PLAYING BY NUMBERS Edoardo Molinari has used Mark Broadie’s Every Shot Counts book to transform the way he works on his game – and he believes it can help you, too, says John Huggan. Drive for show and putt for dough. It’s one of the oldest clichés in golf, but it turns out that it isn’t even actually true. In fact, research from American professor Mark Broadie in his book Every Shot Counts proves the long game (shots outside 100 yards) accounts for two-thirds of your score. And it’s a theory that former Ryder Cup player Edoardo Molinari wholeheartedly buys into. The 34-year-old Italian, who possesses an engineering degree from the University of Torino, is convinced that long game prowess is the real key to ultimate success in golf and this has prompted him to alter his practice and preparation radically. His argument, backed up by undeniable statistics, is pretty persuasive. “If the short game is everything, why was it Seve couldn’t play at tour level for the last few years of his career?” asks Molinari. “And look at the guys who have been number one in the world over the last 20 years or so. Only Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy and Vijay Singh have been there for any significant length of time. Martin Kaymer, Luke Donald and Lee Westwood all stayed at the top for only a year or so. But here’s the thing. Five of those six have great long games. Only Luke has a superior short game. And he made it to number one by holing ‘every’ putt for a year, which is not a sustainable formula for success.” Molinari has some other questions too. “If you had to play against a tour pro for £100, would you play from five feet away, from just off the green, from 100 yards out, from 200 yards over water, or with a driver on a long hole?” he continues. “You would go for the five-foot putt and work outwards away from the hole. So would almost everyone because the shorter the shot, the more chance the inferior player has. I could easily miss the five-foot putt a 24-handicapper has just made. But there is no way I will lose to him hitting a long iron over water.” Molinari makes a good point. While a certain proficiency in the short game is obviously a prerequisite for success at the highest level, the most impressive thing about most of the game’s true elite is how they hit the ball. Look at Rory, Adam Scott, Henrik Stenson, Jason Day and Justin Rose: none is the best putter on tour. But they are all right up there in the world rankings. When Stenson won the DP <strong>World</strong> Tour Championship at the end of last year he hit 68 greens from 72 and hit 95% of the fairways. In other words, he won with his long game. “I met Mark Broadie in 2011,” says Molinari. “It was shocking to learn that some of the players supposed to be the best putters were not at the top of his list statistically [Broadie invented the strokes gained – putting statistic now widely used on the PGA Tour]. Mark takes the average number of putts from every distance – for example, from eight feet it is 1.5 – then gauges everyone against that. So if I make an eight-foot putt I gain half-a-shot on the field. If I miss, I lose half-a-shot. “Another example: the tour average from 33 feet is two putts. If I make one from there I gain one shot on the field. If I take <strong>June</strong> 2015 <strong>Golf</strong> <strong>World</strong> 61