(I was off to butcher my final round of a golf tournament, so I
didn’t have the time to complete the email on Sunday.)

Without much ado… here are the final 5 mistakes!

(6) Trying for too much out of trouble

When was the last time you thought you could make it through a
group of trees (or over, or under, or around) after a poorly placed tee
shot? You probably knew it was unlikely… but “what the hell, I’m gonna
do it anyway!”

I’d be willing to bet you hit your shot right into trouble,
only to take your next shot from under a different tree!

… yeah, it’s hard to shoot it sideways back into the fairway …
but try it for a round and see what happens to your score!

(7) Trying shots you have never practiced

Seriously… Phil can get away with the flop. Can you?

(Here’s a hint: Phil has practiced his flop shot for thousands of
hours. Have you?)

(8) Panicking in the sand

Please, practice it first! (Or, warn me to move from the other
side of the green so I don’t have to dodge your bladed ball.)

(9) Misreading turf and lie conditions

This one relates closely to #1
(http://clubhouse.swingbyswing.com/blog/10-most-common-golf-mistakes-part-1/)
in that, it’s easy to mis-judge the club you need when your ball
is laying poorly.

Another easy way to screw up your shot is to fail to take into
account an up-hill or down-hill lie.

(10) Consistently under-reading the break on the greens

This is one that caught me off guard.

But, when I was playing in my tourney last weekend, I noticed
just how true it is.

Consistently, when amateurs took a putt with any significant
break, the ball would slide beneath the hole.

I made an effort to avoid this particular pitfall, and my putting was
the only thing decent about the tourney…

That’s it for the 10 Most Common Golf Mistakes!

Take these factors into account during your next round, and you
can’t help but score better! In fact, if you concentrate on just
2 or 3 of these mistakes, you can significantly improve your
score.

Now go make some birdies!

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(1) Underclubbing

Amateurs routinely underclub. Sure, you might be able to hit that 9 iron 140 yards… when you swing as hard as you can (see mistake #2), from a perfect lie (see #9), when you hit it right in the sweet spot.

Take out a little more club and swing at 85%. It could do wonders for your score…

(2) Swinging too hard

We are constantly searching for the perfect shot. You know, the one that takes off low and rises as it goes, dropping perfectly into place…

Well, it doesn’t happen often!

By trying to swing at 85% most of the time, you’ll make more consistent impact on the ball and find your shots becoming more consistent.

(3) Automatically shooting at the flag

Most times, the flag is not the smartest play… For amateurs, the center of the green is a higher percentage shot. (Because from there, at least you’re putting instead of chipping from an uncertain lie.)

Sometimes, shooting at the green isn’t a good idea at all! (See mistake #4)

(4) Not playing away from trouble

If you’ve never considered playing away from trouble, you could take 10 strokes off your score today.

a) Penalty strokes are costly!

b) Getting short-sided on the green is a low percentage play. (See #5)

c) Hitting a shot from the forest (sometimes between trees, sometimes sideways back into the fairway) is a good way to inflate your score.

Often, it’s easy to play away from OOB and other trouble. Just take out a short club, or hit a safety shot. Sure, it might be an assured way to get a bogey instead of a lucky birdie/par… but it’s also an assured way to get a bogey instead of an unlucky triple/quadruple.

(5) Missing the green on the wrong side of the flag

When you miss the green on the short side of the flag, it’s called getting “short-sided”. This causes you to shoot a “flop” at a short pin, with a green sloping away from you. It’s a low probability shot, with a high degree of difficulty.

Chances are pretty good, when you get short-sided, that you’ll be playing your next shoot from where you should have hit the last shot. That is, the opposite side of the green from the flag…

That’s it for today! Part 2 is coming your way in a day or two.

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- Do you compete your best when you are calm or excited before the round? What do you do to get yourself to feel this way?

- Where are your thoughts and attention when you are truly focused to hit each shot?

- Where are your thoughts and attention during the time between shots when competing your best?

- Finally, if you successfully manage yourself by putting these thoughts/feelings into action, does the environment really matter?

By placing a high priority on maintaining consistency in thoughts and feelings, consistent actions will follow regardless of the environment. The more an individual works on becoming aware of and creating consistent thoughts and feelings in practice (in a comfortable environment) the more comfortable the individual will become with those thoughts and feelings to use in competition (as the environment and comfort level changes). Continue to evaluate both good rounds and bad. Establish personal keys to staying the same as the various environments of summer golf approach.

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Simply said, this is the habit of concerning yourself more with the results of your shots than with the process of execution. Many of my junior golfers have a name for this, the call it “brain farts.” Sorry for the bathroom humor, but that’s what they call it. Their minds become totally preoccupied with outcome thoughts and they are totally engulfed before they know it. Once this happens, it is virtually impossible to play their best golf.

This is an easy trap to fall into since scores are cumulative over 18 holes. Players become consumed with this because once the round is over the score becomes a historical moment of their skills. What is the number one question asked by your friends, family, teammates, coaches…. when you come off the course? “What did you shoot?” It is difficult to get away from outcome thinking, however you can learn to manage it and even use it to your advantage.

