Friday, 16 September 2011

Golf: As Simple As Riding A Bike

By Alex Kelly


Do you remember learning the best way to ride a bike? You almost certainly spent a large amount of time practicing - typically learning the way to not fall off - until you mind was ready to combine the essential balance and motor skills so you could just do it without thinking. When you find out how to ride a bicycle - you learned to peddle, to balance, and to steer - you just never forget how.

This learned talent is one of the most widely referenced examples of the brain recalling a previously learned and frequently rehearsed mental pattern. Once your mind "gets it" your body can translate that into the skills. Other motor skills are learned in a similar fashion by our minds, including golf.

Pro golfers use a similar strategy to enhance their golf. The strategy, one of a group often referred to as mental golf, is mental rehearsal. Using mental rehearsal any golfer, non-professional or professional, can create the ideal mental environment for improving any area of their game. Athletes from any sport can tap the power of their subconscious and get results considerably beyond those from physical practice alone.

Mental rehearsal is a technique to make and replay a mental movie of the result you would like to achieve. We have all seen pro golfers line up a putt. They rehearse their stance and their swing several times before proceeding to make the shot. What separates the pros from other golfers is that thay also practice the whole shot - from walking up to the ball to seeing the ball drop into the center of the cup - in their mind many times before really attempting it.

Mental Rehearsal is effective because your brain doesn't know the difference between a real event and an imagined one. When you rehearse an event in your brain, the brain creates it by building a neurological pattern in the same way it would a event. You are then able to recall this when you come across this event physically. By making a desired end result in your mind's eye, you can create it more easily physically. It's just like riding a bike.




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