Vacation Golf: Tasmania
From Victoria Golf Club, we headed to Moorabbin Airport to board a flight to Tasmania. It was bittersweet to leave Melbourne after five fantastic days, but we were also excited for the next leg of our journey. None of us had been to Tasmania before, which added to the intrigue of the destination.
Arrival Day: January 1st, Tasmania
I remember seeing a propeller whirling and feeling quite warm as our plane prepared for takeoff in Melbourne. It’s hard to believe that Australia used to be a penal colony for Great Britain and Ireland, seeing how serene things seem now. I wondered how Tasmania differed from Melbourne. I had learned while researching visas that Tasmania is an island state of Australia. Bass Strait separates Tasmania from mainland Australia, and apparently it’s one of the roughest stretches of ocean in the world. I wondered if that meant more dangerous convicts were sent there, assuming they were truly criminals. I fell asleep with these thoughts swirling in my head, and it must have unlocked a new level of REM, as I have no recollection of the inflight experience. If it weren’t for the vibrations of the plane during landing, I probably would have stayed asleep beyond the hour-long flight.
We lifted the final piece of luggage from the plane and were greeted by a fleet of trucks. Our friendly shuttle drivers were taking us to Barnbougle, a property that would become our home base for the next two days. During the 8-minute commute, we received a rundown of the local wildlife. We learned that wallabies and wombats were plentiful in Tasmania, but danger was lurking in the bushes here. Our driver advised us not to wander beyond the fairway, as a few species of poisonous snakes could have taken residence in the longer grass.
We dropped off bags at our cottages and met up at the restaurant on property for dinner. Perched atop a steep hill, the Lost Farms restaurant at Barnbougle offers the most spectacular views of the sea and surrounding landscape. From the restaurant, I could see the Marram grass swaying in the wind, as if it were waving hello to us.
The stunning views were second only to the presentation and taste of the incoming food. My main course was Mariners Pie, which according to the menu was “Tasmanian fresh farmed salmon, local scallops, and king prawn tails in a light curry and cream white wine sauce topped with crispy filo.” We also shared their house cheesecake, which came accompanied by poached pear and double cream. It was one of the most delicious meals I’ve ever had.
Janaury 2nd, Barnbougle Lost Farm
After a good night’s rest and putting away a casual but delicious Eggs Benedict for breakfast, we headed to Barnbougle’s Lost Farm course for our 8:30 a.m. tee time. Established in 2010 and designed by Coore and Crenshaw, a golf architectural firm established by Ben Crenshaw and Bill Coore, Lost Farm is currently ranked in the top 100 courses in the world list. This 20-hole track features holes that run along the coast and inland and carries two additional par 3’s on the back nine. After playing the first few, I noticed there were many strategically placed bunkers throughout the holes, and though the course is not overly narrow, the undulating greens and elevation change demand precision.
We played an alternate shot match on this day, and I partnered with another coach to take on a duo of team members. Our golf games were a little less sharp as a group, but there was plenty to talk about between the majestic views of the shoreline and the lack of man-made objects in every direction. It truly felt like we were playing golf on the edge of the earth.
At lunch, we shared a couple of pizzas, and a few of us went back for a second eighteen at Lost Farm. Another small group went to play Bougle Run, a 14-hole short course on property that opened recently. I was bummed to be missing out on both experiences, but my legs were starting to feel like logs. I decided it would be best to pace myself given the many can’t-miss rounds that still lie ahead.
Group dinner that night was a quicker meal at The Dunes Clubhouse. The restaurant was a short walk from our cottages, so it was nice and convenient. I had a salmon salad for dinner and a pecan pie with vanilla bean ice cream and wild berry coulis to finish. After dinner, I walked back to my cottage and repacked a few bags, as I knew we were leaving again the next day.
January 3rd, Barnbougle The Dunes
The next morning, we met up at The Dunes Clubhouse for breakfast at 6:45 a.m. I enjoyed another delicious Eggs Benedict, this time with smoked salmon. For the first time in my life, I tried Vegemite, the popular Australian spread. The paste is dark brown in color and smells quite pungent. The smell reminded me a bit of Better Than Bouillon’s vegetable base. I found the taste to be a lot better than its smell, and learned that the paste is made from brewers' yeast and seasonings and contains lots of B vitamins. I wouldn’t say I became an instant fan of Australia’s iconic paste, but while traveling abroad, it’s something that I could easily scrape on my toast to get the full experience.
Our group began play at Barnbougle’s original course, The Dunes, at 7 a.m. This Tom Doak and Michael Clayton design was another masterpiece. The track features spectacular views of the natural landscape, and balances approachability and challenge extremely well, alternating between generous landing areas, steep drop offs, a few almost drivable par 4’s, and speedy, multi-tiered greens that demand good placement on approach shots. The course felt quite different from Lost Farm, and it became my new favorite course on property by a tiny margin.
My playing partners pointed out a big striped lizard on the 13th tee, but none of us was quite sure of its name despite Google’s assistance. The picture doesn’t quite do it justice - we should have included an object for scale.
After our rounds we packed up our bags and said goodbye to our wonderful hosts and restaurant staff. It was bittersweet to be leaving our temporary home base for the past few days. I hope to return to Barnbougle one day when the third course is built.
