If you haven’t been listening to the “Mind Over Plastic” segments on the the Disc Golf Answer Man podcast, shame on you! Stop reading this and go listen! OK, now that you are back, you’ll know that on a couple of the episodes, I have talked about visualization. On one, it’s how to practice and get good at visualization. On another, it’s using visualization to shake off a bad throw or rescue a bad round.
The most common and helpful time to use it, though, is before every throw you make. That’s right every throw. Just stepping up and hucking the disc, hoping it goes where you need it, is a sure way to make the disc go anywhere BUT where you were hoping. Even when most of us do visualize, most of us visualize the wrong thing. We end up looking at where we want the disc to end up, not the path it needs to take to get there.
When you visualize your shot, it’s really important to visualize the entire flight path of the disc. Do you want to throw it flat or with hyzer? Do you want it to be low or high? Where do you want it to turn? Do you want it to go straight? How much fade at the end? You want to be as specific as you can and really see it in your mind’s eye. Try to see a line from the moment it leaves your hand until it lands exactly where you intend.
If you only think about the final resting place of the disc, often times your mind won’t tell your body to throw the disc on the line needed to get it there. Instead, it just throws it in the general direction of where you want it to end up. When you really concentrate on the exact line, you start to eliminate those shots that go too high or too low or are in the wrong direction all together.
The next time you are out on the course, try this out. Really focus on seeing the line, and then throwing the disc on that line. You’ll be surprised at what a difference it can make.
Another great thing to visualize is our weekly newsletter in your email inbox each week! You don’t even have to concentrate, just enter your email below and we’ll take it from there.
[wysija_form id=”1″]
I’ve been getting better but sometimes, I have trouble hitting a tight gap off the tee and then (BOOM!) 10 feet later the discs ping pongs off a couple trees right at the beginning flight. Any tips on trying to really get into a narrow fairway off the tee? Especially if it’s heavily wooded near the front of the tee.
dayday,
I have 3 things that help me with this:
1. Trust your throw. If those trees weren’t there, you could hit the line, right? Don’t change anything about your throw just because there is a gap there. Step up and fire away.
2. Follow through. This is usually what people stop doing when trying to hit a gap.
3. Don’t aim at the gap. Aim at a point in the distance beyond the gap and throw like the gap wasn’t even there.
In the end, this is a tough one and a big reason a lot of people don’t play courses in the woods. Keep at it and I’m sure you’ll get it down!