The short answer: for most amateurs, aim at the middle of the green unless the flag is in the middle too. Your shots land in a spread, not on a dot, and a 90s golfer's spread from 100 yards can be 20 yards deep. Aim at a tucked flag and a big share of that spread ends up in the bunker or the water. Aim at the middle and the same spread mostly finds the green.
My story
The round I finally broke 90 (an 87, after four years of trying), I didn't go near a flag. I aimed at the middle of every green, away from trouble. If I found the green, I took my two putts for par. If I missed, I chipped on and two-putted for bogey.
No heroics, and the best score I'd ever made. For a golf addict who's still chasing it, that was a strange lesson: playing it safe was what finally got me there.
Your shots land in a spread, not on a dot
Even a good swing doesn't send the ball exactly where you aimed. Your shots land in a pattern around your target, and the pattern gets bigger as your handicap goes up.
GOLFTEC's coaches measured how deep that pattern is from 100 yards, front to back:
| Golfer | Depth of shot pattern from 100 yards |
|---|---|
| Shoots in the 70s | about 6 yards |
| Shoots in the 80s | about 10 yards |
| Shoots in the 90s | up to 20 yards |
Now picture a flag five yards past a front bunker. A 70s golfer can live with that. For a 90s golfer, a fair chunk of normal, decent swings lands in the sand. GOLFTEC's data also shows golfers in the 90s average 3.6 strokes to get down from a greenside bunker, so even a three-putt from the middle of the green is cheaper.
The bogey maths
On a par-72 course, eighteen bogeys is 90. You can break 90 without a single birdie, as long as you avoid the big numbers. Those mostly come from penalties, three-putts and short-sided chips, and aiming at tucked flags feeds all three.
Mark Broadie, the Columbia professor who helped the PGA Tour develop its strokes-gained putting statistic, makes the same case with shot data in Every Shot Counts: the right target depends on your shot pattern and where the trouble is, not on where the flag happens to be.
Your on-course rule
Before every approach, look at the flag and ask one question: if I miss by my normal amount, where does it go?
- If a normal miss finds water, sand or a short-side chip, aim at the middle of the green.
- If a normal miss still finds the green or a simple chip, the flag is fair game.
- When in doubt, favour the side or depth with no trouble. On most greens, that's the middle or the back.
Drill: find your own pattern
On the range, hit ten balls with one club at one target. Pace off (or use the range markers to estimate) how far the shortest and longest good shots finished from each other. That's your depth pattern for that club. Next time you face a tucked flag with that club, picture the pattern around the flag and see how much of it lands in trouble.
Watch the video
See you on the first tee.Aim for the middle.
Sources
- Cameron Kelly, GOLFTEC (2025). How to Hit Better 100-Yard Approach Shots: A Data-Driven Guide.
- Mark Broadie (2014). Every Shot Counts. Gotham Books.