It's time for a new episode of “Faith N Fairways” with the founder, Brad Thorberg, who after more than 16,000 lessons taught to over 2,000 golfers has discovered the most forgotten and overlooked part of your golf game that is keeping you from playing your most consistent and confident golf ever.
Now, here is your host, Brad Thorberg.
Brad Thorberg: Awesome. Awesome. So excited to be here, guys. This is Brad, your host, founder of “Faith N Fairways” podcast. I am so stoked to be launching this podcast, and no better way to kick it off than with the series called “The Code to Breaking 90.”
In today's episode, we're going to dive into why your golf game can't consistently break 90. You see, I have taught over 16,000 lessons over the last 15 years. I have been playing golf since I was three and, really, I've just made a lot of golf swings look really, really good, but what I’ve found is there's a huge hurdle to taking a good looking golf swing and getting it to perform in a way where you can start to consistently score better and break 90. And I found people that by implementing this code over time, even without the most mechanically sound swing, can still go break 90 consistently.
So, I found kind of this secret code to really start helping the average golfer consistently break 90, which is such a huge goal for so many. I mean, over 55 percent of most golfers don't ever break 100 and, literally, 76 percent of those who've come to me over the years, their number one goal is “How can I break 90?” and that's what we're going to largely dive into. I'm so excited to be sharing this with you.
For those of you who already break 90 consistently, you're definitely going to have some lightbulb moments when we get into this maybe where a few of your rounds fall apart. You're going to definitely want to stay tuned.
Also, you want to stay tuned, because even with this code to breaking 90 and teaching you how to apply it on the golf course, there's still three major mistakes you're making before you even get to the golf course or to the first tee, and you're going to want to stay tuned on how to get that free download with some very helpful tips to start implementing today right away to start helping you play more consistent golf instantly. So, definitely stay tuned for that to get the low-down on where to get that, but, basically, we're going to dive into it today.
Today, we’ve got five major reasons why you can't consistently break 90 where I’ll give you some nuggets to really start applying today to help you kind of shift into a more positive direction to help you start scoring and play more consistent golf.
Now, you'd like to be playing—I mean, who here is frustrated with their golf game?—and this game of golf is so addicting and so frustrating at the same time, and we keep coming back to it. So, hopefully, we can help make it more exciting for you guys moving forward towards more enjoyable and you're seeing progress happen more steadily over time.
So, five major reasons why you can't consistently break 90:
Number one is too many of you are out there playing golf swing instead of playing golf. This is such a huge, huge breakthrough for so many of my clients. But how many of you already [03:00] walk out there and, after warming up, maybe don't even warm up on the range, but you're on the first tee, and you're already thinking, Alright, I’m going to keep my head down, don't turn my hips, turn my hips, roll my wrists?
Whatever that is, you're already thinking of two or three or four things in your swing that you're trying to do versus just hit the ball at a target. And that's so, so common, especially those who've had a few lessons or you're reading articles, watching Golf Channel, watching YouTube videos. You have all these thoughts and ideas, and you're out there trying to make your swing look good versus hit a ball where you want it to go.
I love using the analogy of throwing a dart. If you're playing darts and you're sitting there, basically you're playing, if you're playing darts like you play golf, you're sitting there getting ready to throw darts thinking, Alright, 60 percent of my weight on my front foot, need to hold my arm parallel to the ground. I need 90 degrees of hinge. I need to exhale when I released the dart. I mean, if you're thinking of those things, you're lucky to even hit the wall. But, yet, in golf, which is even harder because we're swinging a club at a ball at a high rate of speed, you're sitting there thinking of four things, yet still wanting and expecting this ball to go where you want it to go, and that's just not going to happen, guys.
So, we’ve got to start to get you to focus on where you want the ball to go versus how to get it there. You can't be focusing on the mechanics. You've got to be an athlete in your reactionary mind than your subconscious mind, where you're just reacting and letting hand-eye coordination take over instead of trying to make this beautiful-looking swing and thinking your way through the process, because a golf swing takes 1.2 seconds—there's no way you can think of four things—and even if you did and you looked good, you're not going to like the results.
So, we’ve got to start to get you playing golf instead of golf swing. That's a huge, huge hurdle for so many of you, and one of the simplest ways there to really start to help you is the last thing you should be saying to yourself as you're over the ball about to pull the trigger is you should be thinking, Alright, here's where I want to start; there’s where it's going to end. Here's where it's starting; there's where it's ending. That should be the last phrase you tell yourself before you pull the trigger, because that's getting your mind to focus: Alright, the ball is going to start here; it's going to end here—start implementing that into your routine right before you pull the trigger and I guarantee you, you're going to start doing more solid shots.
