How to Overcome a Bad Start to a Golf Round

reflectionbayg... - Today, I would like to address what you should do when you get off to a very poor start to your round. We've all dealt with this. This is part of golf. However, every hole in literally every shot is individual. So if you make a triple bogey on the first hole and a double bogey on the second hole, I do not want us thinking, Oh man, today's just not going to be a good day. I'm going to shoot this score at that moment. I want you to challenge yourself and I want you to say, “Okay, let's see if I could get this next tee shot into the grass. And then let's see if I can get that shot somewhere near the green.” And if we keep doing this our confidence will come back. Notice that I'm trying to make it per shot and not per hole, not per nine holes and not per 18 holes.
So I want us to try to simplify everything. And when things are a little bit off, try to simplify it literally to the next shot of saying, “Okay, I will be happy if I can just get this ball somewhat in the direction that I'm looking for.” Now to do that, let's check our tension. Let's make sure we have a good target and let's swing freely. Let's not try to guide the ball out there because we've just had a couple bad holes. Key to golf is committing and swinging freely to a good target. That's all that we can do is to try to give as ourselves an opportunity to play our best. So literally try to simplify things when things get off to a bad start and really, really, really, really try to make it per shot and not a whole round and not a nine-hole round per shot.