Surrey golfer and mental coach, David MacKenzie, gives us his best mental tips for the 2022 golf season

STATE OF MIND

Surrey golfer and mental coach, David MacKenzie, gives us his best mental tips to make the 2022 golf season your best yet.

Jack Nicklaus once said that “golf is 90% mental and 10% luck”. If this is anywhere close to being true, why is it that so few golfers spend time training the mental game? Most golfers only train the technical and fail to take advantage of training their mental skills to help them perform better. Let’s take a look at some simple ways to change this:

PRACTICE YOUR PRE-SHOT ROUTINE

Where you put your attention during those valuable seconds before you start your swing has a huge effect on how well you execute the shot. I often speak to golfers at driving ranges and ask them what they are working on. 99% of them will tell me that they are working on their swing, Hardly any will tell me that they are training their attention and working on skills such as visualisation, commitment or consistency of their preshot routine which is just as important.

HAVE AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE

We all want to play well and shoot a good score. But the harder we try, the harder it becomes to do. In order to create the freedom needed for you to focus, relax and swing freely, you’ll have to find ways to take pressure away and shift your perspective. What do you value most about your next round? If it’s only about shooting a good score, it will add pressure.

A better goal for your rounds is to focus on gratitude and learning. Decide to appreciate everything the game gives you such as being outdoors, natural beauty, time with friends, a good walk, etc. If you can do this, you’ll benefit from the powerful emotion of gratitude which will improve your mood and make the inevitable misses easier to deal with.

CHOOSE YOUR RESPONSES

Golf is never easy – we all hit bad shots – it’s how you respond to them makes all the difference. Do you ever think about your post-shot routine? Without it, you’ll be left to your reactions, which can trigger negative thoughts and lower confidence. Try smiling or counting to 10 to diffuse the feelings you have after a bad shot or 3 putt.

TRAIN FOR PRESSURE

We all feel a higher state of arousal when we are playing, compared to practice. If we know this to be true, we should spend time getting ‘more comfortable being uncomfortable’. To do this, try ‘competitive practice’. Use your imagination to create challenging scenarios that you could be faced with in your rounds, like your first tee shot and test the strength of your mental game. Play games that require you to beat a certain score or there is a consequence, just like there is on the course. By doing so, you’ll raise your heart rate and simulate the feelings you have on the course.

BECOME AN OPTIMIST

Optimism is synonymous with mental toughness, which is the ability to be able to see positives and solutions for difficult situations. But this isn’t easy, as the mind tends to be naturally pessimistic. You can make optimism more of your default by journaling after your rounds. Spend 5-10 minutes to write down all the positives – your best shots and aspects of your game that were strong. Write down as many as you can think of. Then write down one thing you learned about yourself, that you will work on.

Try these techniques to train your mental game this season and I’m confident you’ll shoot lower scores.

David MacKenzie is a mental coach and resides in Washington DC, but is originally from Godalming, Surrey. You can find out more about him and his coaching at www.golfstateofmind.com

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