First, golf is about doing your best with proper etiquette. Its a gentleman's (woman's) game. Play to your personal best, and admire your peers when they post wonderful scores. There are links on youtube where you can watch some of the best battle it out and perhaps pick up a tip or 2.
You can play this game for pure entertainment without ever spending a dime and have a rewarding experience, or you can invest money and time improving your game/equipment just like on the real course.
Try to learn from the highly skilled players on here. Some of the really talented ones can shoot low numbers that seem unimaginable when you are still learning. This is in part terrific precision of equipment at the higher levels , and the amount of effort the top players put in. Unlike the pros, we can play a course 10x in the same day, without divots in the fairway, sweaty hands, or adverse weather. Being attentive, thinking about your shots, you can hone in closer and closer to the pin, and learn to read putts.
To get the most out of your wgt experience, play this game with a happy heart. Win and lose graciously ( both will
happen frequently here) If its stressing you out, or you are having a
bad round, step away. Its not productive to come on here, bash the
site, or your competitors. Again, play to your personal best and try to help those with lower skills, while applauding those who are capable of better rounds.
My 10yr old son is a phenom at xbox360 games, Im not even in same zip code as he is in talent there. I still enjoy playing with him from time to time win or lose. Sometimes just enjoy watching him play the game. My computer can also beat me in chess, but its no match for me in kickboxing!
Here are some things I've learned along the way, may or may not work for you, but I hope this helps.
#1 PUTTING Just like in real golf, putting is the key to scoring. Putters are personal preference, and there are players who can shoot amazing rounds with the beginner/starter putter. If you look me up, my putting stats aren't so good, because I spent way too much time trying to do early/late clicks and guessing how far past the DING to let meter go, rather than learning how to properly read breaks. There are guys who can putt LIGHTS out doing the early/late clicking, but I just couldnt master it and have been happy with the switch in methods.
2 things that are paramount to your putts having a chance... 1 NEVER leave a Putt short... pretty self explanatory, if it doesn't get to the hole, it wont go in.... 2 NEVER miss a putt below the hole. You want your putt to fall in from top side of break. Envision allowing gravity to drop your putt into the hole. If you misread the putt and don't play enough break, your ball will pass under the hole before it gets to it, and never has a chance to go in
DISTANCE First you need to get comfortable with distance on your putts.
standard greens 30ft scale, every 10% of meter will roll 3.0 feet, so half the meter on 30ft scale will roll the putt 15 feet. fast greens, its 10% faster, or multiplier 1.1 so that same halfscale putt on fast green will travel 16.5 ft very fast greens I use 1.2 multiplier ( 18ft) tourney greens 1.3 (19.5 ft)
For uphill/downhill add or subtract 1 foot distance for every in of elevation chance. When you get to tournament greens, downhill puts, I will take an additional 1ft off for every 10ft legnth putt.
I try to hit every putt where it will roll 1 ft past the hole if I miss it. Personally, I never lag putt and will try to make the 75ft putts with breaks that I have a 1% chance of making. If you never get to the hole, you never gave it a chance. Also even if you roll it 3-4ft past hole by accident, come back putts are generally easier.
An example, 15 ft 1 in down putt on a tourney green, I would try to hit 13.5 ft distance. (15ft-1ft for down elevation, -1.5 ft for downhill putt on tourney green, +1ft distance past hole 15-1-1.5+1=13.5) which is about 35% of the meter on 30ft scale putter
I know this sounds complicated, Golf isn't easy in real life or here, but you have to get your distance consistent, or your mind will have a tough time learning to read the breaks.
READING PUTTS... There is no trick for reading putts. It is a "FEEL" thing and very difficult to teach. FIRST, I play all my putts by looking at it from REVERSE VIEW. I feel like it gives you a better look at the putt to read it. I play by moving the arrow, and trying to DING every putt. It gives me very good feedback. If I miss the ding putt should miss the hole left or right (depending on miss ) if my read was correct. If you are putting a constant distance past the hole on miss's, and dinging your puts, you will more quickly learn the to read breaks. Beginner/starter putters have a VERY slow meter speed, and easiest to ding. Spider/Rossa putters have more precision coupled with fairly slow meters. Depending on your natural reflexes, you may could hit a very fast meter, but important thing is to move the arrow, hit the ding ( on putts) and process the results ( so you can continually improve)
ABOUT MY GAME....Putting is where I get my low scores from, In the open, I missed 30% of greens in regulation. Approach shots are something I've been working hard to get better at. In the same 36 holes, 30 of them I 1 putted, and successfully scrambled 100% of time to save pars on the greens I missed. For me, nothing in the game is more satisfying than draining a 14ft breaking putt for birdie! ( no matter if I win or lose the match)
Below is an open qualifier round ( not actual tourney) for that round, everything dropped, Its the exception, not the rule however as I generally 1 putt 70% of time and can't remember the last time I 3putted.Putting will be a light switch, one day it will flip on and you will be making all your putts, but be ready, the next day nothing may drop. Just the nature of the game.
Hope this helped, next time I'll write up about what works for me getting up and down from various lies around the green.
Right click and View image. Save it or print this putting scale picture and keep it by your computer, it should help you play faster because at a glance you will see how far a put will travel on each of the various greens. For example, for a 10.8 ft putt on very fast green with starter putter (30ft scale) you would pull the meter back 30% before letting it go.
