Effective Range Practice

Driving to work this morning I was thinking about my students in Taiwan and China. I enjoyed my time over there and the kids I coached were all nice kids and generally worked hard on their games. This got me thinking about practice and practice routines. What is the best way to practice? Do we need to hit thousands of balls to improve our swings and our games? What is effective practice?

One student I had in China (pictured above) was notorious for not practicing effectively. He would hit balls on the range without choosing a target, using his pre-shot routine or even taking enough time to set up to the ball correctly. Sometimes he would hit balls without even looking down the practice fairway! I think his record for consecutive shots without looking at a target was five! Now this student was an extreme example but I think all golfers can benefit from an understanding of different types of practice and when to use the different types of practice.

Most golfers I know tend to go to the range and just hit ball after ball after ball with little thought. This can be called "rake and hit" practice and it not very helpful for improving your golf. I tend to call this exercise rather then practice. I would suggest there are three main types of practice and they should be used at different times to ensure you get the most out of your practice and make the most improvement.

The first type of practice could be called block practice and technical practice. This type of practice involves hitting a number of shots with a club only working on the technical aspects of your swing you are working on with your coach. There is no need to worry about where the ball is going during these types of sessions as the emphasis is on making the swing changes you are trying to make with your coach. This type of practice should be used during time when there are not many important competitions for you to play in and you are working on correcting your swing faults.

The second type of practice could be called random practice or transfer practice. This type of practice is designed to more closely simulate on course play and make it more difficult to get in the "groove" of hitting 20 shots with the same club. Basically, you would change clubs often and change targets more often. An easy formula may be to change targets every two shots and change clubs every six shots. You should also use your pre-shot routine before every second shot. This type of practice should be used to help you take your swing changes onto the course with you.

The third type of practice is called competitive practice and this type of practice needs to be used in the weeks leading up to an important competition. As the name suggests, this kind of practice involves competitions with yourself or a training partner. Closest to the pin competitions and Aussie rules goal type challenges are only a couple of the games you could use during these sessions. You are only limited by your imagination when it comes to inventing competitive practice sessions. Send me an email if you need some ideas. When using this type of practice you should use your full pre-shot routine and make every shot as close to an on course shot as possible. Obviously, doing these practice sessions you won't hit as many balls but the intensity levels will be closer to what they would be during a competition. This will help you take your new and improved swing into a competition with confidence.

Until next time,

Brent

My New Website

Well I have finally joined the 21st century and have my own website. I have just finished putting the final touches on my site and it is now up and running and ready to view. You will find the site here and there is also a link to the site on the right hand side of this blog. On the site you will find information about the coaching services I offer, information about my new coaching venue, Golf Science Centre, in Melbourne as well as links to websites explaining the coaching tools we utilise at the Golf Science Centre. You will also find an easy to use Contact Us page and a link to subscribe to my new e-newsletter that will be published shortly. There are links to my facebook page and also links back to this blog. Keep your eye on the site as it will continue to grow.

I will be posting some coaching advice and tips on my blog soon so please come back soon and check out my coaching advice. Also, please feel free to come down to the Golf Science Centre anytime and say hello. I also want to hear from you so don't be afraid to drop me an email, post a comment here or contact me through my new website.

Until Next Time,

Brent

Australian Amateur 2010

In March this year, four players in the Taiwan National Squad (two boys, two girls) that I used to coach travelled to Perth for the Australian Amateur Championship. This event is held over four rounds of stroke play on Cottesloe Golf Club for the girls and Lake Karrinyup and Mount Lawley Golf Club for the boys. The top 32 players from the stroke play championship qualify to play knockout matchplay to determine the Australian Amateur Champion. Last year, Tsai Pei Ying was runner up in this event so I was hoping that one of these four could go one better this year.

Let me talk about the girls championship first. The two players playing were Yi Chen Liu and Hsuan Yu Yao and both of these girls worked very hard when I was in Taiwan and improved a lot so I was hopeful that they would play well. They both played solidly in the stroke play section with Yi Chen Liu shooting rounds of 71, 72, 72 and 73 to finish equal second and Hsuan Yu Yao scoring 74, 73, 73 and 74 to finish in equal sixth place. I was proud of their good scores as they both qualified easily but was also disappointed to realise that they were both in the same quarter of the match play draw. This meant that they would play each other in the quarter final if they both won their early matches.

As I feared would happen, both of the girls won their first two matches and faced each other in the quarter final. This was good, in a way, for Taiwan golf as at least one player would be in the semi-final but it would have been nicer to see them playing off against each other in the final. In a close fought match Hsuan Yu Yao prevailed in the match 2 up and progressed to the semi final. In this match she met the eventual champion, Stacey Keating, and was unfortunately beaten. I am extremely proud of both girls and I know they will use the experience to further improve and progress their golf.

In the boys championship the two boys from Taiwan competing were Chien Yao Hung and Chi Hsien Hsieh. Unfortunately, with stroke play scores of 69, 78, 71 and 80 Chi Hsien Hsieh missed out on qualifying for the matchplay by two strokes. With a disapointing last round of 80 I hope he will learn from the experience and be a better player. Chien Yao Hung played solidly during the strokeplay and qualified in 20th place for the matchplay by shooting scores of 71, 71, 77 and 72.

After a tight first round where he won on the 21st hole he won his next two matches by the comfortable margins of 5 & 4 and 5 & 3. These results placed him in the semi-final against Matt Jager. After a tough and tight match Chien Yao Hung was beaten on the last hole. It was close all day and I was proud that Chien Yao Hung played so well and was only just beaten by the eventual champion.

Overall, the trip to Perth was beneficial to all players and I am sure they learnt a lot during the tournament.

