From Dave Kendall Academy, Ypsilanti
I have been asked at least 100 times: “Why do I perform on the Range better than I perform on the Course.”
On the Range we are relaxed and there are no real consequences to a miss. On the Course we are playing with adrenaline because of a natural competitive desire to succeed. Adrenaline can take a good sequence or rhythm and take it out of sequence. When adrenaline is not present, you create speed with your own effort. Because adrenaline accelerates or super charges your muscles they may over accelerate and cause a timing problem.
Players do not usually have a problem speeding up when they get to the Course, they have trouble slowing down. For this reason, we should not practice at maximum speed, we should practice getting comfortable at slower rhythm, then when adrenaline is present, it will speed us up into an effective rhythm when we get into a competitive environment. Most players have trouble slowing down when they get excited because they never practice slowing down.
I do not often practice full out on the Range. When I do, I am practicing speed drills. I will observe how fast can I go before efficiency starts to fall off. I then play at a speed that is within my efficiency capability. Over practicing speed simply contributes to getting out of rhythm on the Course.
New skills are best trained slowly and precisely. We then learn to perform only as fast as we can execute the skill reliably. Without question, it is a great deal of fun to swing full out and hit it perfectly. However, even the best in the world have a difficult time producing reliability at full effort, consistently.
If you will practice at a speed that you can produce high reliability, your results on the course will improve and confidence will soar.
