4 Golf Tips to Make Your Practice Perfect

We all know the saying, practice makes perfect. But also, practice makes permanent. So, to help make sure we are practicing in the right way, we asked PGA professional and Superstition Mountain golf instructor, Dan Williams for his advice on how to make your practice perfect.

So many golfers say that they would like to practice more, but they’re afraid of developing bad habits. While this may be an easy excuse for some who don’t really want to put in the work, it’s a genuine concern for many. I encourage most of these golfers to get out and practice anyway, but here are some ideas on how to make sure your time spent practicing will actually improve your game.

Practice with a Purpose
First, if you’re not practicing at all, just go practice! Hit as many balls as you can handle if you enjoy it, but the next step is knowing what parts of your game are actually costing you strokes. If you 3-putt often, you will benefit from working on your putting more than getting a few more yards out of your driver. You don’t have to keep detailed stats of your round, but if you keep track of where you lose most of your strokes it will help you know what to practice.

Make a Practice Station on the Range
One of the biggest errors in a golfer’s game is their alignment or aim. It is so easy to start aiming a little right or left, which will lead to compensations in your golf swing … which lead to big misses. To avoid this, use alignment sticks, a golf club or anything that can help you aim accurately when you’re on the driving range. This isn’t going to drastically change your swing, but it is one of those little things that great golfers do to avoid falling into bad habits.

Check out this blog for tips on setting up a practice station  

Make Practice Like the Game
One of the hard things about taking your range game to the course is there is little to no pressure on the practice area. To create a little pressure when you practice, challenge yourself to make 10 five foot putts in a row. If this is difficult, you’ll start to feel some pressure by the 7th or 8th ball. If this is too easy for you, try to make 20 in a row or more. Not only will this help create a game-like environment, it will improve your putting skills.

You can do this on the driving range as well. Pick a green out on the range, if your driving range doesn’t have a green, you can pick a flag and give yourself 10 yards left, right, long and short, and see how many times you can hit the target green out of 10 swings. Then repeat the drill and see if you can improve. Again, the idea is to help you perform with a little pressure, just like on the course.

Focus on Different Aspects of Your Game
You should spend most of your practice time and focus on the parts of your game that need the most attention. That said, if you have an hour to practice break the time up into three areas. You can choose the specific areas of focus based on your goals and what part of your game needs the most work. One example would be 15 minutes putting, 15 minutes chipping and 30 minutes hitting balls on the range. Even if putting isn’t a problem, by continuing to practice it (at least a little bit) you’re avoiding falling into bad habits on the golf course and keeping your skills sharp.

There are so many ways you can practice effectively, the important thing is that you do it! Keep it fun so you want to come back and do it again. As you get more used to the practice, and make it more of a habit than a chore, you will get more diligent in practicing effectively.

For more hot tips, check out Dan’s blog for ways to improve your golf game and try out these 5 golf tips and drills.