mistake.
I thought I could do magic with a wedge, and God only knows wedges. The result was that, due to the Putter-6i-64˚'s odd win, I rarely had enough club every time I hit it and never saw any action around the greens.
generalize
This is an easy way to have some fun on winter (or summer) golf.
It encourages more imagination, which often encourages better shots or at least going beyond the norm.
The better player will play a round with an even number of irons and the odds will be the next.
Give it a try, it's worth it alone as it's such a lightweight bag in its easy bag, not to mention the club and mindless play method.
Read more: Trying to break 90 again – Ryder Cup venue Moretown A magical place to start 2025
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