The post Justin Rose returns to Olympic gold medal-winning driver at 2022 BMW PGA appeared first on Golf.

The post Justin Rose returns to Olympic gold medal-winning driver at 2022 BMW PGA appeared first on Golf.

It’s only Friday but there has been a flurry of activity at the BMW PGA Championship on the DP World Tour.

First, we had Billy Horschel calling out LIV players and Ian Poulter wearing his LIV team logo, and then play was suspended Thursday with the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. All of this before Rory McIloroy took a full swing from the rough that traveled a whole foot. As I said, busy week.

In contrast, it’s been a quiet week on the (professional) golf equipment front, beyond the release of the new Titleist TSR drivers and fairway woods to the public. But there was one not-so-new thing that caught our eye in the bag of Justin Rose: a 6-year-old driver!

Thanks to Sports Marketing Surveys — the European Tour’s version of the popular Darryl Survey, which tracks equipment on the PGA Tour — we noted that Rose returned to the 2016 TaylorMade M2 driver.

To be frank, spotting a more than 6-year-old club, especially a driver on the highest professional tours, is akin to finding Bigfoot. But if you talk to anyone in the know, the original M2 driver is regarded as one of the best drivers TaylorMade has ever produced. It’s not that Rose doesn’t like new gear — he’s using the newest Stealth fairway woods — but there must be something about the M2 that has him holding onto it for now.

It’s not likely that this will be a long-term solution for Rose but it will be interesting to follow headed into the 2023 season as new driver options become available.

Want to overhaul your bag? Find a fitting location near you at GOLF’s affiliate company True Spec Golf. For more on the latest gear news and information, check out our latest Fully Equipped podcast below.

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The post Why do so many pro golfers swing with a stick in the ground on the range? appeared first on Golf.

The post Why do so many pro golfers swing with a stick in the ground on the range? appeared first on Golf.

This week we saw two idyllic golf swings make their way through golf social media.

First came Justin Rose’s, a swing as steady as clockwork, which was first shared by Director of Golf at The Vintage Club David Woods.

And then came Nelly Korda, the World No. 1 female golfer whose silky swing is about as textbook as it gets.

There are lots of similarities between two of the best moves in golf, but one that stuck out to me had nothing to do with their swing: It had to do with their practice station. Both golfers were hitting golf balls with an alignment rod sticking out of the ground at an angle.

It struck me that those at home may not know why, or what the point of it is. Good news is it’s a nice, simple explanation — and a drill you may want to try yourself.

Golfers will almost always out a stick in the ground like this to work on their swing path. The goal is to use it as an obstacle, and place it in a spot so you have to swing around it. You can fix different things depending on where you put the stick.

Rose places the stick behind the golf ball, so he has to swing around it before he hits the ball. It’s a good one to prevent coming over the top (take note, slicers) because otherwise he’d hit the stick. As you can see, it leaves his downswing looking pretty pure.

Nelly has the stick on the opposite side: Past the golf ball, so she has to swing underneath it on her release. This is good for golfers like me, who get the club stuck inside and fling it out to the right.

It’s a simple solution that can be adapted to solve a myriad of problems in your swing, so that’s why pros do it.

Want to overhaul your bag for 2022? Find a fitting location near you at GOLF’s affiliate company True Spec Golf.

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The post ‘It was difficult to have to ring him:’ Padraig Harrington explains not picking Justin Rose appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘It was difficult to have to ring him:’ Padraig Harrington explains not picking Justin Rose appeared first on Golf.

Sergio Garcia, Shane Lowry and Ian Poulter were in.

And Justin Rose and Alex Noren were out. 

Padraig Harrington, with his three captain’s picks for the European Ryder Cup team, called Garcia, Lowry and Poulter on Sunday to fill out his team for next week’s event at Whistling Straits in Wisconsin. He’d call Rose, too. 

“It was difficult to have to ring him,” Harrington said. “He played well enough to be on the team. He pushed hard at the end, but there wasn’t a spot ultimately.

“Alex Noren played great. Stats-wise, Alex Noren was right there. Fantastically suited to the golf course. So I don’t know if Alex knows how close he was to making the team. Really quality player. But it was tough ringing Justin, because that was the one right in the bubble. Clearly he’s good enough to be in the Ryder Cup. Clearly he’s a great player, showing some form right now.”

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In the end, Harrington picked Garcia and Poulter — players, he said, he had “his heart set on” as being “the hearts of the team, the soul” — and Lowry, was in line for an automatic selection before last week’s BMW PGA Championship, the last qualifying event. Moving in at the BMW was Bernd Wiesberger, who Harrington said “delivered.” And that left out Rose, a five-time Ryder Cupper, and Noren, Harrington said. 

