Welcome to Play Wisely, a game improvement  column   and  podcast   from editor Luke Kerr-Dineen  to help you play smarter, more complete golf.

We all have those 1st tee shots, the ones that just operate fit our eye. May be the one you’re thinking of is sewed on your home course, or another a record you frequent often. You decide, you dread it, this begs the question: How should I accomplish it?

You would be forgiven for that will the smart — and safe — move would be to leave the driving force in the bag for this a specific. Go with a 3-wood reasonably. It’ll give you the best of in turn worlds: Enough accuracy to kick the fairway, with too much distance for a manageable other shot, right?

Wrong.

DON’T hit 3-wood

Just ask Lou Stagner , the data lead at Arccos Golf. You put together data from many thousands golf shots by 10-handicaps and found that golfers weltgesundheitsorganisation opt for a 3-wood only getting a small amount of accuracy, at the investment decision of a decent chunk together with distance.

In the event a Tour player sommet a drive into the rowdy, and has between 125-150 yards left, he’ll hit the approach shot on average over six feet closer to the opening than a Tour player which of you hits a 3-wood in to rough and has between one humdred and fifty and 175 yards when considering his approach. Had all of the 3-wood-hitting Tour player enjoyed the fairway, he’d merely hit the ball something like 10 feet closer towards driver-hitting Tour player from the rough.

It might be better to hit the fairway, obviously, but we all know of which already. If you’re going to the majority of people the fairway, the closer to the hole you are (within reason) the better.

Making use of 3-wood opting for a little reliance of a significant accuracy boost while being guaranteed a very loss of distance means of the tradeoff simply isn’t worth it anymore.

DO first tee the ball lower

That doesn’t mean 3-woods aren’t useful, though. They are far easier to hit off the ground that your driver, of course , and their fundamental service off the tee is really when you need to hit something shorter than trouble long. You almost certainly wil miss a 3-wood particularly long as as often as you pay no attention to it from side-to-side.

But returning to significantly question of what you should do when you do need to hit the fairway: TO THEIR Top 100 Teacher Chris Mayson points to thinking of it as a “second serve drive. ” Take your driver, but tee this ball down lower. It’ll contain more spin , which might help you hit the golfing ball straighter and a little higher than average. And it’ll go faster than when you really first tee one high, but still longer the password than your 3-wood. Furthermore, it’ll go just as right away.

Luke Kerr-Dineen

Golf. com Contributor

Luke Kerr-Dineen is the Game Improvement Publisher at GOLF Magazine along with GOLF. com. In his gig he oversees the brand’s game improvement content comprising instruction, equipment, health and fitness, via all of GOLF’s multimedia websites.

An alumni of the Intercontinental Junior Golf Academy and University of South Carolina–Beaufort golf team, where he made it easier for them to No . 1 for the national NAIA rankings, Henry moved to New York in 2012 to pursue his Masters extent in Journalism from Columbia University.   His work has also arised in USA Today, Are generally Digest, Newsweek and The On a daily basis Beast.