Golf Smarter number four hundred twenty published on January twenty one, twenty fourteen.
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Another way is the way we practice, and I think golfers, even to hire as well, will violate these principles, probably more than any other fourth that I know. So we need to practice in a different way. And there's three ways to practice. One is hitting fifty seven irons. That's good if you're going to enter a seven iron tournament, but I'm not sure when that is. The other way to practice is if we're on a range, is to
practice how you play. So how about next time you go to the range, why don't you do first shot practice? Change targets on every shot. I can use the same club if you really have some skill, you can change the shape of the shot. You can change clubs on each shot, but you can't repeat anything. Well, you're going
to find during your practice. Probably won't practice as well as when you hit fifty seven irons in a row, but it's going to correlate more significantly to what you do when you play on the course.
Winning the Battle Within the return of doctor Glenn Alboch. This is Golf.
Smarter sharing tips and insights from golfers and golf professionals to help lower your score.
It's worked for your host, Fred Green. Welcome back to Golf Smarter. Glenn.
It's it's good to be back, but well.
Thank you.
It's been a long time since we spoke, but each time it's been very meaningful for me because there are moments where my mental game gets a little bit wacky and I need a tune up, and I'm so glad to have you back on the show.
Well, i'll offer that tune up.
Thank you.
In the name of your book to remind listeners who have been here a long time and for those who've never been able to hear you before. It's called Winning the Battle Within. Why don't you give us a brief summary of the.
Book, Well, Winning the Battle Within is it is a lifetime work and what it centers on, of course, is the way that we can finding a way towards self coaching so that we can manage ourselves in our games, so when we're out there playing, we have a set of skills that will allow us to continue playing for
more enjoyment and lower scores. So the book is full of all kinds of anecdotes and stories you know about how people have used these particular concepts in their own games, and it's full of drills and questionnaires and information it you can use is for your own game, and it's it's for people who across all skill levels and all ages. People able to read it, or twelve and eight people that are eighty to be able to use this stuff.
And in looking through it recently because of putting together an excerpt from the book, it will never go out of style. It was first published in two thousand and six and redone again in two thousand and nine, and the information will be golden for everybody in twenty twenty.
And that's one of the things that I love about the Mental Game, and that's really what I try to do here on the podcast is present content what we'd call evergreen, which means that it's just as good in two thousand as it is in twenty fourteen in twenty twenty, it's just as valid like that. Yeah, And also you say from eight to eighty, but it's not just for golfers. I know that you've worked with from athletes of different sports as well.
Oh, indeed work with in past years, I've worked with athletes across many domains and teams as well. And I'm currently working with a couple of teams at the University of Pacific, the men's basketball team and the men's tennis teams, and work with volleyball teams and athletes across many domains.
Right and as we're recording this, it is the morning after the two thirteen NFC Championship between the Seattle Seahawks and the San Francisco forty nine Ers, and you have ties to.
Those teams as well.
Oh yeah, close ties of course with the forty nine ers of the eighties. When Bill Waffs in his heyday, you know, I missed him every day.
Yeah, you were good friends with Bill Walsh and.
A wonderful coach, and so they have access to them during that time was an education indeed for me that I can use in all the work that I do. And then Pete Carroll We've done many, many things together. And as I texted him this morning, there's been a long journey since the seventies, you know, when he was first exposed to the golf in the Kingdom and the intergame oft tenants is all of Timothy Galways stuff as any and all of a sudden here he is not all of a sudden. His journey has been It's been
an interesting journey through all of his coaching experiences. He's taken the inner game right to the top, and now they're headed to the Super Bowl. People ask me, who are you rooting for? Well, I'm rooting for a great game, and yes, indeed we did. I kind of leaned towards Pete and people ask me why. I said, well, if you knew Pete Carroll, you'd probably root for them too. Anyway, it was, it was. It was quite an epic game, with a fourth quarter that was full of all kinds of ebbs and flows.
Actually, I find that really interesting that you know, we're as much as I was rooting for the forty nine ers peak. I have ties to Pete Carroll as well through USC but also because here I live here in Marin County and Pete is from Marine County, went to high school in Marin County and we here in Marine County. You're accused of being a little Oh boy, what do I accuse myself of Western thought?
