One of the best ways to improve your golf game is to focus on your mental training (or brain) as much as your golf swing. Or in some cases, more.
Plenty of golfers swing with perfect ease on the driving range, hitting their woods and irons straight at the target with consistency, only to find those same shots slicing out of play or dribbling down the fairway. “I left my game on the range” is one of the oldest clichés in the book, but there’s a reason it happens so often.
Do you Practice Better than you Play?
Consider why you perform better in practice. There is little pressure to distract you from the task at hand. While relaxed, you find it easy to avoid over complicating your stroke. With a bucket of balls at your feet, it is easy to empty your mind and let your nice, repeatable swing power through the golf ball.
On the course, meanwhile, you don’t get a chance to re-hit a poor shot until you get it right (unless you take an awful lot of mulligans). With more down time between golf shots, doubts can start to creep in, and poor results follow. Give yourself a better chance by transferring some of that practice range attitude to the golf course.
Before you set up, think about all the information you have at your disposal – the distance to the pin, the weather, and the condition of the course, among others. Consider the state of your game on that day. Then pick the golf club that best suits the strength of your game as related to the shot at hand. Keep in mind that for many players, it is best to error on the side of the bigger club, since a nice, easy golf swing with a seven iron will produce better results than a muscled-up eight.
Golf Mental Tips for your Round
Then, mentally focus on visualizing the golf shot instead of your swing mechanics. If you are worried about the individual elements of your swing, your result will likely be a choppy mess that doesn’t get the job done. Picture the ball soaring down the fairway, and that will serve to both relax your mind and come up with a smooth stroke. By performing this mental training, you’ll bring your golf game with you from the practice ground, instead of leaving your best golf strokes behind before you even tee off.