How to Cure the Shanks

We know, we know. You don’t even want to talk about the shanks for fear bringing the subject up will cause you to catch them. But like it or not, you might find yourself in a situation where you’re going to want to know a solution. Though awful, the plague of the shanks is curable.

First thing you have to do is take a break from the course. You need some alone time to sort this out on the range. Start by checking in on a few basics. Make sure you’re standing tall with your chest up during the swing, don’t hold the club too tightly, and make sure your weight isn’t sneaking up toward your toes. David Leadbetter told us that not tending to all of these little things could be the root of your struggles.

He also gave us a drill that will cure your shanking woes.

Set up like you’re going to hit it, and then put a tee in the ground just outside the toe of the club. While you’re swinging, think about keeping the grip end of the club near your body. “Miss the tee at impact, and you’ll hit the ball in the center of the face,” says Leadbetter.

 

-Keely Levins, Golf Digest (Source)

 

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2021 & 2022 Memberships are NOW AVAILABLE!!

It’s time to purchase or renew your membership!! 

$114/yr. – plus a $10/yr. admin. fee

ONLY $248.00

Membership to your Home Course of Meadowview Golf Course, plus your sister courses:

  • The Oaks Golf Course in Springfield
  • Lakeshore Golf Course in Taylorville
  • Timberlake Golf Course in Sullivan

Unlimited GREEN FEES Monday – Sunday for ALL of 2021 & 2022 • Cart Required

 

Purchase HERE in our online store!https://meadowviewgolf.com/product/2021-2022-membership/

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U.S. Open 2020: Tiger Woods needs to overcome his Winged Foot curse to contend

Golf courses can’t talk, but if they could, not many of them would be able to say they’ve gotten the best of Tiger Woods.

Winged Foot is one of them.

Woods has played two tournaments at this beastly A.W. Tillinghast design, which has tormented the world’s best players since its opening 99 years ago. The first was in the 1997 PGA Championship, his first year as a professional. He tied for 29th and wouldn’t post a finish worse than that in a major for another six years. The second was the 2006 U.S. Open, his first tournament after the death of his father. He shot 12 over for two days to miss the cut by three, his first time missing the weekend at a major as a pro.

So, as far as positive memories go, Woods isn’t working with much ahead of this week’s U.S. Open.

“I think it’s right up there next to Oakmont and Carnousite as far as just sheer difficulty, without even doing anything to it,” said Woods, who will start his 22nd U.S. Open on Thursday alongside Justin Thomas and Collin Morikawa on the first tee at 8:07 a.m. local time. “I think those three golf courses, they can host major championships without ever doing anything to them.”
The USGA, of course, did do things to this course. And none of them made it easier. The fairways are pinched and the rough is brutal. The consensus on the ground is that the winning total this week will be somewhere close to Geoff Ogilvy’s five-over 285 from 14 years ago.
For Woods to have a chance come Sunday afternoon, he’s going to need to play his best golf in almost a full year. It’s now been close to 11 months since his last victory, a virtuoso performance at the Zozo Championship in Japan. Woods’ next start was a T-4 at his Hero World Challenge in December. He then flew to Australia and looked like not just the best player on either team at the Presidents Cup, but maybe the best player in the world. After a T-9 to open the year at the Farmers Insurance Open, expectations were sky-high for 2020.

It hasn’t gone to plan. Seemingly nothing has, for anyone, this year. Woods finished last among players who made the cut at the Genesis Invitational at Riviera, then saw his back act up again, forcing him to miss a number of key tournaments including the Players Championship. Then came COVID. The tour took a three-month break and Woods waited an additional two before making his return at the Memorial, where he tied for 40th.

It’s been more of the same in his three starts since—a T-37 at the PGA Championship, a T-58 at the Northern Trust and a T-51 at the BMW. The struggles have mostly been with the putter. Woods didn’t play enough rounds to register official stats for the truncated season, but if he did, he’d have finished around 184th in strokes-gained putting for the year. This, from arguably the greatest putter to ever play the game.

It’s why he’s been tinkering with his flatstick—Woods went with a different one altogether at the PGA before switching back to the “Ol’ Faithful” Scotty Cameron for the FedEx Cup playoff double. It didn’t cooperate, so this week he’s going with a different grip: an older Lamkin model with chord. It’s a little thicker than the Ping he’s gone with for most of his career, and he used a similar one while at Stanford.

