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Want to break 90 this golf season? It might be easier than you think—and your road map doesn't even require an overhaul of your swing.
To get your big break in 2025, all you have to do is learn a few basics to practice better, and with the right tools, you'll start improving your consistency and lowering your scores in no time.
Use these four simple keys to adjust your practices this season.
Set process goals
If you want your practice to be more effective, you must start by setting process goals. In this video for Titleist, Dr. Mo Pickens, a sports psychologist who works with Keegan Bradley and other high-level athletes, explains that process goals can help you focus on a method or procedure , rather than an end goal or outcome.
“What steps do you need to take to give you a realistic chance of changing your statistics from where they are now to where you want them to be?” Dr. Pickens says.
By taking your focus away from the result (ironically, breaking 90 points or winning the upcoming inter-club match), you allow yourself to better analyze your game and figure out what you need to do to achieve it These “result goals”.
A good way to set realistic process goals is to look back at your stats from previous rounds – nothing crazy, just fairways, greens and putts per round – and see where your game is, and in what areas It's what you need to improve the most.
Process goals are also an excellent tool for measuring progress. For example, your goal might be to throw 30 four-foot balls in a row. If you can only hit 20 points, then you have a baseline for the next exercise.
Remember, you don't always need to achieve your goals during practice. If your goals are fairly ambitious, you may not be able to achieve them unless you put in a few hours of practice.
Stretch before swing
A quick active warm-up is one of the best ways to prepare your body and can even help improve your swing over time.
According to Scottie Scheffler's fitness trainer Dr. Troy Van Biezen, this is what amateurs need most in their daily fitness routine.
“Although they [amateur players] When they're working out in the gym, they just don't have the mobility and flexibility to move the way they need to in a golf swing…You have to be able to turn and move,” Dr. Van Biezen said of golf in an interview.
And it doesn't take long. This three-minute stretch will increase your mobility and prepare your body to swing the club.
Focus on the basics: posture, grip, alignment
In an episode of “Warm Up,” five-time major champion Brooks Koepka revealed that every time he's on the practice range, he thinks about a key.
“It's really simple: PGA. Form, grip and alignment,” Koepka said.
It's a key Koepka was given as a youngster and has kept throughout his golf career. You can steal it to level up your practice.
To get into proper golf posture, stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, soften your knees and hinge away from your hips to create a bit of a forward bend.
Grip style is more personal, but if you need a refresher, here's a quick guide to gripping the club written by top golf 100 coach Sean Hogan.
Top 100 Golf Coach Tina Tombs says there are three things to remember when adjusting your posture:
1. Before setting your stance and adjusting your body, be sure to align the clubface with the target.
2. Your body should be parallel to the left of the target line (for right-handers) and parallel to the right of the target line (for left-handers).
3. Ball position affects body alignment. Hitting the ball too far forward will open your shoulders, hitting the ball too far back will close your shoulders.
You can read Tombs' full explanation of targeting and alignment here.
Add stress to your practice
Performing under pressure is a skill you have to practice, just like anything else in golf. One way to do this is by incorporating limit-based exercises into your practice sessions to simulate the stress you feel during the session.
Constraint-based exercises impose constraints on the task at hand, often requiring you to complete the exercise or start over if you make a mistake. A great example is the cutter drill shared by top 100 golf instructor Trillium Rose in a video with Titleist.
To try it out, cut five balls into the same spot. Your ultimate goal is to have all the balls end up within each other's flagstick. If you hit the ball beyond the pin, start over. As you slowly progress through the exercise, you should feel your tension build.
It might take you a few tries to get it done, but that's okay. Remember, you are not only practicing chipping, but you are also improving your ability to perform under pressure.
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