You know?
Sometimes there were a little too two out there for some people.
Yeah, this is you know, Governor Moonbeam and stuff.
But Pete Carroll has taken this inner game and he has really got a very different coaching approach than any other NFL coach we've ever seen. He's happy, he's fun, he's the players love him. You think that a lot of his inner game, a lot of his teachings help that.
Well, there's probably more similarities between Pete and the other NFL coaches than than was. There's many similarities. Oh, of course they are dissimilarities. It's his approach is is quite interesting, and probably it's more similar to Bill Wallace, although there are different personalities. Yeah, you know his you know, competition is everything, and if anybody has read his book, Win Win Forever, it's it's not it's not about winning as much as it's about preparing to win, and competition is
the essence of it. And I would say that going into the game yesterday it was probably really really exciting for him because there they were. It's the Ulfhleman and competition with two teams and two coaches that are so absolutely incredibly prepared for this. And isn't that the essence of competition. It's probably not the winning of it, it's the epic competition of the battle that certainly is a motivation for Pete. Yes, he has taken the inner game and put it into the NFL and the way he
approaches it. And probably one of the concepts and fact in his in my book that he wrote about the importance of suspending judgment and what does that mean. It means, of course that each spending judgment for ourselves. Let's say, for instance, look, let's put it into a shot. So we hit a shot, and I said, we hit a great shot. They ever connected all the odds, and we want to embrace that and anchor it and remember it.
And it's easy to do because we remember the division we see in the feel of the swing and the emotions attached to wow and sometimes the misshots, so Pete says, and we say, and winning the battle in the most important thing you do there is suspend judgment. Describe the shot. So we described the shot by saying hmm, well, you know I'll hit that one high right, And I wasn't. I wasn't connected to the target, and so when I got the impact, because I wasn't connected to the target,
I didn't really allow my club to release. Okay, on the next one, I'm going to I'm going to stay connected to the target and release it. Or says say that, wow, I topped that one. You know, I really was really rushed and I was scared to death. You know that I was going to hit it in the water. Sure enough, I did.
So.
When Pete talked about suspending judgment, he cuts across all of his coaching, and of course it's something important for us to learn as we play golf as well. That's just a couple of descriptions of how we use his suspending judgment, how and he's coaching, and of course how we can use it as we self coach ourselves in our own game of golf. Being able to describe the shot to spend judgment so how quickly then we can refocus and ready for the next shot.
This all goes very well with a newsletter that you sent out for the new year to remind us about the well, not just about winning the battle within the book, but you gave us some tools to work with as we approach the new year in our golf game and our and our mental game.
And I would love to I just was so moved.
By exactly the points that you had. It resonated so well with me that I that's why I wanted to bring you back on the show and talk about this newsletter because there's not a lot there, but there's so much depth to it that we can really break it down.
Okay, okay, Well.
The first point.
You just have a number of points here, and I think the first one kind of dovetails right off of that football game.
If anybody watched it.
But it's a commit to a strategy that fits your game. I would love to hear you explain that a little more.
Sure, Well, it's part of appreciate with team. And the most important thing is when you're getting ready to play and they have a shot, commit to a strategy fits your game. So if you haven't hit the pins on the right hand side and they have, you had a cut shot in about a month, please don't try it today.
So you're going to well some then the best best shot for me is hit the ball straight right into the middle of the green, and I can totally commit to That's very difficult to commit to a shot when you really don't have the skill, so so maybe you'll have to kind of bump it up there. But pick something that fits the situation and hits your game.
And what about those times?
How do you put yourself in check when you're standing on the tee box of a par three. You've got to hit over the water. There's a green that moves away from you. You've played this hole hundreds of times before. You know that you've got to come up short. So the ball is just going to take a couple hops and land safely, softly in the middle of the green. But that flag in the back is tempting you to
try to put the ball closer to the pin. And as you say, you got to You know, when how do you hear yourself say, oh, I'm going to commit to this shot. Maybe you know, I mean like there's something in the back of your head. How do you listen to that? How do you not squash that voice that's going you really shouldn't be going for this.
