The Secret to Golf
Golf is a very difficult game to learn. Most of the people who try to learn golf give up. Most of the people that play golf have difficulty improving their performance. There are two reasons for this a)executing the full swing golf stroke is requires great precision, and b) golf is a very complex game. Once you have learnt the full swing, you still need to master approach shots, pitching, chipping, putting, bunker shots, the mental game, etiquette, and the rules. What makes it even more difficult is that most of the time you are learning, you will not have a professional teacher watching you. It is simply too expensive for most people to have a golf teaching professional follow them around the course, round after round. Accordingly, for most golfers, the approach to learning is known as self-directed learning. The secret to golf is for you to have a clear framework and feedback mechanism for your learning. The Golf Mentor provides such a framework that makes it much easier for you to master all the aspects of the game.
The Mentor system is based on Goal Oriented Reflective Practice. In simple terms this means that you should set clear goals and then practice in a thoughtful fashion. The overall approach is to set Goals, make plans on how to fix weaknesses, carry out thoughtful practice, and periodically review your progress. This may sound complicated, but the Mentors system makes all this easy and fun. Lets look at each of the activities in detail:
Goals are a long term commitment to just how much you want to improve at golf. In the Mentors system, you will set a target for how much you want to improve, and then specify how much work that you will do to achieve that target.
Make Plans. Once you have worked out what you want to achieve, you should then work out how many practice sessions you will devote to improving the weakest part of your game. The Mentor's system automatically produces a plan based on your diagnosis and Goals, but allows you to easily alter or elaborate the plan.
Thoughtful Practice. You have worked out what fault you want to fix, you have worked out how to fix it, you have planned how you are going to practice. Now you need to actually do the work. Importantly, you need to carry out the practice in a thoughtful fashion. This means writing brief notes on each practice session in order to assess how the practice is working. As well, you should write brief notes on each game you play, recording the score and identifying the strengths and weakness during that game. The Mentor system provides a customised blog that makes it easy to post your practice and game notes.
Review. Periodically it is important to review your progress. Because golf has many parts, it is important to work on the aspects of the game that need most attention. As time goes by, the aspect that needs most attention varies. Accordingly, from time to time it is important to identify the weakest part of your game and work out how to remedy the weakest part. The Mentor System can automatically generate detailed reports that can greatly assist you to review your progress and games, so working out your major focus for practice sessions
The way this all works is that using the Mentor System you identify your target and work out how long it will take to reach your target. Typically this time to reach the target is between six months and a year. For example, your target might be to reduce your handicap by ten strokes over a period of six months. Then you start working on a shorter term cycle, known as a practice cycle. The recommended period for a practice cycle is four weeks. At the beginning of the four weeks, you will work out the major focus for your practice sessions for the next four weeks and how much time you will devote to practice. For example, your major focus might be your pitching and you might plan to spend an hour a week on this. After each practice session you will post to your Mentors Blog, the outcomes of the practice and you will also post the results from your golf game. After four weeks you will have finished your first practice cycle and it is time to analyse your efforts. The Mentor can produce an analysis report, showing your progress, identify trends in your game, and give you a gentle reminder if you are not practicing as much as you had planned. Using the analysis report you can identify your weaknesses and plan your new practice cycle. It can be seen that a practice cycle involves analysis, making plans, and thoughtful practice. Once one cycle is completed, you start another one, and so on, until you have reached your target.
As well as identifying your major focus for practice session it is often useful to identify a secondary focus, to which you will devote a lesser practice time. For instance if your greatest weakness is your driving, then you need to do most of your practice at a driving range. However, you might have some spare time at home to practice your putting. This is why the Mentor's system allows you to choose a secondary focus, allowing you to work in a methodical fashion on several aspects of your game at once.
One of the fun aspects of the Mentor is that when you set your goals, you can also nominate a reward that you will buy for yourself when you reach halfway to the target and a final reward when you reach your target. Examples of these rewards are buying a new Callaway driver, taking your partner out to dinner, going on a golfing trip with your friends, or giving a gift to your children.
So that is the theory. Now why don't you get started right away, by signing up for the Golf Mentor. There is a 14 day free trial of premium membership and no credit card is needed. If you would like more information, please contact us.