Recently I was asked a very good question about how to change a golf swing stroke pattern where the golf club travels too quickly to inside on the backswing making the golf swing too flat. This golfer was challenged to find an effective way to change his golf swing pattern when he was attempting to hit a golf ball towards a target.

In a perfect world every golfer would learn the golf swing techniques first then learn how to use them to hit golf shots to a target, however this is not realistic for the majority of golfers who have already learned their golf swing techniques at the same time they are attempting to hit perfect shots to the target.

If you desire to change your stubborn golf stroke pattern this year once and for all you might like to try the following reprogramming technique.

You can make significant progress with a golf swing change by practicing your swing against a wall (carefully) using the Back to the Wall Golf Swing Reprogramming Drill.

The idea is to stand with your back to the wall with your rear end about 6 inches away from it in your address position with a 7 iron. (grip down on the iron if you’re limited for ceiling height)

Important: Put a head cover or something protective on the club head before you swing back very slowly to the top of your backswing. When you arrive at the top swing down very slowly through the bottom of the swing and back to the top of the finish position. This is the stroke pattern that you will ingrain over the next few months.

The idea is to change the pattern of your golf swing very deliberately at home initially, and ideally you would go about it just like this.

1. Swing the golf club back and through at 25 percent of its normal speed being very careful not to hit the wall. Do this 50 times each day for consecutive 7 days.
2. Swing the golf club back and through at 50 percent of its normal speed being very careful not to hit the wall. Do this 50 times each day for consecutive 7 days.
3. Swing the golf club back and through at 75 percent of its normal speed being very careful not to hit the wall. Do this 50 times each day for 7 consecutive days.

Now that you have completed the golf swing reprogramming home segment you will go to the driving range to develop the new pattern with golf balls.

1. Week 1. Go to the driving range and hit 75 shots with your seven iron at 50 percent of your normal speed 3 times each week for 2 weeks. (Do not worry about where the golf ball is going)
2. Week 2. Go to the driving range and hit  75 shots with your seven iron at 75 percent of your normal speed 3 times each week for 2 weeks. (Do not worry about where the golf ball is going)
3. Week 3. Go to the driving range and hit 100 shots with your seven iron at 75 percent your normal speed 3 times each week for 2 weeks. (Aim to hit your golf shots towards targets)

Now you have completed the golf range reprogramming segment you can go to the golf course to test the new stroke pattern in play.

1. Week 4. Go to the golf course and test out your new technique. Swing the golf club at 75 percent of your normal swing speed and have someone video some of your golf swings to validate the changes you have made.

You will discover that you can change your golf stroke pattern if you go about it very deliberately and also improve your golf shot-making consistency.

Remember though, that you change the stroke pattern before your develop your shot-making consistency.

It is very important that you get the order right.

On the driving range before your play you hit golf shots at 75 percent of your normal speed. This is important as your old program operates at 100 percent and if you increase the speed of your golf swing pattern to 100 percent it is likely that your old pattern will start to manifest itself.

This reprogramming technique will work if you follow the program just as it is written.

Let me know how you go once you have completed the program.

Until next time,

 

Lawrie Montague

If you asked one hundred regular amateur golfers to honestly rate the quality of their mental game on a scale of 1 to 5 with 5 being highly competent at managing their mental/emotional state on the golf course and one being totally incompetent on the golf course what do you think the majority of golfers would say?

I bet they would say that they rank too low on the scale, probably about a 2 or a 3.

If you then ask them what they need to do to raise their score most would have very little idea about what they need to do.

Some will say that they have read popular authors like Bob Rotella and other popular golf psychologists who write about the mental game and golf.

The truth is that very few golfers ever spend any time developing their mental skills and there’s no doubt that it is holding you back from hitting better and more consistent golf shots and shooting lower golf scores.

How much easier would it be if you knew what your unique personality style was for learning and performing on the golf course?

If you knew that your particular style meant that you needed to take instruction a certain way as well as the way you play on the golf course?

If you were oblivious to your performance style could it mean that every time you play you are no better off than the last time you played?

That in fact you would never get better at golf because you don’t know what you need to do.

Golf is a game of gross generalisations.

Golf books, golf magazines and other forms of media try to persuade you to go with a popular style that may not be even close to being the best way for you.

This has been a challenge for me for many years up until recently when I came across a golf personality profile that actually got it right.

Someone finally developed a golf personality profile for every golfer that helps you to understand why YOU play golf the way YOU do and how YOU can get better at it by following some simple guidelines.

The profile was developed by Bobby Foster, a management consultant headquartered in Columbia, SC. Bobby is a former teaching professional and golf coach at the University of South Carolina where he coached several All-Americans including four players who played on The PGA Tour.