We arrived on time for our flight, which was headed back to Melbourne. I made sure to stay awake on the short flight to savor the gorgeous aerial views before sunset.
Our original bus driver greeted us when we landed, and helped us load bags into our trusty trolley buddy. We headed to a hotel that was within walking distance of Melbourne Airport. Since our flight to New Zealand didn’t depart until the following morning, we needed to stay overnight at an airport hotel.
January 4th, Travel to Auckland, New Zealand
I packed my bags before going to sleep, as I wanted additional time to enjoy the hotel’s breakfast buffet in the morning. The front desk staff raved about their breakfast bar, so I had a feeling it would be memorable. It certainly didn’t disappoint. From the hot bar with breakfast classics such as scrambled eggs, baked beans, and crispy hash browns to an actual make-your-own fresh vegetable juice bar with carrots, ginger, celery, and kale, it was the definition of breakfast of champions.
I skipped the shuttle and crossed the street to the airport to log a few extra steps. There were signs that warned of swooping birds along the walkway, so I braced myself for a different type of inflight experience. Luckily, I didn’t see any action on my short commute.
Our flight was delayed by about an hour, so I had time to grab a coffee. I enjoyed a delicious iced latte from Mocopan, which, interestingly, was served in a paper cup. It was delicious and refreshing.
It was a relief when we finally boarded the plane to Auckland, as we were on a tight schedule. I had never been to New Zealand before and was excited to be visiting the next country on our journey. I had a feeling it was going to be more extraordinary than imagined, and I was right.
Vacation Golf: Melbourne, Australia
In December, I took a trip to Australia and New Zealand with a group of students and coworkers, and experienced some of the best golf destinations in the world. To be with a group that enjoyed golf as much as I do, and to have the chance to visit a former team member in New Zealand, made it even more memorable.
As much golf as I used to play while I was competing, I’ve never played fourteen rounds of golf in fourteen days, so that presented quite a physical challenge. I carried my golf bag for all rounds except for two, and some rounds were 36-hole days. But how could I miss out on any rounds when every course on the list was a postcard in the making?
I documented the trip to commemorate some of the best moments in my golf history and to endorse the wonderful facilities that I feel are still under the radar, or wildly underrated. I have a feeling they won’t be under wraps for long.
Arrival Day: December 28th, Melbourne, Australia.
We departed Los Angeles on December 26th and arrived in Melbourne the morning of December 28th. A day was lost due to travel and the time difference between the U.S. and Australia. Our group sailed through immigration, and we met our bus driver on time. Our bus had plenty of seats, but the luggage compartment was in the form of a rolling trolley. Somehow, nineteen sets of clubs and suitcases managed to fit into this little dude!
We made a quick grocery run and visited an Aldi that was located inside a local mall. In addition to the grocery store, the mall had all kinds of restaurants and a movie theater, so it reminded me of the mega-malls in Thailand.
After wolfing down our lunch and dropping bags at the hotel, we spent the rest of the day playing the first course on our list, St Andrews Beach. As someone who has yet to experience links golf in Europe, this Tom Doak design is how I imagine a links course would be. It was also the first time in my life I saw kangaroos, so it was even more special to have the experience take place on a golf course.
I paired up with another coach, and we took down two team members in best ball matchplay, so it was an extra fun start from a competitive golf standpoint too!
December 29th, Royal Melbourne
After a good night’s rest, we ventured to Royal Melbourne to catch a 10 a.m. tee time. Royal Melbourne’s courses are routinely ranked in the top 100 golf courses in the world list, so I knew we were in for a treat. We played 18 holes on Royal Melbourne’s East Course, and 9 holes on the West Course. One of the nines on the West was undergoing routine turf maintenance, which was unfortunate timing for our group as the West is considered the more challenging layout between the two. This Alister Mackenzie course, which was the site of several Presidents Cups, didn’t disappoint; it was in immaculate shape and boasted some of the firmest greens I’ve ever experienced. Our group was each joined by member hosts who were all so gracious and welcoming. My group’s member host was a funny and good natured businessman, and he provided me with colorful on-course commentary and a glimpse into Australian culture and communication styles. I was told Australians tend to be more direct with their words compared to Americans, and they don’t worry as much about being politically correct. My group’s smooth-swinging member host shot under par from the men’s tees, and apparently doesn’t play golf very much at all. It must be nice to be a great golfer without much practice!
December 30th, Moonlit Sanctuary & Yarra Yarra Golf Club
It’s cultural immersion time! The first stop was the Moonlit Sanctuary, a wildlife park that is dedicated to saving Australia’s endangered species. There were plenty of fowl and reptiles to see, but the marsupials were my favorites. Our tour guide, Michelle, did an awesome job explaining the differences between a wallaby and a kangaroo, but I still had a hard time telling the difference. As far as I can tell, the one on the left below is a wallaby, and the one on the far right is a ‘Roo (short for kangaroo in Australia). The wombat (middle) was also very cute, but somehow got its head stuck in a bucket, so I didn’t catch its face. Fun fact per our tour guide: mother kangaroos can produce two different kinds of milk, which she uses to feed her young that are in different developmental stages. Bonus fun fact: Koalas are nocturnal and can sleep as much as twenty hours per day. Koalas eat up to a kilo of eucalyptus leaves per day, so they don’t need to drink much water since the leaves are full of H2O.
