Tai Chi Swing

So how should we "deliberately" practice golf? To find out I contacted Pia Nilsson, Annika Sörenstam's longtime instructor. She is the author, with Lynn Marriott, of a book about practice, "The Game Before the Game," that is also based in part on Prof. Ericsson's research.

"You don't have to spend 10,000 hours at it. If you have only two hours a week available, you can make those two hours count for a lot if you commit to quality practice," she said.

The first step should be evaluating your game (preferably with the input of an instructor) and identifying one or two high-value areas to focus on first, and exclusively. "Ninety-five percent of people make the mistake of going right to some kind of technical swing fix, but usually there are more effective things to work on," she said.

Common targets that can produce big, immediate payoffs are tempo, the short game and developing an ironclad, stress-reducing preshot routine. Golfers with reduced flexibility and strength want to focus on thoroughly understanding those limitations and developing workarounds, perhaps while also launching a long-term effort to become stronger and more supple.

But don't expect this kind of practice to be as satisfying as whacking balls on the range. One drill that Ms. Nilsson and Ms. Marriott sometimes recommend is a super slow-motion, 30-second swing -- the tai chi swing, they call it. "About 25% of our students find this to be so difficult and awful that they won't do it," Ms. Nilsson said. I'm one of them. Each second is agony. Why? For people whose minds customarily operate at 100 mph, slowing to a snail's pace is just plain hard, but being totally in the present moment is a key to great performance, Ms. Nilsson said. The slow swing also reveals blind spots in awareness of where our hands, limbs and the golf club are. This is surprisingly uncomfortable, but the best players are hyper-aware of their positions throughout a swing and thus can detect when things are off.

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