Tiger Woods’ New Tee Shot And How To Use It In Pressure Situations

Why should golfers take advice from Tiger Woods when it comes to pressure situations?

The better question would be, why not?

After all, he is a legend in the sport.

Woods holds numerous golf records and is tied for first place in PGA Tour wins.

His golf game has made him one of the most successful and popular golfers ever and an intricate part of that game is his play under pressure, particularly his new tee shot which he now uses to overcome tough situations on the golf course.

The Importance Of The Tee Shot

Why is the tee shot important?

Well, it is the first shot that starts every hole and so is critical for setting the pace for the entirety of holes played during an entire game.

Usually, the tee shot should go as far as possible so that the likelihood of taking fewer shots is increased, However, this does not have to be the case if a golfer has a good short game.

Having a good short game takes a lot of the pressure off of the tee shot but that still does not entirely eliminate the mental anxiety that many golfers feel as they start the game.

There is a phenomenon that all golfers face sooner or later called the TBP (tee box pressure). It commonly occurs during the tee shot, especially on the first hole, and has been attributed to the mental fear of failure.

Tiger Woods, who has had to go through multiple back surgeries during his career, has had to readjust his tee shot to overcome his physical limitations. His new tee shot adjustments can also be used to lessen TBP as well.

Tiger Woods’ Pressure Tee Shot

Woods’ uses his adjusted tee shot to make sure that he puts his ball in the fairway right from the start.

As he points out, he has had four back surgeries and will be eligible for the senior tour in six years.

In other words, he is old and injured.

These physical impairments also bring with them a host of mental impairments as the mind gets discouraged because the body will not do what the mind wants it to do.

To compensate for his weakening body, he came up with the following technique to assure that he puts himself in a good position from the start.

Tee Shot Technique

The Tiger Woods’ pressure tee shot is a slappy cut that is not intended to go far. It is used primarily to play it safe and reach short grass.

This technique should be used in the following situations:

First Tee Shot
Difficult Holes
Roomy Fairways
Achieving Par Five In Two

To perform the technique correctly, Woods focuses more on his shoulders than his feet. He keeps his shoulders open and facing the target while his feet remain pretty much square to the target.

The shoulders should end up a little left of the target sp that the ball banks to the right and the feet should be placed square to the target to take the pressure off of the back.

Doing so will allow the back to open up even more on the backswing.

It is also recommended to keep the clubface left of the target instead of square and open to it at address so the ball will not sail to the right of the intended destination.

The technique itself can be summed in six simple steps:

1)Keep the shoulders open.

2)Close the clubface.

3)Take the swing all the way back.

4)Keep the swing down the shoulder line.

5)Rotate through the downswing.

6)Don’t hold on the clubhead (release the clubhead) on the follow-through.

Golfers can also hit down on the ball a few degrees instead of hitting up on it to move the ball forward a bit more.

Conclusion

Even though the pressure tee shot is simple to perform, that does not mean that it is easy. It will take time to get the hang of it but once it becomes second nature, golfers will be able to split fairways with much more ease and with less pressure placed on both their body and minds.

The Tiger Woods Era

For many sports fans today, Tiger Woods has been part of the landscape of national media for as long as we can remember. Many of us don’t remember turning on our favorites highlight show and seeing a golf story that didn’t mention Tiger Woods. From red polos and fist pumps on Sunday afternoons to a fall from grace for the ages, the Tiger Woods era has been both the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.

The Beginning of a New Era

Tiger Woods joined the PGA Tour in 1996. His unmatched run of dominance began at the Las Vegas Invitational and would continue for most of the next 13 years which would see him win a jaw-dropping 14 majors. Everywhere you looked, Tiger Woods was raising another trophy and changing the face of professional golf. In every way imaginable, from the way he looked to the way that he carried himself, Woods was anything but the prototypical PGA golfer. In a time where the world’s top golfers were middle-aged men who would rarely show any emotion, a confident, often brash 20-something year old who would pump his fist and scream with enthusiasm was unheard of. And with that, Tiger brought a new breath into the world of professional golfing.

The Beginning of the End

Tiger’s run that began in 1996 didn’t seem to be coming to an end. While he won “only” 1 major in 2008, a major victory is nothing to diminish. However, 2009 would see the unraveling of one of the world’s greatest athletes. A scandal that involved an extra-marital affair being leaked to the tabloids culminated in an arrest in late November of 2009. For ten years, Tiger, the man who the world watched grow up on the golf course faced criticism in both his personal and professional life.

A New Beginning

That criticism would give way to optimism as sports fans from around the globe rallied behind Tiger as he took a lead into the last round of the 2019 Masters. The hallowed fairways of the legendary Augusta Golf Club were the perfect stage for Woods to carry a lead into the last 3 holes. Even with a bogey on the 18th, Tiger clinched his 5th career Masters victory. A meteoric rise and an infamous fall from grace blended into the background with a legendary resurrection back to the top of the golfing world.

Is the Tiger Woods era of dominance back? It’s hard to say. But we are back to the days of discussing Tiger Woods in every tournament.