After the visit to the animal park, we made two more stops on the way to golf. The first stop was a visit to the Bathing Boxes at Brighton Beach, where we enjoyed views of the historical beachside huts and took in some waves.
The second stop was the Queen Victoria Market, where we grabbed a quick bite and sampled delicious drinks and desserts.
On our drive to these destinations, Michelle pointed out some neat buildings and street art. Can you see the image in the building on the right below? While you can make it out in a photograph, when you look at the building with your naked eye, it’s harder to make out what it is.
This is my favorite street art photo from the trip, taken on my first real camera. I love how the binoculars are looking back at me.
It’s finally golf time! We teed off at roughly 4 p.m and still managed to get in 18 holes before darkness fell. Designed by Alex Russell, Yarra Yarra Golf Club is truly a hidden gem and one of my favorite courses from the trip. The course has the most interesting set of par 3’s I’ve ever played. It was a really fun track overall — a good mix of undulations, well-placed bunkers, runways up to greens, and a few funky roll-offs. If the course was local to me, I could easily play it 7 days a week!
December 31st, Kingston Heath - The Furrows & Heath course
We enjoyed a warm-up session on The Furrows, a new short course that draws inspiration from the main Heath course. The distances of the holes ranged from 50 to 140 meters (yes, I should mention that most courses seem to use meters in Australia, so not so good for English majors such as myself who does calculations in yards!) I love the farm vibes that the pitch fork tee markers and sand barrels on tee boxes give off.
The main course at Kingston Heath, another Alister MacKenzie design, was a favorite for many in our group. The course was in perfect conditions, and it was another unexpected layout with doglegs and trees coming into play on several shots. I played another best ball match, partnering with a member of the men’s team while a senior on the women’s team partnered with another coach. The match came down to the wire and got a little heated at the end as our competitive spirits came alive. My partner carried me for most of the day, but we were still 1 down with 1 to play. I managed to hit the final approach shot within 12 feet of the hole. My birdie putt grabbed a piece of the hole but didn’t quite drop. The neighboring team narrowly missed their 18-footer for birdie. My partner had a birdie putt from about 9 feet to tie the match. I saw a rise in his determination as he went through his full routine. The putt was positively struck, and it rolled right into the heart of the cup! We fist pumped our way off the green but remembered to shake hands and give hugs. It was a fun ending to a full day of golf.
In the evening, we headed downtown and spent New Year’s Eve on the Yarra River. We just missed the fireworks, but a team session at McDonald’s and the ice cream trucks made up for it.
January 1st, Peckish Cafe + Victoria Golf Club
I took a little stroll in the morning to a local cafe that got great reviews for coffee. Our tour guide had mentioned that Australians like their coffee nice and strong, and that’s what I tasted at Peckish Cafe. I’m no coffee expert, but I enjoy learning about and tasting different kinds of beans during my travels. I took an interest in coffee during the COVID days, and received coffee education through James Hoffmann’s Youtube channel. Going by what James has mentioned about brewing ratios, I wondered if the stronger coffee taste comes from shops using greater beans-to-water ratios compared to the U.S. The coffee at Peckish was extremely delicious, but it definitely tastes pretty concentrated, and one was plenty for me to get the day started.
Victoria Golf Club, an Alister MacKenzie design, presented us with an entertaining layout with a few twists and turns with its rolling topography. The course was in tip-top shape; the fairways were pristine, and the greens were rolling close to a 13. What also made it memorable were the different types of trees lining the sides of the fairways.
After golf, we enjoyed the most delicious burgers at the clubhouse. The drink pictured below is called Lemon, Lime, and Bitters, a popular drink in Australia. The bird below is an Australian magpie that came to visit us on the patio, or, more like it came to visit our delicious food.
After saying goodbye to our hosts at Victoria, we headed to the airport. It was time to relocate to the next destination!
Off-Season Series: Part II The Invisible Antenna
Working with young adults keeps you on your toes. The younger crowd consumes knowledge as fast as Pac-Man inhales little yellow dots. One can google just about anything in today’s world. Feed questions into Chat GPT, and it will spit out information in a split second. If you hope to connect with young people and speak their language, you better find ways to keep up.
A few months ago, I surveyed a group of students to see what their strengths and weaknesses were. I like to throw out broader questions at times, as it gives me a sense of their self-awareness. “I thought that’s not a thing anymore,” one of them said. “I thought it depended on the context.” We went on to have a lively discussion, and I made a mental note to look into the latest trends on the topic.
For those of you who are curious about what the experts say on the topic nowadays, I suggest you read up on articles by author and speaker Simon Sinek. To sum it up in my own words, he says what we consider to be strengths and weaknesses are highly situational. On a podcast I listened to, he shared that he is a chronically disorganized person and is prone to losing things. One day he meets a potential client at a conference, and they agree to connect shortly after. Simon misplaces his potential client’s business card but finds it two weeks later at the bottom of his bag. He rushes to email the potential client, thinking the delay might have put a damper on the start of their relationship. Instead, he later learns that his slow response made him seem more attractive to the client — it made him appear busier and more sought-after. An inadvertent advantage in this particular situation, but when it comes to space organization, not so much.
