It’s a problem that probably dates back to nearly the beginnings of the game.

How to take your swing that you use on the range and put it to use just as successfully on the course? This might seem like it should be a pretty easy task, but any experienced golfer knows that it’s far from simple. Plenty of golfers find that they can hit solid shots on the range time after time, only to head out onto the course and immediately run into trouble. If this sounds like a problem you are having in your game, don’t worry – you’re not alone, and there is hope to improve on this frustrating struggle.

In this article, we would like to help you tackle the problem that is making your way from the range to the course without any loss in performance. It’s not going to be easy to get over this hurdle, so you need to know right from the start that you are in for a challenge. You’ll need to be willing to change some of your thinking both during practice and while playing rounds, and you’ll need to pay more attention to detail than you have in the past. If you are willing to adapt yourself to the demands of the game, you should find that you can gradually improve the way you play on the links.

All of the content below is based on a right-handed golfer. If you happen to play left-handed, please take a moment to reverse the directions as necessary.

Do You Really Have a Problem?

It is true that many golfers struggle to play at the same level on the course as they do on the range. It’s also true that many golfers tend to think they are performing better on the range than they actually are. In some cases, the only difference between the range and the course is the perception of the player, not the actual swings or the shots that are produced. So, the first step in this process is to confirm that you are actually dealing with a loss of quality as you transition from range to course.

Let’s look at a few key points which may help you determine if this is truly a problem that needs to be addressed.

Pick specific targets on the range. Most driving ranges are wide – far wider than any fairway, and certainly wider than any green. With that in mind, you may be sending the ball down the range and feeling good about your swing – only because you aren’t paying close enough attention to your performance. If you aren’t really aiming, and instead are just swinging away, you’ll never know if you are actually hitting quality shots. One of the best things you can do for the improvement of your golf game is to pick out a specific target for each and every swing you make. That means swings on the range as well as swings on the course. That way, you can always evaluate your performance by comparing the final location of the ball with the original target. Committing to picking out a specific target for each shot on the range will mean that your practice session will move along more slowly – and that’s a good thing. Golf is a slow game, and rushing through practice really isn’t going to help you play well on the course. For each shot, pick a club, pick a target, and then make a swing. That’s how the process works on the course, and it is how it should work on the range, as well. Once you’ve gotten into the habit of picking targets on the range, you may find that you aren’t actually swinging that well in practice, either. If you miss your targets at a similar rate during practice as on the course, you don’t really need to work on making the transition better – you just need to work on building a better swing.

Ignore distance. One of the classic mistakes that many amateur golfers make is attempting to use the driving range as some kind of gauge for their distance capabilities. Quite simply, this is a waste of time, and is almost always going to be misleading. There are a couple big problems with trying to judge your distances on the range. First, the golf balls you are hitting are not the same kinds of balls that you will use on the course. Often, range balls are flight-limited, which helps keep the balls on the range so they can be picked up and used again. Even if your range doesn’t use flight limited balls, it’s still likely they are not using a ball with the same kind of construction as the ball you choose to play during your rounds. Therefore, you can’t really compare distances, and you should ignore how far you are hitting your range shots. Also, range balls are hit over and over again, potentially thousands of times before they are retired. That means they are going to be worn down, and their dimples will gradually flatten out. This is another issue that can impact distance, further casting doubt on the results you are seeing. In the end, the best thing you can do is forget about how far you hit the ball on the range. The driving range is great for working on many parts of your game, but it does not serve much purpose when it comes to figuring out how far you can hit the ball. If you come away from the range thinking that you hit the ball a certain distance, only to hit it a different distance on the course, you may believe something in your swing changed during the round. That may not be the case at all – it may be that it was the change in golf balls that led to the discrepancy.

Avoid firing away. With a bucket of range balls in front of you and a nice spot to hit from, you might be tempted to take your favorite club from your bag – likely the driver – and swing away in rapid succession. This type of practice is common among the amateur set, but it doesn’t actually do much good. The issue is that you never get to hit your driver, or any club, over and over again in quick succession on the course. If you hit 10 driver shots in a row within just a couple of minutes, you may manage to work yourself into a rhythm by the last couple shots. But so what? You’ll never have that same chance when playing a round of golf. Instead, you need to learn how to hit your driver well from the first swing, without any second chances. Even if you hit your driver 10 times during the course of a round, those shots will be spread out over four hours or more. So, if you think that you’ve been hitting your driver well on the range but not on the course, think about how you are practicing. If you are hitting a number of drivers in a row before you get good results, that is a sign you’ll probably struggle on the course.

