Golf In The Zone, How Can I Stay In It On The Course? (Video) - by Natalie Adams
Golf In The Zone, How Can I Stay In It On The Course? (Video) - by Natalie Adams

How can I stay in the zone on the golf course? Well the zone is just really an area of the player being in peak performance. They are completely at one with their golf swing and the zone is where you perform to your best. But there are certain traits and characteristics of being in the zone that we can replicate to help you stay in the zone. You can't force yourself to be in the zone but we can do things to try to induce it to happen. So the zone is really just peak performance, it’s you playing at your best more of the time and if we can replicate that to happen you're going to be a much consistent golfer.

And one way we can induce it to happen is to get you to have a really good pre-shot routine and during the pre shot routine to move through three different zones. So I'm going to represent these with alignment poles, just placed on the floor and the three zones we’re going to move through here are first of all the zone furthest away from the ball is your thinking zone. Then we move into our feel zone and then finally we move into the play zone. And as we’re moving through these zones your focus is becoming more concentrated on the task at hand which is to hit the ball from this position to where you want it to go. So when you're in thinking zone, that’s exactly what you're doing, you're thinking what shot am I going to play, and how am I going to do, which club am I going to use. So first of all look at the yardage, look at the wind, look at the lie you’ve got, look at any slopes that you feel are relevant to shot and get a feel for how far you want the ball to travel then pick the club that you feel is most appropriate for that shot. Once you’ve picked the club then stand and get a really good mental picture, loads of detail about what’s actually going on out there and what you see and then paint a line on that picture from the ball to where you want to hit the ball to, to the target and that’s what we’ve got to start focusing down on to now as we move through the other two zones. We’ve already made the decisions, we’ve looked if there's any hazard, we’ve considered the risk reward, the yardage we’ve got the club and we’ve decided right this is the shot ultimately that I want to play. Now we’re going to step forward into the field zone and that’s exactly what we’re going to do in this zone, we’re going to have our practice swing and get a feel for the shot that we want to play. And once we’re happy, we’ve got the feel of that shot, we’re now going to re-look at the target and focus on that target line again back down to the ball. We’re going to pick out a spot just one to two feet in front of the target line so we can aim the club face up but all we’re focusing on now is that target line and hitting the ball down that target line to the target. So now were going to walk into our play zone, we’re going to set the club face to the line we want to hit the ball down, we’re going to set our feet up and we’re not going to think now, were just going to react and let the club swing so the ball gets hit down that target line. If you can focus on the target line and on the picture you see out there so you're really playing the shot from the memory of what you know is out there, you will see that once you’re experiencing that you feel very calm, very relaxed, very confident and that’s the feeling of being in the zone, somehow you just know you're going to hit a good shot without over controlling it and you’ll let yourself go and react to that memory and hit a good shot. And that’s how to help yourself stay in the zone when you're out on the golf course. 2014-07-29

How can I stay in the zone on the golf course? Well the zone is just really an area of the player being in peak performance. They are completely at one with their golf swing and the zone is where you perform to your best. But there are certain traits and characteristics of being in the zone that we can replicate to help you stay in the zone. You can't force yourself to be in the zone but we can do things to try to induce it to happen. So the zone is really just peak performance, it’s you playing at your best more of the time and if we can replicate that to happen you're going to be a much consistent golfer.

And one way we can induce it to happen is to get you to have a really good pre-shot routine and during the pre shot routine to move through three different zones. So I'm going to represent these with alignment poles, just placed on the floor and the three zones we’re going to move through here are first of all the zone furthest away from the ball is your thinking zone. Then we move into our feel zone and then finally we move into the play zone. And as we’re moving through these zones your focus is becoming more concentrated on the task at hand which is to hit the ball from this position to where you want it to go. So when you're in thinking zone, that’s exactly what you're doing, you're thinking what shot am I going to play, and how am I going to do, which club am I going to use.

So first of all look at the yardage, look at the wind, look at the lie you’ve got, look at any slopes that you feel are relevant to shot and get a feel for how far you want the ball to travel then pick the club that you feel is most appropriate for that shot. Once you’ve picked the club then stand and get a really good mental picture, loads of detail about what’s actually going on out there and what you see and then paint a line on that picture from the ball to where you want to hit the ball to, to the target and that’s what we’ve got to start focusing down on to now as we move through the other two zones. We’ve already made the decisions, we’ve looked if there's any hazard, we’ve considered the risk reward, the yardage we’ve got the club and we’ve decided right this is the shot ultimately that I want to play.

Now we’re going to step forward into the field zone and that’s exactly what we’re going to do in this zone, we’re going to have our practice swing and get a feel for the shot that we want to play. And once we’re happy, we’ve got the feel of that shot, we’re now going to re-look at the target and focus on that target line again back down to the ball. We’re going to pick out a spot just one to two feet in front of the target line so we can aim the club face up but all we’re focusing on now is that target line and hitting the ball down that target line to the target. So now were going to walk into our play zone, we’re going to set the club face to the line we want to hit the ball down, we’re going to set our feet up and we’re not going to think now, were just going to react and let the club swing so the ball gets hit down that target line.

If you can focus on the target line and on the picture you see out there so you're really playing the shot from the memory of what you know is out there, you will see that once you’re experiencing that you feel very calm, very relaxed, very confident and that’s the feeling of being in the zone, somehow you just know you're going to hit a good shot without over controlling it and you’ll let yourself go and react to that memory and hit a good shot. And that’s how to help yourself stay in the zone when you're out on the golf course.