Reflecting on my own strengths as a golfer and the situations in which they shine, I credit my acute senses as a defining quality of my game. Feeling and visualizing shot shape, ball flight, gauging distance, and connecting to targets are some of my specialties. These skills lend themselves to different areas of the shortgame, in particular. Chipping and bunker shots eventually became the best parts of my game. As I step in to execute a chip or bunker shot, I feel confident that my approach is sound — that the club selection and landing spot chosen are appropriate given the distance, lie, grain, green speed, and slope. My feel-based analysis informs the set-up adjustments I would have made to ensure the best possible strike is achieved. To reach that end point, I would have visually assessed the variables mentioned (speed, slope, grain, etc.) and used my feel and visualization skills to double check that the chosen landing area is correct for my upcoming shot. The connection I feel to the landing spot towards the end of my pre-shot routine is as tangible as a physical object to me. The end result usually doesn’t disappoint, and even if it does, it doesn’t bother me as much as I know a miss is rare.
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The off-season is a wonderful time to fine-tune our feel—the invisible antenna of our golf games. Building and refining your feel will have tremendous benefits for your scoring skills. Some of my favorite exercises are as follows:
Eyes-closed practice swings: the purpose of practice swings is to dial in the feel and rehearse the motion for the upcoming shot. The practice swing is the coming attractions of the real thing. Closing your eyes and masking your ability to see forces you to call upon your sense of touch and sound. Start by doing practice swings next to the ball to see if you can replicate the strike you want. Rotate the focus areas for each practice swing by asking yourself the following questions: How well can you feel the club head brushing the grass? Does the length of your swing feel appropriate for the shot you’re attempting? Asking a coach to observe you or recording yourself can be very helpful too. Eventually work your way up to doing eyes-closed practice swings, then hitting a shot normally with your eyes open. After a few rounds of these, you might start to notice less of a difference between the feel of the practice swing and the actual shot. It can feel meditative after a while as well, and I bet it will sharpen your feel.
Ladders, a.k.a. snake drill: put down a stick or shaft at a certain distance, let’s say, 45 feet away from you. Chip or putt your first ball and try to get it to finish as close as possible to the shaft, but don’t hit the shaft or go beyond it. Your second ball should finish behind the first ball, and so on. Your goal is to fit in as many balls as possible between you and the shaft. If you happen to go past your previous ball, start over. By the way, it’s harder than it sounds. Setting a goal ahead of time for the number of balls to fit into the gap keeps it competitive, and you can also do it with a friend for a little more excitement.
One-handed drills - Tiger hits these right-hand only putts to warm up regularly. Watching the rhythm of his pure, one-handed putting stroke is like watching an artist paint. One-handed chipping is more difficult, but I’ve seen pros with the best chipping action do this with relative ease. While it’s harder for chipping, it’s a great way to test your strike and forces you to understand the feel that produces your cleanest strike. The goal of the one-handed drill is not to be perfect; being 50% successful is still very effective at producing the effects you want for sharpening your feel. The bonus benefits of this drill are many: it sharpens your proprioception by helping you sense where your body and club are in space. It also trains for resilience, as mishits may be plentiful in the beginning. If you want to be good at this game, you need to understand how to make the right mental and physical adjustments when the previous shot wasn’t ideal. The one-handed drill is a great drill for all of these reasons — it trains the club, body, and mind at the same time.
Off-Season Series: Part I Rest & Effort
For collegiate golfers and coaches, the off-season is now upon us. If you’re in the northeast like me, daylight hours are more limited now — it got dark at 4:17pm today. I’ve gotten into plants lately and the limited sunshine and colder climate has made some of them go dormant. Indoor golf is ramping up in the area, and gyms are getting crowed.
For college players, it’s a great time to recharge the mind and body. The golf game is quite a repetitive motion sport, and it’s beneficial for injury prevention and longevity to take some time off.
The off-season also affords a good chunk of time for collegiate players to get physically stronger, and refine their golf skills. If you need to switch clubs and test new equipment, now is a great time. If you need to reconnect with your long game, short game, and mental game coaches, or perhaps reassess your working relationships with any of these experts, it’s a great time for that too. Slowing things down allows you to reflect on what’s to come. The goal is to single out aspects of your game that will ultimately have the biggest impact on tournament scoring, which is the point of the game for competitive players.
I’ll jump around a bit and share snippets on topics that are especially relevant to the off-season. This is the first of a few snippets.
Effort: how hard people feel they are working on their game is always an interesting topic. Over the years, I’ve had the pleasure of hearing from pros, amateurs, and juniors on how hard they feel they’re working. While some put in 8-10 hours into their games per day, others put in 1-2 hours per day, or somewhere in between. Yet, individuals often feel they are working their butts off which is both interesting and head-scratching. I tend to think the reason for this perception is because golfers often live in their own heads, and aren’t always aware of what everyone else is doing. Some may be living under some misconception or with limited context of how their training compares with peers. Others may derive confidence from knowing they are putting in maximum effort (and more so than everyone else), and so they deserve to improve more.