“This year I really haven’t putted as well as I wanted to, and the times I did make a few swing mistakes, I missed it in the wrong spots,” Woods said. “Consequently, I just didn’t have the right looks at it. I’ve compounded mistakes here and there that ended up not making me able to make pars or a birdie run. And, consequently, I haven’t put myself in contention to win these events.”

Woods has three U.S. Open titles but has struggled of late, missing the cut in back-to-back appearances before a T-21 at Pebble Beach last year. They’re typically the most unforgiving setups of the year, and Woods has struggled to keep the ball in the fairway.

“Strategy-wise, it’s ebb-and-flow,” Woods said of his plan of attack this week. “For me in particular, I’m trying to play to certain areas. Whatever club that is, could be 5-wood, could be driver or could be a 3-wood. I’m trying to play to a specific spot and then move on from there.”

By Daniel Rapaport
Golfworld
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Callaway Fitting Day

Join us for the Callaway Fitting Day!

When: September 13th from 10am-2pm

Call us at 217-258-7888 to schedule your appointment for a Callaway Custom Fitting! Appointments are an hour long and are a must this year. We will not be accepting walk ups!

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The Great Golf Ball Search

The Great Golf Ball Search

How To Find The Best Ball For Your Game
By Tom Patri

With so many brands of golf ball overloading the marketplace, it’s difficult if not confusing to figure out which one best fits your golf game.

Here’s a sensible game plan to help you logically conduct and conquer The Great Golf Ball Search.

First, ask yourself what you are looking for:

A – Distance

B – Accuracy

C – Short Game: touch, feel, and spin

If you answer all three, the search is over, as far as I’m concerned … the Pro V1 family. Look no further. For me, Titleist’s premier line is the best all-around ball, regardless of skill level, to deliver all of the above traits. Market research and testing proves that. Period, end of discussion.

To me, anyway. For you, the discussion may be different. There are a lot of good golf balls out there. Either way, here’s my advice on finding the perfect ball.

If your answer is A – Distance, be careful, because by boxing yourself into the “distance matters most” request (granted, every manufacturer has a ball to fulfill this request), you are severely tying one hand behind your back when it comes to the touchy-feely scoring shots.

B – Many balls today with a bevy of dimple designs and patterns do a wonderful job of helping the average golfer hold their line in windy conditions, and in fact almost self-correct to a degree, minimizing those off-line shots when you make the occasional poor swing.

C – Some manufacturers advertise their “softer feel” ball for the lower-swing-speed player, and also tell you these balls feel better around and on the putting surface. When you see this type of ad on your TV, change the channel or leave the room. It’s nonsense.

Let me tell you a personal story that happened in winter 2018-19 in Naples, Florida, where I live and teach. I have been a Titleist Leadership Advisory Board Member for many years.

I’m prejudiced with reason. As a competitive professional player many moons ago, and before that a fairly successful college player, I had access to any golf ball I wanted to play. It had always been an incredibly easy choice to make through the years: Whatever was the Titleist premium ball of the time period was the ball of choice. In my experience, they always out-performed the other balls hands-down.

Anyway, in October 2018 I turned 60. Ouch — it hurts to type and look at that number. I wondered if it was time for the Old Pro to find a ball (in the Titleist line of course) that would help me find a few extra yards while not hurting me on the scoring shots (my bread and butter), on and around the green. In the past, I had gone on similar journeys and always found yardage, but hated the greenside touch and feel results. About that time, Titleist suddenly launched the AVX, and it was and still is receiving rave reviews.

I grabbed a dozen Pro Vs and a dozen AVXs. For three consecutive evenings, after I finished teaching, I went out and played holes on the golf course, hitting several drives, second shots, pitches, chips, sand shots, and putts with several of each ball. I then played several rounds with the AVX on my home course. I’m sure you know on your home track where you generally drive the ball, as I do, and how your regular ball reacts when you hit any particular club into a green, how it feels off the putter face, and so on.

With the driver, both balls were similar. The AVX was a bit longer in the air (about half a club) with my irons, and compared to any previous distance-type ball it had much better feel on short shots. Still, the Pro V won out across the board. Just more consistent, better feel, better all-around performance.

You may very well find a different result.

What you must do when contemplating a ball change is conduct side-by-side on-course testing, hitting many golf shots with every club in your bag over several days (conditions change, as do you). Then and only then will you be able to make a sound decision.

Take a hard look at the Darrell Survey results the last 100 years. Titleist is played by a landslide percentage of tournament professionals around the globe. A small percentage of world-class players are paid big bucks to play a particular ball, but the vast majority are not. Given the choice, those golfers still choose Titleist.

