The Backstory of Flaghunting.com Yardage Books
My first foray into making yardage books started out while sketching on blank pieces of paper while I was bored at my 9 to 5. As an amateur golfer, I had come to the early realization that eliminating the blowup holes would allow me to shoot lower scores, and enjoy the experience more with my family and friends.
As I worked on my swing and began to know the general vicinity of where my ball would be going, these sketches turned into detailed drawings of the courses I played from the previous weekend.
I would spend significant time on the holes that gave me the most trouble so that I could brainstorm ways to lower the risk of writing down the dreaded "8" on my scorecard.These sketches were giving me my first glimpse into golf course design, and as I started looking at satellite images of great courses, it allowed me to peek into the minds of great architects such as Mackenzie,
Crenshaw, Fazio, Dye, Jones, and Ross.
As I began to sketch overhead views of these courses, I began to realize specific areas of the course where a good architect would cleverly place a bailout area, a fairway bunker, or why the green complex sloped one way versus the other. I began to visualize the perfect shot on every hole of the course, which, if I executed this shot would allow me to eliminate the large numbers and increase my chance of scoring well.
These sketches turned into rudimentary, handmade, yardage books that I would bring with me to the courses I played on a regular basis. Most courses I started playing on, didn't't provide yardage books, and I didn't
have enough skin in the game to purchase a laser rangefinder, a GPS, etc...
As my golf IQ continued to develop, I began to reverse engineer particular holes starting from the green and going backwards towards the tee box. I figured out what positions I needed to be in for my approach shots, which influenced what club and shot shape(s) I had to execute to get there.
In under a year of playing, I broke 80 for the first time ever using my own yardage book as a guide to eliminating the big score .
This is nothing new for a competitive golfer, but my process and scores were aided by the yardage books I was making. I circled landing areas that I wanted to be in, tracked what club I hit on a particular hole for next time, and started mapping out the greens to figure out which way a putt would break. Obviously club selection, weather, psychological factors, and swing execution all play a large role in determining the success or lack thereof, of a golf shot.
My yardage books helped eliminate the emotion of my round, and most importantly, gave me a history of the hole that I could reference every time I went back.
As my HCP started dropping, my playing partners began noticing and started requesting their own yardage books for the courses they played on a regular basis. Something about the tradition and historical use of yardage books just made sense to me.
Fast forward to today, and Flaghunting.com continues to provide yardage books for everyday golfers utilizing modern technology and a direct to consumer model that otherwise would cost courses thousands of dollars to replicate.
If you want to see how a yardage book can lower your score, contact us. We are happy to help!