There lies some of biggest challenges of golf and if you keep reading this blog, you’ll hear me say often that golf is often a game of opposites. What may seem like a good thing to do may in fact not be helpful at all. The difficult part of golf is that the output doesn’t always correspond to the input. You can have 2 players who put in the same amount of work get completely different results from the hours they put in. Someone who works efficiently for 2 hours can get so much more out of it than someone who gets in 6 hours of wishy-washy practice. Hard-work or long hours doesn’t mean you will beat the competition.
I would argue that the relationship between training hours and improvement corresponds less so in golf than some other sports, especially endurance sports such as cycling or running. Putting in more training hours in endurance sports often lead to increased performance, speed, better times, etc. Improvement in such sports tend to also be more trackable, more linear, more clear. In the game of golf, improvement can be more nuanced, and more tricky to track. If you picked up more swing speed, you’d still be tasked with keeping it in the fairway. Generally speaking, longer drivers tend to be less straight than shorter hitters. If you spent more time on the long game, the scales might tip too much and your short game might start to squeak for attention.
Given all of those considerations, it’s much more helpful for longevity and energy conservation to think you are working the right amount for your goals. It’s more beneficial to put your energy and effort towards figuring out what you need to improve and how to do it, rather than thinking about how hard you need to work and measuring those hours. Statistically speaking, chances are there is someone out there in the world who is working harder than you. It also doesn’t mean they will automatically be better than you. How you work on your game matters the most, so figure out how to work on things you’ve identified then get to it. Your game will be in a better spot for it, and you’ll be in a better headspace too. If you ever need to put in longer hours, you could easily scale up because you haven’t been working at the “maximum amount” — you’ve been working the right amount.
The Others
Yes, this blog has the same title as the suspenseful horror movie starring Nicole Kidman from a while back. For those who haven’t seen it, the movie is about mysterious occurrences in a haunted mansion. Spoiler alert: “the others” is a nod to both the new family that moves in and the ghost family residing there. The living and the dead eventually clash, and both are equally bothered, viewing the other as intrusive.
While this blog isn’t about ghosts, a topic that has fascinated me recently are the numerous factors that impact golfers during competition — both real and imagined. Since as players we all have different strengths and weaknesses, I wasn’t always aware of the things that bother other competitive players until I started working with players of all abilities and backgrounds. I like to refer to these factors as “the others” for the invisible hold they seem to have over us. Here is a list of these factors and tips on how to combat them.
Playing Partners
I’m the type of person that gets deeply absorbed in activities and prefer to keep my own council while I’m playing, so it’s rare for me to be bothered by playing partners. To me, playing partners are invisible folks that I notice only when they need something. I interviewed other players to learn why they are sometimes bothered by their playing partners to better understand the reasons people are affected by this. “Slower pace of play,” some said. “I hate it when people have quirky routines,” said another. “Some people talk too much, or not at all,” was also a popular one. After hearing some of these complaints, I better understood the issue. Players who are more affected and bothered by others seem to view playing partners as very much a part of their daily competitive experience. Whether they are conscious of it or not, it’s as if they have a vision of how their ideal competitive round should look from an experiential standpoint, and if what unfolds doesn’t conform to that expectation, they are negatively affected by it.
Tip: my advice is to start using your playing partners for your own purposes. They really have nothing to do with your day on the course! Keep in mind what they are there for. Their primary function is to help you keep pace with the field, and to help keep your score as a playing marker. If you want to be social, feel free to chat. If you don’t want to be social, then you don’t need to. If it doesn’t help you to watch them, then look away while they hit. If they are playing too slow, tell them to speed up or if that isn’t your style, tell a rules official to observe them. If it sounds simple, that’s because it is. Consider what your ideal experience looks like while you’re competing, and make sure what you envision doesn’t involve how your playing partners are behaving. Then live out this vision while you are competing. Do this, and your playing partners will fade into the background, just like puffy clouds in the distance.
Gamesmanship
Some players like to play mind games with their playing partners to distract them or get them off their games. There are tales about Tiger taking more club than usual on par 3’s to trick playing partners into hitting too much club, and they often do. As far as personal experience goes, I remember one episode from when my sister and I were about 10 years old, and we were playing in a small golf event in Florida that was hosted by what used to be called the Greater Tampa Golf Association. My sister was playing in the group in front of me and there was a long wait on a par 3. While I waited by the water cooler for the human logjam to dissolve, Aree told me that one of her playing partners kept jiggling coins in their pocket whenever she was trying to hit. I was quite surprised by this since this event wasn’t the U.S Open after all. Sure enough, as Aree was getting ready to hit on a par 3, her playing partner jingled coins. Apparently I walked up to this person and asked them a simple question that made them stop the rest of the way. I guess my instincts took over as hearing that someone was intentionally bothering my sister didn’t sit well with me. I’ve told this story a few times to my friends and they just laugh as they can’t believe I actually said something to this person.
Tip: at the heart of it, golf is just a game. Because we care so much about our performance, it can feel very personal, but it really is just a game. There are also some mind games that competitors like to play with one another within the game of golf. First, realize it’s never personal, even if it might feel like it. Some cultures see mind games as a regular part of competition. What is helpful is for you to decide ahead of time how to best handle these games. Do you play back? Do you ignore it? Do you address it? Any of these responses can be reasonable depending on the situation, your style, and your personality type. Planning ahead will help you feel more prepared for these situations, because if you compete long enough, you will encounter these episodes.
