PLAYER DEVELOPMENT PLAN
Our player development plan is in 4 definitive stages:
- Technical Development Phase.
- Skills Development Phase.
- Performance Development
- Competing Phase
There is no substitute in elite golf for the marriage of great technical, physical & mental skills. ‘In the end quality in these 3 areas always wins’. Fundamental technical skills are one of the the ingredients of a great player & eventually for the elite golfer, swinging the club with great technique becomes as natural as breathing. When it works every day and under the highest pressure, that’s when the magic can really start and results follow. The most important objective in this phase is the Golf Swing and Skills Sets Technique. After this program the players’ golf swing will be fundamentally sound and life lasting.
Once the correct core fundamental movement in the golfswing has been ingrained, it is much easier to adapt this correct movement pattern to all the necessary skills & compete at the very highest level. Quite simply all great skills are a result of a great core fundamental movement pattern.
Skills:
- Driving
- Fairway Woods/Hybrids
- Long Irons
- Middle Irons
- Short Irons
- Pitching
- Chipping
- Bunker Play
- Putting
- Shot shaping
So we systematically work through the list of skills in the order of most important & weakest, until we become solid in all skill sets.
Once we have a great golf swing and great skill set, it is time to move from the range onto the golf course, learning how to perform and convert our skills into scores and results. We will spend a lot of this phase on both the range and the golf course, monitoring scores in practice & 1 day local tournaments. 2To perform we need to learn on course mental skills to maximize performance including:
- Game plan Course
- Management
- Decision making
- Focus Confidence
- Determination
- Pressure
- Management
- Mindfulness
In addition there are nuances each player would operate on their own unique ideal mindset in tournament play. Some players work best with extreme focus and fight mentality. For example, Tiger Woods & Nick Faldo. The there are others whom operate in a more relaxed, switch focus on, switch focus off mode. For example Ernie Els & Sergio Garcia. It is our task to evaluate and encourage the players to operate in their own personal mental sweet spot in tournament play and implement ideal game strategies.
The last phase is where we test the players in tournament play. Our presence on tournament site is critical to evaluate the learned strategy, game skills, stats and the mental status before, during and after the round. Methodology of tournament preparation is also extremely important, including sleep, hygiene, diet, hydration, warm up strategy, and post round practice sessions used for next day adjustments. 3In our development program we will enter Andalusia Federation Tournaments, WAGR and Andalusia Pro Events and we would travel to the tournaments with a group of players operating as a very close knit team. Post tournament evaluation and analysis will always be undertaken between player and Coach with the focus on deciding the necessary adjustments for future tournaments.
TECHNIQUE COACHING METHODOLOGY
We understand that the decisions we make and the guidance we give to the potential elite juniors will shape the rest of their golfing careers. This means potential US University Golf Scholarships and even a Tour Professional Golf career. We understand this and we take this trust and privilege to coach young talents extremely seriously. For this the reason we have developed a 4 step Screening screening process which allows us to make intelligent bespoke development decisions, and to coach each player to achieve their maximum potential in a very simple holistic form.
For the coach to be extremely effective with all students, it is vital that they adapt their coaching style to suit the unique human being in front of them. So in this part of our process we make a relaxed format interview. Through testing and questioning, we ascertain the ambitions, energy and motivation level, then we test for the students optimum learning style, visual or audio or sensory learner and for systematic or go with the flow learners. With this process we can speak and coach in the format and language that resonates with the him or her, and design a structured practice plan that will maximize results.
It is extremely important that we understand the physical status of the student in regards to the Golf Body Connection through a TPI SCREENING. We call this FMS ‘Functional Mobility Stability’, which means how physically able the student is to swing the club. Once we understand what the students body can or cannot do, we can formulate a plan for physical improvement through a targeted fitness plan. We can’t ask students to make movements in the swing that they physically cannot do, so we identify the weakness and improve them with a comprehensive fitness plan with our Golf specialist fitness coach in the Gym.
It is our core coaching philosophy when working on the players swing technique, that we adapt the golf swing to each player as a unique case. Through a broad ranging testing and measuring process we identify players ideal and natural pre determined movement patterns. If the player is encouraged to use his or her instinctive movements and the coach applies the correct match ups to these patterns, the golf swing works at maximum speed & maximum efficiency every day and under the highest pressure, because under pressure we always do what comes instinctively.
In our coaching we leave nothing to chance or subjectivity so we use state of the art technology to support our holistic methods. The screening process will include sessions with: The screening process will include sessions with:
- Trackman 4
- 4D Motion Biomemechanics
- BodiTrak Golf – Pressure Sensing Golf Mat
The use of the technology is a vital part of modern day coaching which allows us to give perfect holistic advice to the players, based on facts . This is strictly for the coach analysis, the player would always receive the information in a non technical natural and sensory form.
The initial Student/parent consultation involves no financial commitment, with a visit to the PG Golf & Sports Academy or a Zoom meeting, where the potential Student has the opportunity to meet with our head coach and discuss in more depth information about our facility and development process. This ensures before going ahead that both sides feel that a position for the student at the PG Elite Program is the correct step forward for both parties.