“I talked to Justin a few weeks ago, and you know, he was very keen that he was going to work on his game, get his game ready, and look, he did,” Harrington said. “But ultimately, Bernd went in and stole his thunder and got in there and got that automatic position, which you know, in the end of the day, just there wasn’t enough room.

“That’s the tough thing with the picks. There is a point where — there’s not a huge deal of difference, either. It’s not like the three picks, while I’m happy with them and very comfortable with them, clearly people could have argued all the way for Justin, and as I said, Alex had exceptional stats coming into this. So yeah, there was other options on the table that we would have been happy with.”  

On the other side, Steve Stricker had six automatic picks and six captain’s picks for the U.S. team. Harrington, besides the three captain’s picks, completed his team with four players off a European points list, and five from world points.

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Would Harrington have liked more captain’s picks?

“No, we couldn’t have the same number of picks,” he said. “We have our European points list. We have to deal with players who — even you just look at Covid, who struggle to travel across the continent and can’t play all the events they want to play.

“Europe is in a distinctly different position. We are picking off different orders. In years gone by, we have been waiting for U.S. Tour events to finish picking our team. It’s a very complicated system in Europe that needs to be considered by each individual captain how he wants to do it, depending on the closing date of the event. Lots of little reasons.

“As I said at one stage during Covid, I was offered eight picks, and with eight picks, because it was very broad in Covid, we were thinking no golf for six months into the Ryder Cup, [and] you know, you might have 20 people, 20-plus people who might have a thought of making the team. That’s 730,000 combinations of teams you can make up out of that. More picks — it was tough making a pick. I had three picks, and it was tough leaving Justin Rose out. There’s always going to be somebody on the bubble.”

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The post Final-hole 3-putt sends one player to FedEx Cup Playoffs — and boots former World No. 1 appeared first on Golf.

The post Final-hole 3-putt sends one player to FedEx Cup Playoffs — and boots former World No. 1 appeared first on Golf.

Justin Rose needed to make a putt of 5 feet, 4 inches to earn a trip to New Jersey and the first round of the FedEx Cup Playoffs. He missed, and he punched a ticket for Chesson Hadley instead.

The PGA Tour regular season came to an end on Sunday at the Wyndham Championship, meaning it was the final event for players to qualify for the postseason, which would also secure their PGA Tour cards for the 2021-22 season.

Hadley, age 34, was one of the pros battling to get to 125th or better in the FedEx Cup standings — or be sent to more qualifying events, where the competition continues (and intensifies) to earn a card. He started the day 132nd in the FedEx Cup but got hot early and shot an eight-under 62, which included a hole in one. Hadley, who started on the back nine, birdied three of his first four and made a hole-in-one — the first of his life — on 16.

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He said he didn’t have number in mind to start the day. He just knew he had to go low.

“After I made that [ace] and got to five under on the day, I was like, I can do this. I made a nice birdie on the next hole and made a nice par save on 18 and I started to tighten up a little bit,” Hadley said. “I hit some good shots early on on the front nine, my back side, but didn’t get anything out of it. Nice par save on 4. You know, I finished strong with a couple birdies. You just, I don’t know, it will be close. I mean, it will be really, really close.”

When Hadley finished he had moved up to 126th, but that still meant he needed to improve by one spot or lose his PGA Tour card. Then Justin Rose came to the 18th hole, needing to clean up a five-footer on 18 to close his round. He missed, and with that three-putt Rose went from 115 to 126 in the standings. Hadley was in.

Rose is now out of the Playoffs, but he didn’t lose his card. He’s among several players who didn’t make the top 125 but still has a card for next season (or beyond) based off previous wins. But Hadley didn’t have the security.

“That’s kind of what the Playoffs is all about, right?” Rose said. “It’s a knife-edged moment. I’ve been on the winning side at East Lake where a bogey was costly and a birdie got me back into the projected No. 1 spot, so I’ve been on the right side of it and maybe on the wrong side today. Yeah, it’s not nice when it’s not in your hands, but obviously it was in my hands up 18. I didn’t do a very good job of that.”

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The post Justin Rose has five simple words of advice for playing under pressure appeared first on Golf.

The post Justin Rose has five simple words of advice for playing under pressure appeared first on Golf.

