Category: In The Zone

Remove the Barriers of Thinking – Let Your Guard Down for Good Golf

Many amateurs, myself (Bob Geismar) included, try too hard to play our best.

No one is immune to this, but if you are aware of it as a potential problem, you can nip it in the bud!

Sometimes if we allow ourselves a “break” from that thought our best golf will actually appear.  This often starts with squeezing the club—I have to remind myself throughout the round “easy does it.”  I actually say something to that effect out loud.  I might say “smooth” or “don’t squeeze the club.”

This relaxes the muscles in your forearms and allows the club to get through the hitting zone with much more speed and power.

One other thought here: always, always remember the golf club is moved properly via a swing, not a slap and not a forced movement.  This is not a tip.  It is a permanent part of your golf game every time you touch a club.

Take it easy—sort of like a nap on a Saturday afternoon—and watch those scores go lower and lower!!!

 US Open 2013

This week the United States Open returns to one of America’s famed golf courses; Merion Golf Club in Ardmore, Pennsylvania which is in suburban Philadelphia.  This will be the fifth time Merion has hosted the U.S. Open and the first since David Graham won the title in 1981.  It is the site of Ben Hogan’s heroic victory in 1950 and Lee Trevino’s memorable playoff triumph over Jack Nicklaus in 1971.  Old Merion built in 1912 was deemed by the USGA as too short to have a major.  The course will play this week at just under 7000 yards.  Most majors these days are playing at over 7400 so it will be short but it will also be ever so sweet.  The USGA decided to give the “old lady” one more chance and I for one can’t wait to see how she holds up under today’s power players.

I can see it now—the fairways will be tight. The rough will be thick and extra penal. I expect the greens will be off the charts high on the stimpmeter.  So who does a course like this favor?  It favors no one and everyone. It sounds contradictory but true if you think about it.  Opens always favor the guys who hit the fairways and they always favor guys who can handle 5 footers—the difference here is the length allows the shorter hitters to be right in the ballgame from the outset. There will be no overpowering merion.

 I love it and can’t wait until Thursday!

 Bob’s picks: 156 men will tee it up.

 My picks are Justin Rose, Keegan Bradley and Charl Schwartzel.

Who are yours? Let us know in the comments!

Don’t let terms like mental and physical limit you in golf.

I have never liked the words mental and physical as they pertain to golf.

First, I do not believe that separating the two is favorable in creating a great golf game as it affects golfers having control of your own game and lowering your scores.  I focus always on the positive. I believe that mental and physical are more negative than positive.

Therefore, we will eliminate those words from our golfing vocabulary from this point forward.  They will be permanently changed from mental and physical to thinking and action, respectively.

These two new words invoke a much more positive approach to the game.

We like to think and we like to act upon our thinking.  Linking these two terms together allows for conscious decisions to be made.  They will allow you to self correct better and put your conscious thoughts into action for lower scores.

Matt Kuchar won the Memorial tournament for his 6^th career PGA Tour victory. It was his second victory of the year—winning the WGC Bridgestone event in February.  He is having his finest year on the tour as he turns 35 later this month.  Those are the statistics they do not tell the story.

 His journey to get here has not been without bumps in the road.  Matt won early in his career at the Honda Classic in 2002 and then went into a slump that resulted in him losing his card and having to go to “the minors”—the web.com tour.  He took it all in stride. He knew it was all part of a “10 year learning curve” that Matt was told it usually took to become a tour regular and stalwart. He earned his way back to the tour.   He decided to get a more consistent swing that would perhaps not be one that overwhelmed courses but instead one that would kill them with consistency.  He has done just that—killed them with consistency—having made 35 cuts in a row.

 

  Now Matt faces the next challenge—winning a major.  The list of players without a major who many fans and pundits alike think should have one on their resume is daunting—Westwood, Donald, Garcia, Stricker, Snedeker, Haas, Dustin Johnson, the list goes on and on—now the name Kuchar appears on that list—maybe really for the first time.  Is he poised to take down old Merion? Or Muirfield? Or perhaps Oak Hill?  I think so—yes, Matt Kuchar gets a major in 2013—he does so because he is living the dream and he gets it!

PGA TOUR added 12 Players to the Field

 The PGATour policy board sought to rectify a shortcoming involving Q-school and web.com graduates.

 In April, the policy board voted to ask all PGA tour tournaments to increase their fields by 12 players.

 That would mean some events would go from 132 to 144 and others from 144 to 156 and invitations to increase by 12.

 This small change would allow players such as Derek Ernst into events. Derek went on to win the Wells Fargo Championship.

 Some players who were just under the bar were unable to compete, and now they can play out their dreams!

I started to think recently about Tiger’s almost impeccable ability to close out tournaments on Sunday and win from the lead.

He has won something like 52 out of 56 leading-after-third round chances.