Whatever brand and model you choose, don’t base it on some ad, or your buddies’ prompting; do it based on your own mini-testing. Play the ball that performs best tee through green for you. It’s the only piece of equipment that is involved in every shot you hit.

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Regular golfers reveal the best piece of golf advice they’ve ever received

We can’t help it. Recreational golfers, we love the game, and we’re unapologetically hooked on it. We’re also always trying to get better, which means we’re constantly on the hunt for a new tip that could prove the breakthrough for our games. There’s a ton of great information floating around out; the key is finding the piece of golf swing advice that works for you.

So, we asked the members of our How To Hit Every Shot Instruction group(which we invite you to join, too) a straightforward question: What’s the best piece of swing advice you’ve ever received? They came back with a host of simple pieces of advice that helped them the most — and could help you, too.

1. Stay in rhythm

Tempo is universal. But good tempo isn’t. Keeping a smooth rhythm in your golf swing can cover for a lot of sins, and it’s something golfers of every skill level can aspire to.

2. Grip it and rip it

Ah, yes, the John Daly approach. I respect it.

3. You’ll never see a good shot (aka, don’t look up)

Keeping your head down is probably the most common piece of swing advice ever — but don’t tell our Top 100 Teachers, who think it’s the worstpiece of advice for golfers to follow.

–Golf.com

 

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Join us for the Sizzling Summer Scramble


SIZZLING SUMMER SCRAMBLE

CALL TODAY to REGISTER!

Saturday, July 25th, 2020 1:00pm Lunch | 2:00pm Shotgun Start

Join us for a fun day of golf on the beautiful Meadowview Golf Course!

4 Person Scramble

Flighted based on number of entries

Lots of Prizes

Open to the first 25 teams!

$50 per person

Contact the Pro Shop to Register

Sign up deadline July 23th

Join us in the Meadowview Cafe for after golf specials

217-258-7888

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Meadowview will be closed through April 7th per State of IL Executive Order

Due to the State of Illinois’s Executive Order,

Meadowview will be closed through April 7th

Meadowview wants to do their part to protect our golfers, employees and community.  Therefore, effective immediately, Meadowview and our sister courses will be closed through April 7th per Illinois’s Executive Order 20-10 (click on link below to read).

We have been actively trying to get clarification from the State of Illinois since the executive order was announced on whether golf courses can remain open.  Finally, this afternoon, we received word this question was addressed by the state, and the answer is; “we must close”.

Please read the last page of the below link on the part that addresses golf courses.

https://www2.illinois.gov/dceo/SmallBizAssistance/Documents/Essential%20Business%20Checklist3-22.pdf#search=essential%20business%20checklist

Unfortunately, we are all dealing with the economic fallout of this global virus.  But ultimately, the safety of everyone is the most important issue. We will continue to maintain the golf course as it is essential to our business; so we can be ready for all of you, our valued golfers and friends, on April 8th!  We will all get through this.  Stay safe everyone!

In the meantime, if you are interested in renewing or purchasing your membership, click on the button below to navigate to Meadowview’s online store.

https://meadowviewgolf.com/online-store/
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Golfer Safety & Covid-19

Read more
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Would you like to improve your game? It could be as simple as re-gripping your clubs!

Is your game lacking some key shots?  Perhaps the simplest solution is to have your clubs re-gripped.  Our knowledgeable staff can help with the decision making and proper grip choice for your game.

GOLF CLUB REGRIPPING

Meadowview offers a range of quality grips.  Ozone, heat, dirt, and oils from your hands all age your grips and cause damage.   Grips that are the wrong size, worn out or that aren’t suited for weather conditions can all negatively impact your game. We recommend having your clubs re-gripped once a year or every 30 – 40 rounds depending on how much time you spend on the practice range.

A good grip can improve comfort, consistency and shot distance. You can personalize your grip type, size, color and material to get one that best suits your hands.

A grip should always be replaced if you notice any of the following signs…

• smooth hard surfaces

• cracks

• shiny patches

• worn spots

• loss of tack

GOLF CLUB RESHAFTING

Broken shafts happen and whether it’s an accident or on purpose we can supply and fit shafts from all the main manufacturers. We can simply perform a straight replacement or perhaps recommend a new improved type of shaft that could lengthen your drivers.

We have a large assortment of grips in stock or one day custom ship.  

Stop in today to check out the selection.

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