The roughs at Congressional last weekend exemplified the perils of missing fairways at a US Open. The USGA has recently moved away from long roughs and soft fairways and somewhat standardized on firmer, faster conditions for the PGA tour courses in order to speed up play.  However, the old tradition of narrow fairways and long, thick rough remains a characteristic of every US Open in an effort to increase the degree of difficulty and make winning the ultimate test of golf on a course in America.

The Rough Can Be Very Rough: Everyday of the tournament some of the world's best players were vividly displayed on TV trying to hack their way out of the rough - some with success and others needed a second opportunity to get onto the fairway. Simply put, its not easy... for anyone. The seasoned touring pros just have a far better chance of extricating themselves from the thick rough's treachery than do amateurs because they know how to play the shot. Even with this knowledge, however, execution becomes the key component and the rough is generally the deciding factor in success or failure.

Getting Out Of Long, Thick Rough:  Use lofted irons because they will elevate the ball higher and get it out of the rough faster than longer clubs. A rule of thumb to follow is the deeper the rough the more lofted iron to use. Longer irons and fairway clubs tend to drive the ball forward through the rough, typically causing it to nose dive, dribble a few feet, and present another difficult shot from the rough. Many players at the US Open were using sand wedges to get back on the fairway.

Executing the Shot: The major obstacle for getting out of the thick rough is hitting the grass on the back-swing and downswing because that will impede or stops the club head's progress. In order to minimize this and strike the ball cleaner, the back-swing and downswing must have steeper paths, or respectively, steeper angles of ascent and descent.

Two more pleasantries typically experienced when attempting to hit out of the long, thick rough are as follows:

• Hitting long grass on the downswing will also de-loft the club and result in a shot that dribbles a few feet so always make sure it is steep with a lofted iron.
• The club head will close to the left for righties and to the right for lefties as it travels through the grass. This can be dealt with in three ways:

1. Set up with a wide open face so the grass squares it on downswing
2. Play for a pull and aim accordingly
3. Grip the club more firmly with the top hand

Optimum Solution: Keep your ball in the fairway. To increase the chances of hitting the ball to your desired target stop by for a chat with me on the range where we can identify and work on eliminating the causes of bad shots.

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