Spectators
By now you’ve probably heard that public speaking is feared more than death itself. 75% of people surveyed by the National Institutes of Mental Health say it’s their public enemy #1. It’s not surprising then that most golfers, especially untrained golfers, get more nervous in front of a crowd. On pro-am days while I was touring, I used to give my amateur playing partners a pep talk before we teed off since they often appeared sheet white on the first tee. “We are just out here to have fun, and no one will remember how you play,” I would tell them. Their nerves are very understandable though — even pros get nervous in front of big crowds — what chance do untrained weekend golfer have?
Since stage fright is such a big factor for so many people, including serious juniors, amateurs, and even pros, it might be helpful to explain the physical changes we could experience from the nervousness that crowds often bring. The heart beating faster, the sweaty palms, the jittery feeling, all kinds of thoughts racing through our minds. These are all normal physical reactions to mental stress, and rather than pretending like it’s not there, you are better off acknowledging that it’s completely normal, and doing a few breathing exercises to get your body to relax, and to encourage the feeling to pass.
Tip: When you feel the nerves coming on, do a breathing exercise called the “physiological sigh” that one of my favorite YouTubers, Dr. Andrew Huberman, recommends. Dr. Huberman is a neuroscientist and professor at Stanford University, and he shares science-based tools that help improve health and human performance on his channel.
A physiological sigh is done by performing a double inhale followed by an extended exhale. As shared by Dr. Huberman, it works to relax us by offloading a lot of carbon dioxide all at once. Follow this link to watch Dr. Huberman’s demonstration.
Another tip is to use self-talk to guide your thoughts and feelings to a more neutral place. Knowing which words and phrases calm you down in these situations may require some experimentation. For some it might work best to simply acknowledge that these feelings are normal. Some may benefit more from distracting these thoughts or feelings, and if so, chatting to your caddie, humming a tune, or thinking or picturing something in your mind’s eye might work best. Competitive experience and knowing yourself as a competitor, is helpful here. Regardless of what words or strategies you use, the effect it should have is to slow things down enough to let you refocus on the task at hand so you can execute your normal pre-shot routine.
Employing strategies to deal with these real and imagined factors will not only make you a better golfer, it will make the game more enjoyable, whether you are playing alone or with others, or being watched or not.
The Set Up
“Practice makes perfect.” I’ve heard this saying often over the years. After 16 years of coaching and working with players of varying skill levels, I think there’s much more to practice than simply logging hours, if you are serious about game improvement.
When I was about 12 years old, my siblings and I started taking golf lessons from renowned golf instructors, including David Leadbetter. David’s explanation of the challenges of learning golf was especially helpful to me as someone who didn’t consider myself to be a natural at the sport.“Why don’t I have a good swing?” I remember asking David at one of our first lessons. I remember his response clearly. “The golf swing is not a natural motion,” he said. “Running, throwing, or kicking is more natural and intuitive. You can kick a ball poorly and it will still go forward. How many people can make contact with a golf ball the very first time they swing a club?”
If you play another ball-and-stick sport such as hockey or squash, then you probably have a leg up on someone who doesn’t. If you are athletic with great proprioception or hand-eye coordination, that should shorten your learning curve. If you learn golf from a young age, your older self will thank you, and you’ll likely pick up the game much faster. Speed, strength, and power is best built from a young age after all. So I agree with David — the golf swing is not intuitive, and with a ball that is smaller is size, it’s difficult for beginners to start off with a bang, literally.
Developing a solid foundation for golf starts with good basic fundamentals — a good grip, square alignment, and an athletic posture. These fundamentals influence how your body and club moves from the start and throughout your swing. If you watch or listen to instructional golf content, websites and t.v shows have these topics on rotation. But do you ever wonder why basic fundamentals are so important? After years of reflecting on the best response to this question, I’ve come up with my own explanation: because good fundamentals help you form a simpler swing pattern, and a simpler swing pattern is easier to repeat than a more complicated one. Repeatability is the key to consistency. That’s really it. Align your feet, knees, hips, and shoulders in all different directions like a cross roads sign and you’re encouraging a winding swing that’s challenging to repeat twice, let alone on an ongoing basis. Although good fundamentals don’t necessarily guarantee a good swing, bad fundamentals surely guarantee that you won’t have the simplest possible swing.
I want to share a few basic drills that I’ve done over the years that help fine tune my fundamentals. I especially like that they don’t require fancy tools:
Grip: first work with a coach to understand what a neutral grip looks like. If you prefer a grip that is a bit stronger or weaker that is fine, as long as it works for you. Practice gripping a club in front of a full length mirror. Grip the club first, then look at it closely in the mirror to check that it looks right. You’ll need to do this more often as you are starting out in the game, but expect to do this on and off your entire golfing life. Even the pros make grip adjustments regularly — it’s just one of those things that shift around from time to time. We are humans that wake up feeling different every day. We are not concrete!
Alignment: next up is the alignment stick, golf’s most popular training aid. One of the best ways to test your alignment is to set up to a shot on the range and ask a friend to put an alignment stick down along the lines of your feet. Notice how I didn’t say ask your siblings, because they’ll point it somewhere else on purpose just to drive you mad! If the stick isn’t pointing anywhere close to your target line, it’s time to put in some time with the alignment stick. The pros love to start off their range sessions by ‘zeroing out’ their alignment. As one of my coaches once explained it to me, alignment in golf is challenging because it’s easier to aim when you are standing directly behind the ball staring down the target line in the distance. It’s harder to aim when you are standing next to the ball and trying to get parallel to the target line. That’s why we need to practice our alignment regularly — it’s just not intuitive.
