How To CRUSH Your Practice Rounds | Practice Like A Pro

welcome to the andrew jensen official unofficial guide to a practice [Music] round [Music] see i've got a bit of a home game for my next event i haven't played an event in two months since the middle of july it's gonna be the late september playing this event or an hour from the house at plantation bay down in ormond beach and today i'm playing my practice round but i'm going to walk you through everything that i look for when playing a practice round for an event whether it's a week before or a day before first thing though you want to look into your commute you want to make sure you know the drive you know how long it's going to take you want to make sure you know what's along the way in case you have to stop for a bite if you schedule that in there gas coffee whatever and then also in terms of prep you want to know at the course what's the practice facility like do you have a bit of a drive do you have a five-minute drive to the range and then back to the first tee so i'm looking for those things because all of that is going to determine when i wake up when i start my drive down here and how long i give myself for my warm-up typically my warm-up's about 40 minutes but if this golf course there's a bit of driving from the putting green to the range to the first tee i've got to take that into consideration so that that 40 minutes maybe isn't enough time because i'm wasting close to 10 of it commuting so those are the things i'm looking for first then when i'm out on the golf course we're going to go on the golf course and we're going to walk through and talk about the things that i'm looking for when playing a golf course for the first time and trying to prepare myself [Music] [Music] i'm getting down here i don't know half an hour before my tea time today i'm not concerned about the rain i'm just concerned about i'm gonna hit a few chips a few putts get a feel for the greens because this is obviously the most important thing when we're playing the tournament greens feel very similar to my home course like being only an hour down the road conditions are going to be pretty comparable to what i practice on rough looks a little fluffier the ball can sit down a little bit more so that's something i'll go and look for when i'm on the golf course see if the conditions out there are the same as the putting green but yeah just roll a few putts get a feel for everything and then go out on the golf course [Music] you can see the first hole here part five 525 great looking starting hole winds helping on the scorecard there's no map i don't have a yardage book so i've just got a gps app to see what's up there and have an idea of it rather than hit it you know into some and be like oh i know after the fact so it looks like this one i can just take it right over the bunker it's about 270 to carry that bunker and if i hit it i mean a little right there is water but at least i know what's up there so that's kind of a little help i use for tee shots to know my line see i didn't go over the bunker but that should be okay that one was a much more aggressive line really looks good there so we'll go up there and we'll kind of see what i got so there's my first one that i kind of floated out to the right i probably only hit it about 280 285 but this is what i was talking about if i you know i didn't know it said it's 320 but downwind firm or whatever but that's good to know i can actually hit this thing kind of straight up the middle and i'm gonna be there that's okay but if you come over here to the left where i took my really really aggressive line which i thought would have been a great line which was just over the left side of that bunker i'm right here and look a little more trouble so this is kind of if you're taking notes this is what i'm doing with tee shots today is i just want to know my lines this is not the right shot i want to hit it over the right side of this bunker so i'm actually in the fairway and have a wide open look to the green why why stress myself early this water is not in play so if you're taking notes the lines that's what you're looking for when you're playing a practice round what are your lines off the tee that are going to allow you biggest room for error but also allow you an opportunity to score we're up at the green now and this whole actually everything i want to kind of teach in this video is all on this first hole so you're picking your line with the tee shot and then up on the green i could tell that this flag was sitting in this little low i had 218 a little downwind i went with my 205 club five iron hit it kind of thin but we're in a perfect spot to leave myself a really straightforward up and down for birdie if i took my four iron had enough to get me pin high i could tell there's like a harder up and down here this green i could obviously i didn't want to be long because that's a tough putt bunker over there trouble there so this is what i'm doing with approach shots and then when i get up to these greens i'm looking where the best place to miss it is but then the best place to be is on top of that so going for this par five and two a little short mist is totally okay to that pin but if the pin were back there obviously i wanted middle of the green and over there not the end of the world so i'm paying attention to these things i'm thinking where potential pins will be we'll probably have a back one and we'll probably have one like here so that brings in all of these swales paying attention to that and i'm going to hit shots using all that i'm not really playing to the flag today i don't don't really care too too much but that's what i'm looking for and yeah it's all on this first hole this is great so since i have some time i can hit some shots imagining i you know this is my actual third shot sort of a back pin and i'm seeing how these greens react if it's similar to the putting green or if it's a little different out