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Visualise your are on a different hole?

T

toffee

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Throwing this one out there as an idea. Maybe it's well documented somewhere.

People talk a lot about certain holes 'suiting their eye'. I have this to an extreme level at my home course. There's a par 5 hole with an uphill drive followed by an extreme right dogleg. Right is dead, left is dead, short is very troublesome because of the dogleg.

Yet I always drive it well. And my second shot is typically my best ball strike of the round. In fact I'd say my best ball strikes ever have come on that hole. I regularly put it within millimetres of my target line and it really fizzes off the club. Incredible feeling.

So here are the questions.

1. Does anyone relate to this?
2. Can you trick the mind into seeing your favourite hole when you're elsewhere on the course?
3. Has anyone tried?
 
I don't. Gotta play the hole you're looking at.
 
Welcome to THP!

No, I can't visualize something like what you're describing. I can't even convince myself there is no water when there's water in front of me. I've got a 50% chance of making it over, and a 50% chance of putting my ball right in the water.

I tend to try to layup to doglegs... my days of trying to cut the corner are over and I'll be in the rough looking for my ball if I were to try.😢
 
I don't know if i "visualize" another hole per se' but I know there are certain holes that I just feel comfortable on and always feel relaxed when I play them. (wish I had that feeling on all of the holes).
 
I don't visualize a hole, but I do sometimes visualize the range I go to for practice. I'll pick the flag that matches the distance and pretend I'm hunting that flag on the range.
 
Coming back to this... I've abandoned the idea of visualising another scene.

I just need to find a way for the hole I'm on to 'suit my eye'. Find a shot I can honestly visualise and then play it with full confidence. And find a way to convince myself that I love the hole for some reason!
 
I’ve heard Nick Faldo talk about visualising the driving range to encourage a sense of freedom in the swing when facing a difficult driving hole…
 
About as close as I come to that is: I tell myself to "make the shot". If I don't hit the shot because of some outside influence, I'll never know if the shot was right or not.
 
I need to try this on #15 at the home course. Long hard driving hole that I lose OB right too often. Which is not a bad miss usually, except that hole.
 
👋 I do this sometimes.

I've only ever talked about it with a couple others that do, and they mostly do it for confidence reasons. Which I think is what you're going for. Don't like the look of this one, picture type favorite type thing. And it works for them.

I guess depending on how I look at it I suppose I could say I do it a little the same way. Maybe. It's really about shot shaping for me. I shape to layouts a lot to kind of maximize things, and some visuals off the tee just don't look right for the shape I want/need to hit. I pick a long target, and then a window to put it through, and that's my shape. And having those in my mind it's easier for me to just hit the shot that travels on that path. Some holes have a reverse twist or are misaligned or the window has some not friendly thing staring back at me through it. They want it to screw with you. So I'll picture a hole I know that takes the same shape, generally one I play well, and hold that hole's shot in my mind as my goal. Target in mind, look at ball, align to spatial target, and go for it. Body does what it needs to to make it happen without some of the clutter of the actual hole I'm on.
 
I don't visualize a hole, but I visualize a shot or previously similar shot I hit that day or in a prior round.
 
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