He does exactly the opposite of what almost every other golfer does—he wins from the lead when most golfers choke on the lead like a dog on a pork chop!

I figured it out—Sunday on the PGA Tour is as close as it gets to match play.  Even though its not match play it is stroke play. It boils down on Sundays that a few players are in the hunt for the title—you do not actually compete against the entire field.  There simply has never been a better match play performer than Tiger in the history of golf.

Witness his three consecutive USGA Junior titles in a row and then followed that up with three consecutive US Amateur titles in a row—six years in a row he never lost a match play USGA match!

His resolve to triumph when going head-to-head is what separates him from all of the other great golfers of today—they do not know how to close the door.  I believe he approaches final rounds with the thought that it is match play and he is virtually untouchable in that format.

Tiger is officially the greatest “door slammer” of all time.

The USGA and the R&A have made their decision.

And I, for one, like it.

The governing bodies of the game should have taken this action years ago before it became a firestorm.

The basis of playing golf has always been and always will be a free stroke performed by your hands and arms.  Anchoring the putter against any portion of your body whether it be your belly or forearm clearly goes against the basis of golf.  No doubt the decision will be debated and perhaps even litigated but the context of the ruling is proper and correct.

Qualifying for the PGA Tour through Q-School or the Web.com Tour used to give you playing privileges for one entire year on the PGA Tour—this is not true anymore. Let me explain. Earning those cards simply allows you to play in some west coast early season events. Following the west coast swing the PGA Tour has a “reshuffle” of your status based entirely on your earning in those events. For example if you miss those cuts your status may drop from a top ten to over 40 and shut you out of the Florida swing—then subsequent reshuffles occur following the Masters, The Players, The U.S. Open and the final reshuffle follows the British Open. There are 36 ways of being exempt to play in a PGA Tour event. This allows older players who perhaps have won events in the past but their games and status otherwise would not continue to allow them playing privileges. Many of these 36 ways are very forgiving to those veterans to say the least.

The players own and control the tour. They set the code of conduct, the way tournaments are structured and who gets to play. It is obvious to me that in the last decade the current players have made it more and more difficult for minimally exempt players to even play in events. The older tour players have seen to that. Is it right? Is it wrong? This is a matter of opinion of course those opinions are 180 degrees apart. I feel for both sides the older players want to keep playing for the big bucks and the way they can do that is to make it very tough on the new guys trying to start making their living on the tour by in essence shutting them out of many events. It’s a tough call. I weigh in favor of the young guns. If the tour becomes more and more of a closed fraternity the career aspirations of high school and college golfers will in effect suppress their dreams of playing on the tour. I want to see “open” events truly be “open”. Let’s reduce the number of exemptions to a realistic number and truly make the PGA Tour career in reach for more.

The PGA Tour is a business. Simple statement isn’t it?  The Tour for some of the players at times doesn’t appear to be fun or a game.  It is serious business for many.  It’s about keeping your tour standing for some trying to get exempt for the remainder of the current year for others and for still others it’s about resume building to get into majors.  For me that leaves something missing—playing for the pure joy of being able to play golf for a living.  It is a sign of our times on Tour.  I am not sure 10% of the guys on tour play simply for the pure joy of playing.  I guess for me its because golf was taken away from me for 18 months due to sickness that when I play I appreciate every aspect of the game to its fullest.

If you play golf for a living and do not have that joy in your heart., you are leaving something valuable on the table—love.

I went to the Allianz Classic—the first full field event on the Champions Tour this past week in my hometown of Boca Raton,Florida.  This event is a big deal in Boca Raton—the charity is our local community hospital foundation.  It is one of the biggest charity benefactor events in our city annually and its great fun to boot.

I love going to the range and the practice putting greens and chipping areas.  This is where the players are accessible to visit and discuss golf a bit.  Also, I get a look at how great they are at ball striking and the short game.  I was a few feet from Andy Bean—a veteran of the Champions Tour and a fellow Florida Gator alumnus. He was no more than five feet in front of me.  He was chipping to a pin about 20 feet on the green and he was about 10 feet off the green.  This is not a difficult play for him but his proficiency was uncanny.  He now moved to a position a little farther from the pin and his caddy dropped 7 balls on the ground.  Andy proceeded to knock the first one in the cup.  I then challenged him and said you need to validate that shot and he proceeded to do so after one miss.  He was making this look very easy—it’s really not that easy to the average amateur.

One of the biggest mistakes amateurs make is they try so hard to do what the pros do when in reality you should try to be the best golfer you can be and not worry about how great the pros are.  They do it for a living. You do not.  If you do not roll chips in with regularity—its o.k. Of course try to get close and perhaps occasionally one will roll in but if not the idea is to get closer to make the ensuing putt easier and therefore lower scores.  The one thought here is to play your best game and no one else’s.