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The real reason golfers don’t get better with practice


gatorpedsMD

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Probably if you’re reading this thread you have a hard time learning the game. There’s so much info and data and most ams can’t tell what works and what doesn’t, so you pick the wrong data and work unsupervised and you usually feel frustrated about the outcome.

 

I’ve always noticed how kids learn. It’s a fine observation that a young person learns fast and they naturally develop a game. Now kids who have a ton of golf game have been through the scrutiny of a teacher for a few years and they all listen to the teacher as a prophet speaking, they don’t question much but they try to do as told until they achieve it and there’s most often a long term relationship with the instructor. This type of relationship plus knowledge of the game allows the student to also suggest or try out with the instructor in control.

 

The ultimate fact is golf learning is a long process, something awful for most beginners and intermediate players, there’s a lot of snake oil in the learn the easy or fast way thing you see on the web, plus the thousands of golfers that try this out today and try that out next week. Just for the record: when you see a veteran better player you’ll notice that they never attempt to change swing method or the confidence club or the bread and butter chip. In the end golf is about repeating what you do well over and over without anyone contaminating it, and when you’re not playing ok go back to your basics. Even though it’s always easier to turn to the YouTube gurus in search of an instant cure when you’re away from your fundamentals.

 

In piano it is imperative to learn proper technique early-on because bad technique will present a huge barrier to advancement. So many folks try to self-teach the piano and quit because they find out PDQ that they can't get any better. And, bad technique is super-hard to "unwind". However, once the fundamentals are mastered, each player does have their own style of play, own way of playing songs how they like to hear them. It's the same for golf IMO. Learn and master the basics....at least in terms of reasonableness, then one can venture off to shot specifics, tempo, etc.

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IMO golf is not nearly as hard as some folks make what's a relatively simple movement hard.

 

Year ago, my college golf coach years ago did a demonstration. He had a giant chalkboard with a drawing of stairs. He outlined every body movement to "think about" while walking down a flight of stairs....in extreme detail...weight here....knee moves here...then weight moves there...arm swings there, etc. Then he had the group dissect each movement from there. At the end, he took each person to a flight of stairs, one at a time, and asked them to walk down the stairs without holding the railing. Not ONE person could freely walk down the stairs after about 2 steps without grabbing the railing.

 

When I read the above, it brought to mind "overthinking" or letting minutia get in one's way of progress. Some people get off on making mechanic minutia more important than improving their golf thinking and scoring ability.

 

Not to pick on any one person but seen it over and over; engineers, math or like minds tend to get in their own way by letting minutia stagnate improvement. :beach:

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The process the article lays out is highly similar to what is used in TQM manufacturing methods. It's the reason planes don't fall out of the sky and Toyota's go 300K without a hiccup even though there's 10's of thousands of components in both. The learning/improvement process is ongoing and does not end at the lesson or process plan. It's continual, it has a matrix to evaluate and adjust in real time and do better on the next effort. There's good stuff here and frankly I need to adopt it more even though I've gotten companies ISO registered, lol.

 

I was thinking the same thing. Cut out the "new-age mumbo jumbo" (its really not that new) and call in PDCA - Plan Do Check Act.

  • Have a plan (setup/swing thought/target/etc)
  • Hit the ball
  • Check your results - where did the ball go in relation to your plan? What other feedback (divot/video/feels) can you incorporate?
  • Update your plan accordingly

Repeat.

 

Do I do all of this? No. But I also have the "meta-awareness" to realize that I'm ok with my golf game being where it is, and practice would require me to sacrifice elsewhere.

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The process the article lays out is highly similar to what is used in TQM manufacturing methods. It's the reason planes don't fall out of the sky and Toyota's go 300K without a hiccup even though there's 10's of thousands of components in both. The learning/improvement process is ongoing and does not end at the lesson or process plan. It's continual, it has a matrix to evaluate and adjust in real time and do better on the next effort. There's good stuff here and frankly I need to adopt it more even though I've gotten companies ISO registered, lol.

