Practice Golf Without Going to the Driving Range
We are sure you lead a busy life. Work, family, and other adjacent obligations can keep you out of the range for some time. Besides, who has ever told you that you have to be at the golf range 24/7 to become a good golfer? Here we show you realistic ways to practice golf without having to go there.
Ideas for Practicing Golf Without a Range
Deep Golf Immersion
When we refer to “immersion” we refer to consuming as much golf-related media as possible. DVDs, YouTube videos, magazines, online talk forums, television, and podcasts. Anything goes. In this day and age, you can get any kind of information you desire about virtually any topic.
Instructional videos, articles about golf, product reviews, and simple golf chat, to name a few. You can obtain very worthy information from the media. So, even if you’re not physically practicing, you can still hear or read a tip that could make you break out of stagnation, or overcome a difficulty.
Even if you are not actively looking for instructional material, you can have a great time by just watching your favorite golf talk shows, or historical moments caught on camera. Before you know it, you’ll be incorporating different resources into your game too.
Visualize Yourself Golfing
This may seem odd, but visualization is a type of training being used by numerous elite athletes worldwide alongside many other sportspeople from diverse disciplines.
It consists of putting yourself mentally in situations that you would face in the sport that involve a certain degree of difficulty to overcome and seeing yourself conquering those scenarios. However, you don’t necessarily have to create this type of mental image. It could be any normal situation in golfing, and just imagining what you would do in those cases.
In short, you imagine yourself golfing. You can picture swinging your club, or putting the ball inside the cup.
The purpose of visualization is to make you relax. Furthermore, it puts you in a rather concentrated mindset. It’s a good practice to engage in prior to training or playing, but it can also do wonders when you are outside the range. With visualization, your results improve.
Putt at Home
Putting at home holds several advantages. First and foremost, it is comfortable and cost-effective. You don’t have to go anywhere. All you have to do is go to your living room, grab your putter, and get some shots in. Plus, you have no entrance fees to pay, as you would in a driving range.
The other upside to putting at home is that short-range skills often determine the outcome of a match. Therefore, practicing your putting skills is a must if you want to become a proficient golfer.
If you find no inspiration when putting at home, look for instructional videos on the Internet. There you have plenty of exercises that you can do. You can also buy putting mats. Putting mats allow you to practice different skills and drills for a very small upfront investment that most certainly pays golf dividends in the long run.
Do some Swing Drills
Another great form of keeping your golfing skills sharp is by polishing your swing technique. You can do this anywhere, provided you have a golf club with you.
Learning how to use the ground properly when swinging is highly relevant. What you can do to maximize its use is to do the ice skater drill. What the ice skater drill consists of is utilizing the floor in such a way that resembles the figures described by ice skaters.
You have to displace yourself forward, performing similar leg motions akin to those of a skater, while swinging the club side to side simultaneously. Don’t bother too much about the swing, since this exercise is more about feeling the ground than about swinging per se.
Pro tip: Don’t overthink your swing. Let the club flow freely once you decide what path you want the ball to travel. Rehearsing at home the act of letting your arms go is a great practice to improve your swing as well.
Use a Mirror to Practice Your Posture
Many nuances oftentimes go unnoticed when playing golf at a course. It can be hard to pinpoint the mistakes that make the ball steer clear from the cup. Yet, many of these bodily cues can easily be noticed when observing your posture in front of a mirror.
From the trajectory your shoulders follow to the position of your feet, you can closely inspect all these checkpoints more effectively with the aid of a putting mirror. Scan your body positioning from head to toe to determine how accurately you have aligned yourself with the ball. Once you notice what mistakes you are making, try to bring those corrections with you to the course—or range, for that matter—next time.
Improve Your Overall Fitness
The way in which the fitness factor is underrated in golf is directly criminal. There is lots of potential laid to waste when forgoing this aspect of golf. Many times golfers believe that because of the slow-paced nature of golf you can skimp on your fitness. This is far off from the truth.
Regarding swings, you can maximize the employed force if your body can withstand strong rotational forces. You’ll swing the ball further and better with a strong body.
Concerning putts, you’ll have much more control over your shots when your workout regimen is on point.
Even if you completely discard these matters, the long walks that usually take place on golf courses could be less harsh on your body if you trained more extensively. Use this time outside the range to sculpt a healthier body. Not only will you be more proficient at golf, but you will also lead a richer life.
When Should You Go to the Range?
The range is very useful once you soundly grasp the fundamentals of the golf driver swing. When your technique is sufficiently polished, getting those extra repetitions done in the range becomes beneficial.
However, it is easy to tell that many components of your game can be improved outside the range too. Whether you are inside or outside the golfing range, it is paramount to have adequate equipment for your golfing journey. Get premium golf products at https://back2basics.golf/collections/all.