Now, the next piece of that, which is number two here, is you keep trying to hit the ball straight versus playing with what you have. So, part of that routine that we just talked about, you have to let go of trying to hit the golf ball straight.
First of all, hitting a ball straight, it's like an anomaly, because, at the end of the day, you're swinging a three-inch chunk of metal on arc at a sphere object at a high rate of speed, 70, 80, 90 miles an hour, so you're always creating side-spin. Dead straight is not something that's going to happen, the ball should have a slight curve to it one way or the other.
Now, if you don't like the curve it has, you need to work on that. You need to see your local professional, get some lessons, be working on that [06:00] on the range, not before your round, but on a completely different day, maybe after the round or a day you're not playing when you work on your mechanics, but you need to be working on that. But when you go onto that first tee box, you’ve got to play with what you have, not with what you want to have.
I always joke with my clients like, Yeah, if you told me every ball I hit was going to go 30 yards right slice, yeah, I don't like the way it looks, but I would play that, and then with my short game, I'd go shoot under par, because I'm playing with what I have and I'm managing the course with what I have that day because, realistically, if you go and you shoot 90, you're only going to make 30–35 full swings that day. So, you’ve got to just play with what you have, not trying to change or create new thoughts to make the ball go straight, or trying to play the ball straight all day, because to hit one out of 30 straight, that's a long day on the golf course. You’ve got to start playing with what you have instead of with what you want to have. So, when you warm up before the round, you're just simply trying to get a sense of, Alright, most of my shots, 70–80 percent of them are fading to the right 25–30 yards, so that's the tendency I need to play and play away from trouble.
That's going to be huge for so many of you to realize, Hey, what I have today is what I need to play with to manage the course because, again, to shoot 89, realistically, you're going to have 17–18 mishits, but you're also only going to make 30–35 full swings. The rest are all going to be partial swings, pitches, chips and putts. There's not a lot of full swings happening over the course of that round.
So, if you can start focusing on where you want the ball to start and end right before you pull the trigger, and you're managing that start and end point with your tendency or shape, I guarantee you, you're going to start to hit more solid shots because now you're reacting. You're like the tee-ball player where the ball is coming at them and they, reactionary, stick their glove out and catch it versus the tee-ball player where it's a pop fly and they're thinking, Don't drop it. Don't drop it. Hold my glove up. Bring my other hand up, and, bam, right off the forehead, which happened to me once—so, yeah, that happened to me—so, that's just you thinking it and overanalyzing. That's a perfect example right there. So, you need to start getting in your reactionary mind, just focusing on “Here's where it starts. Here's where it is,” and that should look a lot like what your tendency is.
So, those two things right there alone is gold when it comes to helping you start to play better golf.
Number three, the third reason a lot of you can't consistently break 90 right now is you just don't believe you can. Yeah, you're in such a negative mindset because you get so frustrated and you attach so much anger and depression and frustration and emotion to so many bad shots that you just constantly spiral into this “I can't do it. I give up,” and you get angry—and this is crazy, guys—but the stronger the emotion you attach to something, the stronger the memory.
I don't usually see too many of you out there just super excited, high-fiving [09:00] and positive. I see more clubs being slammed in the ground, angry, “This is stupid. I give up” type of “Where's the bev cart girl? I need another round.” I see more of that. So, you've constantly been ingraining this negativity in these poor memories that you recall upon, so you don't believe in yourself. You haven't visualized yourself shooting 87 and you haven't thought through that. You don't grab a club out of the bag and go, Here's the best shot ever. I hit with this club. I know I can do it again. You grab the club out of the bag and go, Gosh, I hope I don't chunk this like I did on hole-3. I mean, we've all been there. So, that happens so much to you.
And golf truly is 90 percent between your ears. It truly is. That stat, yeah, that is so huge. The mind is such a powerful thing in this sport, because this is the one sport where you're given three minutes to psych yourself out. So, we’ve got to start focusing on the good instead of the bad, because golf is a game of bad shots—the person with the better bad shots wins—so that you're going to hitting a lot of bad shots. That's golf, especially for those of you just trying to break 90 because, again, you're going to have 17–18 pretty bad mishits over the course of that round, so you're going to have bad shots.
You have to let it go. You have to get over the next shot, grab that club and go, Alright, I've hit great shots with this. I almost had a hole-in-one with this, or whatever that is, but you’ve got to remember something positive and then get into that routine of
“Alright, here's where it starts. Here's where it's going to end,” step up and just hit it, and trust where your mechanics are and play with what you’ve got that day, not with what you want to have.
