Golf Flow

will take longer than you anticipate. As I explain to my golfers, adopting this approach means that if you are right and it does take longer, then you are usually right on time. If you are wrong, then the worst thing that happens is that you arrive early somewhere and can take advantage of that free time.
Rule 2: Time management is a habit to cultivate on and off the course: When trying to improve golfers’ time management, I also spend time with their friends and families because being chronically late is seldom isolated to golf. People who are late to practice or late to the golf course are typically late in other areas of their lives. Thus, we try to enlist friends and families to bring in accountability.
Rule 3: Don’t just talk about it; do it. Getting golfers to show up early is more important than talking to them about showing up early. I often spend the first week with a golfer going to tournaments, going to practices, and sometimes even going to dinner to make sure that the person is doing time management rather than simply discussing time management.
Rule 4: Notice and appreciate when others are on time. Because I am often part of a golfer’s inner circle—those people whom the golfer chooses to surround him- or herself with—I make it a point to excel at time management in my own life. I work hard to be a good model of time management and punctuality, and I go out of my way to point out when one of my golfers is doing a good job of time management.
    Having worked with Hall of Fame golfer Vijay Singh, I was able to see firsthand what an effective manager of time Vijay is. During my 15 years of traveling with PGA Tour golfers, I have never seen Vijay late for a practice session, late for a tee time, or in a rush to get anywhere. Vijay has a slow, casual shuffle around golf tournaments, and he always seems to play the game at a steady, even, relaxed pace. Time management is one of the habits that have enabled Vijay to capture the number-one world ranking for 32 weeks and achieve 58 professional wins, including 3 major championships. Note that an astonishing 23 of those wins came when he was in his 40s.

Let Vijay Singh’s exemplary time management skills and extraordinary work ethic inspire you to step up your own efforts in these areas.

    Jake Drake/Icon SMI
    After winning the 2002 Tour Championship, Vijay explained his training schedule:
You know, I work out twice a day, once in the morning and once in the evening. That should tell you how hard I work. On a regular Tour event, I work like 40 minutes with my warm-up in the morning and probably an hour in the evening, four times a week in the evenings. But every morning, I work out. When I go home, like tomorrow, I have another program set up. It’s an ongoing thing. A long time ago, a guy said to me, “Once you reach 35, 36, that’s when you kind of start going downwards.” So you've got to work twice as hard to keep that one step up. And I’ve been doing it.
    Imagine the type of time management and discipline required to maintain that regimen for the better part of 30 years. I will be the first to admit that time management can be a detail that is easy to overlook. After all, it is more fun to hit golf balls or practice putting. But make no mistake about it, your ability to manage time will eventually show up on your scorecard, so take it seriously.

Improving Your Skills
    Although not everyone can be a morning person, I do suggest that mornings are typically the best time to work effectively. The chances of your being interrupted between the hours of 5 a.m. and 8 a.m. are dramatically less than the chances of your being interrupted between the hours of 8 a.m. and 11 a.m. That quiet, undistracted time is essential for being able to focus on the skill development necessary for golf.
    Although one of my keys for success is to own your mornings, I have to allow for the fact that not everyone is a morning person. Some people have early morning commitments or have children whose mornings also begin early, so they can’t dedicate their mornings to themselves or their golf game. On this note, recognize that the definition of being an effective manager of time can vary from person to person. Depending on individual responsibilities, time management is more a state of mind than an unbending schedule. Let me ask you this: When you have a free 20 or 30 minutes, do you find yourself surfing the Internet or doing something productive? During days when your