The Problem With Perfection

UK Handicap; 3.8 USGA Handicap; 3.1

I’ve played 3 times since my last update, all at my home course, the first two being quick run-around games in the evening, followed by a competition game today.

The first game was a mediocre five over par 76. It was nothing special, I didn’t think I played that well, but looking back on what I know now maybe that’s the type of round I need.

I went out on Thursday evening and played 18 holes. Well, actually, I played 9 holes, but what I often do when I don’t have much time is play two balls on each hole and play 1 ball versus the other, ProV1 versus ProV1X. On this occasion the match was a tie, both balls played 9 holes in level par, in quite difficult conditions.

So it was set up nicely for a competition today, but as far as I was concerned my round was over after the first hole, which I double bogied from nowhere. Looking back, I played alright in spells today, but mentally I was awful, and have been in competition for a while. I am trying to have a perfect round, and as soon as I drop a shot, or something goes against my plan, my brain explodes and I find it hard to recover.

I need to re-learn, pretty quickly, that I’m going to drop shots during a round. That may sound a bit paradoxical, but I’ve never had a round without a dropped shot, so it’s natural that it will happen. Obviously I want to limit the dropped shots to as few as possible, and have the confidence that at some point I have the ability to maybe birdie some holes. I have unreasonable expectations currently, if I double bogey the first hole then instead of thinking that my round is over I should be thinking about, well, nothing. There is also no point in thinking that I must get the shots back in the next 2 holes, as that is just heaping more pressure on myself and setting myself up to fail.

The thing that frustrates me about my mental implosions is that I already know about everything that I have said, I’ve blogged about how hard it is to go for a round of golf without dropping a shot, and I’ve blogged about how I should be thinking when on the course. I’ve just got sloppy about it recently, and additionally I’ve been putting excessive pressure on myself to have a sub-par round, as I’m very conscious that my best round on my home course is a poor 73 this year, and my handicap is higher now than when I started this blog. However, this is the whole purpose of this blog, when things aren’t going well I can review what things were like when things were going well. So that’s exactly what I’ve done, re-read a few posts and a bit of a golf book that helps me psychologically, and all being well I’ll play in another competition tomorrow with a clear, positive, frame of mind. The ability is still there, I know it is, it just won’t come out to play whilst my mind is putting unreasonable demands on it.