 

I was thinking the same thing. Cut out the "new-age mumbo jumbo" (its really not that new) and call in PDCA - Plan Do Check Act.

  • Have a plan (setup/swing thought/target/etc)
  • Hit the ball
  • Check your results - where did the ball go in relation to your plan? What other feedback (divot/video/feels) can you incorporate?
  • Update your plan accordingly

Repeat.

 

Do I do all of this? No. But I also have the "meta-awareness" to realize that I'm ok with my golf game being where it is, and practice would require me to sacrifice elsewhere.

 

That sounds like the system for which all the golfers who don't improve utilize.

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IMO golf is not nearly as hard as some folks make what's a relatively simple movement hard.

 

Year ago, my college golf coach years ago did a demonstration. He had a giant chalkboard with a drawing of stairs. He outlined every body movement to "think about" while walking down a flight of stairs....in extreme detail...weight here....knee moves here...then weight moves there...arm swings there, etc. Then he had the group dissect each movement from there. At the end, he took each person to a flight of stairs, one at a time, and asked them to walk down the stairs without holding the railing. Not ONE person could freely walk down the stairs after about 2 steps without grabbing the railing.

 

When I read the above, it brought to mind "overthinking" or letting minutia get in one's way of progress. Some people get off on making mechanic minutia more important than improving their golf thinking and scoring ability.

 

Not to pick on any one person but seen it over and over; engineers, math or like minds tend to get in their own way by letting minutia stagnate improvement. :beach:

 

Yeah, usually very hard for overanalytical people to learn golf. There’s a tendency to forget golf is a sport and lots of people put no athleticism at all in the game, they treat it as hard science.

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IMO golf is not nearly as hard as some folks make what's a relatively simple movement hard.

 

Year ago, my college golf coach years ago did a demonstration. He had a giant chalkboard with a drawing of stairs. He outlined every body movement to "think about" while walking down a flight of stairs....in extreme detail...weight here....knee moves here...then weight moves there...arm swings there, etc. Then he had the group dissect each movement from there. At the end, he took each person to a flight of stairs, one at a time, and asked them to walk down the stairs without holding the railing. Not ONE person could freely walk down the stairs after about 2 steps without grabbing the railing.

 

When I read the above, it brought to mind "overthinking" or letting minutia get in one's way of progress. Some people get off on making mechanic minutia more important than improving their golf thinking and scoring ability.

 

Not to pick on any one person but seen it over and over; engineers, math or like minds tend to get in their own way by letting minutia stagnate improvement. :beach:

 

Yeah, usually very hard for overanalytical people to learn golf. There’s a tendency to forget golf is a sport and lots of people put no athleticism at all in the game, they treat it as hard science.

 

I'd really like those guys to answer the following: What would they think while walking across an 18 inch wide board on the ground? Then what would they think when walking across the same board 30 stories high between two buildings?

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IMO golf is not nearly as hard as some folks make what's a relatively simple movement hard.

 

Year ago, my college golf coach years ago did a demonstration. He had a giant chalkboard with a drawing of stairs. He outlined every body movement to "think about" while walking down a flight of stairs....in extreme detail...weight here....knee moves here...then weight moves there...arm swings there, etc. Then he had the group dissect each movement from there. At the end, he took each person to a flight of stairs, one at a time, and asked them to walk down the stairs without holding the railing. Not ONE person could freely walk down the stairs after about 2 steps without grabbing the railing.

 

When I read the above, it brought to mind "overthinking" or letting minutia get in one's way of progress. Some people get off on making mechanic minutia more important than improving their golf thinking and scoring ability.

 

Not to pick on any one person but seen it over and over; engineers, math or like minds tend to get in their own way by letting minutia stagnate improvement. :beach:

 

Yeah, usually very hard for overanalytical people to learn golf. There’s a tendency to forget golf is a sport and lots of people put no athleticism at all in the game, they treat it as hard science.

 

I agree - but then there are people like Phil and Deshambeau ...

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IMO golf is not nearly as hard as some folks make what's a relatively simple movement hard.

 

Year ago, my college golf coach years ago did a demonstration. He had a giant chalkboard with a drawing of stairs. He outlined every body movement to "think about" while walking down a flight of stairs....in extreme detail...weight here....knee moves here...then weight moves there...arm swings there, etc. Then he had the group dissect each movement from there. At the end, he took each person to a flight of stairs, one at a time, and asked them to walk down the stairs without holding the railing. Not ONE person could freely walk down the stairs after about 2 steps without grabbing the railing.

 

When I read the above, it brought to mind "overthinking" or letting minutia get in one's way of progress. Some people get off on making mechanic minutia more important than improving their golf thinking and scoring ability.

 

Not to pick on any one person but seen it over and over; engineers, math or like minds tend to get in their own way by letting minutia stagnate improvement. :beach:

 

Yeah, usually very hard for overanalytical people to learn golf. There’s a tendency to forget golf is a sport and lots of people put no athleticism at all in the game, they treat it as hard science.

 

I agree - but then there are people like Phil and Deshambeau ...

 

True, both your examples are known to be analytical. But I see their behavior as nothing more than attention to good golfer details; as opposed to engineers and math minds or the like that are overly analytical about every aspect or thing. The latter group sees the slightest detail as having a paramount influence on the swing and outcome bogs them down when over the ball. Instead of a 3 or 4 step wedge swing, they tend to see the impact of every digit on the clock.

 

A friend (10 index) has a BS Mathematics and MS in Engineering and leads a design team. We've talked, and I have watched him over the ball. It's evident how all the minutia makes it challenging for him to clear his mind allowing him to feel confident over the ball and execute the shot.

 

IMO - Once the body has grooved swing and muscle memory "attention to detail" deals with making a quick clear shot plan, executing the proper takeaway, swing and face angle for the intended shot. Then noticing how the ball was impacted through shaft vibration in the hands and recalling how one's body acted when making the swing to decide if the shot was executed correctly or not.

Of course, there are other minor details like how the ball behaves on different turf, under different conditions and reading greens but not much about swing mechanics as it's entwined in muscle memory. Only to be tweaked now and again. My 2cents. :beach:

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/02/12/how-to-learn-new-skills-twice-as-fast/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.16d827c8c5df

 

Found this interesting and validates personal experience.

 

Upshot is to speed up improvements, alter the practice, alter the clubs.........alter.

 

I've made biggest gains of true improvement when I changed weight or flex of shafts or head type or SW or just alter type of shot. For instance practice low punch draws if stock shot is high fade. Swing gets stale,plods and even degrades when I do same thing all the time. Science backs this experience and probably explains the payoff to ho'ing clubs and why best practices have me doing a variety of things with a variety of goals and clubs.

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IMO golf is not nearly as hard as some folks make what's a relatively simple movement hard.

 

Year ago, my college golf coach years ago did a demonstration. He had a giant chalkboard with a drawing of stairs. He outlined every body movement to "think about" while walking down a flight of stairs....in extreme detail...weight here....knee moves here...then weight moves there...arm swings there, etc. Then he had the group dissect each movement from there. At the end, he took each person to a flight of stairs, one at a time, and asked them to walk down the stairs without holding the railing. Not ONE person could freely walk down the stairs after about 2 steps without grabbing the railing.

 

When I read the above, it brought to mind "overthinking" or letting minutia get in one's way of progress. Some people get off on making mechanic minutia more important than improving their golf thinking and scoring ability.

 

Not to pick on any one person but seen it over and over; engineers, math or like minds tend to get in their own way by letting minutia stagnate improvement. :beach:

 

Yeah, usually very hard for overanalytical people to learn golf. There’s a tendency to forget golf is a sport and lots of people put no athleticism at all in the game, they treat it as hard science.

 

I agree - but then there are people like Phil and Deshambeau ...

 

True, both your examples are known to be analytical. But I see their behavior as nothing more than attention to good golfer details; as opposed to engineers and math minds or the like that are overly analytical about every aspect or thing. The latter group sees the slightest detail as having a paramount influence on the swing and outcome bogs them down when over the ball. Instead of a 3 or 4 step wedge swing, they tend to see the impact of every digit on the clock.

 

A friend (10 index) has a BS Mathematics and MS in Engineering and leads a design team. We've talked, and I have watched him over the ball. It's evident how all the minutia makes it challenging for him to clear his mind allowing him to feel confident over the ball and execute the shot.

 

IMO - Once the body has grooved swing and muscle memory "attention to detail" deals with making a quick clear shot plan, executing the proper takeaway, swing and face angle for the intended shot. Then noticing how the ball was impacted through shaft vibration in the hands and recalling how one's body acted when making the swing to decide if the shot was executed correctly or not.

Of course, there are other minor details like how the ball behaves on different turf, under different conditions and reading greens but not much about swing mechanics as it's entwined in muscle memory. Only to be tweaked now and again. My 2cents. :beach:

 

I think what we're calling 'overanalytical' is really shorthand for people who are not real connected to their bodies/feel, those guys that live above their eyebrows, so to speak. I am guessing if you talked to Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods, they'd have a whole lot of detailed understanding of each moment in the swing but this is based first on feel that they then translated into ideas (vs from ideas to feel, although I am sure they have done some of that, too).

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As I posted above, my college golf coach did the stairs experiment. This is a great example of "over-thinking" to the point of paralysis. You see it all the time on the course....guy stands up to the ball...you can almost hear the list of instructions given to every body-part....you're waiting....then they hit and lose their balance.

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As I posted above, my college golf coach did the stairs experiment. This is a great example of "over-thinking" to the point of paralysis. You see it all the time on the course....guy stands up to the ball...you can almost hear the list of instructions given to every body-part....you're waiting....then they hit and lose their balance.

A "forest for the trees" mentality.

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As I posted above, my college golf coach did the stairs experiment. This is a great example of "over-thinking" to the point of paralysis. You see it all the time on the course....guy stands up to the ball...you can almost hear the list of instructions given to every body-part....you're waiting....then they hit and lose their balance.

A "forest for the trees" mentality.

 

You could say that...or....there reaches a point where there's no use to try to dish-out instructions to the body because it knows what to do...or...the brain is simply over-riding what one can do in increments without hitting. I've posted before that I can get guys to nearly mimic every position of their favorite golfer....in SLOW MOTION...but as soon as they speed up....POOF....looks nothing like what they just mimicked for the prior hour.

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Yet another interesting read. Thank you for sharing.

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Posted A minute ago

I talked to our personal friend who is a professional dancer about 30 minutes ago because I texted her asking why i seem to not be able to perform certain moves in golf at full-speed...only in slow motion. i told her my body seems to be rejecting my requests.

 

She called me and said: "you're NOT stretched enough!" She said she stretches for over an hour before attempting a dance routine...and has a specific regimen of stretches according to the upcoming dance style / demands. She said she's stretching when she's off camera between dances. She also said "imagine me...I do this for a living...and I have to stretch more in one night than you in 10 years!". She was joking...but making a point. She said it's not your brain fighting you....it's your body saying NO. She added that's why I can hit certain positions in slow-motion...but not at full-speed.

 

I can't say who this woman is....but if you've watched DWTS....you've seen her many times.

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Posted A minute ago

I talked to our personal friend who is a professional dancer about 30 minutes ago because I texted her asking why i seem to not be able to perform certain moves in golf at full-speed...only in slow motion. i told her my body seems to be rejecting my requests.

 

She called me and said: "you're NOT stretched enough!" She said she stretches for over an hour before attempting a dance routine...and has a specific regimen of stretches according to the upcoming dance style / demands. She said she's stretching when she's off camera between dances. She also said "imagine me...I do this for a living...and I have to stretch more in one night than you in 10 years!". She was joking...but making a point. She said it's not your brain fighting you....it's your body saying NO. She added that's why I can hit certain positions in slow-motion...but not at full-speed.

 

I can't say who this woman is....but if you've watched DWTS....you've seen her many times.

 

Please, for the love of God, tell me its Sharna?!?!

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Posted A minute ago

I talked to our personal friend who is a professional dancer about 30 minutes ago because I texted her asking why i seem to not be able to perform certain moves in golf at full-speed...only in slow motion. i told her my body seems to be rejecting my requests.

 

She called me and said: "you're NOT stretched enough!" She said she stretches for over an hour before attempting a dance routine...and has a specific regimen of stretches according to the upcoming dance style / demands. She said she's stretching when she's off camera between dances. She also said "imagine me...I do this for a living...and I have to stretch more in one night than you in 10 years!". She was joking...but making a point. She said it's not your brain fighting you....it's your body saying NO. She added that's why I can hit certain positions in slow-motion...but not at full-speed.

 

I can't say who this woman is....but if you've watched DWTS....you've seen her many times.

 

Please, for the love of God, tell me its Sharna?!?!

 

It's not Sharna....but I hear you bro....but just as eye-popping. I can tell you these gals are IN SHAPE!

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Posted A minute ago

I talked to our personal friend who is a professional dancer about 30 minutes ago because I texted her asking why i seem to not be able to perform certain moves in golf at full-speed...only in slow motion. i told her my body seems to be rejecting my requests.

 

She called me and said: "you're NOT stretched enough!" She said she stretches for over an hour before attempting a dance routine...and has a specific regimen of stretches according to the upcoming dance style / demands. She said she's stretching when she's off camera between dances. She also said "imagine me...I do this for a living...and I have to stretch more in one night than you in 10 years!". She was joking...but making a point. She said it's not your brain fighting you....it's your body saying NO. She added that's why I can hit certain positions in slow-motion...but not at full-speed.

 

I can't say who this woman is....but if you've watched DWTS....you've seen her many times.

 

Please, for the love of God, tell me its Sharna?!?!

 

It's not Sharna....but I hear you bro....but just as eye-popping. I can tell you these gals are IN SHAPE!

 

That's a statement I think all of WRX can agree upon :friends:

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Posted A minute ago

I talked to our personal friend who is a professional dancer about 30 minutes ago because I texted her asking why i seem to not be able to perform certain moves in golf at full-speed...only in slow motion. i told her my body seems to be rejecting my requests.

 

She called me and said: "you're NOT stretched enough!" She said she stretches for over an hour before attempting a dance routine...and has a specific regimen of stretches according to the upcoming dance style / demands. She said she's stretching when she's off camera between dances. She also said "imagine me...I do this for a living...and I have to stretch more in one night than you in 10 years!". She was joking...but making a point. She said it's not your brain fighting you....it's your body saying NO. She added that's why I can hit certain positions in slow-motion...but not at full-speed.

 

I can't say who this woman is....but if you've watched DWTS....you've seen her many times.

 

Please, for the love of God, tell me its Sharna?!?!

 

It's not Sharna....but I hear you bro....but just as eye-popping. I can tell you these gals are IN SHAPE!

 

That's a statement I think all of WRX can agree upon :friends:

 

I went to several shoots and OMG....few folks in sports can hold a candle to the conditioning of DWTS dancers. Some of the stuff they do is mind-boggling in person that TV doesn't give credit.

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Posted A minute ago

I talked to our personal friend who is a professional dancer about 30 minutes ago because I texted her asking why i seem to not be able to perform certain moves in golf at full-speed...only in slow motion. i told her my body seems to be rejecting my requests.

 

She called me and said: "you're NOT stretched enough!" She said she stretches for over an hour before attempting a dance routine...and has a specific regimen of stretches according to the upcoming dance style / demands. She said she's stretching when she's off camera between dances. She also said "imagine me...I do this for a living...and I have to stretch more in one night than you in 10 years!". She was joking...but making a point. She said it's not your brain fighting you....it's your body saying NO. She added that's why I can hit certain positions in slow-motion...but not at full-speed.

 

I can't say who this woman is....but if you've watched DWTS....you've seen her many times.

 

This makes total sense to me. I have been thinking that the core constraint in improving is not all the stuff I have been fretting over but is, in fact, the physical constraints that my not very flexible body presents me.

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This too makes great sense. I started marshaling at a little exec course just to be able to practice on it and play more than one ball.

 

The one thing I haven’t started doing is playing practice games on the range - the addiction to scraping balls is strong (and I enjoy that but it has limits to usefulness). But it makes sense.

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Just thought I'd chime in with my two cents. I think the real reason most golfers don't improve is that they don't have a good process where they build a foundation and move on from there.

 

I equate golf to the martial arts quite a bit, since I've been a student of both. Martial arts instruction tends to be much different. Rarely one on one, so everyone is taught the same. You start with very basic stances, punches, kicks and blocks before you move on to forms and more complicated stuff.

 

In the martial arts, you also have the opportunity to attend many classes during the week, and then you train with other students at your level and above.

 

Typical golf instruction involves about 5 beginner group lessons, and then you are off and running. If you have some ability, you can get to a certain level, and then maybe you will seek out private golf instruction, which tends to be about the same cost for one hour as you'll pay to attend martial arts classes for a whole month.

 

So, if you want to improve over the long run, you need a better process for learning. It's not so much about setting goals and such. You just have to work on the right things at whatever level you happen to be.

 

I think one of the big issues in the world of golf instruction is student expectation. When I first got into teaching, a couple top instructors gave me the same advice...to keep a student coming back, you need to get them to experience some sort of improvement during each lesson.

 

In other words, the focus was always on the short-term, kinda like when a company reports its earnings each quarter. If they miss estimates, investors dump the stock.

 

I'll never forget one of the first lessons I ever gave. A student came to me for a lesson, and he had a horrible swing...way too many moving parts. So, I just worked on trying to simplify things a bit.

 

After about 30 minutes he says "don't you have some sort of quick fix? I have a tournament on Saturday." I said "Nope, not for that swing."

 

And, there it is.

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Just thought I'd chime in with my two cents. I think the real reason most golfers don't improve is that they don't have a good process where they build a foundation and move on from there.

 

I equate golf to the martial arts quite a bit, since I've been a student of both. Martial arts instruction tends to be much different. Rarely one on one, so everyone is taught the same. You start with very basic stances, punches, kicks and blocks before you move on to forms and more complicated stuff.

 

In the martial arts, you also have the opportunity to attend many classes during the week, and then you train with other students at your level and above.

 

Typical golf instruction involves about 5 beginner group lessons, and then you are off and running. If you have some ability, you can get to a certain level, and then maybe you will seek out private golf instruction, which tends to be about the same cost for one hour as you'll pay to attend martial arts classes for a whole month.

 

So, if you want to improve over the long run, you need a better process for learning. It's not so much about setting goals and such. You just have to work on the right things at whatever level you happen to be.

 

I think one of the big issues in the world of golf instruction is student expectation. When I first got into teaching, a couple top instructors gave me the same advice...to keep a student coming back, you need to get them to experience some sort of improvement during each lesson.

 

In other words, the focus was always on the short-term, kinda like when a company reports its earnings each quarter. If they miss estimates, investors dump the stock.

 

I'll never forget one of the first lessons I ever gave. A student came to me for a lesson, and he had a horrible swing...way too many moving parts. So, I just worked on trying to simplify things a bit.

 

After about 30 minutes he says "don't you have some sort of quick fix? I have a tournament on Saturday." I said "Nope, not for that swing."

 

And, there it is.

 

Great post man!!!! I tend to compare golf and piano...but Martial Arts comparison is REALLY GOOD! Stay in the "now"....don't get ahead. WELL DONE!

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Yeah I wish I had the luxury of on course practice. Closest I get is simulator, but it's not really that good since it's not a real environment but it makes it easier to set skill games and multi ball.

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Yet another interesting read. Thank you for sharing.

 

i saw a thing on youtube where Alex Noren plays two ball worse ball and I think that is the closet to "optimal practice" I have come up with..... U also have to make both puts at the end. like say u have a five footer. if u miss one then it doesn't count as made.

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