Golfers miss the green short about eight times for every time they miss it long. Arccos looked at more than 6 million approach shots: 40% finished short of the green, 5% went long (Arccos, reported by the Wall Street Journal, 2017). The same report had a 7 iron that golfers expected to fly 150 yards. It flew 138.
So the club in your hand is usually one too few. Not because you swung badly. Because the number in your head is your best shot, not your normal one.
And it gets worse as the shot gets longer. Golfers who shoot in the 90s miss short 27% of the time from 50 to 75 yards, 43% from 101 to 125, and 53% from 125 to 150 (Arccos data in Golf Digest, 2023).
Decision 1: one more club
Take the club that gets there on your normal swing, not your best one. If you are between clubs, take the longer one. On most holes you play, the trouble sits in front of the green, not behind it. Look at your home course. That makes the back the better miss.
Decision 2: aim away from the trouble
The flag is a bonus. The green is the goal. Find the trouble first, water, a bunker, a slope that runs the ball away, and aim at the part of the green farthest from it. Most of the time that is the middle.
Our own data on short pitches shows why. When a pitch from 25 to 50 yards found the green, 19% of those holes still turned into a double or worse. When it missed the green, that jumped to 60% (PRG app data, 453 rounds). Missing the green triples the double rate. Missing the flag costs you a longer putt.
Level 2: aim for your miss
The two decisions work before you know anything about your game. Level 2 starts once you know which way you miss.
If your miss is right, aim at the left half of the green, so the miss lands on the putting surface. If your miss is short, Decision 1 already fixed it. You are not trying to change the miss. You are moving the target so the miss stops costing you.
Two honest ways to find your miss:
- Log your rounds. The app records where every approach finished, so after three rounds your miss is a fact.
- Run a range session like the course. The 9 Hole Range Card: nine balls, each with a new club and a new target, and a note on which way each one missed. A normal bucket does not count, because you never hit the same club twice on the course.
The level above you
A 10 handicap hits about 6 greens a round. A 15 hits about 4 (Shot Scope data via Golf Monthly, 2026). You do not need a new swing to find two more greens. The two decisions find some of them, because the 15's misses are mostly short, and short is the miss a club fixes.
Your one action this week
Play your next round, or your next simulator round, with both decisions on every approach. One more club. Aim away from the trouble. No exceptions for 18 holes, and see what the card says.
In winter, run one 9 Hole Range Card session and write down which way each miss went. That is the start of level 2.
Aim for your miss
Which way does your approach usually miss?
Kept on this phone. Lesson 6 uses it.
The app tracks miss direction, so three logged rounds tell you your miss. 30 days free at app.playready.golf. Code COURSE20 takes $20 off the annual plan, every year. Start free.
Tomorrow: when driver stays in the bag. The answer is less often than you think, and the data on 3 wood will surprise you.