CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Viktor Hovland is the living embodiment of a problem most golfers know all too well.
Here's the problem:
There's a weird move in their swing that golfers want to fix.
The problem is that the old bad move feels normal, because it's so ingrained.
You know the new move is better in the long term, but it feels weird.
Sure, you hit some good golf shots with the new swing, but it feels so strange that it's sort of distracting.
Plus, you're playing golf this weekend. You want to win and have fun.
Should you spend that round making a weird-feeling swing, or just ride your luck with your old swing for the time being? You still hit decent shots from time to time with the old swing, after all, and at least that one doesn't feel strange.
What should you do?
That has been Viktor Hovland's issue for most of the last two years, as he's discussed openly. Some bad habits snuck into his golf swing over the years. It happened gradually enough that his swing still felt great, but over time, the results got worse and worse.
"I've just had a move in my golf swing for the past five, six years that's just been so effortless, and it's been very easy to predict. And now suddenly the last couple years it hasn't been doing that...I do beat myself down with kind of where I'm at technically, and it's not fun when you're out there trying to predict a certain golf shot and the ball flight does the opposite."
But Hovland's getting it back. He's already won once this season, and even though he's in the middle of rewiring his golf swing feels, he still thinks he can again this week at the 2025 PGA Championship
On the ground at Quail Hollow, he shared some insight into how that process works.
Step 1: Accept that your favorite swing feels will stop working 📉
Because of those bad habits that crept in, it's Hovland old move that now feels different—and strange. It's counterintuitive, but going back requires feeling something new, because what feels comfortable isn't actually where Hovland wants his swing to be long term.
Hovland's coach Grant Waite explains with a recent example:
Stephen Denton
"It was on Wednesday at a recent Pro-Am. His driver was off. He hit drives that started right and went more right on one, two and three. On the tee of the par-3 I said, alright, stop. You're going to make a swing for me and you're going to do this and it's going to feel horrendous to you, but I just need you to make the swing...The shot hits the green. I asked him how it felt, he said 'horrible,' but I filmed it and compared it to some swings he liked from 2020. One felt good, one felt horrible, but you couldn't tell the difference between the two swings."
The moral of the story is that feels don't stay the same—much as you may want them to. It's just a strange fact of this game. You can't deny it. Accept it, Viktor says, and move on.
"Feel is just so subjective," Hovland explains. "Feels change all the time. I can still rely on the same old feels right now as I used to, but those feels now have changed. You're always changing, whether you're doing it consciously or unconsciously."
Step 2: Separate subjective feels from objective results ⬅️ ➡️
Once you accept that your old feels may no longer be the ones that work best for you, it's time to embrace the new ones. To do that, you need to deprioritize the awkwardness of how something feels, and instead focus solely on the outcomes. Specifically, the good outcomes.
"I wire my brain to the new feels. If I see that the ball is doing what I want it to do; if I'm seeing objectively good results, it's easy to get over the weirdness of how it feels. I try to separate what I feel and what the ball is objectively doing...I try to divorce those two things."
Jared C. Tilton
In short, don't let how something feels right now be the measure of whether you made a good swing or not. Let the objective result be the judge, and put your subjective opinions on how something feels temporarily to one side. It's simply not helpful in this phase.
Step 3: It won't feel awkward forever 📈
The good news is that over time, the 'this feels awkward' swing feels will start transitioning into 'this is the feel that creates good shots' feels. It'll only keep feeling awkward if you don't commit. Waver back and forth, and nothing will feel comfortable; push through the awkward phase, and you'll land in the spot you want sooner than you think.
"You kind of have to deconstruct it in a way, then ingrain the movement you already have, but even deeper," Hovland says. "You make progress... then you'll go out there and let your unconscious swing just do what it's supposed to do."