Justin Rose, from 214 yards out on the par-5 15th at Sedgefield Country Club on Friday, hit a 5-iron over the water fronting the green, and his ball dropped to about 12 feet. “Wow, best I’ve seen so far today here at 15,” the announcer on the PGA Tour Live broadcast said. It was a shot Rose hadn’t seen recently, either.

“That was a really nice 5-iron I hit in there, which is a shot that I’ve been working on this week to kind of get the full numbers out of my iron play,” he said. “Last week in Memphis, I was struggling to hit my numbers and that’s a shot I couldn’t have hit last week, so shows I’m making some progress.”

While it’s important to know how Rose hit the shot, it’s maybe more meaningful to know when he hit it. 

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The former world No. 1 hasn’t won since early 2019. This week, at the Wyndham Championship, he’s fighting to keep his season alive; he’s 138th in the FedEx Cup standings, and only the top 125 will move on to next week’s Northern Trust, the first leg of the three-week postseason. And yet, with all of that at the front of mind, Rose appeared to have put it in the rearview, worked on a shot on the range and then went out and executed. 

How’d he do it? A reporter even more bluntly asked: “As somebody who, like, chokes when he’s playing corn hole, how do you do that as a professional athlete?” In a thoughtful answer after his round, complete with a later reference to tennis, it all really boils down to just five words:

You need to be free. 

“You just need to have a little bit of a bigger picture and a bit of perspective going on,” Rose said. “So for me, for example, if I want to get back to playing some of the best golf that I’ve played and to compete with the best players in the world again and sort of compete in major championships, you need to be free. 

“You need to kind of, no matter what the scenario is and what the pressure is, you need to be able to swing freely and commit. So yeah, whatever the scenarios are this week, I need to be able to swing freely and commit through coming up the 18th hole with a chance to finish top 10 or a chance to win or whatever it might be. It’s a great opportunity this week just to continue to kind of practice that kind of hopefully steppingstone back towards playing great.”

The thought, he said, is something he picked up not from golf, but tennis’ big three: Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. 

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“I look at a lot of the tennis players, actually,” Rose said. “I look at Nadal, Djokovic and Federer, when they’re 15-30 down, they swing for the lines. They don’t start chipping it back into the middle of the court; they commit to their shots. 

“Sometimes I find it easier to learn from other sports than I do in my own arena, probably just stubbornness of looking at other players and wanting to learn from them, but definitely when I see tennis players, yeah, they commit 100 percent.”

A reporter then asked: Is Rose “more of a Federer probably than a Nadal?”

“Yeah, to be honest, you’re spoilt for choice in tennis, but yeah, the grace and elegance with which Roger’s gone about his business and how he plays tennis, he’s a pretty good role model,” he said.

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The post Two former world No. 1s! Two Olympic medalists! Season may end for big names appeared first on Golf.

The post Two former world No. 1s! Two Olympic medalists! Season may end for big names appeared first on Golf.

A former world No. 1 and a Masters champ. Another former world No. 1 and a U.S. Open winner. Two of this year’s three Olympic medalists. And fan favorite Rickie Fowler. 

Gone? 

The PGA Tour’s first-ever “super season,” with six major championships and 50 events total, is playing the last week of its regular season, and with it, a few of golf’s bigger names may be playing the last week of their season, period. The Tour’s three-week playoff system begins next week, when the top 125 golfers in the season-long FedEx Cup standings tee it up at the Northern Trust, and it ends with 30 players competing at the Tour Championship over Labor Day weekend. 

The top 125 also are guaranteed their Tour cards for next season, though many of the aforementioned stars are exempt through other means. To note, players ranked 125 to 200 can attempt to win back full-time Tour status through the three-week Korn Ferry Tour finals, which begin next week. 

A look, then, at the stars who are playing this week’s Wyndham Championship — and then possibly might not play again on Tour until the next season begins with the Fortinet Championship next month: 

Adam Scott 

The former Masters champ and world No. 1 is No. 121 in the standings, and according to projections from the Tour, he likely needs to finish 51st or better this week to advance. Scott is exempt through the 2023-24 season thanks to his victory at the Genesis Invitational in February of last year. 

Scott, who has never missed the playoffs in its 14 years of existence, has missed just one cut this season, but has played in only 17 events, with his highest finish a tie for 10th at the Farmers Insurance Open at the start of the year. During Thursday’s first round at the Wyndham, he shot a four-under 66 and is four shots out of the lead. 