Even though Brad has cracked the code to consistently breaking 90, there are still three major mistakes he's found from working with over 2,000 clients that will sabotage your round before you get to the first tee. Head to www.MyGolfCode.com now to receive your free guide where he outlines all three faults and provides you with some easy action steps to start playing more consistent golf today.
But that's such a huge component and it's really one of the biggest pieces, and it's why I started this whole podcast as to really dive into the inner game of golf of the mindset and the body, because it's holding so many of you back from playing your best golf, because even with lessons and the best mechanics, if you don't learn how to use the mind to your benefit and get your body right, you're not going to play better golf. You're just going to have a good-looking golf swing on video and still score lousy and be inconsistent.
So, we’ve got to work on that mindset. We’ve got to get your positives and the number one way to start implementing that is what I touched on. It’s that was when you pull a club out of the bag, I want you to, at the moment you pull it out, think of the best shot you ever hit with it and then set up over the shot thinking, All right, here's where it’s starting. Here's where it's ending, and fire away—so, now you're getting focused on the golf shot. You're getting focused on target. You're remembering something positive.
Gosh, guys, just those three things alone will dramatically change the enjoyment of golf for you moving forward for the rest of your golfing life, [12:00] if you can implement those three consistently, and that's going to be hard. I have been on the course with clients trying to implement this and it's funny how easy it is to tune me out because the mind is so powerful. So, you're going to have to practice this. You're going to have to work on this. But just implementing those, those few things alone, is going to dramatically change the way you play golf.
So, those are our first three steps. That's groundbreaking right there for you.
Number four: Your tank isn't fueled correctly. It’s such an important component that nobody realizes. For instance, you're playing golf league in the afternoon. You wake up, you're busy. We all have full lives. We have kids, family, careers, volunteer, whatever it is that it looks like for you. We're busy. Just humans today are busy people. How many of us wake up and we don't really have a breakfast, so we have some coffee or we grab something out the door? We're not having a good breakfast. We're not fueling our body properly.
And, guys, your body's a high-performance engine. I mean, the human body is just amazing to begin with, but think of it, and you need to start thinking that this way—it's a high-performance race car and you need to start fueling it in such a way. So, if your day looks like skipping breakfast, kind of a lunch here, race into the course, warming up, grabbing a six pack of beer and a hot dog, I mean, how do you expect to play your best round ever with a day like that of fueling your high-performance engine? That ain't going to happen. You're kidding yourself. There's just no way that's going to happen that you can play your best round of golf fueling your body that way.
So, you’ve got to start thinking, the day you play golf, I need a good breakfast. I need some high-protein. I need to get the body going, the mind going. I need to start fueling my body so my mind can function. Think of when you took a bunch of exams, if you can remember back that far—it's hard for me, too—but, if you're in college and you had a couple exams in the same day, you're exhausted by the other day because of how much your mind was working. And that happens on the golf course.
And, for most of you, you're overthinking things, because you're not only thinking about playing golf, but now you're also thinking of how to swing the golf club; you're adding twice as many thoughts in, so you're double exhausted, and you haven't filled your body properly. I mean, there's a reason you see tour players eating bananas and nuts and protein bars, and drinking water all through the round of golf. It’s because they're trying to keep their mind strong, so they can focus and not have a mental miscue that leads into a double or triple bogey like so many of us have.
So, when you find yourself really struggling later in the rounds and you start to have some blow-up holes, a lot of it can be just because your mind is exhausted because you haven't fueled it properly, so start paying attention. Bring some protein bars to the golf course. Really pay attention to water intake through the day before you get there. It's okay to have a beer or two, but try to have a beer during the round and then the other one or two after the round, so you can play your best golf if that's what you want to do.
If you're trying to play better golf, you need to start treating your body like an athlete, like a high-performance vehicle and start fueling it in such a way instead of just putting [15:00] garbage in and expecting extraordinary results. It’s just not going to happen.
And, number five: Your body just won't allow you to consistently break 90. Your body physically just isn't in a place to be able to do it. You have poor balance, poor stability, poor mobility—such huge components.
No matter how much power you have in the swing, and I've worked with some crazy CrossFit athletes, generate intense power. I've worked with former NFL football players; I've worked with some MLB players who have played in the majors, generate tons of power, but if they don't have the balance, stability and mobility to stay in control while swinging this club violently on an arc, then who knows where the ball is going to go? They can’t make consistent contact.
