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Visualizing Accurate Lines  Email this Article to a Friend
David F. Wright, Ph.D., PGA Good golfers stand behind the ball and draw an imaginary line from their ball to a precise target, putter through driver. Then they use this line to aim their golf club and align their body parallel to their target line. Research in Dr. Frank Jobe's biomechanics lab showed that when a player was out of balance and out of body symmetry, their perception of lines moved left or right of known points (almost always left.) Players stood on a mat with drawn footprints the way most right-handed players stand behind the ball: Their left foot in front of their right with the golf club in the right hand. The perception of accurate lines is important for alignment to the target line and reading greens. When points on a line are perceived left of their actual intersection of a known point, the player unwittingly moves their line to the right of the "true" line. That is likely why most players align themselves right of their target. Join me next month in this newsletter and I will teach you how to create your own "test" on the putting green and how to know which hand you should hold the club in behind the ball. I will also show you how to find the beginning of your body symmetry. If you are interested in attending our next putting school, send us an email and we will advise you of the date. We cover everything (and more) you read in this newsletter in our putting school. drwright@WrightBalance.com Mental Tip: I have a student, a former Division 1 college player, who was an undercover Narcotics Officer for a major Metropolitan Police Department well over 20 years ago. He is playing tournaments in preparation for the Senior PGA Tour School. He is a good player and he will do well if his nervous system holds up. He has a sleep disturbance and a host of other physical problems that stem from his former occupation. Sleepless nights and bouts of generalized anxiety plague his day to day life. Underneath his engaging smile resides a wealth of talent and chronic physical problems. He is no different than anybody who has had trauma in their life from abuse to being at the epicenter of an earthquake to an occupation where your life is potentially in harms way. All of these people have a learned state of vigilance. They are always on the look out for pending danger. Their nervous systems are stuck on vigilance. They tend toward irritability, they startle easily, they are short on tolerance for frustration and their performance suffers when vigilance kicks in. On the golf course, their nervous system activity creates quickened movement around the ball and a faster tempo, their judgment is impaired and their ability to visualize diminishes. I spent over 2 years studying physical balance and body symmetry in Dr. Frank Jobe's biomechanics lab at Centinela Hospital. I am reminded daily by my students that physical balance and body symmetry is only ½ the picture of performance. If you can balance your body and your emotions simultaneously, you are well on your way to being a star, no matter what the arena might be. Something like a golf lesson is enough to cause the same internal state that vigilance creates, a nervous system so revved up that learning is compromised and performance deteriorates rapidly. (That is why I frequently take my students through a brief breathing exercise at the beginning of their lesson or golf school.) Playing with somebody you want to impress or a fear of embarrassment can create the same nervous system state that vigilance creates. We think in pictures. One of my favorite visualization exercises follows: Picture a lemon cut in half on a plate. Got it? Now, pick that lemon up and take a big bite of it. Bite into the rind of the lemon and taste the sour juice as it flows into your mouth. Feel the juice drip over your lower lip and onto your chin as you taste that sour flavor. Vigilance is about the potential dangers of the future. It is one massive dose of FEAR. If visualizing yourself biting into a lemon can make you salivate, what are pictures of the potential "dangers" you are facing doing to your body?
These "dangers" may vary from the focus of how others you want to impress may perceive you if your performance on the golf course is less than your capability to an occupation where your life is in constant potential peril. Can you imagine what soldiers preparing for combat with the threat of loss of life face? Following the "Gulf War" of the early 90's, many of our troops returned home with what became known as the "Gulf War Syndrome." It was speculated that Saddam Hussein had used some form of biological warfare causing the syndrome, a mixture of neurological complaints. A little known French study shed light on the "Gulf War Syndrome." We have a barrier between our blood system and brain through which medication passes. It is called the "blood brain barrier." Think of it as a mesh like cheesecloth. When you take a medication, it is absorbed into the blood stream and crosses the blood brain barrier through this cheesecloth like mesh. In addition to treating a specific site for which the medication is meant, it also impacts other parts of our central nervous system. That is why medication meant for a particular condition might read "causes drowsiness" or "do not operate heavy equipment" on the medication bottle. The French research showed that under extreme stress, the cheesecloth like mesh of the blood brain barrier enlarges its "holes" and allows more medication through. It seems that we overdosed our troops with inoculations meant to protect them from potential biological warfare and in fact we may have created the "Gulf War Syndrome." Fear is a driving force in our daily lives. So what can you do? We can learn to be present, to set aside a focus on past and future events. Breathing, movement and focus training exercises will teach you skills to use from the first tee to the first date to the final exam to the board room. Great players have used these skills for years. European Tour Player and Commentator, David Feherty once said that the mental game is like building a muscle. You have to exercise (practice) your mental skills regularly to keep them active. Otherwise, your mental skills will atrophy like an unused muscle. Former UCLA basketball coach, John Wooden, would teach his players to put on their socks during their first practice. Wooden would take 30 minutes for this exercise. He taught them that a wrinkle in a sock could cause a blister and blisters caused loss of playing time. He also taught them that prolonged focus on a simple task quiets both movement and nervous system activity. Johnny Miller would take 20 minutes to shave the day of a tournament round and Ben Hogan and Byron Nelson described driving 10 miles per hour more slowly to a tournament site. I have 2 books now available at Roger Dunn Golf Shops, online on this web site and in the Arroyo Trabuco Golf Shop. These books have companion CD's that teach breathing and focus strategies. The goal of these audio exercises is to teach you a set of skills you use independent of the guided practice audios. Like any exercise, as long as you maintain the practice, you will benefit. The next time you shave, put on your socks or drive to the club, remember the wisdom of John Wooden, Johnny Miller, Ben Hogan and Byron Nelson. We have a lot of "health" we can glean from these past champions. These strategies will impact your life no matter what the arena. All we need to do is remember to keep working that mental muscle. If we don't use it, we lose it.
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