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Perfect Practice
In order to improve in golf you need
to practice all areas of the game. Most
people visit the driving range once a
week and just hit balls for hours. This
is not practice it's exercise.
Maximize your time by writing out a
detailed schedule the night before you
practice. Try to spend at least half of
your time on the short game. This will
help you lower your scores and will
improve your full swing.
Tour players set up a perfect practice
station. They lay down clubs for alignment
and ball position. So lay one club down as
your target line. Next, lay another club
down, about two feet to the left, parallel
to the target line. This will be your stance
line. Finally, place a club perpendicular to
the stance line to represent your ball
position. Now every time you set up you will
know that you are aimed correctly.
Practicing off a tee is also useful. It
provides a perfect lie allowing you to focus
on your swing. Make your practice sessions short and
intense so you do not lose focus. Remember,
it's quality not quantity.
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FOCUS
ON SUCCESS ...
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When faced with a difficult chip/touch shot, do you think about how
hard the shot is and doubt your ability to make a good shot? If you do,
train your mind to play each chip shot with your focus on your probability
of success, instead of failure.
Once you estimate your chances of making a shot, focus totally on making
the shot. Don't concern yourself with the probability of not making the
shot. Even if the odds are only 1% or less that you can make a very
difficult chip/touch shot, be happy and excited that you have a chance of
pulling it off. Expect to be able to make the shot, if everything goes
right.
This will put you in a very good frame of mind. You will find that you
will make more chip/touch shots if you believe you can. If you end up
missing the shot, so what because the odds were against you anyway.
This holds true for a chip/touch shot that you should make 90% of the
time. Focus solely on making the shot and don't concern yourself with the
10% chance of missing. If you end up missing the shot, so what because you
will make it 90% of the other times.
Learn to love the challenge that each chip shot brings. Expect success,
but allow yourself the freedom to fail as just part of the game. If you
focus on success, you will have more fun and lower scores.
| There are very few certainties in the
game of golf. Here's one: If you're on the practice tee hitting
balls, and someone walks up next to you and begins his practice
session by pulling out his driver, that guy is not a player. No good
player begins a warm-up or practice session with a driver-or any
long club, for that matter. |
All good players begin-and end-their practice or warm-up sessions by
hitting less-than-full wedge shots. Half wedges are a wonderful
foundation upon which to build your full swing. They demand
excellent tempo and timing, and they require that you start your
swing in a fundamentally sound way-you simply cannot hit a half
wedge with any consistency if you pull the club too far to the
inside, or lift it up abruptly to begin your backswing. If you start
your practice session by ripping drivers, you don't give yourself
the opportunity to develop a sense of rhythm and timing and, if
you're not careful, it's easy to allow swing faults to creep into
your game-faults that you could spend the rest of your range time
trying to sort out.
By finishing your range session with less-than-full wedges, you'll
again have the opportunity to focus on rhythm and tempo and smooth
out any glitches that have crept into your swing with your longer
clubs. In addition, you're forcing yourself to practice those tricky
40-80 yard touch shots that are so crucial to scoring well. You'll
walk away from the practice tee cooler, calmer and more
confident-the perfect state to start your round. Or, if you're not
playing that day, you're ready to drive home happy, with your
swing's tempo and fundamentals on solid ground.
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