Posture: we are all built differently. We come in different shapes, sizes, and proportions. My sister and I are identical twins and we are physically strong in different limbs with different proportions — a fact that still surprises me today. The goal is to have an athletic posture that encourages a good swing, keeping your unique proportions in mind. Unless you are Tiger Woods and grew up with the most perfect golf golf set up since the age of 1, you’ll need to pair up with a coach for more specific feedback on your best posture based on your body type. Once you have a good template for posture, practicing your setup in a full length mirror will go along way. Practicing in the mirror is especially helpful as you can make adjustments quickly and get visual feedback without your coach being there. Once you have learned your ideal posture, test yourself by getting into your posture, then look up at the mirror for visual feedback.
Bonus posture tip: getting on a good mobility and golf specific training program can also be very helpful if you have trouble getting into good posture. We all have some physical imbalances and limitations — it’s normal and expected. Your body will also thank you when you’re older.
Recap
Pair up with a good golf coach early on to build good basic fundamentals — grip, alignment, and posture. Learn how to maintain these fundamentals when you are practicing without your coach. Ask for drills and exercises you can do on your own. Do those drills with a coach to verify you are doing them correctly before doing them on your own.
You’ll be working on golf fundamentals for the rest of your life so you should normalize it and not look at it as too basic to work on. Having something to work on can be comforting after all, like knowing that you’ll see an old friend on the practice range. Good fundamentals help you develop a pattern that repeats. While it may feel like it’s slow paced and boring to spend time on these basics, working on these early on will optimize your game progression down the road.
Pursuing Mastery
Before taking a deeper dive into different golf topics and training advice, I want to bring up the importance of desire and motivation. There are many reasons people want to pursue something. From passion, enjoyment, and fulfillment, to honor, fame and fortune, there are plenty of reasons that drive someone’s pursuits. While the most admirable reason may be the genuine love of the subject such as love of a sport, it doesn’t necessarily mean this is the most helpful reason — for you. “You should say I love golf,” media coaches and golf coaches advised me to say during interviews as I was growing up. But there can be incredible energy and power behind extrinsic motivators such as gaining the admiration of others. Well, initially, anyway.
I started practicing golf 6 to 7 days a week since the age of 7 and a half. I say half because my sister and I quit for about 6 months since it’s so darn hot in Thailand. We were 7 years old and without much tolerance, yet. But when we restarted, we practiced for 3 hours+ almost every day with a Thai coach who worked at our local driving range in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Pro Vit, our first golf coach, had a gentle nature and was a good golfer himself. He kept practice fun by organizing golf games and drills, and let my siblings and I goof off from time to time.
At about 8 and a half years old, my sister and I started competing in junior tournaments around Thailand. The age divisions were typically 10 & under, or 12 & under. A typical field had 3 - 8 players, with us included. My sister immediately started wining these events and I would follow behind, losing by just a few sometimes, and by wide margins at others. It was rare for me to beat Aree at this age. She was a natural athlete, both physically and mentally. Her success also felt like mine so I never felt badly when losing to her — our early success informed me that winning was fun! Being identical twins, we quickly gained attention from local and national press. Winning early and often and being recognized felt exciting. It was a worthy reward for putting in those practice hours. With each passing day, I became more motivated. The cycle of training, competing, and winning is a self-propelling ferris wheel that I could stay on forever.
But as the popular saying goes, nothing lasts forever. As you graduate to higher levels of golf, there is more competition, and you win less often. You are not a worse player and you didn’t lose your skills — you simply win less. If you are motivated by victories only, or getting attention from others, the game becomes less fun, and motivation dips. The problem with external motivators is that it tends to be a powerful driver and an energy drainer, all at once.
Pursuing something of value is already difficult, so it is your job to support yourself mentally and emotionally throughout your journey. It’s something you have to get good at if you want to stay in the game for the long haul. Physical skill alone won’t bring about your best in the most critical moments — moments that often define whether you will accomplish your greatest performance goals. Managing your emotions well is a vital part of scoring consistently well, especially in the toughest events like majors. Winning less frequently taught me how to support myself properly as a competitor. It drove me to change what I enjoyed most about pursuing golf, to find joy in hitting my daily goals, and to celebrate the small victories along the way, especially during practice sessions. I no longer needed to wait until I played well or won tournaments to gain confidence - I learned to practice in ways that boosted my confidence daily. I began to ‘win’ again every day, and became a more complete competitor as a result.
Today I would say my greatest motivation is the joy I get from overcoming challenges. It’s fun to attempt to do hard things. The peace that comes from knowing I gave my best effort is the greatest feeling of all. Looking back at my golf career, this discovery is probably the reason I tend to do better in bigger junior and amateur events where courses and conditions were often more difficult.
