Touring professionals, by virtue of playing so frequently, are constantly honing and fine-tuning their mechanics. They also discover volumes of information regarding their adjustability factors, the emotional and psychological traits that affect every shot they take, and the impact these areas have on their scoring abilities.
The best way for your team members to improve their game is to play often. They must know how to practice properly and play with fundamentally sound techniques. Touring professionals play every day with acceptable-to-great swing mechanics. If your team members play every day but don’t practice those acceptable-to-great mechanics, they plateau with too many variables still in their swings. As a result, they occasionally shoot up to higher scores than they want.
Whether your team members are beginners or advanced golfers, and whether they play four times a month or 20, they must rehearse correctly before they can reach their greatest level of play. When they feel they know how to swing but can’t score, it is time to take a careful look at every aspect of their game.
HOW GOOD CAN YOU BE?
Your team members should ask themselves the following questions to find out just how good they can be:
1. What is the single most flagrant error or flaw in my swing?
2. Just how much information do I need to have?
3. What do I need to know about the negative effects of ill-fitted equipment?
4. How much time must I give myself to see and believe that I’m improving?
5. What is the adjustability factor that the professionals have?
6. What must I do to make my swing (correctly) repeat?
7. How many of the issues that enable me to score are not related to swing mechanics?
8. Which is worse: to be mechanically flawed, emotionally flawed, or psychologically flawed?
9. Can I play better even if I cannot play often?
10. If, because of time limitations, I could only work on a few of the many items to learn, what should they be?
And now, here are the answers:
1. Professional video analysis can help students identify the most flagrant errors or flaws in their swings.
2. Players need only the information that deals directly with their current problems.
3. Students should understand that ill-fitted equipment negatively affects their posture, their ability to bend the shaft appropriately, and (if the grip size is incorrect) their hand action.
4. Students who want to see improvement should give themselves 90 days at first—and the rest of their lives after that.
5. Adjustability factor refers to the professionals’ ability to go anywhere under any conditions and play their best.
6. There is one solution for students who want to make their swings correctly repeat: rehearse drills.
7. Many issues unrelated to swing mechanics affect a player’s ability to score. Each player must build a correct swing, manage that swing, and learn to execute it under varying conditions, such as different grasses or soils, kinds of lies, slopes, wind, weather, or momentary pressures. External elements that influence a player’s scoring ability include the expectation levels of the player and any spectators, the position of the player’s opponent in match play, the opponent’s comments, other circumstances in the player’s life, and the way those issues affect the player. Train your students to focus intensely for short periods of time. The ability to focus has to become second nature.
8. Early in a student’s development, mechanical flaws are more disastrous than emotional or psychological flaws. After a point, however, they are all equal. Emotions, mechanics, and psychology each play a role during the various stages of a player’s development.
9. Players can improve even if they cannot play often, but limiting their playing time prevents them from reaching their full potential.
10. If students can work on only a few items, they should practice posture and a balanced, poised finish with neutral hands.
IDENTIFYING SKILL LEVELS
To help your students reach their potential, you must identify their golfing skill levels. There are five stages of golfing ability: learner, adjustor, developer, player, and tour player.
Learners are true beginners. Learners have no idea of the proper grip and its relationship to the ultimate face position at impact. They have no awareness of body lines relative to the target, and they do not have motion and balance in sync. They do not coordinate the arm swing with the body rotation and weight transfer. Although learners may present some degree of the four common positions (see “The Four Absolutes” in chapter 12), they cannot link the positions properly. Ball contact is a major problem. Learners generally score 100 or higher.
Adjusters are intermediate golfers who have developed their game through instincts and personal athletic talents. Adjustors have a much larger degree of balance and rhythm, yet they still lack target-side dominance during the transition and exhibit too much trail-side dominance before delivery and release. Their grip, stance, and alignment are the result of ball flight feedback. Adjustors need to realign their perceptions of what is right and wrong. They need to retrain their muscle and mental habits. Ball contact is less than desired and most likely occurs with an open face. Adjustors generally score 88 to 98, usually playing better at their home courses.
Developers are advanced golfers who have a much better understanding of the grip, stance, and alignment requirements. Developers may, however, still have misperceptions of what is perfectly square and slightly open. Their grips may need minor repositioning, and they definitely need to work on staying linked in the full swing. Developers generally do not position the club shaft correctly during the takeaway or just before impact. They need to improve their transition and release timing, and they have established draw or fade preferences. Ball contact is generally solid but still a variable. Developers generally score 78 to 88.
Players are more advanced golfers who have started to develop a how-to-score versus a how-to-swing mentality. Players display confidence, understand the game, and are ready to work on items such as visualization, grip pressures, feel, and sensitivity to clubface and path. They are beginning to play more instinctively and need only slight adjustments. Study the ball flight carefully to ascertain whether their control and distance are adequate for shooting lower scores. Short game brilliance is paramount. Players’ perceptions of alignment may vary, and they may lose key posture and set-up positions. Ball contact is generally sound but can slip. Quality of practice and proper use of time is important; players need more competitive playing and generally just more playing time. They may blame swing flaws when in fact their skills only suffer from lack of use, since some swing mechanics are only achieved through a quantity of play. Players generally score 70 to 78 anywhere they play.