As you can see, there is a lot to consider here. It’s entirely possible – maybe even likely – that your game really isn’t changing from the range to the course. Instead, the way you are playing the game is changing, and the way you are evaluating your performance is changing, as well. Instead of aiming for a big target – the entire range – you are now aiming at a specific fairway or flag. Also, you only get one chance at each shot, which is not the case on the range. Before you work on figuring out how to take your range game to the course, make sure to confirm that your range game is actually better than what you usually produce during a round.

Improving Your Practice Habits

For the remainder of the article, we are going to make the assumption that you are actually having trouble translating your game from the range to the course. Going on that assumption, we are going to get started by talking about how you can form some improved practice habits. If you improve the quality of your practice, there is a good chance you’ll wind up improving your performance on the course, as well.

More time, fewer shots. This is something we alluded to in the previous section, but it needs a bit more discussion here. Your overall idea when practicing should be to take plenty of time to hit a relatively low number of shots. In other words, you should not be judging the quality of your practice by how many shots you manage to fire off before you run out of time and need to leave. Let’s work through an example of how this works. Imagine you are heading to your local golf facility to work on your game, and you have one hour available. One option would be to buy the biggest bucket of golf balls offered at the range and spend the whole hour hitting them as quickly as possible. Another, better, option would be to purchase fewer golf balls and divide up your time. You could spend a half hour methodically hitting the balls while paying attention to detail, and you could spend the other half hour working on your short game. The golfer who chooses this second style of practice is almost certainly going to make more progress, and he or she will be more likely to have their hard work pay off on the course.

Add variety. One of the best things about the game of golf, and one of the things which keeps players coming back time after time, is the fact that there is so much variety to be enjoyed on the course. Even if you play the same course day after day, you’ll constantly be finding new angles and new challenges based on the conditions, where your ball ends up, etc. Of course, if you are going to play well, you need to have a variety of shots at your disposal, in order to meet the challenge that comes with the various on-course situations you’ll face. So, if you need to be creative and have variety on the course, you will also need to work on that variety in practice. Rather than just trying to hit the same type of shot over and over again – which is something that many golfers do – work on building variety into your practice sessions. For instance, if you usually hit a draw, spend at least a few shots each session trying to hit a fade. Or, if you typically hit a high ball, work on bringing the ball down lower on a few swings. Not only will adding variety to your practice make you more course-ready, it should also make those range sessions far more enjoyable and interesting.

Use a pre-shot routine. Hopefully, you are already using a pre-shot routine on the golf course. If so, it would be smart to bring that routine to the practice range, in order to make your practice experience more similar to what you are doing on the course. Before each shot you hit on the range, stand a few feet back from the ball and go through your routine. Then, walk up to the ball, take your stance carefully, and hit the shot. By repeating this process over and over again, your routine will become second nature and you will be able to execute it easily on the course without consciously thinking about it.

It should be no surprise that good practice habits are closely related to positive outcomes on the course. When you practice well, you should play well. It’s easy to fall into bad habits on the range, so take some time to think about your usual practice pattern and make any changes that you deem necessary.

The Mental Side

It’s important to prepare yourself physically with good practice habits to make the transition from the range to the course. However, it might be even more important to prepare yourself mentally for the challenge that you’ll face once you head to the first tee. Having your mind in the right place is not always easy to accomplish, but it is going to play a vital role in lowering your scores. If you continue to be plagued by the inability to take your range game to the course, consider the possibility that it is your mental game which is holding you back.

To improve the way you approach your rounds of golf from a mental perspective, take the following tips under consideration.

Don’t set too many expectations. One of the commonly seen errors made in the amateur game – from a mental perspective, at least – is to set high expectations on each and every round of golf. For example, if you are a player with a career-best score of 85, you should not set out for every round thinking that you are going to break 80. Could it happen? Sure. Should you try and make it happen? Of course. But if you set that as your expectation, you are going to put pressure on yourself, and you’ll likely get frustrated when things go off track. Instead of thinking about a specific score, make it your goal to produce quality swings time after time. Focus on each individual shot and trust your score to take care of itself at the end of the day.

The battle to slow down. At its core, golf is a slow game. Most 18-hole rounds take at least four hours to complete, and you usually only hit one shot every few minutes (with the exception of your putts). With that in mind, it is interesting that so many golfers seem to rush when it is their turn to make a swing. You don’t want to rush, as that will disrupt the timing of your swing, but you don’t want to take too long and slow down the pace of play, either. One of the most valuable skills you can possess as a golfer is the ability to find a good rhythm and carry that rhythm throughout the day. If you find yourself rushing through your swings, consider adding a deep breath to your pre-shot routine to slow yourself down a bit. Even something as simple as a deep breath could go a long way toward improving your performance on the course.