I invite you to think about your own biggest source of motivation. Why do you want to be the best golfer you can be? For some of you, your goals may be to try and master the game. Others may be satisfied with breaking a certain score. Just as your goals are personal to you, your reason for pursuing golf will be different. Your main reason is the reason you walk out the door when it’s pouring down rain or it’s 100 degrees outside. Your main reason keeps you standing on the range past the 2nd hour if you still haven’t figured things out for the day. If it is your love and passion for the sport that is wonderful news! If it’s not, you’re not automatically worse off either. But there needs to be a reason — your big why — that drives your work. Even better when the reason comes from within — not dictated by external factors.
Levels of Golf
I’m practicing about once a week at a local driving range. My swing is gradually picking up speed again but the lines aren’t quite there yet. My friend who is learning golf videos my swing for me once in a while. I’m traveling overseas on a golf trip in a few months, and I’d like to play at an enjoyable level. An “enjoyable level” for me nowadays means the golf ball is traveling in the direction of the intended target line, somewhat. What a departure from my younger self’s performance standards…“Enjoyable” then meant that 75% or above confidence level as I stood over shots translated to my golf ball flying towards the target often. It meant the machinery was well oiled and getting the job done. Better yet, the machinery was firing shots on all cylinders all the time.
When I was little and starting out in golf, it was hard to imagine how good I would become one day. I wasn’t born with the best physique for athletic pursuits. My twin and I shared space in the womb but I guess my feet got smooshed and I had to wear metal braces for a while to straighten things out. Unlike my twin who was naturally stronger and had a dynamic swing ever since she picked up the game, my original golf swing was technically weak. A wicked over the top move was an early signature move. I know, pretty awful. Good news is I received help from experts along the way, and discovered that I was a fast learner. I practiced with intention in each practice session, but if you told me then that I would hold the no. 1 spot in the U.S junior golf rankings one day, I would have told you that was too kind of a prediction. There was a point in my junior career where I remember smiling in a tournament as I had exceeded my own expectations. This event was the 1999 AJGA Ashworth Junior Classic at Windsor Parke, where I shot 68-69-66, good enough for the win, a new course record, and a new AJGA Girls 54-hole scoring record at the time. Shout out to my brother Chan too, who won the boys division with scores of 71-69-68. I was in total control of my game all week. Every part of my game — putting, chipping, irons, driver, and bunker game — were firing on all cylinders. Not bad for being a first generation athlete, I thought.
I had two important takeaways after this event. One is I had exceeded my expectations of how good I could be at this game, and I was both pleasantly surprised, and proud of myself. There is great satisfaction in seeing your hard work pay off, and memorable achievements are something you will remember and have forever. Another takeaway was how a good training approach can help you accomplish more than one ever imagined. You can become excellent if you apply the right training approach. The experience informs how I think about natural abilities and training nowadays.
My first love is competitive golf, or becoming the best golfer I can be. Physical injuries led me to change course and eventually, I discovered my second love, helping others pursue their best golf. Whether your goal is to be a top junior, amateur, college, or professional golfer, or if you simply want to be a respectable weekend golfer, there is a way to practice and train that would make your journey much more fun and enjoyable. It will be fun to be your guide.
The Great Gamble
Naturally, I want to start at the beginning. But when I try to explain my origin in the game, I’m often flooded by thoughts and feelings. When I was young, starting from the age of about 8 or 9, I often told my history factually — in sequence. It made sense to me…they were simply facts after all. But the face of the person receiving my response eventually told me that these facts were out of the norm. The fact is, my father was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer when I was about 4 or 5 — before I started golf. With only a few years to live, as he was told by doctors, he needed to ensure that his children could fend for themselves when he was gone. His rationale was simple: golf scholarships were plentiful in the U.S. He had done some research and found this to be the case. He also enjoyed the game and was about a bogey player without playing or practicing all that much. How hard could it be? It would take him about 10 years or so to find out. Eventually all three of us: myself, my twin sister, and my older brother, all held the no. 1 spot in the national junior rankings in the U.S. We all received athletic scholarships to Division I colleges in America. But it wouldn’t be as easy as he thought. But then again, three children excelling in the same sport is pretty unusual, and rare.
Nowadays, I’ll give another answer to my origin story, which is also true. My dad told my sister and I to pick a sport that we liked, with the expectation that we were going to learn it well, and together. We had to pick the same sport because of logistics — it was easier to have the twins doing the same activity. Plus, it’s eye catching to have identical twins doing the same things. I liked swimming — the water was nice and cool. It was way too hot in Thailand to be outside, especially during the summertime. The poolside crinkle-cut french fries dipped in Heinz ketchup was pretty amazing too. But my sister liked golf better.
One day we decided to settle it at the local driving range with a little competition. If I threw a golf ball further than her 7 iron goes, I could pick the sport. Such good odds for me! It was our second time practicing golf ever — how far could she possibly hit it with a miniature muscle back 7 iron? I’m always quite nervous and excited before any competition, and this was no different. I picked up the shiniest golf ball from the bucket and took a step back. I cranked my arm well behind my head, and stepped forward as I propelled my fist towards a 100 yard sign in the distance. BOOM. Crash…bounce, bounce, bounce. The big crashing noise and the sound of a golf ball ricocheting off concrete startled me. What happened? I must have early released it — not good for golf, or throwing apparently. My sister hit a beautiful 7 iron that carried 80 yards or so. Our golf training has begun.