“Obviously the season hasn’t gone how I wanted, and I feel like I’m kind of playing with house money,” Scott said. “I mean, I’m not really thinking about it. I’m more interested in getting my game into the shape I feel it should be, and it’s getting closer. I would like to play well this week and get a chance to play next week and keep getting my game into place. It’s hard to improve your game when you don’t have a chance to play, so at the moment, my goal is to just keep playing week after week.”

Matt Kuchar

Kuchar, a four-time member of the U.S. Ryder Cup team, is No. 124 in the standings, and according to projections from the Tour, he likely needs to finish 42nd or better this week to advance. Kuchar is exempt through the 2022-23 season.

Kuchar, who also has never missed the playoffs, has made 11 cuts this season and been cut 11 times. On Thursday, he also shot a 66. 

Rickie Fowler  

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Fowler, one of the biggest names in golf, is No. 130 in the standings, and according to projections from the Tour, he likely needs to finish 21st or better this week to advance. Fowler is exempt through the 2022-23 season thanks to his victory at the Players Championship in 2015.

Fowler, who has never missed the playoffs in his career, tied for eighth at the PGA Championship, but he has no other top 10s and has missed eight cuts this season. On Thursday, he shot a 71 and is nine strokes out of the lead. 

“It’s kind of right out there laid out in front of me; I know exactly what needs to be done,” Fowler said. “So in a way, it’s just go play solid golf and that’s all I can control or do to control what’s — if I’m moving forward or not. Yeah, it’s pretty simple. Back up against the wall, go make some more birdies than I do bogeys and get a tee time next week, and if not, you don’t. Yeah, it’s kind of just all on me, that’s about it.”

Tommy Fleetwood 

Instruction

Fleetwood, a 2018 Ryder Cup star, is No. 136 in the standings, and according to projections from the Tour, he likely needs to finish 11th or better this week to advance. Fleetwood is no longer exempt after this season, but he’s 35th in the world golf rankings and could work his way into events through that route. 

On Thursday, Fleetwood also shot a 66. 

“It’s not going to make or break my year,” Fleetwood said of the playoffs. “Like I think I’ve had a long enough season, I’ve had enough events to be doing a lot better and I haven’t, so I’m not going to like, I’m not going to come into this week and overload myself with pressure thinking I need to get into the playoffs.

“Fact is, I’m not there. I really want to be there, and I also, I mean I just said it, I could still win the FedExCup. Like I could still have a great run and go to Atlanta and win the FedExCup and I’m not going to lose sight of that.”

Justin Rose 

Gear

Rose, a U.S. Open champion and a former world No. 1, is No. 138 in the standings, and according to projections from the Tour, he likely needs to finish 10th or better this week to advance. Rose is exempt through the 2023-24 season thanks to his victory at the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions in 2018.

Rose, the 2018 FedEx Cup champion, finished in the top 10 at the Masters and the PGA Championship — but those are his only top 10s this season. On Thursday, Rose shot, you guessed it, a 66. 

“The playoffs isn’t something you want to miss and it’s something I haven’t ever missed and it’s something that you don’t want to make a habit of,” he said. “Obviously I do have exemptions and this and that — that’s nice to be able to rely on — but from a pride point of view, I think it’s really, really important to make a run into the playoffs. The playoffs are designed to give someone an opportunity to make up for what hasn’t been a good season. 

Francesco Molinari 

Molinari, an Open Championship winner, is No. 140 in the standings, and according to projections from the Tour, he likely needs to finish sixth or better this week to advance. Molinari is exempt through the 2024-25 season thanks to his Open win.

On Thursday, he shot a 67. 

Rory Sabbatini and C.T. Pan 

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Sabbatini, the Olympic silver medalist, and Pan, the bronze medalist, could both miss the playoffs, and if Sabbatini does, he could be playing in the Korn Ferry Finals. 

Pan is 120th in the standings, and according to projections from the Tour, he likely needs to finish 60th or better this week to advance. Pan is also exempt for next season after winning the 2019 RBC Heritage. 

Sabbatini, however, is not exempt, though he could use a one-time exemption for being in the top on the Tour career money list. And he is 141st in the standings, likely needing a fifth-place finish or better to advance. On Thursday, he, too, shot a 66, while Pan fired a 68. 

“Obviously this is a huge week. I’ve got a big job to do,” Sabbatini said. “… I know I’ve got a tough job, it’s a good field, a lot of good players, so I’ve just got to keep my head down and keep trying to move forward and hopefully make it to next week.”

Will Zalatoris 

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Then there’s Zalatoris. His name is nowhere to be found in the standings. And the only way he can play next week is if he wins this week. But he’s ranked No. 29 in the world and finished second at the Masters and eighth at the PGA. 

