Are You Practicing With PURPOSE? | Practice Like A Pro

what's up welcome back to the channel my name's andrew it's great to see you back in jacksonville now i got back last thursday night and since i've been back i've been putting in a lot of work on the range and a lot of work in the gym because my three weeks in ottawa was none of that i wasn't sure if i was gonna even make an upload for today and then as i was out here practicing just on my warm up i got to thinking about some of the things that i heard yesterday in a podcast the newest altus performance podcast from pete cowan and it got me thinking maybe great to kind of share my version of this in a little little impromptu practice vlog i don't even have a tripod i don't have anything i just have a new phone so let's see how this turns out with the iphone 11 but working away here on a very intentional and focused practice session like a lot of the things pete was saying in uh in that podcast yesterday is incredible i've linked it below if you don't listen to altus earn your edge podcast you're missing out there's been a lot of great interviews during this whole kind of quarantine season but towards the end of the interview pete really hones in on something that i was really great at early in my professional career late in my amateur career kind of on the heels of a vision 54 and this every shot must have a purpose and pete says you know he wasn't very good at it when he was practicing but this is something he wants to really hone in with his players is that literally every shot you hit practice session on the golf course needs to have some sort of intention you need to be trying to accomplish something with every shot you hit because if you're not you don't know if you did it right or wrong you just don't know if you just hit it for the sake of hitting it what are you learning what are you gaining from practice so my practice right now i'm working really intentionally on the physiological kind of the motion of getting to a good place at the top but letting this really happen and getting to a feel where i'm like this at impact so you can see i'm really trying to feel it a lot with every swing for every rehearsal then when i'm over the ball just kind of let it go but i know exactly what i'm feel trying to feel and if i feel it or don't feel it that's how i judge that strike so this is a super kind of technical mechanical thing but it translates as well if i'm hitting little wedges i was focusing solely on the target and then if i have a shot where i'm thinking about technique i didn't accomplish what i wanted to accomplish because the the the intention there was target focus that's it and that's what uh i'm trying to get out of my practice because i want to start playing tournaments again there's a couple tournaments locally now and i'm going to start playing them so i don't want to be a shitty shitty player anymore so i feel really good about where i'm at but i want to keep working intentionally and literally every shot even as i'm talking there's a purpose to this shot yeah i can get on some video i could put live view up and get feedback or i could put a flight scope and get feedback if i'm dialing in working on numbers carry yardage all that kind of stuff but right now we're just working on a feel of really letting things open up and letting this kind of right shoulder and elbow get right there because when i played my best golf i felt like i was almost just sidearming iron shots and that's been the weakness the last couple years since breaking my arm i've been swinging more with my left arm because this elbow is made of titanium now and i think subconsciously i've held back from really using this arm whereas when i was up in ottawa and got a bit of practice in i'm like dude just use your right arm it doesn't hurt anymore maybe a little pain here and there but overall it's 99 so i'm using my right arm a lot more i'm able to focus on my right arm delivering that right side a lot better because when i was swinging just with my left arm for fear of this i'd get tight i'd get tension here and that's where my steepness comes from the left arm rushes and kind of yanks across the body so my focus very intentional is just on the right side letting this left arm just kind of go along for the ride but to go along this kind of intentional thing a great drill for me right now is one arm swings and i have immediate feedback if i've accomplished what i want to accomplish but the intention is there there's a purpose to this shot but i have feedback okay i know what i'm looking for kind of rush that one got it thin as opposed to just oh i'm doing a one-arm swing just because oh that was a good one oh that was a bad one i know exactly what i'm looking for there's a purpose there's an intention and holy cow this makes your practice so much better a little rushed okay get some feedback because a great thing pete said in this podcast is a golf swing is a second and a half and if you hit you know 400 golf balls in a day that's like 10 minutes of work so if we're out here for hours and hours and hours but the actual work is only 10 12 minutes what are we doing with the rest we need to make the other bit of that time be very focused very intentional very kind of he keeps saying the word physiological where you're thinking a lot on the motion you're doing a lot of good rehearsals because the reality is i mean in this little run here the work i've put in it's just been a minute a second and a half for each of those swings so you want kind of the time in and around those swings to be intentional and count as your work i mean golfers work very hard but if we told elite level athletes that you know in a five-hour session we actually put about 10 minutes of work in they'd laugh at us so how do we make all of these golf balls all this time we spend how do we make it more dynamic more intentional more purposeful if you will beyond the second and a half it takes to hit a shot i know what i'm looking for that was really close but it's just a little quick and i can tell by the strike just a little heavy but that's perfect so i've got something that's giving me feedback and again intention purpose focus for everything i'm hitting not just going through for the sake of going through so this is a drill i've been really doing a lot lately teen up mid irons higher because if i get steep i'm going to hit it like here or i'm going to hit it crap or whatever if i'm shallowed out perfectly i can kind of hit this thing perfectly and maybe even fade it like it's just a great drill i saw on sean foley's instagram but it's easy like i could just be like hit it okay nope nope nope like i'm trying to just hit the right shot as opposed to learning from each one i i make so have a bit of intention and make this second and a half a lot more that was close but i caught it a little up on the toe so that tells me i was a little steep just a little steep contention focused purpose to that shot [Music] same thing there just a little bit up on the toe [Music] they're good but they're just a little high man see but again like even though i'm not executing every time or at all for this matter i know what i'm looking for instead of just reacting oh that was a bad one do it again that was a bad one do it again that's easy to get frustrated i know what i'm looking for and it's it's night and day that was better but it's still a little on the toe so like i'm really nitpicking myself here and i want that right feedback i want to execute exactly what i'm intending perfect and you can tell by the sound like that would just hit well so even though i hit about five shitty ones being in intentional with every swing i learn from each one and it's like i'm gaining from this practice and i tell you what like it just becomes a lot easier and also less stressful because that was a bad one got a little quick you can tell by the ball i can tell by the strike but tell by everything but i'm not like oh my gosh what's going on i know what i'm trying to do and right now this is a feel and execution block of practice [Music] but then let's say like i said earlier if i'm gonna grab a wedge and now it's like let's just let's just hit the post my only thinking is target it's post that's it you know there hit it on the bounce like there's an intention there's a purpose to that so i'm not thinking technique i'm not thinking anything i've gone from a mechanical bit now just to play and this is like what pete cowan says he gets all his players to do is hit the nine shots low medium high draw fade straight those nine shots you're out of your you're out of your technique thinking and you're into execution but you have an intention you have a purpose and if you don't do it you just have feedback right away as opposed to hitting just out into the range for no real reason to feel a good golf swing i mean if that's what you're doing you don't even need to go to the range like you're wasting your time but then i can go to this one and i can take different trajectories and just like that's the intention that's the purpose of this part of my practice i wanted a little lower flight there and i'm judging myself i'm grading myself based on that based on my thinking if i hit a good one but i'm thinking technique that's not what i wanted to do so it's a failing grade like i said i wasn't sure if i was going to upload today but i just had something i wanted to share i hope you learned from this i hope you enjoyed it and when you go out to your next practice session have some intention have some purpose to everything you're doing so that beyond just the second and a half of work it is to make the golf swing you're working on everything and your practice becomes far more dynamic far more engaging and more much more beneficial than you can actually realize if you want to listen to that podcast it is linked below pete cowan is an absolute legend um yeah give this video a thumbs up 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