Practice With A Goal

I played golf for the first time in about 4 months today. I shot pretty poorly, over 100 for sure. Having fun today wan't about shooting par, clearly. Even though I expected lot's of poor shots, I still found myself trying to get frustrated. I constantly had to remind myself, anything I want to do well takes practice. So I knew going into today, if I focused on the score I'd be upset. I had a couple goals, make good contact on a few balls. Focus on chipping well, and get that first putt distance within sinkable second shot territory. Oh, and get my head up enough to see the view! Overall, I think I hit my goals, and I was able to enjoy the unbelievable scenery of the AZ Rim Club course along with a great time out with my dad.

There's been plenty of days where I wanted to throw the clubs, but today wasn't one of them. Usually those frustrating days are triggered by unrealistic goals and not enough practice.

The same goes for just about every other thing I do in life, from business to cycling. I'd love to KOM a number of climbs, but the reality is, I need to focus on my training schedule. Trying to KOM a hill usually leads to me not doing something I should be doing. After a year with a very good coach, I've realized staying the course, putting the practice in, always leads to the results I want. The opposite is also true, deviating from the training schedule just creates failure.

One great example of this was last year about this time, everyone was harassing me for not putting in longer rides while training for the Death Ride, a tour of the California Alps, the longest was about 55 miles in months of training leading up to the main event. They didn't know the plan, but they sure did want to tell me about what I should be doing. Suffice it to say, I wasn't paying them for there advice and I didn't listen to them. How'd I fair? I crushed all my goals for Death Ride 2015 (130 miles and 15k of climbing). John knew exactly what was needed, and listening to the one with the plan helped me crush my goals.

Put the practice in, know exactly what the goal is each time you go out, and stick to it. Others will try to tell you differently, but at the end of the day, they don't know the path.

Practice is only useful if you have a goal each time and it supports the objective.