What gives?

As described by GOLF’s Jessica Marksbury here, Zalatoris is playing this season as a special temporary member, and he’d have to gain his Tour card through a Wyndham victory to move on to the playoffs. He has, however, accumulated enough points to play next season.

On Thursday, he shot a 68. 

“Even if he’s ahead of me in the FedExCup playoffs, I think he deserves to be in the playoffs,” Webb Simpson said on Wednesday. “Nothing that the Tour has done wrong, I just think it’s a tool that really needs to be looked at and revised. He’s played long enough now and in enough events and played well enough, he deserves to be there. The only reason he’s not there is because of the way the rule is written, but I feel like I speak for pretty much all the players that I’ve talked to at least that Will should be in New York next week and it stinks that he won’t be unless he wins.”

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The post Justin Rose is using never-before-seen Mizuno Pro 221 irons at the Open Championship appeared first on Golf.

The post Justin Rose is using never-before-seen Mizuno Pro 221 irons at the Open Championship appeared first on Golf.

Justin Rose, currently an equipment free agent, has the freedom to play with any irons he chooses from week-to-week. It just so happens that this week at the 2021 Open Championship at Royal St. George’s Golf Club, Rose has decided to use never-before-seen Mizuno Pro 221 irons.

Earlier in the week, three new Mizuno irons popped up on the USGA Conforming List, including Mizuno Pro 221, 223 and 225 models.

Judging by the USGA black-and-white photos, it appears the Mizuno Pro 221 irons – Rose’s irons of choice at The Open – are most akin to traditional blade irons. The 223 irons appear to have cavity back designs, and the 225 models have “HMB” stamped on their hosels; in the past, HMB has stood for “Hot Metal Blade,” which were hollow-bodied long iron replacements.

On the hosel of the Mizuno Pro 221 irons, it reads, “GF Forged HD 1025E.” Surmising based on past Mizuno releases, those letters and numbers would stand for “Grain Flow Forged High Density 1025E.”

“Grain Flow” refers to Mizuno’s forging process that ensures the grains in the metals of the iron heads flow in a particular direction for better precision and feel. As for “1025E,” that likely refers to the type of material the heads are made from; 1025E is a type of high-density carbon.

Golf equipment fans will remember that Mizuno’s recent MP-20 irons had the same “GF Forged HD 1025E” stampings on its hosels.

What’s different about the Mizuno Pro 221 irons versus the MP-20 irons? It’s hard to tell exactly from the photos, but it appears the muscle pad in the back of the irons has a different look on the Pro 221s.

For now, it’s all speculation until Mizuno officially comments on the designs. The only things we know for sure right now are 1) the irons are USGA conforming, and 2) they’re in Rose’s bag as he contends to win The Open this week. Rose currently sits at T25 (three under par) through two rounds at Royal St. George’s.

Want to overhaul your bag for 2021? Find a fitting location near you at GOLF’s affiliate company True Spec Golf. For more on the latest gear news and information, check out our latest Fully Equipped podcast below!

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The post The putting fix that helped Brooke Henderson snap a winless drought appeared first on Golf.

Welcome to Teachable Moments, GOLF’s weekly instruction column that will help you improve your game through the excellence and expertise of the Tour stars of the week. Class is now in session.

Henderson’s new putting technique

The drought is over for Brooke Henderson. After a nearly two years without a win, the Canadian got back in the winner’s circle last week at the L.A. Open. The key to her resurgence? Changes to her putting technique.

In Henderson’s multi-win, 2019 campaign, she ranked 34th on the LPGA Tour in putting, but in 2020 she slipped to 104th. Those struggles persisted into this season, so she decided to make a change.

Instruction

Henderson and her caddie (and sister) got to work experimenting with different grips — including left-hand low on putts within 10 feet — and green-reading techniques, and the changes have paid off. Since the switch at last month’s Kia Classic, Henderson has not finished outside the top 30.

“It’s continuing to be a work in progress, but definitely this week felt a lot more comfortable,” she said. “Even today I made a lot of great putts, and even the ones I didn’t make I still felt like I hit it where I wanted to, which was a great feeling.

“We worked on grip, different reading techniques,” Henderson said. “We’re just trying to find what’s working the best, and to be honest, it’s just the extra time that we’ve been putting in that’s made the biggest difference.”

Finau’s resistance to distance

Tony Finau might have more raw power than anyone on the PGA Tour, but he rarely showcases it to his full potential on the course. He explained at the Zurich Classic that when he unleashes his full swing speed, he doesn’t have as much control as he’d like.

