Mental Golf Lets You Play Like the Pros

Mental Golf Lets You Play Like the Pros

The AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am starts Thursday. As Tiger Woods readies to play his best, he takes some time out to talk to reporters. And I’m sure glad he did! Woods lets us in on a key aspect of golf: anyone can be a great golfer. In his words: “…the cool thing about the game is you can play it so many different ways. You don’t have to be a power player. You can hit it shorter and still get the ball in the hole. You just have to be more efficient.” Basically, as long as you focus on improving your game – even if you’re not the world’s best athlete – you can play great golf. And that’s why I say that mental golf lets you play like the pros.

You see, working on your mental game will let you play your best. If you want to play like the pros do, mental golf brings you MUCH closer to that vision. See this excerpt from that article where Woods mentioned that you don’t have to be a power player to be a great golfer (from Carl Steward, writer for MercuryNews.com):

[Woods] said the game has already changed dramatically during his career when it comes to conditioning. ”When I first came out here, I was the only guy in the gym … nobody else,” [Woods] said. “Then it was Vijay (Singh). Now, everybody’s in the gym. Everybody has their own personal trainer who travels with them or they have a program that they follow. The game is way more athletic. We’re getting guys who grew up doing other sports who are transitioning to golf. One day we’re going to get a guy who’s like a Bo Jackson or Michael Jordan, they’ll be that explosive and that good, but decide to play golf.

“We have a pretty darned good athlete out here in D.J. (Dustin Johnson) who can dunk the ball,” Woods continued. “But what happens when you get one of those truly superior athletes who decides to play golf, devote himself and has the mental aspects and acuity to play. That’s when it’s going to be cool to see. I’ll be shrimping it down the fairway doing it a different way. I’ll be the Corey Pavin of my generation. But the cool thing about the game is you can play it so many different ways. You don’t have to be a power player. You can hit it shorter and still get the ball in the hole. You just have to be more efficient.”

It’s not unrealistic that you can play like the pros do. It all depends on what you focus on. If you focus on your mental game, you’ll performance out on the course will skyrocket. That’s why I say that mental golf lets you play like the pros.

Do you practice any mental game strategies when you play? Let me hear about them in the comments section below.