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The best way to approach the situation of being trapped by a tree, so to speak, is to put yourself into a trance.

Every golfer tends to miss a high percentage of shots that are in serious trouble, such as one where a tree limb is totally preventing a full backswing. And all too often, the reason for a mess is not the awkward lie, but rather a failure to be able to concentrate on the execution.

 Switch Your Thoughts 

You start to think about the tree instead of hitting the ball. What you should do for any such shot as this is to take your position over the ball and try a tentative backswing. Once you have established how far back you can take the club, repeat the restricted swing over and over until you feel comfortable enough to make the swing within your restricted zone.

Once you have done this, put yourself into a trance and forget about the obstacle. Put all your concentration into striking the ball as firmly and properly as possible. Even if your club hits the tree on the backswing, you are now prepared for this and your new-found concentration will help you to complete the shot.

The tricky part about hitting a pitch shot from a downhill lie is hitting the ball with the clubhead before it strikes the ground behind the ball. Make no mistake, this is indeed a tough shot!

When you come upon a downhill lie, put most of your weight on your front side at address and keep it there throughout the swing. Because the hillside tilts you to your front, you naturally de-loft the angle of the clubface. The ball will come off the club flying lower and perhaps longer, so you may want to take a more lofted club or shorten your backswing accordingly.

For uphill lies, you want to let the clubhead follow the ground contour, just as you do with a downhill lie. Because the ball lies on an uphill slope, the angle effectively increases the loft of the club, causing the ball to fly higher and shorter after impact. Choose a longer club than you would normally use and also lengthen your backswing to account for the lost yardage.

The angle of the hill, depending upon its steepness, also affects your balance by forcing your weight onto your backside and perhaps causing you to pull up or even fall back out of the shot. Guard against this by keeping your weight on your front foot and keeping the ball in the middle of your stance.

One of the basic tenets of golf is to take care of your equipment.
The appearance of a player and his golf accessories can tell a lot about that person.  By taking pride in your golf apparel,
especially your clubs and golf bag, and keeping everything in shape, you will look better and most importantly, your expensive
golf equipment will last a lot longer.

Keeping Your Club Faces Free From Dirt

Whenever you hit a shot, you will see that the grooves of the face on your iron will be cluttered with dirt.  To keep this
area clean and free of grime, simply wipe off the clubhead with a rag or small towel and then use the sharp end of a tee to
scrape each groove.

Cleaning your club face like this is not just for appearances either. By removing encrusted dirt and mud, your shots will
maintain distance. With a dirty club, you can lose control and your ball will not reach the distances desired.

Cleaning Your Golf Balls

When you arrive at each tee box, you will see a small structure on a pole designed to help keep your golf balls clean.  Some of
these contraptions have a round handle on top, and some have a crank-type handle on the side.

These are called ball washers and the purpose is to enable you to clean your golf balls. You simply place the ball in the
designated area and once finished, the ball will come out erfectly clean.

When cleaning your golf balls, keep it courteous. These ball washers can be extremely noisy so be sure not to use the machine
when one of your playing partners is about to make a shot. It’s best to wait until the swing is over before you operate the ball cleaner.

Keeping Your Shoes Clean

If you wear spiked shoes during your golf games, as everybody should, keeping them clean is also standard procedure for the
player who takes care of his or her equipment.  At the end of the day, be sure to scrape off any of the excess dirt and grass
from the spikes before taking off your shoes.

In addition to preventing the trunk of your car from getting dirty from your shoes, you’ll also be able to keep an eye on the
spikes and know when it’s time to get new ones installed in your shoes.

Note: You can purchase a package of spikes to keep your footing fresh at all times.  Each package should come with a small wrench
that has two claws. You will insert these claws into the holes at the base of your cleats in order to remove the spikes.
Replace them with the new spikes but be sure not to tighten them up too hard because it may be extremely difficult to remove the
spikes for future replacements.

