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My First Swing - Beginning the Cognitive Stage 

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My First Swing - Beginning the Cognitive Stage 

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When it comes to the sport of golf, there is much to learn. I was lucky enough to be introduced to the game at a very young age. By the age of four, I was using plastic clubs in my back yard, trying different ways of swinging. Countless mini putt games also gave me a general understanding of a putting motion.
Golf certainly has a strong learning curve with a negatively accelerated performance trend. Many new skills and strategies are learned during the cognitive stage and learner often sees large improvements during their first experiences.
From my first golf swing to about age ten I experienced lots of growth. I acquired critical learning variables such as proper club grip and correct stance/posture. Trial and error allowed me to develop the basic mechanics of a golf swing.

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Sports were an important part of my childhood. I was involved with three organized sports including basketball, football, and baseball. I also played golf occasionally on the side. While being involved in many sports is a great way to stay active and develop character, they can often interfere with each other. Because of this my golf skill greatly declined during early adolescence. From the ages of 9 to 15 I put loads of time into baseball. From April until July nearly every weekend was spend at the diamond. Hundreds of practices later, my baseball swing was nearly concrete. Strong hip and wrist rotation, timing step, and elbow extension at the end of the swing had been drilled into my long-term memory. This came to be detrimental to my golf swing the moment I stepped into the tee box. Interference from baseball had caused a negative transfer of skills. My wrists were turning over after every swing causing all of my shots to severely hook inwards. I remember playing 14-15 holes before I would perform a clean tee shot down the fairway. The contexts and movements of both sports were just too similar to keep them completely separate in my motor memory. This interference had reverted me back to the early cognitive stage where I was going through different strategies to correct my errors. Because baseball was my primary focus during these years, I often avoided golf due to my struggles which caused lots of regression and trace decay.

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Associative Stage and the Implementation of Augmented Feedback

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Associative Stage and the Implementation of Augmented Feedback

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Following my sophomore year of an intense high school baseball season, I decided that the sport wasn't for me. Too much time was taken out of my summer sweating in catchers gear so I decided to move on.
With all of this free time in the summer, I began golfing much more. After a few rough outings at the course, I thought maybe it would be a good idea to get lessons. Once a week I saw an instructor who worked with me on all facets of the game. My driving, mid-range, chipping, and putting all improved. I began refining my movements and focusing on proprioceptive cues during my swing. My mechanics became consistent and I was able to decipher errors subjectively such as incorrect head position or dropping or if I opened the face of my club too early. At this point, I believe I had reached the associative stage of learning and I would attribute this advancement to my access to proper augmented feedback. I had solidified the strategies and mechanics to my game and I also eventually noticed a decrease in the rate of my improvements. Some important performance changes included the ability to coordinate limb segments, increase timing accuracy (kinematics), and also properly focus on key visual cues.
In the sport of golf, I believe augmented feedback is critical in learning and greatly enhances skill acquisition. My instructor sped up my learning and taught me many skills that would have taken me years to learn on my own. His ability to give prescriptive feedback at proper times certainly progressed me into the associative stage of learning.

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Using Practice Variability to Independently Progress

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Using Practice Variability to Independently Progress

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Golf is a very expensive sport. Although my time with an instructor was very beneficial, since I wasn't competing in the sport, I decided it was no longer worth paying for. I knew there were still many ways to improve however, so around age 18 I began heading to the driving range by myself. My instructor had given me a 'Range Agenda' and I made sure to stick to it. The first portion of my practice was blocked. To start, Five to ten shots with each club from 9 iron to driver. This was to retrieve my muscle mechanics from long-term memory for each type of club. Next, the practice would become more variable. I would use imagine a hole, weather it be a par 3,4, or 5 and then pretend like I was playing each one out. Start with a drive to the correct yardage, use a mid range iron or hybrid depending on how much fairway was left, and then chip the remaining distance. Unfortunately, putting was not much of an option at the range but if there was a practice green, I would putt from different lengths. I believe this practice format and variability allowed me to continue to progress even though the rate of improvement was much slower. At this point, I began bridging the gap to autonomy.

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As the title implies, golf is a lifelong sport of learning. Within one round you can go from performing greatly to hitting a ball right out of bounds. At times, I find myself swinging fluidly, striking the ball perfectly, and having delicate touch. During these moments I believe I am performing automatically. I simply go up and swing. One miscalculation however, and I regress immediately back to the associative stage. While this fluctuation is frustrating, I believe it is what makes golf so compelling. Even the top golfers in the world make huge mistakes and revert back to trial and error with their strategies. For example, world class golfer Jordan Spieth just recently changed his putting grip. It was a successful alteration and he is now performing at his best every tournament. I hope to one day reach autonomy but there is a chance that will never happen. Nevertheless, with diligence and the implementation of practice strategies learned from this class, I think its an achievable goal!