Confidence is the key

Hitting good bad shots’ when the golfing gods frown upon us is a talent not many of us have. Confidence certainly plays a big role in how our mind phrases questions to ourselves during a round. If you’re asking yourself several negative questions — then you’ve certainly framed your psyche for failure.

If you find yourself in such a predicament, step back from the ball and re-group mentally. Try to forget any previous bad shots and visualise some of the best shots you’ve ever hit. Picture the ball flying on the desired trajectory landing exactly where you want it to. Take a few extra practice swings and focus.

The birth of sports psychology in Europe happened largely in Germany. The first sports psychology laboratory was founded by Dr Carl Diem (perhaps a golfer!) in Berlin, in the early 1920s.

The early years of sport psychology were also highlighted by the formation of the German College of Physical Education in 1920. The lab measured physical abilities and aptitude in sport.

In Russia, sport psychology experiments began as early as 1925 at institutes of physical culture in Moscow and Leningrad, and formal sport psychology departments were formed around 1930.

However, it was a bit later during the Cold War period (1946-1989) that numerous sport science programs were formed, due to the military competitiveness between the Soviet Union and the United States, and as a result of attempts to increase the Olympic medal numbers.

Unfortunately the golfing area in our brains is extremely fragile and terribly susceptible to suggestion and only a ‘rare’ few of us succeed in blocking out these demons.

Golfers are gullible. We have all played with people who would try and talk you into losing but good players know when another is feeling insecure.

Keeping your concentration for four or five hours, while playing at a high level — is something that any golfer who wishes to play to the best of their ability must learn.

Playing golf we undergo a form of meditation. For the time we spend on the course we must study hard to focus on the game and clean our minds of worrisome thoughts.

Out of Bounds: Golf has probably kept more people sane than psychiatrists have.