The five non-negotiables and the house rules, ranked and in plain English: what every plan and every round is graded against before a report reaches a player.
The five non-negotiables stay five and no standard was lowered. The dead zone keeps its rule, and a lay-up now has two dead zones: 40–74 and 121+. Winners avoid both.
Every plan has to pass all five. There are no exceptions except one, written into the dead-zone rule: if a player's own numbers make 40–74 yards a strong distance, the coach may allow it. The report never decides that; you do.
If the player leaves the driver in the bag to play safe, the safer club has to find the fairway. Every time. Laying back gives up distance to buy position; if the shorter club misses too, they paid for nothing.
Every par 4 and par 5 gets one tee club. If the driver finds 70% of fairways or more, hit it: the distance is free. Lay back only when driver would leave the dead zone, or finds fewer fairways than the shorter club.
On tour: from the fairway, greens hit 82% (winners) and 78% (field); from the rough, 65% and 52%.
H3: the 2-wood lay-back missed the fairway into the rough. ATTENTION. The report says where it finished (the rough) and, when the data has it, how far from the edge.
Any shot with a wedge finishes on the green: full swing, pitch, chip, bunker shot, or a wedge from the fringe. The green is the minimum; inside 6 feet is the target. A wedge means PW, GW, SW or LW; a 9-iron is not a wedge. When the data names no clubs, approaches from inside the player's own wedge range and shots from inside 40 yards of the green count.
Leave the wedge distance the player actually hits greens from, full or three-quarter. Around the green, pick the lower shot that lands on the green and runs, not the high one that has to land perfectly. Green or fringe in regulation prints as its own line, never mixed into greens hit.
On tour: a chip or bunker shot missed the green in 26% of winners' rounds and 40% of the field's.
H8: gap wedge from 133 finished 26 yd short, still in the fairway; a green that missed. ATTENTION.
Don't plan a shot that leaves 40–74 yards. Leave a distance the player hits greens from. On a short par 4, lay back to their best number; on a par 5, lay up to their band, not as close as possible.
If the player's own numbers make 40–74 a strong distance (90% of greens or more, or better than the next band out), they may leave it. That is usually a shorter hitter whose best band really is 50–75. Every band shows its count, and one with fewer than ten approaches is marked small, so one good month doesn't open it alone.
On tour: winners avoid it (73 approaches left there, about 202 expected): that is winning golf. On a lay-up, 121 yards and out is the second dead zone.
No approach from 40–74 all week, yet two leaves finished there: R3 H9 at 53 yd and R4 H1 at 50 yd, both after a tee ball in the rough. ATTENTION. When the tee ball leaks, wedge it to 130, not to 50.
Clear every hazard by at least 15 yards, or stop at least 15 yards short of it. Never play to the edge. Aiming at the edge of trouble turns an ordinary miss into a penalty: the difference between a bogey and a double.
There are two clubs: the one that clears by 15 and the one that stops 15 short. The club in between is never the answer. Fifteen is the minimum: a player whose misses spread wider takes a wider margin.
On tour: winners kept the margin (no penalty) in 91% of rounds, the field in 74%.
H12: went for it from a fairway bunker against the plan's own call (lay to 90). Penalty, the round's first double. NOT CONFIRMED: read from the penalties at H12 and H16.
Play the shot you know works, not the one that might. When two options are close, the plan picks the one the player can commit to. Plan the first six holes to start level or better. Stress builds before the scorecard shows it, so we measure four things:
From the fairway every next decision is a normal one. Good Drive % prints beside it.
Each green under 12 adds a little stress; each one over takes some away.
A second chip on the same hole is the expensive one. The saved rate prints beside it.
Always shown with greens hit. Putts per green hit prints too, elite 1.72.
One problem travels: a missed fairway leads to a missed green, then a chip, then more putts. So the report names one cause, the first one that broke.
Nothing broke: every measure inside its line, no double, no pair of three-putts.
Stress was made but held: one measure short, and the next part of the game covered it.
It spread and nothing paid it back: two or more measures short.
One double makes it at least medium. Two or more make it high, whatever else the round says.
Two or more raise the level one step. One is noted and moves nothing.
Three or more make it at least medium. Two or fewer is the elite round. Tour 2.54 · 2.15 · 1.71 a round.
One-putting two in three missed greens prints "rescued". It never lowers the level. Tour saves 59.2%.
If a measure can't be read, the card says so: "MEDIUM · 3 of 4 measures". Never a silent pass.
On tour: winners' low-stress rounds beat the field by 4.7 shots, medium 3.3, high 2.5.
HIGH STRESS, cause: the tee shot. 64% fairways, 34 putts, two doubles.
Every lay-up and tee shot is planned to leave the distance the player scores best from, read from their own numbers. Two players on the same hole get two plans.
Example: the player would lay up to 100, but they're best from 75–100, so The Check moves the lay-up to about 90, inside the stronger band.
Only on real evidence. The Check moves a plan only when one band clearly beats its neighbour on enough shots. When two bands are close, closer is better down to 75 yards, and never 40–74. Every band shows its count.
