Courtesy: Bodog Nation

A couple of things conspired this week to remind me of the importance of the short game in golf.

The first event occurred earlier this week.

I was in attendance at Angus Glen golf club in Toronto, site of next month's Canadian Open (the week after The Open in Britain) where Davis Love conducted a press conference.

Love and his design team have wrought significant changes to the North Course at Angus Glen, toughening it up to make it challenging for the big hitting touring pros.

I was field producing a short web video in conjunction with my colleague, Robert Thompson who writes the highly regarded Going for the Green (more on that in the days to come).

Following the press conference and our own one-on-one interview with Davis, my cameraman and I followed Love up to the practice range where he held a clinic.

Davis talked easily with the 60 or so golfers on the range, stretching and warming up slowly as he did so.

He described his practice routine before a round, starting with a wedge and working up to an 8 iron.

I have never seen more purely struck warm-up shots in my life.

Love's swing is effortless; his head is perfectly still over the ball as his shoulders swing around his sternum; he was blowing his short irons off into the distance.

He made a simple point very clearly. "Most of my scoring shots are with my short irons or wedges", he said, "So I don't stand on the range all day hitting my driver. I might hit my driver twice and put it away".

There's the first key: you score with the short game so practice that. Point noted.

The second key is much like the first: you score with your flat stick. So practice your putting.

Now my confidence in my putting stroke is never great. So I have decided to start working on that aspect with some degree of serious intent; I ordered Dave Pelz' Putting Bible and am now immersing myself in the big man's philosophy of putting.

I'm a fan of Pelz; his Short Game Bible has a place of prominence on my book shelf and has helped me greatly with my shaky short game.

My intent now when I go to the range is not to pound my driver all day, even though I would like to very much.

I will spend perhaps three-quarters of my time on my short irons and wedges.

No matter how long or short I am off the tee, more often than not I will be hitting a short iron into a green.

Putting pride aside and the driver back in the bag and working with the short irons will be my new attitude on the practice tee.