Stop Trying to Make Birdie

 

I know what you’re thinking. Matt, isn’t making birdie the goal of every golfer? Shouldn’t we always be trying to make a birdie? To be fair, you’re right. The goal should be to make a birdie, but the problem is that when that is all you focus on your game can suffer. I’m here to tell you that if you aren’t thinking about birdies, you might play better. 

There was an older gentleman who used to always play ahead of us at the country club where I grew up. We’d always meet up with him on the practice green or the patio outside the clubhouse after our rounds and he’d always amaze us with the score he shot that day. We’d stand there with our mouths agape listening to him casually talk about his 78 that day like it was just a walk in the park. Finally, one day, we couldn’t take it anymore and my brother had to ask. “How on earth do you always shoot such a great score?” he asked, hoping to get some sort of profound answer or tip to radically change our game. What he said, instead, really shook us and has resonated with me to this day. “Stop trying to make birdie, that’s the secret,” he told us as he smiled and lifted his cup to his lips for a long, sustained drink of his sweet tea. “Par is a pretty dang good score, don’t you think?”

Those words have been stuck in my head since that day and I promise you I’ll never forget them. I had never thought about it like that before, and I’m betting you hadn’t either! Take a second and let that sink in. Par on most courses is somewhere between 70 and 74, right? That means that if you went out today and shot even par on your course you would probably have the best round of your life. The best score I’ve ever shot is 82, and I’m dang proud of that round. But even that was 10 over par! If I had just made 18 pars that day, I would have shot 72 and would never have stopped bragging! 

Here’s the hang-up with most golfers: par isn’t sexy. Par sounds, or seems, boring, and birdie sounds exciting. There’s also the challenge of beating par and accomplishing something hard for golfers, myself included, to get out of our heads. We see a number on a scorecard and our brains tell us we have to beat it. That’s just how it goes. But, if you can fight that voice and realize that par is just as good as birdie for the average golfer (let’s face it, we’re all average unless we’re on tour) you can open the door for some great rounds of golf and scorecards worthy of hanging on to. 

What’s interesting is how a psychological shift can have a physical effect when you’re golfing. When I stopped trying to make birdie and focused on par, I noticed that I was less stressed over shots. I wasn’t putting the pressure on myself to make every shot perfect, and I wasn’t trying to make every putt I stood over. I relaxed a lot and it ended up helping my swing feel more natural and comfortable. It hasn’t necessarily dropped my scores off a cliff, but I’m definitely enjoying my game more and I’m noticing more consistency than I’ve ever had. So next time you hit the links don’t try to make birdie, just go out, have a good time, and play the game you love. You just might enjoy it more and you may even play better than you expect.