19th Hole

Jeff Fisher
Director of Instruction
Fisher Bryan Golf Academy at Longbow Golf Club
Mesa, AZ
jfisher@obsports.com

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Lessons From the TOUR

This has been a strange year on the PGA TOUR. Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson have combined for four WD’s but only one top ten! What should this tell you? That as athletes we need to live in the present and not in the past.

For Tiger especially this has seemed to be difficult. He still views himself as the unstoppable physical and mental force that dominated the Tour for years and won majors and big events seemingly at will. His body was capable of doing most anything, including winning with a broken leg and 3 different golf swings.

But time and life catch up with everyone and the body seems to be failing him and you can only say, “I just need more reps” so many times before there has to be a realization that maybe I just cannot go about things the way that I used to.

The same is true for all of us. To succeed in a sport today we must do so with the abilities that we have today and not those we possessed years ago. Those abilities could range from endurance, strength or flexibility to just not having as much time to practice or play as you once did.

As a golfer you need to take all of these things into account when you set your expectations for your game or else you will be doomed to forever disappoint yourself. Set small goals for yourself that are directly related to better scores. Maybe the place to focus your efforts is not in trying for ten more yards off the tee, but in trying to make a few more ten footers.

I also would encourage you to take a close look at your game and really assess where you are. Have a professional put you on a launch monitor and see how far you actually hit each of your clubs, including your driver. I am certain that having this knowledge will help you in club selection and easily shave a few strokes off your score.

Keep good stats for each round so that you can better use the practice time that you do have. FOURSUM is a great app that is available on pretty much all phones and tablets and allows you to instantly record your stats from each round. You can then go back later and review them as well as your stats for your whole season! It might be valuable to know that you hit more than fifty percent of your fairways but only forty percent of your greens and get up and down only one out of four times! Imagine how efficient your practice would be with that information in hand.

If you focus on today, and not yesterday, it will be much easier to reach the potential within your game.

Jeff Fisher is Director of Instruction at the Fisher Bryan Golf Academy at Longbow Golf Club. Jeff can be reached at 480.414.9330 or jfisher@obsports.com.