Until next time,

Brent

Riverside Oaks

The company I work for in China, Nanshan, has just purchased the Riverside Oaks golf course in western Sydney. It was privately owned prior to Nanshan's purchase and Nanshsan have some big plans for the development of the golf course and surrounding area.

Since Christmas some of my students from the golf school in China have been staying at Riverside Oaks with me and we have been training and seeing the sights of Sydney. It has been great to get out of the cold and snow of China and do some training in the sun and warmth of January in Australia. We have been covering all areas of golf with training involving long game practice, short game practice, putting, on course, fitness training and I have also introduced some eye/vision exercises and training for the students. We have had a lot of fun and the kids have worked hard as well.

As well as the golf training the students have had an opportunity to explore some of the sights of Sydney and I have attempted to introduce them to Australian culture, customs and food. They seem to like BBQ and they think the koalas and kangaroos are cute but they are a little scared of the spiders and they are disgusted with the taste of Vegemite! Tomato sauce gets mixed reviews but overall they are enjoying their time in Australia.

The students had a chance to touch and pet a kangaroo and koala and we took a speed boat ride on Sydney Harbour which they all loved and returned from in a very wet state! We visited the Sydney Aquarium and went sight seeing around Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Sydney Opera House. We are heading to the beach this weekend to give them a taste of an Aussie beach before they head home to China. They are a little scared of sharks but I am sure they will enjoy the sun, sand and surf.

We are here until the 5th of February when the students will head back to China for Chinese New Year and I will head to Melbourne for a month of leave. I am looking forward to the break, catching up with friends and clients and heading back to China in March ready to work hard with my students.

Until next time,

Brent

Pre Shot Routine

An often overlooked part of golf is pre shot routine. I define this as what you do before each shot on the golf course. It should be as consistent as possible both in actions and the time it takes to complete the routine.

As I watch players on the golf course in pressure situations I tend to see two different types of reactions when watching their pre shot routines. Some players will get faster and some players will get slower. Both of these reaction can cause problems for the player. As humans, we tend to do most things by following a routine. Think about what you do in the morning and I bet it will be the same most days. People tend to follow routines in their daily life so it makes sense to have a routine for your golf shots.

During the latest school tournament here in Nanshan I timed my students while they were playing different shots to see if they were consistent with their pre shot routines. As you can see by the picture they have some work to do on consistency.

Every one's routine will be different but it needs to be the same every time. The first step should be to formally define what your routine will be. Write down each thing you will do before you play the shot. Things such as choosing a target, visualising the shot, when you take your grip, how many waggles you have, how many looks at the target you will have and what your swing trigger is are all things you should write down.

Once you have written it down you should spend some time on the practice range working on your pre shot routine. Practice it with your practice shots until you find a routine that has all the steps you defined and feels comfortable.

Once you have a routine that feels comfortable you need to have a friend time you doing it in practice. Complete this stage a number of times until you find the timing that feels comfortable and relaxed for you. This is your own personal timing for your routine.

Spend some time each week practicing your routine and you will be more consistent when you are on the course and you can have a consistent routine like Greg in the video.

Until next time,

Brent

My Training Group

I have settled into my new role here at Nanshan Golf School and have my own group of students. My group is nice group of 8 golfers. It is nice to have a little smaller group as this allows me to do more individualised coaching and make sure that all of my players get the attention and coaching that they need.

There is a variety of skill levels and ages in my group which makes it challenging to ensure all the players get the information that they need. I have ages ranging from 12 years old to 22 years old, beginners and national squad players and both males and females. This makes the coaching fun and having the better players in the group gives the less skilled players something to aim for.

We started off their training with the usual group of evaluation tests. We tested their range of motion, basic strength, psychological profile, learning style and golf skills with a number of different tests. This gives us the starting point to develop the golfers to the level that they want.

There are different goals with each student. Some just want to play well in the monthly school tournaments, some have the specific goal of making the China National Squad and some want to be professional players. I always make sure I know what the players want before we start on any training program.

All of the players are being heavily coached on golf swing technique at the moment as well as completing their stretching program to develop their range of motion. They are also being slowly introduced to cardio training, fit ball exercises and body weight strength training exercises. We are moving nice and slowly as these ideas are generally very new to these students as golf is a new sport in China.

I will post again shortly to update their training and talk about how we deal with the Winter here.

Until next time,

Brent

New Job

I have just accepted a new job as the Head Coach of Nanshan Golf School in China. This golf school is based near the city of Yantai in the north of China. Nanshan is a large company based in China that have interests in golf courses, education, construction, manufacturing, textiles, wine and many other things. The company has the largest golf facility in the world and there are 275 holes at last count with several new courses in development at the moment. My job here is to develop and improve the golf training program at the school by training the coaches currently here as well as attracting new students to the program. As well as this role, I will also be doing some work for the China Golf Association with their development program. I will be working with some players on the fringe of National Team selection and hoping to improve them to make the National team.

My first job here was to run a junior training camp over the Summer vacation period. I had a group of around 20 players of varying standards and we worked together for around four weeks. During those four weeks there were also two tournaments for the kids to play in so it was a little difficult to fix too much in their games. We had some fun and did some video coaching and helped them a little with their on course strategy and it was a good opportunity to introduce myself to some of the students and let them know what my coaching style is all about. The students will choose a coach to train with when they come back to school next month so we will see who decides to train with me.

The camp finished last Sunday and this week I have been helping the players from the CGA National Squad. I have four junior boys that I am helping and we are training alongside the National Squad so they can see how the National Players structure their training. It is lots of fun and they have a tournament this weekend so hopefully I have helped them with their preparation and they have a nice result.

That is about it for now but I will post again really soon and fill you in on some of my student's results since my last post. Some of my Taiwan students have had some good results lately and I will tell you all about it next post.

Until next time,

Brent