What are your problems on the blow up holes. One would have to look at what is causing them to blow up on a hole or two every round and look to work on those issues when they practice. As always practice your game from green to tee. always work putting and short game.

Greens and fairways to all

Simba

Although it is only one stroke, there is a world of difference between 80 and 79.  I'm sure there are several areas that you can work on, but I would recommend analyzing your round to determine where those 10-13 extra strokes over par are coming from.  I'm sure there are much better players out there that can chime in, but I can think of about 4 different "areas" to look at:  Putting, chipping/short game, long game, course management.  

1. Did you have 5 or 6 3-Putts during the round?  Then putting might be the culprit.  If so, analyze further, was it putts from certain distances?  Maybe take a putting lesson.

2. How many greens did you hit/miss? If you miss 13 greens, it is the approach shot that got you there and it is the short game that saves par.  If so, take a chipping lesson and spend several hours around the practice green with a shag bag of balls that you normally use during play.  Developing a deadly short game  will pay dividends and shave a few strokes.  Over the years, I found that some of the best short games belong to the 13 and 14 year-olds that can't quite reach/hit the greens.  They usually have several opportunities during a round to lean on their short game.  I remember I could always put it within a foot when I was 13.

3.  If you are missing greens because you are not set up by your drive or your approach shots are off, then a few lessons to better the long game might be in order.

4.  Finally, Course Management: Determining where you want to play your NEXT shot from.  I have seen some players that hit the ball OK, but score much worse, because they keep setting themselves up to get in trouble.  For instance, I was playing a short par 4 a few weeks ago that played to about 360 yards.  It has a wide fairway up to about 130 yds out, then has a vary narrow bottleneck flanked by trees.  If you choose to tee off with driver, it has to be straight.  Left would bounce down a hill into trouble and right would bounce down a hill in the rough and if it didn't go into the woods, you would be blocked by the trees for an approach shot. I opted to tee off with a 2-iron instead.  If I missed it right, I would still be in the fairway since it was still wide at 140-150 yds.  My 2-iron tee shot ended up in the middle of the fairway with a pretty standard 140-yd 9-iron to the green for par.  My playing partner (used driver) had to chip out from the woods to another bad lie, missed the green, chipped up for a 6.

The same can be said for water hazards, sand traps, grass traps, and any trouble spots.  For a lot of courses, determine your drive based on distance to the 150-yd marker.  If you hit those well, you will have a 7 or 8 iron shot to every green.

Best of luck

The key to breaking that plateau is to really disect your rounds.  Look at where and what might be costing you strokes, fairways, GIR, not able to get it up and down, penalty strokes, ect.  Once you have done that look for what you can do to get the biggest bang for your buck for say, what can you work on that is going to get you a stroke back here or there.  With most ams the key is not making the big numbers, limiting penalty strokes, and sometimes making the play that makes a bogey but takes double or triple out of play.  Good luck, hope this helps!

Carl, I'm 70 and have much the same routine as you do.  Prior to retiring, my handicap tended to hang between 10 and 12.  Since then (six years now in SE Texas), I've been able to get it into the single digits, and even as low as a 4.5 index.  What I focus on is getting rid of the really bad holes--cut down OB's and shots in the hazards--and you'll see your scores and handicap go lower.  I find it interesting that you still play a course rated at 136.  Congratulations.  That usually means the course not only has a bunch of difficult holes (long, multiple hazards, etc.), but also that the greens are not very straightforward.  If your still long enough to reach the long 4's and 3's without difficulty, then I'd work on eliminating the big errors.  One of the hardest lessons for me was to not compound a bad shot with a bad decision.  Play safe and give yourself a shot at no worse than bogey.  Keep plugging away.  It will come down, but you will lose distance as you age, trust me on that.

Carl,

 I wish I had an answer. It happens to me as well!

Putt less .....be able to get up and down, put the driver away..,,,master chipping and putting.

Know the course and the trouble and always play short of the trouble.  

Carl,

I would echo what others have said about needing to analyze your rounds in order to find the root cause of your problems. I would begin by tracking some key stats (FIR, GIR, Putts, Sand Saves, etc) to get some baseline data for your game. Since you play fairly often...trends should appear pretty quickly on areas of improvement. If putting seems to be a problem I would be willing to bet it is because you are not as effective at "lag" putting as you could be. One thing that helps me with this is I picture a 2ft circle around the hole and that is the "hole" I am trying to hit to. I try and do the same thing with chips / pitches but I widen to 3-15ft depending on distance.

Another key thing I would focus on is course management. If you miss a shot in a bad spot, don't try and be a hero...take your medicine, punch out and play again from the short grass.

Hope this helps.

Play well.

Great topic here and a lot of good advice as well. If you do decide to start tracking some stats, make sure you check out our My Game section on the site. It's a great way to log and analyze the key areas of your game. Here's the link:

http://www.titleist.com/my-game/default.aspx

Good luck!

- Mike

Carl, I'm 67 and know what you are talking about with the loss of strength and distance.  I guess that you feel obligated to hold onto the clubs unwritten rule that until you reach 70 you play the tees that have a course rating of 136.  That is a pretty difficult course rating for most of us seniors to deal with.  I'll be the contrarian here, move up a tee and have more fun, hitting from a tee that takes you into a short iron shot to the green is a whole lot more fun than struggling with mid and long iron shots simply because you can no longer smoke one out to 275.  My guess is that you are probably thinking that its time to tee forward?  Give it a try.  Someone has to be first ...  Good luck.

Most contributors already touched on the good topics but the one that sticks out the most is to 'disect' your round and find out what it is that is causing the poor holes. Is it a snap hook drive, missed approaches, poor putting, etc. The game we play and love is funny in the sense that it will never be mastered, but once you identify this the only real key is to practice. Repetition. Grind it out!

Swing well!

Unless the blow up holes are occurring randomly throughout your round, you could just be getting fatigued. Stock up some snacks and keep yourself hydrated with plenty of water so that you don't fade on the back nine. A good analysis of your game wouldn't hurt either. Might see if the club pro or a highly-skilled member would be willing to walk a few holes with you to see what you can improve - especially if there are specific holes that you struggle on.