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TANGENT is headed to the Myrtle Beach Golf Trail…

And it might be wet, so we had some unorthodox help preparing. You can follow along with The Good Miss in the community tab, but expect a lot of great Myrtle Beach Golf Trail content in the near future featuring TANGENT.

What are the TANGENT Four?

The TANGENT Four are our key stats for fast game improvement. Think of these as low hanging fruit to take your game to the next level. If you’re a follower of DECADE or golf trends then you’ve probably heard of the Tiger 5. These are five stats that Tiger Woods worked on to make sure he wasn’t throwing away easy strokes. The Tiger 5 are:

1. Bogeys on par 5s

2. Doubles (or worse)

3. 3 putts

4. Bogeys with wedges or less

5. Blown ‘easy saves’

Tiger was good enough that he knew if he eliminated the above mistakes, he would always be in contention and while these 5 stats are key, for most of us they are a little aspirational and include some overlap. Often when you make double (or worse) it includes at least one of the other 4 mistakes.

So in TANGENT, we’ve simplified the list to four things you want to avoid for optimal scoring and we call them the TANGENT Four:

1. Three Putts - Taking 3 or more putts on any green to finish the hole

2. Two Chips - Taking more than one shot to get onto the green from inside 50 yards

3. Penalties - Hitting into a penalty

4. Recoveries - Hitting into a recovery situation

This data is shown to subscribers after every round in your Round Report and also in your player summary. Here’s how to use it.

TANGENT Four in the Round Report

I have not been playing well recently, at least relative to my handicap, and the TANGENT Four is a great place to get started! In a recent round with some buddies, I shot an 81 at Texas Star.

It is a difficult golf course, but I felt like I played better than that and just made some simple mistakes. My favorite part of the TANGENT Four is that it tells you your ‘potential score’. In other words, what you would have shot with a clean TANGENT Four.

My 81… turns into a 75! I would have been a lot happier with a 75. In fact, I probably wouldn’t have lost the Nassau with a 75. At first glance, sometimes the TANGENT Four can be jarring. Really?!? I could have been 6 strokes better! You are going to make mistakes in a round of golf, but these are low hanging fruit, easier things to control, without changing your golf swing!

Let’s dive into what I would do to try to minimize these mistakes in my next round of golf.

Three Putts

The biggest factor for 3 putting is generally speed control. Occasionally you may read one grossly wrong, but more often than not you are just leaving yourself a longer 2nd putt than needed or you are missing short ones.

A few minutes on the greens before (or after) every round to work on speed control can work wonders for eliminating those three putts. If you’re still struggling, try the pullback drill in the TANGENT app.

Two Chips

Watching pro golf can sometimes ruin our expectations for short chips. We see all the highlights of pros stuffing it close from everywhere, but the number one task for any short shot is to get it on the green. Don’t make it worse with a two chip. Chances are you’re going to two putt anything outside of 5 feet anyway, so taking on more risk is typically not a good answer.

My suggestion for avoiding two chips… find a technique for a basic pitch and stick to it. Most players don’t need to hit flop shots or Thai spinners.

Penalties / Recoveries

Penalties and Recoveries typically come down to course management. Choosing good targets based on your dispersions that take penalties and recoveries out of play. That’s the whole point of the TANGENT AI Caddie. To help you navigate the golf course so that you aren’t taking on too much risk.

Depending on your handicap, you will have penalty and recoveries based on ball striking as well. You didn’t hit well enough to cover that lake or you shank one into an area that was outside of your dispersion….

But you should find that as your game improves, penalties and recoveries become more a function of targets and decisions than ball striking. So next time you see a high number of penalties in particular, ask yourself if you could have avoided the penalty with a better target.

TANGENT Four in the Player Report

As you play more rounds with TANGENT, you’ll have a player report that will summarize the results of multiple rounds which is good for spotting trends. I mentioned that I haven’t been playing well lately and if I summarize the TANGENT Four for my last 10 rounds, it looks like this:

I could have averaged 9 strokes better per round with just better performance on the TANGENT Four! You may never fully eliminate these mistakes, but minimizing them is the fastest way to improve your handicap, without having to significantly improve your ball striking skills.

Next Steps

If you really want to improve your game, you’ll take it to the next level by further exploring your round and player reports and focusing your practice. I talk about how to do exactly that in this YouTube Video.

It’s getting hot out there. Make sure you have a fresh glove from Red Rooster to keep control of the club face. Controlling the club face is your ticket to better shots.

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