Fairways and greens? “Horrible information,” says Padraig Harrington

As golfers, we’re always looking for ways to quantify our performance on the course. According to Padraig Harrington, looking at fairways and greens statistics won’t always be useful.

In fact, the three-time major champion thinks that knowing how many fairways and greens you found on the course can be “horrible information.”

Harrington was speaking after his second round at the Senior PGA Championship, where he eventually finished in a tie for second place. That day, Harrington walked off with an impressive score of 69, three-under-par, in blustery conditions.

What he wasn’t interested in, however, was how many fairways he had hit. He wasn’t even bothered about how many greens he had found in regulation.

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“I think one of the worst things you can do on the golf course is judge and analyse, and after, let’s say, 26 holes, I knew I’d missed two greens this week and hit a couple of par-5s,” Harrington said.

“That was horrible information to have in your head. You shouldn’t be aware of how many fairways or how many greens because we don’t play fairways and greens. We play score.”

To illustrate what Harrington was saying, he used the difficult par-4 fourth hole at Congressional as an example, where he made a par.

The two-time Open champion explained that he missed the fairway to the left of the difficult par-4 fourth, but that wasn’t a bad thing, as he actually had a shorter approach shot than what he might have faced from the other side of the fairway.

“I hit a bad tee shot on 5 (Harrington meant the fourth hole) up the right-hand side, but I had only 150 yards left out of the rough. Whereas, if you missed on the left-hand side you probably had 190 yards.”

“If I hit it down the fairway, I might have had 180 yards, but I kind of cut across the dogleg. Even though it wasn’t a good drive, it was in the rough, it was the sensible miss in the conditions.”

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But, what about greens in regulation? We know that this stat is something the pros excel at, so why was Harrington so quick to disregard it? One example he pointed to was if you find yourself closer to the hole after just missing the green, rather than being further away on the putting surface.

“You can ask yourself the question, would you rather be 15 feet away from the hole on the fringe or 20 feet away from the hole on the green. 15 feet on the fringe, but you’ve missed the green. You see what I’m saying?

“When you’re playing well like that, you get caught up in hitting fairways and hitting greens, which isn’t always what you want to do on a windy day.”

“The fact I was hitting so many greens in regulation and things like that means you start to think about it,” he continued.

“I think in windy conditions, you’ve just got to get it up-and-down and do what you have to do. I made a very good up-and-down on the fourth, and I think if anything, a good example of what I’m saying is you could hit it on the green to 20 feet and two-putt and walk off disappointed. On the fourth, I missed the green and chipped up and holed my putt from eight feet, and I walked off the happiest man in the world.

“Sometimes on a windy day, or any day, getting up-and-down, having a few misses and getting up-and-down cheers you up a lot more than hitting it to 25 feet and two-putting.”

Lewis Fraser As bunkered’s Performance Editor, Lewis oversees the content that’s designed to make you a better player. From the latest gear to tuition, nutrition, strategy and more, he’s the man. A graduate of the University of Stirling, Lewis joined bunkered in 2021. Formerly a caddie at Castle Stuart Golf Links, he is a member of Bathgate Golf Club where he plays off four.

Performance Editor