You probably recognise the scenario. You are on the 18^th green and you have a 4 foot putt for the match. You have holed putts like this many times before in practice, but as you step over the shot, your nerves start to kick in and your hands start to shake. The hole seems to be getting smaller and smaller and you are starting to wonder if you are reading the borrow correctly. These doubts take over your mind with the inevitable result that you pull the putt and you miss!

Tiger Woods has said "The biggest thing is to have the mind-set and the belief you can win every tournament going on. A lot of guys don't have that; Nicklaus had it, he felt he was going to beat everybody."

The importance of mental skills is often overlooked by most golfers. If you think that mental techniques are only important for elite players then think again! The margins of golf excellence are small and getting control of your mind can have a huge impact. It could be the difference between you being a good golfer and a great golfer, or it could turn golf from a frustrating game where you never achieve what you want into one that is far more enjoyable and fulfilling.    

There is no more intense mind game than golf. You have the time when you are preparing to make your shot to think about what you are going to do and what could go wrong! Then there is the time between shots, when all you can think about is how badly you played your last iron!

A common phrase I have heard from many golfers is, "When I am playing well I think about nothing, when I am playing badly I think about everything!"

Wouldn't it be fantastic to have control over your mind so that it worked for you and not against you, so you could be the best golfer you could possibly be?

Psychology has shown us all the impact of the mind on sporting performance and the problems our mind can cause if it is working against us. Mental skills coaching can help fix these problems by teaching you how to change the way you think, giving you the tools to achieve your goal, whether it be to win The Open or just to break 90 on a regular basis. 

Mental skills coaching could help you in many ways including:

-         Building consistency - by having more control over your mind you will achieve better rounds on a more consistent basis.

-         Improving concentration - by being more focused on your game and not on what is happening around you, will mean that you achieve better results and will be mentally fresh throughout your round.

-         Building self confidence - mental skills will allow you to have more self belief and enable you to take your game to the next level.

-         Handling nerves and anxiety - by dealing with stress so that these do not affect your performance.

-         Dealing with adversity - ensuring that your whole round is not ruined by one bad shot.

Simple techniques like learning how to stay relaxed on the course and thinking positively can in themselves play an enormous part in improving your game. The mind cannot process a negative so if you constantly say to yourself, "I mustn't hook it to the left, I mustn't hook it to the left," you will almost certainly hook it to the left! By stating your objectives positively, such as "I want to hit this straight and between the trees" you dramatically increase your chances of doing just that. It is all about understanding how your brain works and how you can get the best out of it. Using a mental skills coach to understand more about how you can take control of your brain could transform your golf game and your enjoyment of the sport. It could also help you in all aspects of your life as you learn how to take control of yourself and your emotions.

Top golfers realise that they need to work as hard on the mental side of golf as they do on the technical side. It requires practice and you need to include it in your normal training schedule and work as hard on your mind as you do on your swing.

"I'm about 5 inches from being an outstanding golfer. That's the distance my left ear is from my right." - Ben Crenshaw.  

Peter Blake

Mental Skills Coach

 

PB Coaching & Training Limited registered in England number 06723709