Birdie or bogey? The smallest of margins

If you think about it, the closer you get to the hole, the greater the margin for error matters.

What do we mean by this?

Well, picture yourself standing on the tee of a par-5 hole. You’ve got close to 500 yards until you reach the green. You get the big stick out and hammer your driver down the middle.

At least your shot seems to start heading right down the middle. As the seconds tick by with your eyes fixed on the ball, you notice it fade a little, and come to rest on the right-hand-side of the fairway.

No harm done right? You didn’t hit it perfectly straight but it’s come to rest in a decent stretch of fairway. You might not even think about it, but the reality is your ball has travelled 5-10 yards off-center.

It might not seem like such a big deal when you’re teeing off, for many of us it’s a relief to be landing on the fairway in the first place. But being off-target to the same degree when hitting into the green can be disastrous.

Imagine a green where the flag happens to be placed close to a greenside bunker (pictured above). You’ve hit a cracking shot and the ball is sailing merrily towards the pin. Unknown to you from where you stand hundreds of yards out, there’s a slight lip in the ground that the ball catches at an angle, and your stellar shot trundles into the bunker. What should have been a birdie score has just become a rather sandy bogey.

It's a horrible feeling when you feel you should be celebrating then a slight change in fortune has you very annoyed. Thankfully, with the latest Garmin Golf GPS devices ready to go in your bag, you’ll be fully clued up on your yardages and content to fully commit to each shot.

Golf GPS devices

When it comes to getting your yardage readings on the course, you can’t go wrong with a Garmin distance measuring device.

77% of our readers said they make use of a distance measuring device to get reliable yardage readings.

These fantastic golf GPS devices take all the uncertainty out of your game. Think how frustrating it is to have the perfect lie sitting up in the fairway but you misjudge the distance and end up either coming short or walloping your ball past the green. Garmin’s range of gadgets will give you pinpoint accuracy to the flag no matter where on the hole you’re standing.

The latest Garmin devices

Garmin has a whole range of Golf GPS devices to help you measure your yardages, from handhelds, to watches and laser rangefinders.

If you’ve never had a golf GPS and you’re looking to sink your teeth into some game-changing tech, you can’t go wrong with the Approach G12 GPS device.

This handy tool fits in the palm of your hand and can give you yardage readings to the front, middle, and back of greens. It has a easily readable high-resolution screen, and you can move the pin around when reading a green thanks to the Green View feature. It comes with over 42,000 courses pre-loaded, and with up to 30hours of battery life, it makes for the perfect on-course companion.

If you regularly play golf and want a golf GPS that will give you absolute clarity of the green ahead, the Approach S70 GPS Watch will give you exactly that.

This watch features a gorgeous AMOLED touchscreen display so you can navigate detailed full-colour virtual greens with just a finger. It comes with all sorts of fascinating capabilities like a virtual caddie feature that shoes you shot dispersion data, and green contour data that will give you a good idea of how green’s slope direction. You can even use this watch for other fitness activities like yoga and cardio, it does just about everything you could want!

One thing you're going to notice when you put on the Garmin S70 watch is just how lightweight it feels.

The ultimate device when it comes to distance measuring tech, the Garmin Approach Z82 Laser will give you pinpoint accurate readings to within 10 inches from the flag when you’re hundreds of yards away. Once you’ve locked onto a target with this device, it will give you a slight vibration to reassure you it’s locked onto the correct target. With Garmin’s Playslike mode you’ll have the wind direction and speed of the greens being factored in to each distance reading.

If you’re looking for a Golf GPS to add to your arsenal but you’re uncertain of what to look for or which one will best suit your game, please contact us in the pro shop and we’ll be happy to lend you a hand.