Details are the smallest items of your golf game that make the biggest difference in your performance.
Some examples of details within your golf game are:
- How many degrees open or closed do you place your front foot at address?
- What yardage with a 50% swing does my 56° wedge carry?
- With the ball below my feet, how much less or more club will you need to carry a shot to a specific yardage?
These questions, along with countless more questions comprise the details of your golf skills. But how do you remember all these details? And how are you using these details after remembering them?
When do Details Occur within Your Golf Game?
Most of the details you’ll discover that make the most difference in your game happen before you ever swing a club. These details set up the chain of events that allow your new “in-swing” details to actually occur.
As a general tag, these details are part of your pre-shot routine. As the name implies, a routine before your swing can assist you with properly remembering and placing each detail in the same place each time. More on that later.
However, it’s not uncommon to discover a new detail whole you’re swinging a club. The one detail all new golfers eventually discover is the feeling of the golf ball compressing when contacting the club face. This new feeling leads to new questions about the details to the feeling, and how your body felt at the time your felt impact.
How to Understand New Details of Your Game
There are various times within your playing career, professional or amateur, that details coming pouring out of the simplest discovery. It’s your responsibility to evaluate each detail, understanding its relevance within your game.
You first need to recognize what defines the detail you discovered. In most situations, you’ll compare the new detail to a previous habit or detail. This is the simplest and most productive method to understanding details. Why? Because comparing one detail to another similar yet different detail is easy to apply. It’s like comparing an apple to an orange. Each are fruits, but both are different. The same applies to your golf game.
Many times, discovering and understanding details of your game requires you to “reverse engineer” the sequence of events that occur to make the golf ball fly. It’s through this type of discovery that you can “define” each detail and its uniqueness. Often, reverse engineering from impact can lead to the discovery of many more details about you and your golf swing.
Take ball position for example. 2 different positions are still “ball position”. But how does one position differ from the other? Details prior to swinging the club include your weight distribution; how does each ball position make your feel? Do you see one ball position between your feet differently than the other? An example of an in-swing detail related to ball position is the trajectory of ball flight. Does one ball position create a different trajectory than the other?
Each ball position has its own unique set of details. Comparing one to the other allows you a chance to remember each detail. And allows you to easily employ the detail when needed.
How to Organize Your Pre-Shot Details
Creating a repeatable order to remember the details of your game is like remembering your phone number.
You easily remember the 10 digits that make up your phone number. Why, because you repeat all 10 digits in the same order. Would it not make sense to repeat your pre-shot details in the same order, for each shot?
Most golfers do remember pre-shot details. But they do not repeat these items in the same sequence. This is a primary cause of inconsistency. To make a fair comparison, if you did not repeat your area code in the same sequence, you could make a call, but to the wrong geographic location. Same goes for your pre-shot routine details. Failing to repeat and employ those items in the same logical and sequential order will lead to shots landing in unintended locations on the course.
Using Your In-Swing Details to Your Advantage
As you discover the new details of your swing, it’s always best to immediately evaluate what defines each detail.
A post-shot evaluation of golf shot is regularly overlooked by the everyday golfer. Whether playing golf on the course or practicing at the range, you’ll totally ignore evaluating each shot after you make your swing.
In most cases, you’ll recognize by how the ball flies whether you hit a “good” shot or not. But did you put the ball flight together with a particular feeling in your swing?
To become a better golfer, it’s a must that you make the conscious decision to evaluate all the details of each shot. As well couple ball flight of each shot with the detailed feelings of each swing. Anything less keeps you right where you are now, frustrated with the outcome only of each shot.
As you detail the feeling of each swing, at some point you’ll realize a pattern or trend to the details that comprise your better shots. Recognizing the trends and repeating the good trends is ultimately what you’re attempting to accomplish. It’s at this point you should relate these trends to pre-shot details, to create a more wholistic approach to the details of your golf skills.
Conclusion
Details are the smallest yet most value items that comprise your golf skills. It’s hard to define details without Discipline, and without Dedication.
Commit Yourself to the 3 D’s this Golf Season!
When you’re facing adversity this golf season, can you remember your “3 D’s”? Can you commit to being dedicated this golf season to genuinely and sustainably improving your skills, not your score? How will you discipline yourself to reach your targeted golf goals for 2021? And what details will truly make the biggest difference in your game and your sustained improvement?
Dedicated to the Discipline of the Details is a mantra I encourage all my clients to use. It’s not just for competitive golfers. Stay Dedicated to the Discipline of Your Details. You’ll be surprised at the end of the season how much better a golfer you became by doing so.