Boiling down the Tour Player advice 🔪
Mikkelgolf.com Newsletter #8
Last week, we looked at advice from Tour players that Coach McGraw collected for a podcast episode we did a while back. You can find last week’s post and all of the advice HERE.
I know there is gold in all of this advice. Maybe one of the suggestions stood out to you personally? If so, I’d love to hear which piece of advice that was for you, and why:
Now… Advice is fantastic. However, a piece of advice is not really received until it’s implemented. This is an error I made as a player on numerous occasions as I was incessantly seeking out advice and new information. If you do this without a proper filter, you’ll soon enough run into conflicting advice. At that point, which piece of advice do you listen to?
Segal’s law is an adage that states: A man with a watch knows what time it is. A man with two watches is never sure. In the player journey, we’re always either moving towards clarity or towards noise. There were too many times I was wearing two watches…
As an aspiring player, another factor you have to filter for when receiving advice is who the information is intended for. For example, the tour-player advice from last week was specifically regarding the transition to professional golf. Webb Simpson’s advice included having a solid team around him. But if you’re a fourteen year-old reading that advice, you know nothing about what Webb did at fourteen. Did he already have a team around him at that point? Would that actually be the most important thing for a fourteen year old as well? Or would factors like having fun at the golf course, developing a love for the game, short-game quantity, etc. have higher significance?
Again, that’s an error I’ve made as a player. Not applying the context. Failing to filter out the information that doesn’t apply to my situation. The goal of seeking advice is to drill it down to what you actually end up applying to your own game.
So today, let’s put our filtering glasses on…
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First, let’s see if we can boil all this advice down to some commonalities. I think we have a great source - tour players. Their advice is personal to them and is likely a reflection of what their individual journeys have been like. However, there are common threads. I put the entire document into Chat-GPT and asked it to summarize all the advice. Here’s what Chat-GPT came up with:
Establish a Personalized Routine and Preparation Plan:
Kyle Jones emphasizes the importance of purposeful practice and understanding how to prepare efficiently from Monday through Wednesday during tournament weeks.
Collin Morikawa advises starting early to create a personalized routine and prep work for every event, emphasizing that it should evolve but be tailored to individual needs.
Peter Uihlein stresses the need for a plan to keep the mind and body fresh while adapting to the increased number of golf events as a professional.
Know Thyself and Stay in the Moment:
Hunter Mahan highlights two crucial attributes for professional success: knowing and understanding oneself, both in terms of strengths and weaknesses, and the ability to stay in the moment during competition.
Talor Gooch encourages aspiring professionals to set bigger goals, fall in love with maximizing each day's potential, and avoid being overly focused on just reaching the PGA Tour.
Mind Management and Holistic Approach:
Robby Shelton emphasizes the importance of being in total control of the mind when entering professional golf, urging individuals to step out of their comfort zone and prepare for the challenges.
Mark Reppe advocates for a holistic perspective, emphasizing the significance of mental and physical well-being in addition to refining the golf game.
Webb Simpson stresses the value of investing in oneself by building a world-class team and learning to say no to manage time effectively.
These recommendations collectively highlight the significance of personalized preparation, self-awareness, mental resilience, and a holistic approach to both physical and mental well-being in the journey to becoming a successful professional golfer.
OK, that’s a pretty good summary. But the advice is getting less tangible summarized this way. I asked Chat-GPT to re-summarize it all into one sentence:
Establish a personalized routine and preparation plan, know and understand oneself while staying in the moment, and prioritize mind management and a holistic approach, as advised by professional golfers, to navigate the challenges and succeed in the transition to a professional golf career.
That’s a bit too wishy-washy for me... So let me give it a go:
When transitioning to professional golf, prioritize your time management by saying no to things, get to know your game by refining your preparation routines, stay present in each competitive opportunity by having time to rest, and stay personally balanced by having a team around you that you trust.
That turned out pretty decent I think. A long sentence, but a little more tangible…
Now, it’s your task to further filter out what doesn’t apply to you. You might be a player transitioning to professional golf, but you’ve always had great time management skills. Scheduling has been a competitive advantage for you throughout your college years. You’re comfortable with saying “no” to things. Then perhaps you should overlook the first part of the sentence. Maybe refining your preparation routines is where you should truly put the emphasis instead. The point: The advice is taken once you actually put effort into your preparation routine - for example by writing, discussing with your coach, or experimenting and evaluating the results of the changes. The advice is not taken if it just remains an idea.
Another example of filtering this information could be for a junior golfer at fifteen. Knowing what successful tour players said about their transitions to professional golf is a valuable insight, but probably not the most applicable at this time. The advice regarding a proper team around you and your time management skills might not be quite as pressing at this stage. It’s more important to get the right quantity of practice in, and that you’re starting to learn how to compete. However, there’s the advice about competing rested. That might be beneficial to apply at fifteen, so you decide to implement competing rested by not “stress-practicing” leading up to tournaments, while focusing on your nutrition and sleep at tournaments. Perfect. You’ve applied it to your game. The rest of the advice you store for when you are in a golf transition; for example, when you’re about to start college.
…
To sum up today’s post, it’s important to be smart about the filter you have internally. Develop this filter the entire way through your playing career. Then, once new advice or ideas pass through your filter, make decisions that lead to applying the new information to your game. Don’t let good ideas just pile up and cloud your mind. Implement them into your habits and practice routines.
See you next week. I know you’ll have your “filter” on when reading next week’s newsletter so I have to step up my game :)
Warm regards,
Mikkel Bjerch-Andresen
Golf Coach and Analyst
Oslo, Norway