Why do I often play poorly after a good warm up? (Video) - by Pete Styles
Why do I often play poorly after a good warm up? (Video) - by Pete Styles

How frustrating is it when you’ve been on the practice ground prior to a round of golf and you just stripe in the ball, just ripping it at the flag every target you want to weigh in for. You go out on the golf course and you can’t repeat it. You hit it all over the place and you think, “How did I leave such a good session there before I came onto the golf course and played so poorly”. One of the major issues that I see with golfers that often do this is that they don’t use the same routine on the golf course as they have on the driving range. So on the driving range they line up a load of golf balls across the mat and just one two three, hit them down there, maybe not even focused where they’re aiming.

Just hitting the ball, thinking, “Yeah, these are all fine, they’re all going up in the air.” Then on the golf course, things are a bit different. They are standing behind the ball, they are lining up where they need to go, they are taking three four practice swings, then they’re hitting the shell. Although they feel like they’re doing everything like they should be doing, they don’t hit the ball very well. The problem is they haven’t practiced doing everything like they should be doing. So next time you’re on the practice ground, you need to focus like you’re on the golf course. You need to choose the right club for a designed target. You need to make sure you have a couple of practice swings to that designated target. You need to make sure you setup looking at the target, go ahead make your wing, pop it down there. Then take a little break, maybe even change clubs like you would do on the golf course. Then come back in different targets, different practice stroke, pop it down there. Now the practice you’re doing there is improving your practice but most importantly it’s improving how you’re going to play next time you get on the golf course. So the results might now seem instantaneous but in the next weekend when you go and play, you’ll feel like you have rehearsed your own course stuff a lot more; rather than just bashing balls on the range and then being super focused on the golf course. And I think that’s a great way of trying to take a good range game, and turn into a good on course game. 2015-03-27

How frustrating is it when you’ve been on the practice ground prior to a round of golf and you just stripe in the ball, just ripping it at the flag every target you want to weigh in for. You go out on the golf course and you can’t repeat it. You hit it all over the place and you think, “How did I leave such a good session there before I came onto the golf course and played so poorly”. One of the major issues that I see with golfers that often do this is that they don’t use the same routine on the golf course as they have on the driving range. So on the driving range they line up a load of golf balls across the mat and just one two three, hit them down there, maybe not even focused where they’re aiming.

Just hitting the ball, thinking, “Yeah, these are all fine, they’re all going up in the air.” Then on the golf course, things are a bit different. They are standing behind the ball, they are lining up where they need to go, they are taking three four practice swings, then they’re hitting the shell. Although they feel like they’re doing everything like they should be doing, they don’t hit the ball very well. The problem is they haven’t practiced doing everything like they should be doing. So next time you’re on the practice ground, you need to focus like you’re on the golf course.

You need to choose the right club for a designed target. You need to make sure you have a couple of practice swings to that designated target. You need to make sure you setup looking at the target, go ahead make your wing, pop it down there. Then take a little break, maybe even change clubs like you would do on the golf course. Then come back in different targets, different practice stroke, pop it down there.

Now the practice you’re doing there is improving your practice but most importantly it’s improving how you’re going to play next time you get on the golf course. So the results might now seem instantaneous but in the next weekend when you go and play, you’ll feel like you have rehearsed your own course stuff a lot more; rather than just bashing balls on the range and then being super focused on the golf course. And I think that’s a great way of trying to take a good range game, and turn into a good on course game.