He is a Certified Behavioral Analyst specializing in the D.I.S.C Behavioral Style Model. He explains the purpose behind the development of the mental golf profile -

“Our company has had great success using DISC profiles in work language to help people improve performance in all types of working environments.

 

Over the years, I’ve often thought about how much better I would have been as a player, instructor and coach if I’d known about the DISC System during that stage of my life.

We built this profile in golf language so that players, instructors and coaches could enjoy the same benefits I’ve seen countless experience with DISC profiles in the workplace.”

The system generates personalized information for working on your mental game just as video and launch monitors produce personalized information for working on your swing and customizing your equipment. The profile works great for self-coaching as well as for collaborating with your instructor or coach.

It’s Quick…It’s Accurate…It’s Comprehensive… “The beauty of this system is that our players get an accurate and comprehensive report without having to spend hours completing a laborious questionnaire. You sure get a lot for the time and money you invest in this process.”
– Dr. Greg Rose, Co-Founder, Titleist Performance Institute

Following is the 5 step outline of the Mental Golf Workshop™ profile process -

1. Log in to www.mentalgolfworkshop.com with my access code procollege (all one word).
2. Pay US $65.00 (worth every penny too!)
3. Spend about ten minutes answering the multiple-choice questionnaire.
4. Your answers go through the proprietary scoring system to produce a 20 plus page report.
5. Review the detailed descriptions of your mental golf tendencies and customized strategies for these areas of your game – Golf Temperament
   1. Pre-Round Preparation
   2. Mental Tendencies When Playing Shots
   3. Course Management
   4. Working With Your Instructors
   5. Mental Tendencies Toward Golf Fitness

Your report is produced in a “workshop” format, with space provided to make notes as you work through your report. This format makes it easy to self-coach yourself or to review with your instructor or coach.

I know that this great tool will be the tool you need to make the New Year your best year ever to play golf the way you have always wanted to.

Lawrie Montague – Golf Confidence Pro

I came across these excellent video golf instruction lessons by PGA golf instructor Martin Hall. He is doing an instruction segment for the Golf Channel and thought you’d really enjoy watching them.

Golf Video Instruction Lesson 1

Golf Video Instruction Lesson 2

Until next time,

Lawrie Montague

What is the difference between playing golf for fun and playing golf in a competition? Not a lot really. Many of the golfers we work with at Pro Tour Golf College struggle with the process of learning how to shoot lower-more competitive scores when they are competing.

When they are relaxed and playing a sociable game with their friends they tell us that they play much better and score lower than the times when they are competing in a tournament.

When professional golfers play golf on tour they are required to play four round events because they only get paid when they complete four rounds of golf successfully. The trouble is that they have to play to a very high standard every week and particularly in the first and second round.

This poses somewhat of a problem for many young and inexperienced professionals because in their minds they think they need a lot of experience before they start to perform consistently for four days.

I don’t agree with this. I believe that you can fast-track the “playing for experience” process by focusing your mental energy on developing effective modelling strategies that get to the heart of performing better faster.

What do I mean when I say “modelling strategies?” We build mental models or maps of all our experiences and we use these maps to get us back to places we want to be and also places we don’t want to be.

That’s right; they will also take us to places we don’t want to go. For many golfers, their “competition model” takes them to places they don’t want to be i.e. higher scores, frustration and feelings of helplessness that makes it difficult for them to make cuts and win prize money whereas their non-competition model takes them to lower scores that seem easier to achieve.

Basically you need to understand that there is a distinction between the times when you compete where you feel satisfied with your results and the times when you compete and you don’t.

Your map of higher scores and the feelings associated with it is something you fight to stay away from which might seem logical and sensible to you, however you need to understand that this is not about logic. There is nothing logical about not playing to your potential and no amount of logic or positive thinking will make you feel better about playing sub-standard golf.

What you need to do is design a competition model that leads you to consistent lower golf scores and at the same time positively develops your self-image and self esteem.

Think of any consistent routine as a model. The routine is an experience that you have packaged up so that you can use it again and again. You have literally hundreds of routines or models of experience that you use to get through your life safely and with few mistakes. Driving the kids to school at the same time each day, along the same route is an example of a consistent routine many people execute.

Think about it like this; nearly everything you do in your life is done effortlessly and seamlessly. In other words, it’s relatively easy and you make few if any mistakes.

And yet the one routine you’ve spent a great deal of your life time perfecting is the one your struggle with the most. Driving your car on the other side of the road is a challenge (particularly in traffic) and yet it will seems easier to do for many golfers than stringing four consistent rounds of golf together.

Why do we try so hard to do something that you can already do so well?

