Back 9 Blues

One of the biggest problems I've encountered this season, besides hitting the ball awful off the tee, has been my poor play on the back nine during most of rounds. In the last seven of the nine rounds I've played so far this year, I have shot worse on the second nine that I have on first nine. While I've only posted one round in which I've hit triple digits (a 103 on June 16 at FDR Golf Club), the fact that I have been unable to shoot lower on the inward nine has kept me from breaking 90 so far.

In my first two rounds of this season, I opened with 51 and 50 on my front nines, but shot a combined 17 strokes lower on the two second nines, an average of 8.5 strokes lower. Since then, however, I have averaged 4.2 strokes higher on the second nine in the seven rounds I've played. This includes four rounds in which I failed to break 50 on the back nine.

I don't know whether it's a lack of concentration, fitness, poor course management or just getting ahead of myself by thinking about my final score instead of playing one-hole-at-a-time on the back nine. Often, it seems like I blow up on a couple of holes or fail to take advantage of the easy holes on the back nine. Either way, it is preventing me from posting lower scores.