Golf Skill

There’s more to golfing skill than your swing and hitting the ball

Golfing skill includes course management, strategy, knowing your game, a good pre shot routine and knowing how to score.

Here are some of the things to consider when we look at golfing skill:

  • Play to your target, play through the ball.
  • It’s all in your pre shot routine.
  • Alignment is critical.
  • Play for accuracy not distance.
  • Keep the ball in play.
  • Play to the comfort of your game.
  • Know how to score.
  • Discover your natural golf swing
  • Be a tortoise not a hare, slow down.

Don’t hit the ball

It’s interesting when we consider that in the last twenty years golfing skill has placed so much emphasis on the technique of the golf swing and focusing on hitting the ball.

Sure you need to a build a golf swing you can replicate. You won’t do it by getting bogged down in technique.

PGA golf professionals mostly teach you to hit the ball. Yet when they play the basis for their golfing skill is focused on playing to a target not on hitting the ball.

They play through the ball to the target.

Which is more important, hitting the ball or where the ball lands?

It’s all in your pre shot routine

This is the heart and soul of golfing skill and good, consistent golf.

If you want to play consistent golf then you need to think and do things consistently.

Your pre shot routine starts from the moment you start looking at your target and making your decisions. Once your decisions are made then you need to relax and go through your physical routine of aligning to your target and set yourself up to play to that target.

Zero in on a small target

Golfing skill is about precision, if you really want to score. Align yourself to a precise line and target.
Your golfing skill rests on aligning everything to your target. Mind, body, skill and equipment.

This includes:

  • Your thinking – positive, on the target.
  • Your eyes and your peripheral vision – notice the target even over the ball.
  • Notice the ball, play to the target.
  • The club face, your feet and body.
  • Your breathing – breathe out through the ball to your target.

Learn to play accuracy first

Golf is a strategic game. You need to weigh up your skill level but even then you cannot get away from a simple fact. It’s all about accuracy and your ability to score.

So you can go for distance. The danger is you open yourself up for a much greater margin of error. You might hit a driver 300 plus metres. But if your percentage of getting the ball in play is low, you need to rethink your game.

I strongly suggest anyone with a handicap of 18 or more should put that driver away. Play smart, use your golfing skill on a par 4 and hit a 3 or 4 iron comfortably down the middle of the fairway and a 5 iron to the green.

This is preferable to playing for distance and hoping to hit your driver an extra 100 metres and a wedge to the green.

The difficulty is if you only manage this 3 out of 9 holes you are costing yourself valuable strokes.

Those 12 holes you are not in play could be costing you 12 or more strokes a round.

Golf is not a game of strength

Most people play golf like it is a game of strength. Golfing skill is about rhythm and timing, not strength.

Golfers who come from strength overplay off the tee because they get out the big driver and try to whack the cover off the ball.

It’s the macho thing of being able to hit the ball a long way off the tee. Problem is the ball more often than not goes off in all sorts of directions. Rather than great rhythm and timing it forces the ball.

It generally creates slices, hooks and mishits. Not to mention injury.

Then as players get closer to the green and the hole they get fearful and start to underplay. They get tentative. They either duff the shot, play short or get the yips through indecision.

Golfing skill is about playing smart.

It’s quite simple really, keep the ball in play

If you were asked to hit the ball to a target 10, 20 or 50 metres away you could easily do it. Get the ball in play and keep it there.

What would happen to your score if you simply kept the ball in play on every hole?

It really is quite simple. Keep the ball in play and you will lower your score.

Play to the comfort of your game

This includes getting to know your clubs and distances. It really means getting to know your game.

An important lesson here is you need to also know your comfort levels for a particular shot on the day. Play shots you feel good about.

Build flexibility into your shots

Seve Ballesteros says every new golfer should be given a putter and 5 iron for the first two years. They need to master those two clubs for every shot on the golf course.

Then add a 7 iron, 9 iron and wedges one at a time in that order. Once you have mastered those only then move up the clubs.

Seve knew what he was talking about. He knew what golfing skill was about.

This strategy will help you keep the ball in play and to focus on the most important part of your scoring game.

Putting and the short game.

Know how to score

You don’t score off the tee. The reality of golf is you score with your putting and short game. Putting is half your allowed par score.

This is where accuracy, precision and routine is what it is all about. This is your golfing skill really counts.

Once you pick a target and line, play it with precise thinking and confidence. Choose your target with precision.

Think about where you want the ball to land and what it will do where it lands. How will it roll and behave?

Treat a wedge shot, a bunker shot as if it was a putt. Go for the hole.

Anyone with a handicap of 12 or less should be going for the hole from 100 metres out.

Tap into your natural swing and rhythm

Relaxation, balance and rhythm. The foundation for a natural swing.

Most people work against themselves without ever realizing it. Totally focused on their swing technique or simply getting the shot over and done with. Not to mention those who might take their frustration out on the ball.

With the right rhythm and timing the club head moving through the ball will do the work for you. It will feel almost effortless. And, it will mostly go where you want it to go.

To tap into your natural swing, first learn to relax. You can do this through your breathing. Take three deep breaths as you focus on your target.

Get a good balance over the ball.

Your breathing is the secret to your natural swing. Most people hold their breath when they hit the ball.

This makes you tense, it weakens you and it freezes your rib cage and movement. You also lose flexibility and rotation.

So, relax. Free up your body, slow down and use your breathing to let your natural swing happen.

Inhale on the back swing and exhale on the downswing through the ball to the target. You’ll be amazed at the results.

Who would have thought breathing would be so important to your golfing skill?

Slow down

Take your time. Go through your routine. Check out the line. Make sure you have the line and distance.

Most golfers feel pressured to speed up on a golf course.

The more you speed up, the more shots you waste. This actually slows down play.

Have you noticed most golfers swing too fast. And, the more frustrated they get the faster they swing. Their golf goes downhill. They have no routine, rhythm or timing.

A great way to slow down is to take three deep breaths before a shot. To slow down to your swing, breathe through the shot.

Be a tortoise, you win your race. Like the tortoise, golfing skill is knowing what you want, having a rhythm, patience, discipline and going for your target with precision and accuracy.