I believe that part of the reason is appreciating how the context and content of an experience influences your existing competition model. The difference in experience between two events is that the context is different and the content is different.

Here’s two examples:

• Playing a round of golf in a golf tournament
• Playing a round golf with friends

Secondly the content of these two experiences might also be different.

• Enjoying the experience of just going through the process of playing golf shots
• Trying to play golf and being too focused on your score, swing or shot.

The distinction: When you’re playing relaxed and enjoying the experience of playing golf you perform better because you’re not trying to perform better.

Now I know that this is a simplistic attempt to help you to understand that the content of your experience makes up your experience and when slightly different can lead you to different outcomes.

So the question is this; Is it useful and even helpful for you to you to see it this way?…

Let’s look at it again:

Context #1. Playing a round of golf with friends and enjoying the experience which leads to better performances and more fun

Context #1. Trying to play well in a golf tournament which leads to higher scores and no fun

Is there a difference between playing golf and trying to play golf? You bet there is, the difference is massive!

Remember this; you are not wrong or broken in some way. Golfers use the word ‘fix’ often when describing some aspect their performance that is not up to par. The word fix implies broken or in need of repair, but you are not broken, you are carrying out your current strategies perfectly, however its just possible that your strategies (which form the content of your model) may be poorly designed and ineffective.

Golfers who are currently performing more the way you want to in a golf tournament are more than likely using more effective and useful strategies built around well constructed models that define the context and content of the experience they’re striving for, and which can be repeated consistently because they have developed a clearly defined map which is harmonious with their future goals.

When you build a competition model that taps into the golf skills and potential you already possess, you will start to perform more the way you want to. The paradigm of playing as much golf as possible to get better is not a useful strategy unless you develop your strategy with content that taps into your existing skills and golfing experience.

Remember that you have all the resources you need already to play golf the way you truly want to. So build a better map of the experience you wish to have by carefully adding content to it that will lead you to lower golf scores, better results in tournaments and ultimately a lot more fun.

It’s not impossible because there are plenty of golfers already doing it the way you want to, so take a leaf from their experience and add it to yours.

Do it today, do it now, and get on with playing golf in competition just the way you want to play it.

Until next time.

Lawrie Montague – Golf Confidence Coach

“He’s probably the best in the world in the short game at the moment” – Martin Kaymer Commenting on Luke Donald’s Short Game Skills after his victory in the 2011 Accenture Matchplay Championship

Englishman Luke Donald won the Accenture Matchplay Championship playing just 89 holes during his six matches for the week. He was never behind at any time and never had to play the 18th hole, and in-fact only had to play the 17th hole once.

He amassed 32 birdies for the week – an average of more than five per round, which was also seven more than anybody else in the field. He seemed to be a golfer in complete control of his game and was rarely threatened even when the challenge was taken to him he had the answer.

Luke Donald is not a long hitter of the golf ball (277 yards or around 250 meters) and in-fact actually went through the process of trying to increase his distance off the tee to be more competitive with the longer hitters which turned out to be a bad decision for him.

Fortunately though he went back to what he knows and trusts and this victory has propelled him from 9th place in the Sony World Rankings to number three.

Luke Donalds weapon – his competitive advantage is his supreme confidence in his shortgame. His consistent chipping, pitching, sand and putting skills gives him a decided advantage on the PGA tour because whenever he misses a green in regulation there is a very high probability that he will get the ball onto the green and into the hole for par or better most of the time.

This is very typical for the top ranked players on the PGA tours.

Have a look at some of the key performance statistics of Luke Donald from last season (2010) on the PGA tour and you’ll see what I mean.

Score Average – 70.25 / rank 31st
Top 10 Finishes – 7 / rank 6th
Putts Per Greens Hit in Regulation – 1.751 / rank 17th
Total Putts – 28.46 / rank 8th
3 Putt Avoidance – 1.63 % / rank 5th (3 putts or more divided by total holes played)
Sand Saves – 66.39 % / rank 1st
Proximity to Hole from Sand (Greenside) Average 7 feet from the hole / rank 2
Greenside Scrambling – 65.41 % / rank 4th
Putting Inside 5 Feet – 98.22 % / rank 3rd
Putting 5 to 15 Feet – 51.45 % / rank 2nd
Putting 3 to 5 Feet – 92.68 % / rank 7th
Scrambling From the Greenside Rough – 67.41 % / rank 4th

If you want to see where great golf is really played, study the statistics of Luke Donald and start looking at these key performance statistics in your game.

You will quickly realize that improvement in any of these shortgame skills will definitely lower your score average faster and make you a lot more competitive on the golf course sooner.

Until next time.

Lawrie Montague – Golf Confidence Pro