here but let's say i thought there was a pin there like i'm just getting this feel from what i expect or can anticipate i'm gonna have to wait on the next d but that's when i'll just i'll scribble down some notes on the scorecard here some players bring out a notebook or like they make their own yardage books i'm kind of past that in my career i'm trying to make these as like low stress and as fun as possible so i'll scribble a couple notes like that tee shot just kind of right over the bunker right side of the bunker and short shorts okay basically for my second shot that's what i'm gonna write down here on nice so the second hole it's 415 wins this way what i'm zapping for here is i can see these trees in the on the right side are they reachable it's 258 260 312 a little bit so driver seems like it might be a little bit too much club because it could get me in trouble to the right luckily i've got some time so i'm gonna go with three wood and my two iron and just see where we are up there so i'm gonna stand up here and i'm gonna pick a target which i think will work there seems to be a little dip in the trees that's exactly what i'm gonna aim at and just hit a good 3-wood know that i've got room i've got left or right let it go i hit my target but it faded it didn't draw that's probably totally okay i don't even need to hit a two iron if anything when we get up there if i see that there's more room i could probably hit driver on this hole but you can see a couple feet into the rough these are the trees i was zapping talking about this one i think was 260. so hitting driver it's not like it's any more wide open up there so i like three wood on this hole pretty wide pretty forgiving driver if i happen to lose it out to the right i'm right in there or if i lose it left i'm in trouble so i'm gonna hit something that it is pretty wide even if i mishit it three with the play i've got 154 this looks like a green that you probably just want to be below the hole you can see these slopes left it looks not so bad right looks not so bad pain looks like it's right in the middle but this is why i'm playing a practice round just getting an idea for what i need to hit off the t's pick my lines and kind of go from there yeah that green was super super narrow um just noted right now i'm going through this round now i'm taking taking some notes but when it comes to like me and my swing and my action i'm not worried about my swing right now the big thing i'm working on is being able to stand over the golf ball committed to a target so you can you've heard me talk about i'm just picking targets targets targets i'm trying to stand over each shot and not think about technique think about executing to a target hitting a shot seeing you know asking myself what does it feel like what does it look like and that's what i'm kind of judging myself on today more than scouting the golf course score irrelevant to me today getting comfortable with the course the conditions and comfortable with myself over the golf ball so one thing i'm noticing through the first uh four holes and even looking here at five the greens are are interesting they're not there's some slope to them let's call a spade a spade but it's not unfair it's actually really great they're running really great but they're very small in certain angles when you're looking at them so it's to have the best look into what i'm seeing so far you got to be on the right side of the fairway and the rough obviously is not great it's harder to control the ball out of the rough when it's landing that's one thing i am noticing i'm going to pay attention to see if that's the case throughout the whole round if these greens they look really small on your approach shots but they do open up in certain areas so it's just having an understanding and knowledge of where you're wanting to land it on the green and also like i said on one if you're going to miss where you want to miss so i'm here in the rough it might be a little harder to control my shot that pin looks like it's middle left a little pin high or short of pin high and to the right is the best place for me if i'm going to miss this one if it does kind of turn back to that flag we're laughing but that's kind of how i'm looking at this shot that i can't really be too aggressive with whatever i wanted i took a little too much off that from 174 thinking it might jump but i'm in a great spot just short right of the green should be a straightforward up and down so there you go i said air short right and pretty apparent that that was the right idea obviously if i'd taken enough to fly it back here if it had jumped who knows squirts all the way back there that's a tricky putt or it goes down here or down there and we have a very tricky up and down or even from that bunker so that's absolutely spot on where i wanted to miss that shot if it had enough to get up there i'm putting but yeah that's what i'm looking for where to miss not necessarily just taking dead aim at flags you also want to know if you're out of position if you can't be aggressive where is the best place to miss this shot to give myself the best opportunity to make a par get out of the hole that i was out of position you know and on to the next one [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] all right i hope you enjoyed this video i hope you learned a little bit if you didn't already have a plan for your practice rounds and if you did and everything i've said you knew well well done and if there's anything i missed or anything you do that maybe you could share with some other people let me know down in the comments below some practice round tips you have and apart from that this video if you're watching it right now i'm actually playing my second and final round so hopefully i'm playing well you don't have to look too far down the leaderboard to find my name give this video a thumbs up subscribe if you're not subscribed and i'll see you next video peace