Mental Golf Minute – Pre Shot Routine

Anyone who has played this game at any level has been nervous. It could be when you had a chance to beat your dad for the first time, or lining up a 3 footer for $20 against your buddies, or on the first tee of the club championship.

Either way, every golfer has experienced self-doubt. When my old college golf coach told me golf was 90% mental and 10%mental, I think what he really meant was that the battle that goes in onside one’s head during a round is far more difficult to manage than the one you will face on the course. We see it on the PGA Tour every week. Lets face it, at the highest level of the game everyone hits it good. I beleive what separates the good from the great is how they manage the mental game.

By now most of us know about Tiger’s father grooming him to be mentally strong by constantly distracting him and talking to him on the course. One day, Tiger reacted to a verbal taunt by smiling and hitting a great shot, and Earl Woods knew at that point that Tiger would be a champion. He knew then that he was mentally strong enough to handle the pressure of tournament golf.

Any first year college psychology student can probably describe three of the major conflicts in life – Man vs Man, Man vs. Nature, and Man vs Himself. It just so happens that we must face all three in the game of golf, like many other sports. That’s why sports are such a big part of our lives. Sports provides a never ending challenge to humans to excel. Golfers face these challenges every time they tee it up.

We all battle the course and the elements, and we all want to beat our buddies, but the hardest obstacle to overcome in golf is our own self doubt and negative thoughts. So how can the average golfer handle the perceived pressure and mental challenges we all face on the golf course? One of the first ways to do this is with a solid, repeatable pre-shot routine.

You may already have a trigger move that you do before every shot and don’t even realise it. Many players wipe their grips, or toss grass, or even clean the grooves. Whatever you choose as yout trigger, let it be the starting point for your pre-shot routine to tell your mind that it’s time to get down to business.