Like many of you, I’ve picked up golf again during the pandemic and have fallen in love all over again. I played some high school golf but In the intervening decade only picked up the sticks a few times.

I now play at a 4 handicap and have posted some near par scores at Torrey Pines and a host of difficult courses in the Los Angeles area. I thought that I would pass along some tips for players that are trying to break 90 or 80 to get them on their way to experience the most enjoyable golf: that which is played around par.

1. Intentional Practice

I often don’t have time to Play a round of golf more than once a week but I do manage to hit the range several times a week to stay sharp. Contrary to many of the other players that I observe that subscribe to the grip it and rip it school of repetitive practice, my regiment much more closely mirrors that of a PGA professional. I remember going to a PGA tour event and watching Davis love the third go through every club in his bag and hit all of them at 25%, 50%, 75%, and a full shot. I do this for my wedges, nine iron, 7-iron, five iron, three iron, and the woods. This comprises about half of the balls. The other half I reserve exclusively for wedge play. I don’t leave until I’ve hit within 6 feet of a dozen of the metal targets on the range about 80 yards and closer from the driving range bays. It’s said a million times but once you’re sharp with the scoring clubs, and can keep it reasonably straight, then you’re well on your way to carding a few birdies a round and starting to craft the types of scores that’ll make your drinking buddies jealous.

1. Your eyes deceive you with the putter

I’ve been through every routine with putting imaginable: lining it up with the stripe on the ball, factoring in a different angle based on my usual miss, left hand low and all sorts of configurations and ultimately decided on just closing my left eye. As you know, when we looked directly down at a ball our vision from both eyes slightly distorts our aim. I found that if I close one eye and use my dominant eye to see a line line up with the Dash in my putter that I’m much more likely to hit the line that I want without having to do all sorts of extra maneuvers to ensure that I am correctly lined up. When I have to do a longer lag putt then I’ll just close my left eye for a second to ensure that my aim is correct and then I’ll open them back up again to hit the actual lag putt but if it’s 20 feet or in then I’m keeping my left eye closed the entire time. It’s been beneficial for my putting game.

1. Swing easy

One of the takeaways from doing the 25% on up routine is that the distance of my swings at 50% and 75% are often times within 20% of the distance that I’m getting on my hundred percent swing and are far more controlled. In my mind, I’ll sacrifice a bit of distance, especially with the irons, if I can have better control of the direction of where I’m going. Now, I really won’t swing any club more than 75% because to do so as to add additional spin to the ball and introduced the possibility of it being pushed around by the wind. If I come at a driver at 75% not only am I getting a lower ball flight that penetrates the wind but also helps it roll along further. Going to the first tee and doing an easier swing and watching the ball cut through the wind like butter and the jaws of my playing partners agape is a good feeling and the way to go. If you go to an LPGA event you’ll see these women smashing it out there 260 with rhythmic swings and splitting the fairways. It took me a while but I needed to deprogram my mind from the Bryson Dechambeau model of swinging at it like it owes me money. David Ferrety was famous for saying the easier you swing the farther it’s going to go and it’s true.