First of all, number one is balance. If you don't have the balance, your body, a) is not going to allow you to swing very fast because it doesn't want you to fall over, and b) those are all interconnected—mobility, stability and balance: you need to be improving those. If your fitness routine is nonexistent, we need to find a golf fitness routine that's going to help you move forward and not any of those crazy ones you see the tour players do, because you're not a tour player; you're not an advanced, high-level athlete yet. For a lot of us, we’ve just got to learn how to balance on one foot for more than 30 seconds.
So, redefine a routine that fits you where you're at, and it can help you progress and get your body better, because the last thing you want to do is pummel one of your best drives of the day right down the middle of fairway and now you hit the ball sitting two inches below your feet on a downslope—because, I mean, fairways aren't perfectly flat—so now you’ve just hit a great tee shot, but you're in a position where your body is just not going to allow you to stay in balance and make a good golf swing because you have poor balance, poor mobility and stability, and now you're [then heeling? 16:49.3] off to the right and you compound it with some poor short game, and after a great drive, you’ve just made double. I mean, sound familiar? I've been there myself when I was younger. That happens and a lot of it can be just your body won't allow you to do it, so we’ve got to get your body improving if you want your game and your scoring to improve. It just makes sense.
Some things to start doing there, like I hinted on earlier, is balance. We’ve got to start with balance for so many of you. I see it as one of the biggest things holding many of my clients back as they just don't have the balance to even execute a proper golf swing, especially when you start to deal with trouble lies.
So, some things to help you there from a balance standpoint and ways to implement this is start working when you're brushing your teeth—stand on just your right leg when you brush your teeth and stand on just your left leg when you brush your teeth, but now you're kind of doing another motion while trying to balance, which is going to help with the stability in that leg—or when you're in the shower. Shampoo while on one leg and rinse it out on the other with your eyes closed [that] makes it really hard to balance where we’ve got to start improving the stabilizers in your legs, so they could start to improve the balance when you're swinging on uneven lies or you're trying to swing harder and [18:00] harder to improve distance, because that's a goal for so many of us and it's such a crucial goal.
I mean, I'm big into that because if I can give my clients 10 more yards with better mechanics and balance and power, that's huge, because it's 10 yards off the driver and 10 yards off the next iron—that's 20 yards—so, instead of having to hit a 6-iron, you're hitting an 8-iron into the green. Well, duh, science! You're just going to have a better chance because now you have more loft with a club that's an inch shorter, so the misses are less and the chance at hitting the green are far greater.
So, improving distance is so important, but you can't do it if you're not improving your body. There's no way you're going to show up tomorrow and hit the ball 10 yards further if you haven't been improving your body, so we’ve got to start improving the body, improving the mind, changing the way we think about things.
So, those are kind of the five major reasons why you can't consistently break 90.
There's so many of you who are struggling with it, and you need to start focusing on where you want the ball to go, not how to get it there.
You need to start playing with what you have versus what you want to have.
We need to start being far more positive. We need to start celebrating the victories and realizing golf is a game of bad shots; the person with the better bad shots wins, instead of getting so negative and depressed and frustrated, and attaching such poor emotion to bad shots, because we're going to have them, guys. That's just the name of the game.
We’ve got to start fueling our body properly, staying hydrated, getting in the protein to keep the metabolism up and the energy up and the focus up, so we can last the whole round is sort of falling apart at the end.
And, if you truly want to be improving your game, you’ve got to be improving your body. If you're not improving your balance, your mobility and your stability, and your lower body power, then you're kidding yourself if you think you're going to be improving your golf game and hitting the ball further, and making better contact.
So, those are the five major things that I see that holds most of my clients back from consistently breaking 90. Start implementing some of the things I talked about today. Especially in those first two or three, you're going to start to see improvement right away. Right away, guys. So, start implementing those.
Next week, we're going to start to dive into where you need your game to be before you can start implementing the code, so we're going to have basically a checklist of “Alright, can you do these things? And, if so, then you should be easily able to start breaking 90 consistently.” You're going to want to stay tuned for that, because we're going to lay it out for you and you're going to be able to see, Alright, can I do those things? And most of you are going to be shocked that, yes, you can. I mean, I guarantee you, 90 percent of you listening can already break 90. Your game is already good enough to be there. And you're going to find that out next week.
Then we're going to dive into the code the following weeks, and by end of summer, early fall, probably playing the best golf you've ever played. So, stay tuned for that. Be looking for that.
Again, so excited to be launching this. Can't wait to dive into this and really help you guys—but, yeah, get out there. Play some golf. Implement those things. I'm excited to see where your progress [21:00] goes from here.
Have a great week!
This is ThePodcastFactory.com.