Outcome thinking can come in various forms. It can be from the total score, it can be on a specific hole such as par 5′s and it can even be the second round after a great first round. In any of these cases the same method should be used to overcome them all and that is to focus intensely on your pre-shot routine.

One of the worst places that this kind of thinking can occur is on the greens. It can either be trying to over come poor ball striking or even come after outstanding ball striking. Either way it is self induced pressure to make a putt go in instead of focusing on a good line and rolling the ball along that line. This kind of thinking can easily lead to three putts and make it difficult to get out of a putting slump.

Remember, you cannot control the outcome of your shot or score. However, you can prepare yourself to play shots to the best of your ability.

Ben Crenshaw was once asked how he played so well under pressure. He said, “I do everything in my power to make a good golf swing, then I leave the rest up to fate.” “I hit it, go find it and then hit it again until I get it in the hole. It is as simple as that!” It truly is as simple as that!

Now go make some birdies.

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Have you seen a slow motion picture of a baseball pitcher either overhand or underhand? The legs and back supply all the power and the relaxed motion of the arm provides the speed. Leverage is set with the lower body while the core and back build up torque and then the arm is released which allows the motion of the hand to increase speed right up to the point the ball is released.

The golf swing is the same, yet actually much easier to produce since there are fewer moving parts in the swing. The lower body is quite but in a very athletic position. The left side controls the backswing as it turns the hands to the desired position at the top. The back swing is nothing more than an opportunity for the body to place the hands in the correct position to begin the real swing, which is the downswing. A hurried move to the top can destroy your chance of creating a good swing. You lose too much energy in the transition from the backswing to the downswing. If you are struggling with distance, this is the first place you should look. Go find my “Stop @ The Top Drill”

You can actually eliminate the backswing. Just take your hands to the correct position at the top and stop. Make sure your lower body is in an athletic position as if you were about to sit down on a bar stool or shot a free throw. You will feel torque between your left side and your core. Your shoulders are turned and your left arm is relatively straight. You are now in the perfect position to release the energy that you have stored to the target just like the baseball player.

Now release the hands! You should feel a pulling motion in your left shoulder and your ribcage on your left side. This will be the beginning of the downswing. As your hands drop to about hip high you want the palm of your right hand to feel like you are going to spank the ball. The power delivered from your right side is from the right shoulder down to the forearm. This will facilitate a full release and maximum power.

I like to keep around 60% of my weight on my left side to improve torque in the backswing. This will also provide a descending movement, which will allow for a shallow but descending hit on the ball. This creates spin off of the clubface and a high- ball flight with power.

Swinging with just your arms is placing your swing in the arms of a lot of small muscles when just a few large muscles can do the job much better. Focus on getting your hands in the proper position at the top. Feel athletic and release the torque and allow your hands to swing with speed. Allow your hands to swing and don’t get caught up in swinging the club head. The club will follow your hands.

Now go make some birdies.

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Ross Wortham, a buddy of mine in high school was one of the best money players that I have ever seen. He could get on a birdie run like no one else and I mean a birdie run. We grew up on a little course in West Texas and Ross could really bomb it with his old Tony Pena persimmon driver. As long as Ross was, he was equally as good with the wedge and the putter. I once saw him in a stretch of four days shoot 60, 60, 61, 59. It was truly greatness.

Ross was known all over West Texas even as a school kid. He would venture up to Odessa Country Club about every weekend and get into some money matches with the local oilmen. Now, I wouldn’t recommend this to you junior golfers out there but back in the 70’s we didn’t have AJGA and other great tours like you guys have so we found the best game we could to challenge our skills. Ross wanted to play for the competition, not so much for the money. He won and won a lot. Much like a lot of stories you hear about Lee Trevino playing for a couple of hundred dollars when he only had five dollars in his pocket, that was Ross. On some occasions he would invite one of the guys off our team to venture up north with him. He would even call on the services of some of the best players on teams we competed against to join him in matches at OCC. I was lucky enough to be in about a half dozen of those trips and I can tell you I learned more about greatness in those matches than I could have picked up anywhere else in the world.

On our trips back home I would pick Ross’s brain about what he was thinking about in this situation or standing over that last birdie putt that he had to make or well, the list goes on and on. Ross would always frustrate me by saying, “I don’t know! I don’t think about anything.” I would keep on pressing him and walking him back through the whole round shot by shot. Finally totally frustrated Ross would say, “I just see the shot and go hit it! I don’t think about results or the score.” WOW! There lies the answer and one that took me forever to understand.

I believe that you will find that when you play great your mind is clear and all you do is see the shot and hit it. Nothing more, nothing less! Understand that our mind is better than any super computer. The old adage of garbage in, garbage out is especially true when we play golf. However, if we make all our calculations, pick the club and then see the shot and hit the shot you will usually find greatness. The key is to learn how to do that forever shot during the round. Ross did!

Ross also went on to play college golf at Houston Baptist with a guy you might know, Collin Montgomery. I have lost track of Ross, but I would venture to guess that somewhere there are a few oilmen who are a little light in the wallet today because they played a match against a man who understands what it is like to feel greatness.

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