What is the MOST Difficult part of the Mental Game of Golf for you?

[dave s]

Maybe I'm looking at the 'mental' part of golf differently than you. You're talking more about external conditions and/or distraction over which you have little control.

Thinking more along the lines of the internal mental game, things like not reading enough uphill on a greenside chip shot, or misclubbing from not paying attention to yardage and/or pin placement on the green, or trying to pull off shot above my capability are examples of mental game difficulty for me!

People laughing, telling jokes, squirting beer through the nose? Those things don't bother me one bit on the course! OTOH, leaving a chip shot 15' short because of a mental lapse makes me fume ... for about 5 seconds!

dave

ps: I try to remember that golf is supposed to be FUN and not something that wraps my mind/brain around the axle over.

[Eeryck]

For me it is always trusting myself that I can make good shots.

I'm still enough of a beginner that I have hit more bad shots than good and often second guess my own ability instead of trusting a swing that is working. I need to remember that golf is not a game of perfect.

-E

[AK jr.]

  907golfer12 said:

A little full of yourself? How do you know that you are going to play. With a 4 index you won't even get looked at by a D-I school. You may get looked at by a D-III or NAIA. But best of luck none the less.

i have a few dII schools looking at me that I know of, but i am also going back and forth with hank haney about attending the ijga post grad school so i can have a chance to play for clemson because their coach is an incredible person. i have gotten to talk with him on a few occasions. another tweak to the situation is that im only a junior so i have a sufficient amount of time to play in tournaments and such. my handicap was a 4 over the past month because i was going through swing changes. i am just now starting to get back into my rhythm and turn in good scores. like today i shot 37 with 4 bogeys. i wasn't trying to sound full of myself, so i apologize for the wording. next time i will make sure to say it differently how bout that

. peace bro

[907golfer12]

  AK jr. said:

i have a few dII schools looking at me that I know of, but i am also going back and forth with hank haney about attending the ijga post grad school so i can have a chance to play for clemson because their coach is an incredible person. i have gotten to talk with him on a few occasions. another tweak to the situation is that im only a junior so i have a sufficient amount of time to play in tournaments and such. my handicap was a 4 over the past month because i was going through swing changes. i am just now starting to get back into my rhythm and turn in good scores. like today i shot 37 with 4 bogeys. i wasn't trying to sound full of myself, so i apologize for the wording. next time i will make sure to say it differently how bout that

No problem, it's just that one of my friends who is a freshman thinks he's going to go play for Florida, and he's like a 20 index, and he just doesn't realize how good you have to be to get into D-I. And I just wanted to help, just incase you suffered from the same thing. But good luck again, I'm trying to play for the University of Oregon, and have hit balls in front of the coach, and he liked what he saw, and told me to keep working and I have a good chance. But this is off topic, and I may start a thread for us juniors about progress and college and stuff. Okay I'm done.

[Zeph]

  julie_m said:

Has that EVER worked?

If you're Tiger it does.

My hardest part is probably on the green, it doesn't take much to throw me off my concentration.

[AK jr.]

  907golfer12 said:

No problem, it's just that one of my friends who is a freshman thinks he's going to go play for Florida, and he's like a 20 index, and he just doesn't realize how good you have to be to get into D-I. And I just wanted to help, just incase you suffered from the same thing. But good luck again, I'm trying to play for the University of Oregon, and have hit balls in front of the coach, and he liked what he saw, and told me to keep working and I have a good chance. But this is off topic, and I may start a thread for us juniors about progress and college and stuff. Okay I'm done.

i was actually thinking the same about that kind of a thread cuz im 16 and im sure there are others on here with the same goal that are around that age. i will go ahead and start it since im on right now

[ks8829]

I will say its loosing concentration over a chip shot and not getting up and down.

I played Thursday and shot 6 over par, I did not get up and down 5 times to saved par. I got up and down 9 of 14 attemps or about 64%.

I think I need a pre-shot routine for my chip shots, I just realize that I do not use a routine pre-shot routine, I'll work on that.

[Robiola the Monster]

Confidence. Its hard for me to earn some confidence and i lose confidence really easily. After blowing out to an 8 handicap after being off 5 almost 4 my confidence is at a low especially looking at the card and seeing that i get a shot on a hole rated 8

[Fabfivefigo]

For me, it's two things that are probably related. I have a tendency, usually during my swing, to have negative shot thoughts, like "make sure you don't chunk it".

I also tend to not finish my shots around the green. I'll have a good plan and take a couple good crisp practice strokes, and then totally forget the weight and the tempo of the shot and it goes half the distance I want. I do this at least 3 times per round.

[Bryan72]

If I'm putting good thats great, but if I'm not, i'll suck at it for the entire round, just cant seem to break it.