You're going to certainly have that inner conversation for yeah, but you got to keep your ego and check and making sure that you hit the shot that as I say, again, it's's the situation. And sometimes that means, well, I'll just take a booge here, but I know this that you have a chance if you're totally committed to this strategy. You have no chance. If you're not committed.
How do you quiet that voice?
Well, then how do we acquire that voice? So the main thing is to understand that you are having the conversation, and it begins with being having a work so you can be in the present. Oh here it comes again. You know, well should I go for this? And you're going to have that conversation, but you have to come back to the fact that you're going to be totally committed to us to a to a strategy that really fits that situation. And so then it goes back to
the way we practice. If indeed we were on the range and are doing our practices, we're practicing developing the shops that we can totally commit to when we're playing. And so there's a correlation there, of course, between the way that we practice and what we decide to commit to when we're playing.
Mm hmm.
This is obviously much more than you know. I see this coming into play on approach shots or you know, after a bad t shot when you're tucked in the woods and you're like, oh, I can get through those trees.
Wait, I have to interrupt you there. See, if indeed we're going to suspend judgment and no such thing are good or bad.
Shots, oh thank you, because.
It doesn't tell us anything. So if I'm working, no, there's just there's no such thing. It's just when I missed the shot. You see saying describing and we're missing when we missed the shot is not judging the shot, it's just evaluating the fact, Well I wasn't committed, so I topped the damn thing, or you know, I try to hit a cut there and I really can't do that,
or you know I rushed that one. You know, God, I was thinking about I was a down one, three and five, and I'm not sure have enough money to even pay the debt at the end of the round. So when those inner conversations has come that are interference, is we just we you know, there's just really no chance, and so suspending judgment is really important and it's not just a good shot. We say that I really connected it.
You know. So I'm playing the other day and I had a fifty yard I had the distance locked in and it was a little web shot and I hit a lot of web shots these days because I don't reach many greens. And I just nailed it. Just write an impact. I said, wow, that is really something, and I really released that, and I was totally committed to it. See, it's not just a good shot, it's just what did
I do to make sure that I executed. So it's really really important to suspend judgment, you know, as a player, and I mean a good teacher, Fred is not going to say to you that was a horrible shot. Well, coach, you already knew that. And when you turn to the teaching and say, how about telling me something I didn't know? Or the partner you're playing with, you and said, wow, man, you know that was an awful shot. Knew that. I
got to see it. Tell me more about what happened. Then, well, I wasn't committed or you know, I rushed that one or all the things that have already stated. It's so important. It's one of the things that I really learned from Pete Carroll the importance of sus sending judgment. Okay, so so Russell Wilson fumbles that on a one yard line Yeah, and so what do you think to him when he comes off the field. I mean, he really screwed that
out of Russell. No, he probably say to him with the next play, So what's the next opportunity we have? But primarily with the next play. It's just so nonproductive to judge anybody's behavior or anybody's actions. It just doesn't make any sense at all because it doesn't tell us anything the information we need to have.
Well, that does make sense.
But when you said, you you hit this web shot and as soon as you hit it, you went wow, and then it landed and it's like, wow, that was a great shot, right, Yeah I did.
I made the putt too, by the.
Way, Oh congratulations. I'm happy to hear that. But you didn't suspend judgment. Wait, you're only telling me to suspend judgment if it's a negative judgment.
No, No, it's just it's just that it's so important for us to give ourselves the information. I was talking to a guy on a basketball team that was in kind of a shooting slump, and I said, you know, it's just it's just like a golfer. You know, my goodness, gracious, you knew learned how to shoot, and you're six years old. Why are you trying all these different things on your technique? You know how to do it. What's the target? Just get back on it, you know, get in balance and
shoot the thing. Look like a good golfer, not a bad one. Yeah right, yeah, And it's so anyway back to suspending judgment again, it's just it's just not productive at all. And I've already said that.
Well, and hear your second point of suspend judgment. You say, review replaced refocus, explained to me.
Yeah, well, okay, so I missed a shot and high right, So I went high right. Wow. You know I didn't release that one because I really wasn't connected with the target. Okay, I'm gonna take a swing right here, and boy, I'm going to let this one go. Okay, now I'm ready for the next shot. And I also okay, so that's how I review replaced refocused. Sometimes in there there's some nakeadive emotion that floods in. You know, emotion doesn't tell us it's coming. You know, when frustration we miss a shot,
it just comes. So we've got to do with that first Okay, yeah, well yeah, I hate to miss those, and I was really frustrated. Okay, let's get back in the present here, Okay, high right, didn't release it? Okay, let's keep going. All right, I get five steps here or five seconds for me to get back into the present and so I can get ready for the next shot. And so that's what our post chart routine is. Pre chary team gets us ready, you know, ready to hit
the shot. You know, selecting this strategy we can totally commit to, and a post arrou tine it reviews you know what happened. Wow, I nailed that wedge. But when I released that one, I was really on the target. Wow, you know I pulled that one way left. You know, it's just petrified that I was going to miss a shot, and sure enough I did. Okay, let's get back in the present here, review it, replace it, refocus, be on our way.
Okay.
Now let's talk about the rest of us. Now, we're not talking about the players who are at the peak level of the sport. You know, the NFL Championship that We're not talking about tour players who who occasionally will make a shot that maybe they weren't totally focused on and it didn't have the result they were hoping for.
But the rest of a golfers who may do this, you know, shot after shot where they're having mishits or you know, I'm sorry, that's a judgment that it didn't the result wasn't what they had hoped for.
Where Where do you where? How do you quiet that?
How do you quell that noise in your head that just all of a sudden, now you have no confidence in what you're doing?
Well, thank you for laughing at that.
You know it? See, do you have a semester?
And which university am I signing up at?
It's it's a a person. If a person makes their commitment to improve their self coaching. Oh, one of the things that they have to develop this performance package which pre shot, in between shot and post shot routines. Okay, that's one thing. The next thing they have to understand the value of the awareness of being presence centered. And there's all kinds of ways we can practice, all right,
that's important. Another way we have to do it is the way we practice and I think golfers, even as the highest level, violate these principles probably more than any other fourth that I know. So we need to practice in a different way. There's three ways to practice, and one is hitting fifty seven irons, you know, and so that's good if you're going to enter a seven iron tournament, but I'm not sure when that is. And the other way to practice, if we're on the range is to
practice like you play. So how about next time you go to the listeners, the next time you go to the range, why don't you do this? Why don't you do first shot practice? It was okay, what's first shot practice? All that said, I'm going to change targets on every shot. I can use the same club. If you really have some skill, you can change the shape of the shot. You can change clubs in each shot, but you can't
repeat anything. Well, you're going to find during your practice you probably won't practice as well as when you hit fifty seven irons in a row. But it's going to be more correlate more significantly to what you do when you play on the course. Maybe the next time you practice, you take the wedge out and you'll get some targets out. There at ten intervals thirty forty fifty sixty yards and you'll practice hitting your wedges. You know the correct distances
cease you can't calibrate that distance. Another way to practice could be, Okay, you got a half hour before you start playing, I can play the course on the range. Familiar play the first three holes, hit a drive. Since you're familiar with the course, you know what your second shot will be. Well, I'm in the tree, I have tot low and hear mister green, I have to chip it. I get on green and go to the next hole.
But everything is first shot practice. We need to do more of that when we're on the range instead of just what we call block practice, hitting one ball after another. Now, sometimes that can be valuable if we're running a new technique, but we overdo it. So anyway, one of the ways that we can manage ourselves on the course is the way we practice in preparation for the time we get on the course.
So I'm one of those people, and I'm not going to speak for a lot of listeners, because I know so many are committed to the game so much as I am. But I'm not committed to spending a lot of time on the range because of time constraints, because of so much else going on in life. So I need to make sure that I'm comfortable with my swing, be prepared for any results after I stroked the ball.
And so I've.
Always really tried to make sure that my mental game was at its best. So I don't again, I don't practice a lot when I'm at the range. It's probably because I'm preparing for a round.
Look at most of the people who are listening might have maybe I can practice one hour, maybe two hours a week maximum, and so let's use that times as best we can, all encompassing. So let's say that you'd have a golf professional you work with. Let's pick one that can help you learn how to play, help you with your swing, but also, but more importantly, to help you learn how to play the game and help you. And there are some that are enlightened that that can
possibly do that. But if you can only devote you know, an hour two to practice, I would really recommend that at least fifty percent of that should be first shot practice putting green putt with one ball, you know, practice making putts, chipping, put some balls around the green chip, one at a time, also for shot chipping, and then the other fifty percent of the time you can, you know, use to try to perfect your technique, and that would
be called block practice, working on something in your swing. But if you're going to when you're out there, if you're going to be totally engaged to targets and really trust your swing, you have to do some practice that correlates with that, and that's what we call first shot practice.
I like the concept of first shot practice because I think frequently we'll walk away from the practice area and we'll hit twenty five shots with one club and maybe have four shots that are that we're happy with or five shots that we're happy with and walk away feeling like that went well. But in fact, if you kept score of how it went, you may not be as
happy with that. So this first shot practice idea of just practicing with one ball with one shot at a time, can that's how I think that's a really great tip on how to take your practice game to the course.
Yeah, it's one of the ways you could practice. There's another way we have. The block practice is working on technique. The first shot practice is what we call simulated or practicing like we play. And then there's another practice which feature you know and winning the battle within. We call it inner game practice or trust practice, and it's really
a lot of fun. And a couple of those drills would be next time you practice spread, Let's say you take out your aid iron and you pick out a target and visualize the shot be able to some people can see the whole flight of the ball. Some people see part of it, but you can certainly see the target. Let's see if you can retain the image of the target while you're swinging. It's it's masterful in a way. It can help you trusting the swing you have. Okay,
that's one of them. Another endgame drill is take that take the same aid on and let's see if you can Let's say that you hit an eight iron one hundred and thirty yards, Well, I'd like to do take the aid iron and take a full swing and see if you can hit it ninety yards and keep it online. And the benefit of that drill is what need much more direction focus and it also distance focus and be able to maintain more distance control. And it's a lot of fun to do it. Another one was really a
lot of fun. I was doing it with a young player I started with yesterday. We called let it go drill and you tee up five of and you hit them one right after another, and you just smack them and you don't have time to think about anything. So that's another kind of a drill to help you just trust the swing as you have. And it's a lot of fun too. You can do with any club. So
then we have three ways of practice. One you can work on your technique, one is the first shop practice, and then we call the inner game practice, just learning to trust the swings you have. And thus three explanations of the way you can practice to help improve your game so that you can have more fun when you're on the course, be better at self coaching, and shoot lower scores. How's that?
I like it?
I like and I think that you know, the inner game practice is something that you can take off the course and off the practice area as well, though.
Oh you can, yes again. It's you know, our imagination is really rich, you know that part of our brain that works a thousand times a sassage in the thinking brain. It's like, next time you walk downstairs, think about how you're walking, and you'll probably stumble yes, you know, but you don't think about it because you just walk down the stairs. And of course that to be like to play golf the same way that point of the brain is is just rich with imagination and intuition and creativity.
And the way we get there, of course is by scene targets, feeling, swings. And it's because the game is a non thinking game. It's not an intellectual activity at all.
It's oh, now you tell me there, right, all right, Glen, Well, listen, We've only covered half of the lists of your New Year greeting and I'm wondering would you mind sticking around? Can we do part two and conclude the conversation? Sure, thank you very much.
So.
For anybody who has not joined Golf Smarter for members only, here's an opportunity to improve your game for twenty fourteen by improving your mental game. And this is a topic that I hope to be covering a lot this year. I think this is so so important for everybody to get more comfortable with the concept of improving your mental game.
And some of the things I want to cover, Glenn are going to be, you know, visualization and getting deeper into that and also pre shot and post shot routines, the value of those and how we can take.
Advantage of each one.
So again I appreciate your extra time and advise everyone. If you want to hear part two, you've got to be a member of golf Smarter for members only and joined today at golfsmarter dot com.
And Glenn, thank you again for your time.
Well, it's delighted. It's always obviously, I'm always looking forward the opportunity to talk about these concepts that I am braced