by Richard Foster

Created on: January 25, 2009

It has to be accepted that golf is a complicated game and swinging a golf club correctly is not a natural thing to do. The technique behind timing a golf shot has to be taught and has to be practiced many times before a player can build sufficient confidence to regularly strike the ball correctly. Someone learning the game from scratch will have to process a multitude of messages, such as straightening the left arm or keeping the head down, which fill the mind with a great deal of information. This often leads to confusion and ultimately to frustration, which is the arch enemy of the golfer.

At whatever level of experience, taking a golf lesson will often lead to confusion because the golf swing is made up of so many different components and if we concentrate on one particular aspect, this may be to the detriment of another. One could compare the composition of a golf swing to a delicate cellular structure where each individual part has to be in perfect harmony otherwise the whole thing collapses. Taking a lesson usually gives the golfer a chance to focus on a single element of their game, but the key is being able to merge the learning into the rest of their play and here's where confusion ensues.

So, for example after a lesson the player has learned how to improve addressing the ball, and having perfected this he feels his game should now improve but then he momentarily forgets the best way to control the speed of the club head during the downswing and his game suffers. It is difficult to accept that one has to sometimes take a backward step in terms of short term performance to get better long term.

Significantly, professional golfers probably practice more than any top sportspeople. Even the leading players spend countless hours on the practice ground, even during tournaments, and they are constantly tweaking their game to get close to perfection. Some professionals have had to experience a decline in their game to make improvements, a prime example being Nick Faldo who during his career remodelled his swing, suffered a loss of from but came back stronger in the end. If that can happen to one of the best players in the world then we can begin to understand the consequences for the amateur.

Ultimately, confusion reigns for the vast majority of golfers as they have to accept that the most probable outcome of taking a lesson is a dip in form which is diametrically opposed to the reason for undertaking tuition in the first place.

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