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Hit ‘em straight

Ben

You have probably heard this advice before, but it is worth repeating:

Every shot you hit a golf should have a goal behind it.

Your scorecard can only be improved by increasing your skills and having an understanding of just how to properly prepare and push yourself on every shot you make. You should be asking yourself:

What do I expect from this shot? What is a reasonable result?

Reasonable Goals To Better Your Score

The key to becoming a better golf player and lowering your score is to totally avoid taking too many putt shots on the green.

Regardless of how well you can skyrocket the ball from your tee shot and landing it on the green within regulations, if you take an unacceptable amount of strokes to get the ball into the hole, the opportunity to better your score has been wasted.

There is no excuse for this.

The Initial Goal

Do not confuse goals with expectations. An expectation is an action that is reasonable and one that should happen every time you decide on the outcome. A goal, on the other hand, is something in which you are reaching high for, but may take a little time to reach. Once reached, the goal can then become an expectation through repetition.

The initial goal you should have in golf is to send the ball into the hole within 36 putts or fewer, on an 18 hole course.

This means that you must hit two putts or less on every green.

This goal obviously becomes easier to achieve the closer you can hit the ball to the green, but those times where it lands 30 to 50 feet away from the hole, you’ve got yourself a major feat to accomplish. It’s going to take extreme focus to make long putt
shots successful.

Make Every Putt Count

By accepting the challenge of this article to play every golf game with the goal of 36 or fewer putts, you’ve taken a big step towards improving yourself and your skill. However, do not let this challenge get in the way of your confidence.

When facing a long putt, you may have the tendency to get lazy and lose confidence in knowing that you could make the shot. This may cause you to swing at the ball in a halfhearted matter and quit your goal before even trying.

Too Much Confidence Can Hurt

Even if the shot appears to be too easy, the same negative outcome may happen as well. You may have been very successful in getting the ball close to the hole, but feel overly confident and attack the ball with too much aggressiveness. Instead of staying focused,
your overconfidence and lack of concentration may cause an easy 2′ foot putt to completely miss the hole.

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Hit ‘em straight

Ben

It is inevitable that some of your shots will not go as planned and end up landing in an area which makes it quite difficult to hit the ball out of.

Ahhh - the joy of golf

A good player with a positive attitude will enjoy getting themselves out of trouble when making an unsuccessful shot that lands in the rough or some other messy area.

It’s called recovery and if you can become great at recovery shots, you will be one step ahead of the rest of the pack to being a better golfer.

The Rough

Some of the most difficult shots you can make will be from the rough, which is typically made up of tall, unkempt grass.  Many times your ball will go right to the bottom of the grass which makes it practically invisible.

(I HATE it when that happens )
 
When you make your swing, the thick, tall grass can snag your clubhead as it comes down to the ball. This may also make your shot go far left or far right, instead of the
intended direction.  When landing in the rough, you might as well face the possibility that you will score high on that particular hole.

Working Your Way Out Of The Short Rough

Although not a desired area for your ball to land in, the short rough is definitely a much easier recovery shot than the standard rough, as described above. The short rough
has grass that is generally up to 2 inches or so and height.

Decent contact with your ball should be easy to make. Choose a club that gives you more loft so that your ball has extra airtime and roll.

Your goal is to get as much loft as possible when coming out of the rough. All you want to do is make sure that the ball is back in the play zone.  Yes, you may end up far short of
the hole when the ball hits the fairway, but a least you’ll be able to shoot for the green successfully.

Working Your Way Out Of The Medium Rough

Working your way out of medium rough areas are much the same as making shots from any other length of grass.

However, there are a few tweaks that you can make in your shot which can make a big difference when working your way out of the rough.

If the zone has grass that is medium in length, as compared to the short and long rough, attempt to hit the ball with a descending blow as opposed to a sweeping movement. 

You can achieve this by allowing for a steeper swing arc. This way, your club will hit the least amount of grass on the way to the ball.

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Hit ‘em straight

Ben