{"id":15555841,"date":"2025-01-08T11:52:31","date_gmt":"2025-01-08T16:52:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/golf.com\/?post_type=article&p=15555841"},"modified":"2025-01-08T11:52:37","modified_gmt":"2025-01-08T16:52:37","slug":"gary-player-hit-more-fairways-play-smart","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/golf.com\/instruction\/driving\/gary-player-hit-more-fairways-play-smart\/","title":{"rendered":"Gary Player: Stop making this mistake and start hitting more fairways"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Welcome to Play Smart<\/a>, a regular GOLF.com game-improvement column that will help you become a smarter, better golfer.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Power might be king in the current era of golf, but that doesn’t mean you should ignore accuracy off the tee.<\/a> If you can’t find the short grass at a decent clip, it won’t matter how far you hit the ball.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hitting fairways at a higher percentage doesn’t always require making swing changes. In fact, by making some simple adjustments in your setup, you can easily up your fairways hit without making any<\/em> changes to your swing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gary Player<\/a> recently published a fascinating post on this subject on X, which you can see below. In it, he explains that a huge mistake he sees recreational players make is trying to hit the ball straight. It may seem like a counterintuitive line of thinking, but once you break it down, it makes a ton of sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I believe the mistake most golfers make is that they try to hit a straight ball. Hogan said hitting it straight was a \u201cfluke\u201d. If you aim up the right side and draw it or vice versa, then you make the fairway as big as possible. If you aim up the middle, you then you cut the\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/pYallFYzDF<\/a><\/p>— GARY PLAYER (@garyplayer) January 6, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote>