Mental Golf Coaching

[chouse12]

I’m a competitive amateur golfer and looking to take my game to the next level. I’d love to start working with a mental golf coach/psychologist.
 

Does anyone have any recommended mental golf coaches/psychologists? Separately, can anyone share any benchmarks for how much a mental golf coach/psychologists cost?
 

I’d probably be looking to meet 1-2 times a month (maybe 1-1.5 hours per month), email/text as needed, and possibly an ad hoc 30 minute follow up after tournaments. Not sure how reasonable that all might be or how coaches structure their services, but would love to hear any insight.

[otto6457]

I worked with Dr. Marc Lochbaum for a few seasons back in 2009-2011.  Obviously the pricing has changed since then but most mental coaches operate similarly.  

 

I met with Marc initially to try and find a better way to deal with my poor performances in bigger tournaments.  I won't go into my multiple failures, just suffice to say I was getting ready to walk away from the game entirely.  

 

So after our initial meeting Marc agreed to take me on as a client.  I was set up on a twice monthly coaching sessions with additional sessions as needed for tournament prep.  I usually had one monthly office visit and one on course session.  My office visits included quite a few mental tasks and tests, as well as lots of discussions about my relationship with competitive golf.  (hint.....it wasn't healthy)  Usually my on course session was a practice round where he basically followed me and we worked on my decision making, and tightened up my pre-shot, post shot routines, as well as pre-round and post round routines.  I did have Marc follow me for a U.S. Mid-Am qualifier which was quite revealing.  I was a head case without a doubt.

 

I hope others with more recent experience hop in and share.  I do know that many mental coaches now do a lot of their work online with students which should make the rates more affordable. 

 

I will add that I feel like the money I spent was worth every penny.  I'm not going to claim that it solved all my performance problems with golf.  But I became a different person on the course and a much better and happier person off the course. 

 

Good luck   

 

 

[chouse12]

Thanks so much for sharing! Will send you a PM with some follow ups

 

Curious to hear if anyone else has any thoughts here too. I’ve been thinking I’d probably lean towards a remote option to expand the pool of coaches available but in person probably provides some nice benefits with the on course observation.

[naval2006]

One of the kids at my home course is doing remote sessions with a sport psychologist.  I don't know exactly how they get organized but he told me he has sessions plus activities to complete on the course and driving range so that later they discuss the feedback.  

 

I'm sure a mental coach is of great help to improve.  Most golfers get stuck sooner or later and we tend to just keep afloat.  OP's idea is a real booster for competition.