On the short list of things I don’t want to hear on the golf course, someone else’s phone call ranks pretty high. It’s an intrusion I resent when I’m trying to practice, which is different than saying it’s an intrusion I don’t need.
Think about how often you play golf and something sets you off. A question during your backswing. The group in front of you plumb-bobbing over putts for 7. A husband and wife deciding over speaker phone who will pick up dinner. For such a genteel, tranquil game, golf has a unique ability to raise our blood pressure. It would be nice if everyone agreed to stop being so annoying. A more realistic solution is to find ways to stop being so annoyed.
“ Humans are very outcome-driven, so we think, ‘How controlled can I make the environment so that I can get the outcomes that I want to see?” said Matt Cuccaro, a performance coach who works with tour players and elite amateurs. “Sure, it’s great in practice, but that's not the real world. That's not the golf course.”
If you’ve been paying attention to this space in recent weeks, you might notice a theme around practicing smarter. We’ve talked about distinguishing between “getting ready” and “getting better” practice, and we’ve referenced the need for replicating in practice settings the type of stress you feel in competition.
But if one type of stress is facing a consequence over a shot, another is the kind when you’re distracted or flustered by something else. The flaw in trying to engineer a calm environment for practice is the same as a practice session of hitting 50 consecutive 7-irons off a mat. It faintly resembles golf.
To be clear, a distraction is not always noise. One of the intriguing subplots from a thrilling Masters was Bryson DeChambeau revealing that Rory McIlroy didn’t speak to him the entire final round. Imagine if that was you, and a challenging round was exacerbated by a layer of hostility between you and a playing partner. It might not be a big deal to some, but all of us can point to elements that pull us off task, so we need to develop the skills to refocus our energy.
Cuccaro advocates practicing “coming in and out of shots,” which is to say, establish a moment when you determine the outside elements no longer matter. Much as we’d love for this to be our permanent state, the human brain isn’t a steel trap, so a more realistic strategy is to try for 10 seconds at a time.
“This gives you the opportunity with the noise all around you to really commit for 10 seconds to your target and try to get absorbed in that,” Cuccaro said. “Let yourself be with that, and then come out of it.”
Just like chipping off a tight lie, this, too, requires reps, which brings me back to my phone-call friend on the putting green. The irony of all this is that one of my favorite ways to practice is to throw on some headphones and listen to music while chipping and putting, yet my mistake is believing the chill vibe at dusk is going to carry into a real round the following day. At least being annoyed is something I can expect in reality. I should have bought the guy a beer and thanked him.