The Practice Manual

Tom.D.BJJ wrote: »

Does it only come on paper?

Strangely it appears so

Quahog217 wrote: »

How are you getting on with this book? Im thinking of getting it, would you recommend it?

Still working through it. Still very theoretical. Will probably be a while before I can make a call on it. Life getting in the way of my golf

Right so still working through it. Nearly to the actual practice bit....in my defence there are 255 pages to get through before that

So far I really like it. He touches on loads of topics and I find myself nodding along regularly as he explains things such as why you can't take it from the range to the course, why you fall apart when things are going great etc etc

So the scene is set.....unfortunately due to the imminent arrival of my 3rd child I'd be surprised if I'll have a chance to actually read up on practice and implement the stuff within the next couple of months.

But I'd be surprised if there is a practice book out there that is more detailed. So from what I have read so far I am positive about it - for what that's worth

Right so getting further into the book all the time.
Really like it I must say. Goes into great detail in the first 250 pages to explain the theories. This is important I think so that the reader buys into the ideas behind the practice routines as some are definitely different.

For example he makes a point that sometimes terrible performance during practice is not a bad thing and that we are actually learning loads at this time (potentially anyway). Of course most of us would give up when faced with poor performance levels.

He also says that practicing bad movements is a great learning tool. For example he says he worked on a slice to better understand his students and felt it really helped his game. It makes sense when you think about it. Say if you could hit a reliable slice....it means you have gained control over the club face and club path which is a great skill to have.

He talks about gamifying practice and also how to identify areas of weakness and using progression drills to help with these.

He makes great points about areas of focus and how these may mean bringing good form from range to course is difficult.
For example if focus when making a change is internal (say wrist position)
then when you go to course your focus naturally changes to target and you revert to old swing cause in lay mans terms you associate an area of focus with an action.
Wrist with new action and target with old action. Makes perfect sense to me given trouble I (and others) have when transferring changes made on range to course.

The gamifying aspect is also very good. For example say you pick two signs on the range and aim is to land between them. Go with 10 balls (full pre-shot) and then 3/10 means you go fail and 7/10 means you pass. You can make progressively harder by e.g. narrowing target, changing club/target each time and other more advanced ones such as changing ball position each time, change shape to get within range etc etc

Basically he likens it to weight training...you need to keep adding weight to keep testing your body. If weight stays the same then your body adjusts and gets "lazy". Also need to be careful that target is not too difficult or you will give up.

All in all I am very impressed. I haven't had much time to practice and won't for a while but simply put this has changed my perspective on practice time. No more rake and hit for me. For example recently I have been working on fades and draws. And now with the thought that poor performance is not necessarily a bad thing ( as long as your plan is solid) then I feel much better about it and has spurred me on to try harder and also given me ideas on how to gamify it to keep it fresh and testing.

If you do decide to treat yourself for Xmas then I recommend using parcel motel to get free UK delivery as it will only cost around 3.50 which helps

benny79 wrote: »

Hey Alx,
How you getting on now with the book have you noticed any improvements in your game??

I definitely feel that my practice time is more productive
I have played 9 holes in 4 months so hard to say anything definitive re my game but was striking the ball pretty well when I did play.

I had been spending a good bit of practice time trying to move my strike point around the face. Feel it is working well enough and that should translate to better ball striking.

Anyway book gets a big thumbs up from me.

benny79 wrote: »

keep us updated when you get a few rounds in mate..If you dont mind..

I will do. Of course none of this stuff exists in a vacuum and correlation is not necessarily causation.
I would still recommend it regardless because it makes absolute sense to be doing what he describes. In fact I feel like I've wasted years of practice time doing what I had been doing.

Montgolfier wrote: »

Just wondering how the book is going I'm thinking of buying one to improve my short game.

Well I've had a handful of rounds since I started practicing with it and I've scored well despite not feeling that I played well.

I haven't had as much practice time or playing time as I would have liked but I can see no downside to getting the book.

It will help you organise your time better and I find that the drills he prescribes make sense and I definitely saw progress using them.

alxmorgan wrote: »

For anyone interested the same author has released a video series on strike...

http://www.adamyounggolf.com/the-strike-plan/


I got my hands on it as the is something I struggle with big time. Again will update on here once I have had a chance to go through it

He is running a comp to get a free version on twitter

About 3 modules into video set and very happy with it. Discusses the techniques and why things happen the way they do but the real gold, as he says himself, is in the skill drills.

It's gonna take some work but then nothing good ever happens without it

cjfitz wrote: »

Ya the skill drills are super, worth the fee alone and a lot of them can be done at home.

That bottle cap one looks damn hard...I love a challenge