The Chris Wood column

By Chris Wood Last updated: 8th September 2010

Hi everyone, I don't know if you noticed but last week I was hitting the ball miles.

On the 595 yard par-five 14th hole I was hitting 6-iron to the green for my second shot!

And on the next hole, an uphill 516 yard par-five, I was only hitting 8-iron!

Sometimes I was lashing it out over 380 yards from the tee.

So you must all be thinking that all my hard work on technique has worked quite quickly and I'm now one of the biggest hitters on tour? Or perhaps you've remembered that Crans-sur-Sierre is at altitude and the ball flies miles in the thin air!

I like to think it was a little bit of both because a little extra yardage is what I am after.

The bad news is that I saw a lot of the left-hand side of the course last week; it is where I missed the fairways and greens almost every time.

Learning to shape the ball right to left is part of the plan but not quite to the extent I did in Crans.

Hopefully things are coming on and I'll be a bit straighter in Holland where I am preparing for the KLM Open at Hilversum.

The event had been played on this course a lot in the past but not since 2005 so it is my first visit and I've got to say I like it.

It is a really old-fashioned classic kind of course - very like Sunningdale or Wentworth.

When we first arrived the buzz was that there would be a lot of irons from the tee because the course is firstly very tight and tree-lined, and secondly it is designed to be fast-running.

But the wet weather has changed all of that - it has been raining for a while and ever since we all arrived on Monday.

So instead of steady irons from the tee we'll have to take driver which makes it a tougher test obviously.

Last week I mentioned I had spent some time working on my game back home in Bristol.

I thought I'd explain a little about how my day unfolds during out-of-event weeks.

I've got a stretching and warming-up routine from Cornell, the physic on the Tour bus, and I'll do that every morning, probably at the gym.

Then I head to the range or the course where I'll hit as many balls as I need to.

I'm a hard worker and don't mind putting the time and effort in. I'll concentrate on something and work so hard to get it right.

The one thing that perhaps surprises people is that I do relatively little work on the course in these periods - it is all about getting the game right on the range, practice greens and short game facilities.

Right time to go and see a bit more of Hilversum - talk to you soon!

Chris Wood