Tour players play more instinctively, working on percentages. They excel in all areas of shot making and can deliver under extreme pressure. Their confidence stems from their capabilities. Poor play is generally a result of poor visualization techniques, lack of feel, and minor swing faults that can be corrected within hours or a few days. Full swing flaws are often discovered in short swings. Most tour players prefer video. Those who say they can’t stand to see their swing are few and far between—seeing it saves it. Tour players are lost if they cannot see their problems. Game, course, and emotional management are at the highest level. Tour players definitely spend practice time wisely and work on only those areas that affect scoring. Scoring average is everything. Tour players generally score 66 to 72.
Once you identify your students’ levels, you understand what they need. Golfers need three things: contact, direction, and distance.
Drive learners toward developing the four absolute positions that all great players have in common, starting with the putt and building the motion up to the full swing through incremental learning. Starting with the small swing assures that students develop the most critical of needs: contact. Spoon-feeding is a must. Tension is usually a killer. Keep students relaxed and make sure they maintain soft grip pressure. Work toward a good position at the top of the backswing and a good balanced finish, then add some motion and balance. Teach contact as a result, not a conscious event. Learn how the students learn.
Many of the teaching fundamentals and techniques for learners also apply to adjustors. Adjustors are likely to be the most difficult to help.
Measure adjustors at each level (putting, chipping, pitching, and full swing) to ascertain exactly where the swing begins to malfunction. Be sure to show them how to “feather and drive” the pitch shot. At times adjustors become impatient and frustrated about having to rethink their positions relative to ball flight and consistency. Give them lots of motivational comments and support. Most importantly, educate adjustors about the facts of the swing. The first test for adjustors is correct wrist action at 30 to 50 yards. Avoid letting the students play their own way through instinct alone. Technique is now the key. Learn how they learn.
Developers are easy to work with due to the desire and effort they put forth. You must convince them of the need to have the shaft in specific positions throughout the swing. Again, working on technique is most important. Even at this level, you still need to spoon-feed. Too much too fast creates regression. Spend a considerable amount of time with full pitch and driving. Let developers see the similarities in the two shots. Work on transition and determine whether each student is a hands releaser or a body releaser. Use simple terms and simple drills: swing and turn; swing, then turn again. Learn how they learn.
Players and tour players are a coach’s easiest challenge. Generally they need a coach’s eyes and ears. You should do mostly “yes, no” teaching. Play with these students to appraise their scoring abilities. Be sure they have the finesse shots and expert putting skills. Practice with the driver, wedge, and putter. Make sure the students can both fade and draw at will. Teach them to go with their instincts and feel for each shot. Don’t be too mechanical, yet always demand good technique. Learn how they learn.
Chances are your players will mostly fall into the learner or adjustor categories with perhaps an occasional developer or two. But as golf becomes more popular and children learn to play at younger ages, you may find more experienced golfers—the developer or player levels—on your team.
Creative Ways to Practice
One thing that I do at some of my practice sessions toward the end of the year is to pick four to five captains and then pick teams of varied abilities under each captain. The teams play a scramble, making sure each player has the opportunity to play from the best tee shot, fairway lie, sand and short approach shots, and putts on the green.
I find that beginners learn about basic conduct, etiquette, and rules by watching the experienced players. They also gain a sense of competition, belonging, and contribution. Older players provide input such as club selection and gain experience in the role of leader or advisor to fellow players. They make the decisions that will benefit the foursome while competing against their friends in other groups.
The kids are very interested in the scores at the end of the day and this format relieves the tension of having to post an individual score. I’ve found that my players look forward to playing in this and other two-ball or four-ball formats as they mix up our practice sessions and add some fun to the hard work.
Joe Bernabe, Parsippany High School, Parsippany, New Jersey
WHAT TO PRACTICE
Practice does not make perfect. Proper practice does, however. Your students can only achieve proper practice if they approach swing-building drills as a rehearsal. Just as dancers and actors rehearse their steps or lines, golfers should approach the time they spend hitting golf balls with a script that they adhere to meticulously. The script consists of those techniques and positions that you deem pertinent. It changes as the students develop and improve, so what they rehearse is relative to their levels of play.
As students work on their games, they may develop a feeling or action that has some reliability or repeatability. Encourage students to put these thoughts and feelings in their memory banks to be withdrawn later. Although the main principles behind proper technique are the same for every golfer, each golfer will find his or her unique way of playing the game. A good way to help students remember their thoughts and feelings in practice is to have students write them down. Remembering a feeling or positive thought from practice may help during a tense moment of competition.
Sure Shots
You can help students remember what they’ve learned in practice by giving them catch phrases (I call them sure shots) that will spark their memories. Here are some examples:
• If you can’t seem to get things going, check grip pressure, alignment, and the speed of your takeaway and down-swing.
