Change your belief; change your swing
Are you focused on the wrong target?
I hope your 2024 is off to a great start. Indeed, this is my first post of the New Year. I’ve been focused on editing my book, Quiet Mind Golf, giving lessons at The Golf House in Guelph, Ontario, and my Commit to Freedom workshops. The editing is nearing completion so to paraphrase an Aerosmith nugget, ‘I’m back in the (Substack) saddle again.’
When I begin coaching a golfer or a businessperson, the client often assumes that I’m going to change what they do—whether it’s their golf swing or the way they manage people.
Most people who come to me for golf lessons believe they are moving body parts incorrectly. Hips get most of the blame.
I’ll look at their swing, but I’ll often explore the client’s belief system as well.
I’ll sometimes ask, “At its most basic, what do we do in golf?”
We usually settle on something like: we hit the ball with a club toward a target.
But as we proceed, it turns out there’s a big difference between what average golfers say they do, and what they actually do.
I’ll use a recent session with a client as an example. I’ll call him Frank. In the teaching bay at The Golf House, an indoor facility, clients hit into a screen, but it appears as if they are hitting out at a range in the mountains.
Frank is a strong, robust man in his 60s. But his swing feels weak, his drives usually go way right, and his irons tend to go left.
We took some video. We could see that as the club comes into impact his body stalls, his arms extend out from his body, and the club hits the mat behind the ball. Just before impact, his lead arm starts folding behind him, a motion known as a “chicken wing.”
Frank thought the cure was to straighten his lead arm and “follow-through.” We videotaped some swings. Despite his efforts, nothing changed.
I suggested the problem might be that he was focused on the wrong target. He looked confused.
I asked, ‘What are you focused on when you swing.”
“The ball, of course.”
“So, the ball is the target?”
“Well, no. It’s whatever you’re aiming at. But you’re supposed to hit the ball, right? You have to make sure you hit the ball.”
“No, you don’t.”
“But when I hit a bad shot, my friends all say, ‘You lifted your head.’”
“Don’t listen to your friends.”
Frank was incredulous. This contravened his belief system that to ensure he hit the ball, he must focus on the ball.
Frank is life-long athlete, so I asked him what he focused on when he shot the puck in hockey.
“You look at the net.”
I said, “Sure, the net is the target. But when you play golf, you make the ball the target.”
“I guess so.”
Like Frank, most golfers make the ball the target. But the ball is not the target. The target could be the landing area in the fairway, the flagstick, or the hole.
Consider blind golfers; they hit toward a target that someone directs them to. Or David Duval and Annika Sorenstam, both of whom swivel their heads toward the target before impact. Justin Rose, Lexi Thompson, and Sergio Garcia have all putted with their eyes closed in competition.
(Check out the links for videos of Duval and Sorenstam in their prime. Fast forward the Annika video to the 2:00 minute mark.)
I asked Frank to make some baseball swings with his pitching wedge. The club made a swoosh sound as it sped through the air. He finished each swing in full height, hips and shoulders facing the target, and he was balanced nicely on his lead leg. He looked like a tour pro watching his ball in the air.
“Why is it so different?” he asked.
“Well, there’s no ball there for one, but your attention is focused on swinging out there. To the target.”
I invited him to hit a few balls focused on swinging his wedge toward the screen with the same feeling as his baseball swing. The difference was immediate. His swing looked more natural. Free. Instinctive.
“It feels so much better,” he said. “Faster, more balanced.”
After the lesson, he was still trying to get his head around his experience. “It’s so weird,” he said. For 40 years, he’s been focused on the ball. For much of that time, he tried to change his swing by changing his technique, but he made little progress.
Frank experienced how changing the focus of his attention—and changing his belief—had changed his swing.
Swinging more instinctively to an external target isn’t a magic fix. He’s got a ways to go in developing his skill, but swinging to the actual target will speed his improvement.
I invite you to check out Swing Thoughts podcast episode #43 for our conversation with Professors Gabriele Wulf and Rebecca Lewthwaite, who are regarded as the world’s experts on the role of an external target in peak performance.
If you are interested in golf lessons, coaching, or my Commit to Freedom workshops on commitment and accountability in organizations, please send an email to tim@oconnorgolf.ca.
Tim, that was an Extraordinary lesson.