Several Division I golfers practiced at the golf course
where I worked. One of them came nearly every day that I worked and
spent hours hitting balls and stroking putts with earphones blaring some
angry form of rock and roll. This person had seemingly everything
going for him- he started at a young age, had unfettered access to an
amazing practice facility and golf course, was born to extremely wealthy
parents, and he came from championship golfing pedigree to boot. He
was built to pulverize a golf ball, and his swing speed was fast enough
to warrant extra extra stiff shafts. Unfortunately, his golfing career
never matched his potential. I got to know him when I was working at
the course and my own armchair-psychologist assessment was that he
didn’t succeed because 1) his pedigree allowed him some shortcuts
along the way, 2) at the same time, his pedigree also put a ton of
pressure on him, and 3) deep down, he wasn’t passionate about golf. As I
spent more time with him, I actually started to feel sorry for the guy.
I shared my thoughts to a friend who also worked at the course while
we watched him practice from afar. My coworker had enjoyed a highly
successful college career, and continues to add titles to an already
impressive professional career. My coworker shocked me by stating
flatly that I shouldn’t have any sympathy for the guy because he’s never
actually worked on his game. I started to watch his practice sessions
more closely and realized that we were both right. I started to notice
how much time he spent texting, searching for music, making phone calls,
and chatting while he was “practicing.” He certainly wasn’t getting
the most out of his time. Of course, he was probably distracting
himself because he didn’t actually want to practice but knew that he
“needed” to practice. It was almost like he was there to check
something off a list of things to do. Had practicing become a chore?
I
started reflecting on my own practice time. Luckily for me, I’ve
always enjoyed practicing. I absolutely love hitting balls on the
range, most likely because growing up I couldn’t afford to hit balls
very often. When I worked at the course and had free access to the
range, I would lose track of time and hit balls for two hours straight.
But what I enjoy even more than hitting balls is working on my
chipping. Give me a wedge, a couple of golf balls, and a chipping green
and you can leave me there for the entire day. In other words, I’ve
never lacked the enjoyment piece, which means that I’m always up for a
good long practice session. EXCEPT, if the only thing I can do is
practice putting. That’s one thing I don’t care for. Don’t get me
wrong, I will put in the hours, but the enjoyment is gone after about 30
minutes. I realized this about myself, and started wondering what it
was about putting that made it so much less fulfilling. I’ve decided
that there are three main reasons: 1) it bores me because it’s too
stationary an activity (I haven’t been to a movie theater in a LONG time
for the same reason), 2) I don’t experience much success when it comes
to putting (a nice way of saying that I suck at putting), and 3)
sometimes it feels like the more I practice my putting, the worse I
putt. Funny how that works, the one part of my game that needs the most
work is the part that I’m the least motivated to work on. Obviously,
this is why I remain a weak putter. I started to reflect on my chipping
and swing practice to see if there was something that I could transfer
over to putting.
That’s
when it hit me: when I go to the driving range or to the chipping
green, I don’t really practice to improve a weakness in my game. Most
of the time, I practice to further improve my confidence in an area of
my game where I’m already above average. What I have found is that
after I warm up, I often hit shots that I can already hit fairly
consistently. My goal is to get to what I call “Tour level” with those
shots. For example, I work on really simple chip shots with the goal of
having all four balls within tap-in range (the criterion being whether I
could tap-in the putt using my wedge). This gives me a ton of
confidence when I’m confronted with those shots on the course. When I’m
practicing regularly, I’m pretty automatic when it comes to shots that
are within a couple yards of the edge of the green. When I’m practicing
a ton, I’m trying to make those shots. But the fact of the matter is
that I was already solid with those shots- I could put them within 5
feet consistently. The extra practice helps me put those shots within 3
feet. That 2-foot difference significantly impacts my scoring because
I’m such a poor putter. And as a better player, when I miss greens, I
tend to miss them on the “correct” side. Which means that, more often
than not, the chip shots I find myself facing on the course are similar
to the shots that I practice.
Part
of my problem with practicing putting is that I feel like there’s not a
putt that I’m already decent at making. If that sounds like hyperbole,
it’s not- I miss 2-foot putts on a somewhat regular basis. Now, like
all golfers, I’m a “streaky” putter, which I’ve decided is just a fancy
way of saying that I’m inconsistent. So while I miss a 2-footer every
now and then, I also drain the occasional 15-foot putt and have been
making double-breaking 30+ foot downhillers as of late. That’s my
problem- my putting is so unpredictable that I don’t know where to
begin. Which is where we get to the issue of practicing to improve a
weakness. As you can see, this type of practice is much more difficult
and usually requires some outside help. After a slew of rounds marred
by extremely poor putting, I decided it was time to overhaul my putting
stroke and identify what was causing my inconsistencies. That’s when I
turned to youtube. That’s when the learning began. One clip featured a
teaching pro talking about how most amateurs have one length of
backswing for every putt, decelerating on short putts and jabbing at
long putts. Another clip mentioned focusing on maintaining an even grip
pressure throughout the stroke. And then there was the big one- a
teaching pro breaking down why Tiger was going through a putting slump.
Slow motion video proved that Tiger had started to make a mini hip turn
as he struck his putts. The move was so slight that it was barely
detectable, even in slow motion. But there it was, plain as can be. I
went to the putting green the next day and realized that I was
significantly opening my hips on the through-stroke without even feeling
it. What’s more, I was also opening my shoulders on the
through-stroke. Now I had something concrete to work on. I found that
my putting sessions became more productive as I ingrained this new
putting motion. I also realized that the hours I had been logging on
the putting green before the fix weren’t helping me become a better
putter- I was just rehearsing the same flawed motion over and over again
in a failed attempt to make that motion yield consistent results.
Sound
familiar? Well, maybe it’s time to make a change and get some help.
As far as getting help goes, if someone tries to change your entire
swing in the first lesson, I advise that you find someone else to help
you. I should mention that most good teaching pros will start by
checking the basics of your set-up position. Go ahead and skip this
step by doing it yourself. When hitting balls, lay some clubs on the
ground to establish consistent alignment and ball position. And use a
mirror to check your posture (Tiger Woods is the model of perfect
posture at address). Indeed, simply making sure that you are properly
aligned on every shot will dramatically alter your practice time.
Finally, make your practice count. If you truly are practicing to get
better, then practice requires quite a bit of focus. Make every swing
count by being very specific about what you are trying to accomplish
with each swing: “I’m going to hit a high fade that will move 5 yards
left-to-right in the air and fly 125 yards,” or “I want to keep my eye
on the ball all the way through impact,” or “I want to land this chip
shot on top of that dark spot.” And if practicing is starting to feel
like a chore, it might be time to put the clubs away for a bit.
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