• Power is in the body—speed is in the arms and hands.
• Anger has no place in golf.
• When the mind is right, the body will follow.
• Contact is in the spine angle and knees. Direction is in the hand action and arm path. Distance is in the body pivot.
• The club determines plane angle. Body motion determines swing plane.
• A preshot routine is the father of consistency.
• Remember George Knudson’s description of the grip: palms together as in prayer, fingers close around the grip.
• Too serious, too bad. Being overly technical generally puts you in your own way.
• There is no middle. Swing one to two. Contact is incidental.
• Close vs. perfect. Most great shots are made up of a lot of “close” and a little of “perfect.”
• Any conscious hand action in a full swing is deadly.
• The arms and hands are transmitters, not initiators.
• The hands are brought into service, not put into service.
• During every round of golf, something you won’t like will happen.
• Always be in the present tense.
• You can’t unload that which has not been loaded.
• Think rotary with your body and vertical with your arms.
• Swing speed—too fast and you won’t have time for proper sequencing; too slow and you won’t have sufficient power.
• Great psychology cannot overcome poor physics.
• Not every truth in golf is applicable.
• The fairway is 1,000 balls wide.
• Mistakes are steps to genius.
• DIWIPI: drive it, wedge it, putt it.
• The most important shot in golf is the one you’re about to make.
You and your students will come up with more. Have students write these quick phrases in their golf notebooks, and remind students of them during practice.
Learners
Learners have to spend several minutes a day forming the grip, posturing to the ball and target, and developing a back-and-through motion without any up-and-down motion. They must train their muscles to function in new and different ways, and they must become swingers instead of hitters. At a very small level, they absolutely must begin coordinating arm swing with weight shift and body rotation!
The most productive way to find the correct positions is to start one foot from the hole and work out to about 30 yards. Putt, chip, and then pitch. At the pitching level, students must incorporate the correct wrist and hand action. This is a critical juncture in realizing the students’ long term success. A good practice schedule might look like the following:
• Putting: 1 to 30 feet for 20 minutes
• Chipping: 30 feet for 20 minutes
• Pitching: 30 yards for 20 minutes
The overall plan is to develop motion, centering, and sequencing.
Adjustors
Adjustors must retrain through drills. Students learn by doing, but they change by drilling. The appropriate drill depends on the particular flaw, but all drills must ultimately reposition the students’ hand actions with their arm swing and body rotation. Perfect action at small yardages comes before fuller swings for distance. At 40 or 50 yards, students should swing on the correct path and plane while sequencing the arm swing with the body rotation. Swing and turn; swing, then turn. A good practice schedule might look like the following:
• Chipping: 10 to 20 yards for 20 minutes
• Pitching: 30 to 50 yards for 20 minutes
• Full swing: all clubs for 20 minutes
Developers
Developers must focus on technique. Be sure to correct any gripping flaws. Make posture and alignment adjustments if necessary. Use clubs on the ground for perfect alignment. Begin to perfect the takeaway position and create the four shaft positions (see chapter 12). Drill the takeaway, top-of-backswing, precontact, and finish positions. Be aware of players’ grip pressure and suggest body relaxation exercises. Swing speed and balance at the finish are priorities. A good practice schedule might look like the following:
• No-ball drills: four shaft positions—one, two, three, finish
• Putting: lag putts for 5 minutes; 10 feet and less for 15 minutes
• Pitching: 30 to 60 yards for 20 minutes
• Full swing: all clubs for 20 minutes
Finish with actual course play to determine players’ biggest weaknesses.
Players
Players should work on scoring clubs 80 percent of the time. Have them drive the ball, wedge it, and putt it!
Visualization skills, management techniques, and physical training are all musts. Players should train to strengthen their hands, forearms, and legs. Work with them on ball flight and distance determination. Teach them to hit the wedge specific distances. A good practice schedule might look like the following:
• Putting: 3 to 4 feet for 10 to 20 minutes
• Pitching: 60 to 100 yards for 20 minutes
• Driver: fade and draw for 20 to 30 minutes
Finish with actual course play to determine what areas need more time.
RECORDING PROGRESS
This chapter ends with three worksheets you and your students can use to keep track of their progress. Use this information as a guide when you suggest drills and practice routines. Chapter 16 also contains progress worksheets that can be used during practice rounds or competitive rounds. You can have your students use the charts, guides, and record-keeping logs included here, or you can develop your own.
Your students can use the pre-round analysis and predictions worksheet (figure 7.1) to compare how they expect to play with how they actually play. This may help them see weaknesses in their game or notice improvements. It also will help you show your students how thoughts can enhance or hinder actions.
Figure 7.2 will help students track their yardage and note any changes. The table at the bottom of the worksheet provides a place for them to record their scores.
The practice log (figure 7.3) will help students organize their practice sessions to bring more purposeful effort and eventually more effective results. Have them use the practice logs as a visual account of what they accomplish at each session, as well as what they plan to do at the next session. An example is provided to guide them in using the chart.
