An Effective Approach To Learning Golf!
"Rethinking Golf" – by Chuck Hogan – is a must read for golfers looking to improve their games.
About 10 years ago, I started to collect and read books written by Chuck Hogan – who has always proposed an approach to learning golf that is different than we often think of and use. A few weeks ago my teaching pro friend from Germany, Mike McFadden, suggested that I should read Chuck Hogan's "Rethinking Golf" book. Well, I had a copy downstairs and – though written in 2001 – it is highly relevant to golfers of all skill levels who want to PLAY better golf.
The elements for the "Cycles of Competence" noted in the image above come from this book. Chuck Hogan notes that these things are what we do when we learn any complex motor skill – like tieing your shoes, riding a bike, driving your car – so why not for golf? Many things struck me about his discussion on how he believes we should learn golf, but here are two of the most important ones:
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A good place for actually imprinting a skill (learning a model) and for doing repetitions to make a skill a habit can be in your basement – but not on a practice tee or practice green on a golf course.
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Practice should be play. Practice is not where you should be working on technique. When you practice you should vary the shots you hit, and should have the type of intent that you would have when you are playing golf on the golf course.
In the book he also talks about generating and maintaining confidence. His rules for doing so are actually my favorite take-away from the book:
- "Rule one: Treat the outcome of every golf shot, practice or play, as feedback, never as failure.
- Rule two: Celebrate and emotionalize every functional golf shot."
A very different way to look at how you might improve your golf game, no? I hope you will consider reading it and adopting some of the ideas in it in how you play golf and play to improve your game (note I did not say "work" to improve your game). Personally, I have a number of his other books on order and can't wait to learn from them!
Rooting For YOUR Golfing Success!
Tony
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