Golf On Tour: Pro Tour Golf College Student Finishes 2nd in South African Womens Open

Pro Tour Golf College student Danielle Montgomery had an awesome finish on the European Ladies Tour last week in South Africa. The event was the prestigious South African Open played at the Selborne Park Golf Club in KawaZulu-Natal.
As I predicted in last week newsletter the conditions would suit Danielle and they did!


Danielle started slowly with a 74 in the first round but when the wind got up on the last two days (80km on Sunday) the organizers had to delay the start by 2 hours allowing the Perth girl to catch the leaders with a 2 under 70 on the second day.

An even par 72 on the 3rd day was one stroke short off getting into a playoff for the title with Germany’s Caroline Masson.

This excellent finish has shot Danielle down the Order of Merit from 70th to 36th position.

Lawrie I believe a few more times getting into contention and her time to win is just around the corner. Well done Danielle from all at PTGC.

---

IS STROKES GAINED-PUTTING THE MOST IMPORTANT STATISTIC FOR WINNING GOLF TOURNAMENTS?

As my blog last week indicated, this relatively new putting statistic on the PGA Tour is the most accurate way to identify the player who putts the best against the field for that round, tournament or season.
But is it the most important statisitc to set up a player to win a tournament?...


On examining the 2012 PGA Tour season so far, only two players have led Strokes Gained-Putting (SG-P) and also went on to win the tournament, Luke Donald and Phil Mickelson. So does this mean SG-P is just another meaningless stat?

Lawrie and I have dug a little deeper and winners of every tournament this year were in the top ten SG-P (56%) and 76% were in the top 20 of the SG-P stat. The average PGA Tour winner gains 1.275 strokes on the field which translates to better then 5 strokes over 4 rounds. Only one winner Jason Dufner at the Byron Nelson was -1.546 against the field.

This means that for a player with a minus SG-P stat to win they have to have an outstanding week tee to green and/or play the par 5’s very well. The tournament this week on the PGA tour is a good example. Jason Bohn (3.308) and Luke Guthrie (2.215) are leading, and the players on the cut line Brian Bateman (-1.171) and Peter Lonard (-0.461) are in danger of not getting paid this week!

---

Here’s a look at some of the PGA Tour calculations on average number of putts to get the ball in the hole. These are calculated from data collected from ShotLink and therefore come up with the probability of one, two or three-putts from any distance.

A player's chance of one-putting drops 20 percent when moving from 3 feet (95%) back to 5 feet (75%).

Just under 8 feet: At the 7-foot, 10-inch mark, it's 50/50 whether players will one or two putt.

• 11 feet: Players have a 1 in 3 chance of one-putting from 11 feet (34 percent).
• 14 feet: Players have a 3 in 4 chance of two-putt or better from 14 feet (75 percent).
• 25 feet: Players have a 1 in 10 chance of one-putting from 25 feet (10 percent).
• 33 feet: The point at which a player is expected to two-putt. This is interesting because while there is an 88 percent chance of a two-putt from this distance, it is the point at which a player is equally likely to one-putt or three-putt (6 percent each way)
• 40 Feet: Players have a 1 in 10 chance of three-putting from 40 feet (10 percent)
• 73 Feet: Players have a 1 in 3 chance of three-putting from 73 feet (33 percent)
  

Understanding the above calculations will help you get the true conversion rate for putting and remember this is from the PGA Tour and we know “These guys are good”!

---

Here is a good story of dedication and hard work combined with a program that is designed to lower your competitive scores. Bernard Chan started in the PTGC program in September 2011.

His competitive stroke average when he started with us was 84.3 as he had devoted the previous 3 years to completing his university degree and had not played much during this time.

Over the last month (June) his competitive stroke average has dropped to 74.4 and is going down.

For most golfers shedding 10 shots off your score in such a short time is only a dream but at PTGC we know it’s possible with our high performance program designed to do just that; lower your golf scores.

---

Bernard is always the 1st to arrive each morning and the last to leave at the end of the day. He has improved all facets of his game plus understanding how to manage himself mentally at training and learning to transfer that form to the golf course more effectively.

In his own words “the support I get from Lawrie and David plus the encouragement from the other PTGC students has been invaluable in my goal to play successfully on a PGA Tour”.

The Open Championship is on this week at Royal Lytham & St. Annes and it will take a special player to win. With 206 bunkers guarding fairways and greens and penal rough, straight tee shots, scrambling skills from fairway and rough with the ability to avoid three putts are required.

Not much sleep this weekend for all the diehard golfers out there.

Good golfing

David and Lawrie