Block out the distractions. This one is going to be tough. As a golfer, you encounter plenty of distractions during the average round. Maybe the course you are playing is near a major road, and there are cars frequently driving by as you swing. Or, maybe your playing partners are a bit too chatty while you are trying to focus on your shot. Whatever the case, you’ll need to learn how to block out distractions while focusing on what it is that you need to do in order to succeed. You’ll never be able to completely eliminate the distractions that occur on the course, as many of them are out of your control, so the best plan is to work on strengthening your focus so you can ignore them and get on with the task at hand.

Most golfers think that it’s the physical side of the game which presents the greatest challenge, but that is not necessarily the case. Sometimes, it is what happens between your ears that is going to have the biggest impact on how you perform. If you can manage to make smart decisions, remain patient, and stay focused on each shot, you’ll position yourself for far better outcomes.

Getting Ready for a Round

If you are like most other golfers, you prefer to hit at least a few balls on the range before walking to the first tee. There is certainly nothing wrong with that habit, but you need to make sure you are preparing for the round properly. If you go about your pre-round warmup in the wrong way, you’ll be doing more harm than good.

The first thing you need to understand here is that this is not a practice session. You should not be working on your swing technique, since it’s much too late to make any meaningful changes. With a round about to begin, you don’t want to be attempting to make any alterations to your swing style. Instead, all you should be doing at this point is getting your body warmed up while looking for a good rhythm. If you can get into a good tempo before starting your round, you should have a great chance to start well from the very first shot.

The other point to consider here is fatigue. We usually don’t associate golf with fatigue, as this is far from the most physically demanding sport you can play. However, if you fire through a large bucket of range balls before your round even starts, you might find yourself getting tired late in the day. Remember, those range shots aren’t going to count on the scorecard, so don’t waste too much energy here. It’s a good idea to get warmed up, but be sure to reserve plenty of energy for the shots to be hit on the course.

It can be frustrating to feel like you are coming up short of your potential by playing at a lower level on the course than you do on the range. Don’t give up on yourself if you feel that is the case, however, as there are steps you can take to narrow the performance gap between these two locations. We hope the information offered in this article has been helpful, but the rest is up to you. You’ll need to get down to work on improving the way you practice on the range, as well as improving how you think on the course. Good luck!

Now, I’m sure we’ve all encountered those frustrating days where you go to the driving range or the practice ground before your round and you’re hitting the ball really nicely, really sweet and you just can’t wait to get out in the golf course, and then it just never materializes. You’ve left all of your good shots on the driving range. Nothing on the golf course went your way and you just can’t fathom out how was I playing so well 20 minutes ago, got to the first tee and my range game just deserted me. So here’s a few tips to try and make you feel like you can take your range game onto the golf course more regularly.

Now, the first thing is to actually make the driving range a bit more like the golf course. So, we often see this situation where the golfer is on the driving range, basket of golf ball and he’s doing what I call “raking and beating.” He’s raking the ball out the basket and beating it down there. Raking the ball out and–some people don’t even let go of the club–raking and beating and that just isn’t realistic to what you do on the golf course. So, get your basket of golf balls, shift them away from the mat. The first thing you have to do then is you have to leave the mat to go and get a golf ball, and that will set you into a little bit more of a rhythm, maybe the rhythm that is more associated to how you would play on the golf course. So after each ball, I now need to leave my position, pick another ball up, settle, and then I can set up again and I can set up again and hit the shot again. And that’s much more like the rhythm I might be getting into on the golf course.

The other thing then would be to target areas a little bit more realistically like you would do on the golf course. So, pick out a fairway; a realistic whiff, maybe even pitch of the fairway on the first hole that you’re going to play out in front of you and then take the appropriate club to hit that first tee shot. Then, look at a nice target green. Maybe this would be the second shot that you would be hitting into the green. Pick out that target distance; use the appropriate club to knock it into that distance. Then, maybe have a few little chip shots, a few pit shots. Imagine the shot you might be pitching on the golf course. So, imagine the bunker in front of you and how that would be. Because we tend to find on the driving range, the range is quite easy, it’s not really that critical of your bad shots. If you miss it, it just lands over there towards the edge of the range; it never actually lands in the trees. So, picture a target area that actually represents a bit more like it would do on the golf course.

The other thing then I think that is beneficial is go through your entire bag, maybe even sort of pitch a play in the round. So, I would tee off with my driver, I would then hit a seven iron up towards the green then hit a little cheap shot, then if there’s room to do so a couple of pots at the back of the bay, then go back to the driver and tee off on the second hole. And that’s taking the golf course to the driving range rather than taking the driving range to the golf course. And if you practice like that on a regular basis, I’m sure you’ll feel like those days when you’ve hit the ball brilliantly on the range and not so on the golf course, those days will become few and far between. I hope that works for you.