April 30, 2016

Game Day Strategy: GSS 30 Day Challenge

22 minutes

This is the last week of the challenge and we're going to be

covering what we can do the day of our round to best prepare

ourselves for success.

Our first practice session has to do with determining what our

shot pattern for the day will be. This is important because

we don't want to be working on our swing while we're playing.

You have to work with the shot pattern that you have that

day.

Practice #1: DETERMINING OUR SHOT

PATTERN

Once arriving at the driving range we have to build our practice

station. Place an alignment rod along your intended foot

line, parallel to your target line. To make the station

even more effective, place another rod, perpendicular to the first

to form a T. This rod will represent your ball position.

You can do this with club if you like or you can use alignment

rods. These are the ones I have. There

are three rubber grommets on one of the rods - two for foot

position one for ball position, so then you won't need the extra

rod forming a T.

This station is important because it will ensure that you

consistently align yourself in a similar position during every

portion of the upcoming exercise.

Now that the practice station is in place, let’s get to

work.

5 Ball Iron Test

Using your practice station as a guide take out your PW and hit

5 balls at the same target.

***I know I don't normally

advocate for repeatedly using the same target, but what we're

trying to do is find a pattern, and realistically most people won't

continually reset their practice station every time. So for

that reason we will work in blocks of 5 shots per

target.***

DO NOT hit these shots rapid fire, this is still a no rake and fire

zone. Stand behind the golf ball before every

shot and complete your pre-shot routine.

Repeat this 5 ball exercise with your 6, 7, 8, and 9 iron only

changing targets when you change clubs. When you change

targets please make the necessary adjustments to your practice

station.

The Driver

Now it’s time to bring out everyone's favorite weapon, the

driver. First I need you to visualize a fairway out on the

driving range. Clearly choosing targets that represent the

left and right most edges of the fairway. Now hit 10

shots at this fairway. Don’t forget to take your time and go

through that pre-shot routine before every swing.

Keep track of your shot pattern while you're completing this

exercise. This will tell you what pattern to play throughout

your round that day. Just like Vegas, I want you to play

the odds. When push comes to shove I want you to play

the shot shape that you had from this exercise and don't try to fix

it today.

Practice #2: How to shoot the score you

want

One of the best pieces of advice ever to come through the

podcast was from PGA instructor George Roy, and it dealt with how

to stay in the moment and not get overwhelmed by your score,

whether it's good or bad.

George's advice was to create smaller goals that keep you

focused on the task at hand, rather than looking too far down the

road ahead.

Here's what you

do:

Set goals for the specific number fairways, greens you will hit

from those fairways, and the number of up & downs you will make

from the greens you missed. Here's an example from

George:

Hit 50% of your fairways = 7

Hit 60% of the greens (from the 50% of the fairways) = 4 (two

putt pars)

Get up & down 70% of the time from the greens you've

missed = 9

Add that all up and it equals 13 pars and 5 “others”. Assuming

you can keep those “others” to bogeys you’ll be on a roll!

This does assume you two putt every hole (Yes, I realize

how big of an assumption that is but this is for the sake of easy

math we'll let it fly) you would shoot +5 over 18 holes.

You might wonder

why shouldn't I pick a number?

There's two big

reasons: pressure & limitations.

Picking a specific number adds pressure as you progress through

your round. Your subconscious golf mind will be aware of your

position in relation to that score. If you get behind the pace

needed to achieve that number, the pressure can mount quickly.

Pressure leads to stress, stress often leads to tension, and

everyone knows that tension leads to poor performance. (Insert your

Star Wars dark side joke here) Even if you have successfully let go

of all those issues you still are more likely to take overly

aggressive risks that could lead to even more disastrous outcomes.

(IE: going for sucker pins)

Even if you’re doing great and you manage to stay ahead of the

pace needed to achieve that goal, you’re more likely to rest on

your laurels down the stretch. If my goal is to shoot par and I’m

two under at the turn, it’s really easy for me to mentally take my

foot off of the gas pedal and say “I can afford to shoot +2 on the

back”. All of a sudden after the round is done I’m looking at

missed opportunities that could’ve lead to a FANTASTIC round. My

goal was even par or BETTER, not to just

settle for even par and forgo anything surpassing that.

Practice #3: Following your A.V.E.nue to

success.

There's three things that pros do drastically more often than

the amateur golfer that leads to their mental success. They

Analyze, Visualize, and Execute every shot. What do I

mean?

Analyze

This is the step that most people do pretty well at.

Analyzing is taking in your surroundings and deciding what

will affect the shot. Wind on an approach shot, break on a

green, cold temps that shorten ball flight, etc.

Visualize

Here is where people start to have difficulties.

Visualizing is a commonly skipped step that most people have

trouble with or skip altogether. If you don't know how to

visualize your shot, verbally describe what your're trying to do.

Talk out exactly where you want the ball to land and how it

would release.

Execute

This is where people REALLY struggle. By execute, I mean

staying committed to your shot. This is exactly what we

talked about with the Think Box/Play box drill. Whatever

decision you made in that Think Box you have to stay committed to

it. Staying committed to your shot is absolutely vital to

consistently hitting the shots your want and

therefore, executing your plan.

This is something that we're going to track too.

Every hole I want you to look at each shot and give

yourself a point if you analyzed properly, give yourself a point if

you visualized, and give yourself a point if you executed. So

if you had a 5 on a hole and you did all of your analysis correctly

then you get 5 analysis points, f you properly visualized you

would get 5 visualization points, and if you stayed committed to

every shot then you would get 5 execution points. Here's

a spreadsheet a downloadable spreadsheet to help you track your

progress.

That's all we have for this fourth and final week of our

30 day challenge. Remember to share your results through the

Facebook Group.

There will be a short survey coming out sometime soon just

asking what you thought of the 30 Day Challenge. This is the

first iteration after all and I'd like to keep it rolling forward

and improving. As always, I'll see you in the short

grass.

Cheers!

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By Marty Griffin

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