What I learned at my club championship

Breathing is always good, carry provisions, and math and the rules are your friends. These are among the things that I learned during my club championship at Blue Springs GC this weekend: • Have an extra CR12 battery for your range finder in your bag. This prevents full-scale panic when you finish a round in the dark when the hardware store is closed, and your morning round starts before the hardware store opens. • Don’t be over-reliant on … [Read more...]

The Mind Game Part VI: Balancing the Mental Game and Mechanics

Golf performance coach Paul Dewland is coaching me on the mental game. I played in my club championship last weekend at Blue Springs, and it was a disaster. It was a self-fulfilling prophecy after my last blog on playing when you don’t have confidence in your swing. The experience told me: I need to keep focused on some of the early things Paul and  I discussed (like witnessing my thoughts rather than being caught up in them), develop a … [Read more...]

The Mind Game Part IV: Better golf by keeping your head up

Paul Dewland is coaching me on the mental game, and I’m blogging about it. How 2010! My hope is that golfers will find it a good read, fun and educational. Today’s blog is intended to be more of the latter so that you can learn to keep your head up more often. Ain’t golf weird? A behaviour that I’ve been looking to change on the course, and elsewhere, is my tendency to over-think. I’m a ruminator. Not a bad thing for a writer, but not great for … [Read more...]

The Mind Game Part III: I can change… if I have to

  Paul Dewland is coaching me on the mental side of the game. For a guru, he’s a pretty funny guy. No Birkenstocks! I play most of my golf at Blue Springs GC in Acton, Ontario, just so you know where most of this little experiment is being played out. And our Club Championship is coming up August 7-8. Yes, this could get ugly. I made it through two rounds on the weekend with only one shank. Yes, I used the word. My brother Pat said … [Read more...]

The Mind Game Part II: Hosel rockets made me a killer!

Performance Coach Paul Dewland is coaching me on the mental side of the game, and I’m sharing my little victories and agonies with you through the magic of blogging. Content Rating: Contains violence. I had lopped off its head. Any golfer who has battled the hosel rockets has had the feeling that he could really lose it, but to have it come to this… even I was stunned. I was playing with my parents, Margaret and Dennis, and my brother Pat at … [Read more...]