Ten fixed distances, the same every week: a report never invents a band, and empty bands still show (the distance a player never faces is usually the one their tee plan avoids). Each chart counts the approach to the green in regulation, the shot at par−2. A hole with a penalty leaves the chart and is named in the footnote. Every chart is checked against the official card first.
Name one band, never a range: say "leave 130 or 170", never "lay up to 150–170", which sweeps in the band between. A player who works in metres is counted in metres throughout. Putts are in feet for everyone.
Ranked from our 2026 tour shot study: 35 winners against 313 players from the rest of the field, 1,173 rounds, every hole matched to the card.
Make every putt from 6 feet and in: 100%, every round. One miss is noted. Putting practice starts inside 6 feet and doesn't move on until it holds.
On tour: from 3–6 ft, winners made 90%, the field 84%.
Lay up to the distance the player hits greens from. Going in two is their call if either test clears: 40% of greens from the go distance, or the likely miss (the go leave minus their longest club off the deck) finishes inside 40 yards. Both clear: the go is the plan, the lay-up shown beside it. Neither: the lay-up is the plan. Short par 4 (340 yd or less): a tee shot inside 40 yards is the player's call unless water or out of bounds is in play; laying back stays the plan.
On tour: par 5s on in three, winners 90%, the field 83%; 40% of greens falls at about 240 yards. Short par 4s driven inside 40 yd: −0.74 vs −0.26 laying back (winners).
Plan every approach to finish inside 40 feet. For most golfers, inside 40 feet is a great shot: it takes the three-putt out. When the pin is tight to trouble, the middle of the green is usually inside 40 feet.
On tour: three-putts start from 40 ft (winners 11%, field 15%); winners had none from 25 ft and in.
From 24 feet and out, putt to a distance, not the hole: finish within a tenth of the putt (from 30 feet, inside 3).
Every chip and pitch aims at a 6-foot circle. The green is the minimum (non-negotiable 02). Take the lower shot that runs to the hole.
On tour: bunker shots inside 6 ft, winners 42%, the field 35%.
From a bad lie (waste area, native grass, penalty area, cart path, a bunker off the tee), take the iron, hybrid or wedge that gets back to a normal lie, even if it gives up ground.
On tour: penalty holes a round, winners 0.1, the field 0.4.
Practise one distance at a time until it moves; pick the band with the most shots at stake.
Birdie or better ÷ greens hit in regulation (an eagle counts). Elite is 35%.
On tour: winners 42%, the field 33%.
After a bogey or a double, the next hole is about righting the ship: the player's normal club, fully committed, and the middle of the green. No heroics; a par there is a win.
On tour: another bogey or worse after a bogey, winners 4%, the field 19%; the same winners in other weeks, 16%.
From the fairway, the lay-up has to stay in the fairway and leave the third shot as close as the fairway allows. Two dead zones: 40–74 yards and 121 yards or more.
On tour: fairway third inside 40 yd, −0.83 a hole (winners); rough 121+, +0.33 (field).
The safe miss is the long side or open side: past the pin, never short-sided. Never "fat side".
139 rounds
35 winners, every event with full shot data.
1,034 rounds
313 players from 2nd place to the missed cut.
After trouble (a bad lie, a penalty, or a tee shot in the sand), did the player still make par? Par or better is clutch, bogey is semi-clutch, a double is flagged. The recovery gets back on plan; it never tries a second hero shot.
On tour: winners 85% (169 of 198), the field 62%; a double after trouble, 2% vs 12%.
Putts from 5 feet and out on a par-or-worse hole, holed. A birdie putt on a green hit in regulation doesn't count. It measures the putt that saves a score.
On tour: winners 58% (213 of 367), the field 45%; winners faced 2.6 a round, the field 3.9.
Write Clutch Factor Putting or Clutch Factor Ball Striking, every time. No outside tour stat matches either one, so the On tour lines come from our own study, counted the same way. Show a player's number with how many it came from, never against a made-up expectation.
After a bogey, the next three holes played: stopped = no bogey or worse in them, answered = a birdie in them. From the scorecard alone, so every round has it. It puts a number on righting the ship.
On tour: stopped, winners 81%, the field 56%; answered, winners 72%, the field 51%.
The trouble holes Clutch Factor Ball Striking counts, held to bogey or better. Take the bogey before the double.
On tour: winners 98.5% (195 of 198), the field 88.5%.
The last nine holes of a round the player started within 3 shots of the lead, to par and against the field. Only when the coach gives the gap on the build form.
On tour: winners 1.8 shots better than the field, other contenders 0.7 (25 and 19 rounds: a direction, not yet a finding).
Strokes a round = the gap in that situation × how often the rest of the field faces it. They overlap, so they do not add up.
A report is Verified or Withheld. Two states, no "provisional" tier. A withheld report is built but cannot be delivered, and the player is not told until it clears.
An override has to name the failing check it overrides. Every rule ends in a shot, a target or a decision; the plain-English rules and the full text are at rcgreenlight.com/site/house-rules.html.
We sell the coaching of the data, not the data. Grade by the rules on these pages, and when a rule changes, it changes in the house rules first and here in the next edition.