Becoming a Professional Golfer

One of the most beautiful things about the game of golf is the fact that it doesn’t discriminate based on your age. There are professional opportunities for young teenagers as well as senior citizens, and everyone in between. What a lot of people don’t realize, however, is that you don’t have to develop a multi faceted game like Tiger Woods, Phil Michelson, or Bubba Watson to make it as a professional golfer. Many of us struggle with some aspect of the game of golf, and most often it’s putting. You may be excellent off the tee, but struggle to find the bottom of the cup when you make it to the green. Good news! There’s an opportunity for you to make it as a professional golfer as well!

While many of us are familiar with the PGA and LPGA tours, what you may not know is that there is a professional tour that competes in “longest drive competitions.” Maybe you’re a weekend golfer that doesn’t really fit into the “country club” type mold that many professionals seem to be; that’s even better. The World Long Drive Tour embraces the grass roots type feel that makes you enjoy what you and your friends do at the driving range on weekends.

While it does still remain important to consistently practice, this branch of professional golf embraces the part of the game that many of us enjoy the most: the long ball. While you do need to check on some specialized equipment for your new venture, your primary focus just has to be on increasing your swing speed.

Not only is golf beautiful because it doesn’t require you to be within a certain age range, it also doesn’t require you to fit into any sort of personality “mold.” With options like the World Long Drive Competition, all you have to do is work on increasing speed, perfect hitting the “sweet spot” of the ball off the tee, and see how far you can launch one. Long Drive competitions actually pay up to 6 figures, which means your dreams of hitting it rich playing golf aren’t as out of reach as you may have believed.

The One Drill that Tiger Woods Uses During Every Practice Session

After a stunning win at the Masters tournament at Augusta National Golf Club earlier this year, Tiger Woods appears to have revitalized his career in an unprecedented manner.

And his renewed commitment to personal success did not come easy: Battling a number of personal shortcomings stemming from relationship and substance abuse issues that are said to have taken hold early in his career, Woods had to rely on his remarkable dedication to the game to pull himself back from the abyss and once again find his stride as one of the world’s top golfers.

Indeed, in golfing history, Woods undoubtedly ranks alongside Jack Nicklaus as one of the greatest players of all time. Even as he overcomes a serious back injury, Woods remains committed and self-disciplined when it comes to his golfing practice regime. And in a recent video tutorial for Golf Digest, the pro also revealed that there is one particular drill that he emphasizes above all others when spending time honing his craft.

Based around a short-distance putting exercise, Woods first uses his right hand to tap shots over short distances on the green; he then switches back and forth between hands and also uses traditional grips on the putter to give his shots a laser-like focus and accuracy. According to Woods, the objective in completing such exercises lies in creating a natural swing that always hits the ball with the center of the club face. If everything goes well, in other words, the drill will reinforce a player’s muscle memory until perfectly-centered shots become almost second-nature.

As Woods will happily point out to skeptics, most golfers tend to focus on centering their shots only when they’re using a driver or an iron; too often, time spent learning to center shots on the green is neglected. For Tiger, it’s clear that true power in golfing doesn’t just exist in a player’s approach to their long game; to really improve as players, most individuals will need to regularly put the kind of effort that they put into our drives into their putting exercises.

Whatever a person’s view on Tiger’s approach to the great game of golf, it is clear that most players will stand to improve spending time centering putting shots on the practice green. It may initially feel awkward to put principles related to long-distance shots into short-distance puts, but it is clear that the method has paid off remarkably well for Tiger Woods. And his is the kind of record that certainly speaks for itself.

Risks 101: What Tiger’s Decisions Teach His Observers

Tiger Woods is known for his amazing success and risk taking when it comes to taking a perceived impossible shot. As an acclaimed college and amateur golf player, Woods began participating in professional golf tours at 20 years old. Within a year of becoming a professional, Tiger broke Masters records in 1997 in addition to winning three PGA Golf Tour championships in the same year. Being the most consecutively ranked number one golfer in the world, Tiger Woods is definitely a candidate for giving golfing shot advice.

Golf success comes with being strategic in taking shots since lower scores help the player win each hole. That being said, having an awareness of the risk of a shot is essential. Tiger is very calculated when deciding which decisions will both positively and negatively affect his scorecard. He also teaches his golf students to consider how their percentages will be affected by the shot they take.

For professional golfing spectators, it is almost baffling to see Tiger land shots that they perceive to be impossible. For Tiger, his calculated risk taking comes down to his positioning. “A lot of the shots you’ve seen me hit from bad spots, for the most part they’ve been from good angles. You’re not going to pull off every shot, but if I tried it, I thought I could.”

As Tiger’s career continues, his risks in the game are more prudent. His longevity has taught him to rely on other variables of the game when he doesn’t believe he’ll make the shot. “Physically, I just don’t have the speed to hit some of the shots I used to. I still see the gaps if I’m in a bad spot, but I think, I just can’t. I’ll pitch out, wedge it, and make my putt.”

Every risk comes with the opportunity to either take it or be cautious. Whether playing golf or making life decisions, Tiger Woods encourages people to take risks when a desirable outcome seems attainable. The difference between pulling off a hard shot and failing lies in the belief. Tiger teaches observers that taking calculated risks and believing in outcome creates something special: a champion.