Guides · Updated 12 October 2026

Where your strokes go: the four parts of the game

Most golfers practise what they enjoy. A better method is to find the part of the game that costs you most and fix that first.

The four parts

• Tee shots. Driving and any other shot from the tee on par 4s and 5s. What matters is where the ball ends up for the next shot: distance and position, as well as the fairway.
• Approach. Shots played towards the green from a distance, usually full swings. Penalties and recovery shots from trouble belong with the shot that caused them.
• Short game. Chips, pitches and bunker shots from near the green.
• Putting. Every stroke on the green.

Every stroke in a round belongs to one of the four. That is what makes the split useful: the strokes you lose can be added up by part and compared like with like.

Finding your biggest one from your scorecards

1. Collect more than one round. A single round can mislead. Use rounds from several courses, so one course's quirks do not decide the answer.
2. Record more than the score. For each hole, note putts, whether you hit the green, and any penalty strokes. Those three fields already tell you a lot.
3. Work out what is left. Take the putts out and the remaining strokes were spent getting to the green. Penalties are strokes lost by themselves, whatever the part of the game.
4. Compare with a sensible benchmark. Your own handicap level is the fair one. The question is not whether you are worse than a better golfer. It is where you are furthest behind a golfer who plays to your handicap.
5. Look for repeats. A pattern that shows up across rounds is a habit. A one-off hole is just golf.

What scorecards cannot tell you

Putts and greens in regulation split a round roughly in two: the green and everything before it. To separate tee shots from approach shots, or a chip from a poor approach, you need to know where each shot was played from and where it finished. That needs shot tracking, a launch monitor session or hole-by-hole detail. See the guide on strokes gained for how that comparison works.

Then practise the biggest one

Once you know which part costs you most, spend most of your practice there. A small gain in your weakest part usually returns more than a polish of your strongest.

Sources

• Mark Broadie, Every Shot Counts (Penguin Random House)

Rules summarised from the 2024 edition of the Rules of Handicapping. Your national association and club handicap committee have the final word.