Overview
COMPONENTS
The three components of Aim & Alignment are Mind, Body & Club. While it is easy for most if not all golfers to understand the importance of setting the body and club position correctly in order to be aligned and aimed at the target, the mind is less obvious to some golfers. If we think about how the human system works then it quickly becomes obvious that the mind is so intrinsic to this system that it is sheer folly not to have the mind focused on our target. If you have not had any contact with Sport Psychology, then think of this as your first lesson. You must focus on and think about What You Want, as apposed to something you would like to avoid.
You must focus your mind on what you want to achieve. You must make internal images
of the target and of the ball flying unerringly to this target. If you believe that
you are not very visual then you should make strong “feelings” of the ball flying
perfectly to the target. Using the mind properly is the only way to achieve your
very best golf and you are strongly urged to study the mind-
PRECISION SEEKING
I am never failed to be amazed at the degree to which golfers pay little or no heed
to the immense importance of aiming the mind, body and club-
Consider for a moment which of the following two activities is more difficult to do.
1) Aiming and firing a rifle to send a bullet to a precise target consistently.
2) Hitting a tiny golf ball with the tiny surface of the club-
Let's say for arguments sake, that you had never done either. I am 100% confident that in the space of just one hour I can teach a beginner to fire a rifle, in proficient enough manner, to be able to easily hit a target the size of a car at 200 yards, consistently.
The same cannot be said of golf. It is without doubt, far more difficult to repeatedly send a golf ball to a precise target over varying distances, using varying clubs, with weather conditions such as temperature, winds and terrain difficulties affecting bounce and roll included.
There is not a golfer alive, who would not be ecstatic if they could consistently propel the golf ball 200 yards to a target the size of a car. A marksman on the other hand would think nothing of this task. A marksman would soon become bored of hitting a target as large as a car at 200 yards. In fact it probably would not take the beginner marksman long before wanting more challenge and picking smaller parts of the car to aim at.
The rifleman or woman knows that aim is everything. Sure, breathing, relaxation, focus, visualisation, all of these things are practised in shooting. But at the end of the day those are surely only done in order to be able to facilitate aim (and hold precision aim) whilst the projectile is fired and leaves the barrel.
So we have a situation where those people practising the easier of the two tasks know the immense importance of aim and understand fully that if the barrel is not pointed at the target the projectile has no hope of going there.
The majority of amateur golfers, who have a much harder task, pay little or no heed to the fact that if their body and the face of the club are not aiming precisely where they want the ball to go it has little or no hope of going there with any half reasonable golf shot.
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Author Mark Wright -
Copyright Mark Wright 2009
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