“[Cameron Champ] probably has a better idea where it’s going at that speed,” Finau said. “I have a lot of speed but not quite sure where it’s going.”

He went on to say that he’s not concerned with where he sits on the Tour’s driving distance stats. He doesn’t need to see his name at the top of the board to be satisfied.

“The driving distance stat, to me just seems, it doesn’t mean as much to [me] maybe as it does to some other guys, as far as their ego,” he said. “I’m not big on the driving distance stuff. I think your scoring average and winning golf tournaments is ultimately why we’re out here. I’ve played a lot of high-level golf and I’m more interested in that than the whole distance debate deal.”

Inside Rose’s yardage book

If you’re interested in how caddies map out the course each week for their player, you’re in luck. The PGA Tour posted a fascinating video last week featuring Justin Rose and his caddie, David Clark, that gives a glimpse at what goes on with yardage books inside the ropes.

“[I just] try to give him some information,” Clark said. “And then he’ll take that information and use his skill and judgement to do his thing.”

Check out the entire video above to get a sense for how yardage books are used at the top levels of golf.

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The post The back-to-basics swing thought that helped vault Justin Rose into Masters contention appeared first on Golf.

The post The back-to-basics swing thought that helped vault Justin Rose into Masters contention appeared first on Golf.

In a little more than two and a half years since reaching World No. 1, Justin Rose came into the 2021 Masters the 41st in the world. He had temporarily split with his longtime swing coach, GOLF Top 100 Teacher Sean Foley, and at 40 years old, you may have been forgiven for thinking Rose’s best years were behind him.

Then, right on cue, Rose fired an opening round 65 at Augusta National, then salvaged a second round that threatened to slip away to retain the 36 hole Masters lead.

After a brief stint apart, Rose and Foley are back together again. And while Rose’s good play came slightly sooner than even Rose expected, it’s the product of the pair’s hard work the month leading into the tournament.

And behind it all was a simple, back-to-basics swing thought that Rose had used to ascend to World No. 1 in the first place.

Rose’s thought: Keep the face square to path

On the range this week at Augusta, Rose has been practicing with a specific range setup: Two parallel alignment rods on the ground, one along his foot line and the other along the target line. The alignment rod closer to his feet is to make sure he sets up square to the target; the target line rod is there to provide a visual cue for Rose so he knows where the target line is as he swings.

The third and final alignment rod is sticking at an angle out of the ground, is meant to prevent Rose’s golf swing from getting too shallow. You don’t need to worry about that one too much.

That may sound like a lot, but the goal behind it is actually simple: To practice keeping the face square to the target line, for longer.

“What Sean and I are working on, it’s very simple,” Rose said. “It’s about keeping the face as square to the path for longer. Sometimes when I get my body of out of position, my clubface gets a little too active through impact.”

A square clubface at impact is one of those first principles in golf that is the biggest separator between golfers of all skill levels If you’re missing the ball to the right, your clubface is open. If it’s going left, it’s closed. There could be underlying reasons why that may be happening, but remember that above all else, your clubface is king.

Rose may not be in peak form, but reminding himself of that fundamental truth of the golf swing that has helped vault him into contention at the 2021 Masters — and two rounds away from a green jacket.

“Rosey is such a pro,” Foley says. “We’re helping him create time and space in his swing to square the clubface. That’s it.”

If you’re heading to the range this weekend, you can practice this too. Follow Rose’s range setup by placing a club along your feet, and then one parallel to it down the target line. Take your setup, then start making miniature swings, paying close attention to how the clubface is moving. Slowly work your way up to bigger swings and faster speeds. It’s all about giving yourself an awareness of how and where the clubface is pointing. You may not be playing the Masters, but like Rose, your game will be the better for it.

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The post The clever mental trick that helped Justin Rose take the 36-hole Masters lead appeared first on Golf.

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Justin Rose closed his opening round at the Masters as well as he could’ve hoped, but the start to his second round was a harsh reminder of how difficult Augusta National can be when you get out of position.

Rose’s four-shot lead to start the day began to dwindle just as soon as he sailed his opening tee shot far right into the trees. He bounced back with a birdie on the 2nd, but three more bogeys followed over the next five holes. His once healthy lead had vanished.

As he stepped to the 8th tee box, Rose’s game looked completely different from what we’d seen less than 24 hours earlier. Rose was in real danger of firing a huge number for the day if he didn’t turn things around quickly.

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“It seemed a little more elusive today, no doubt,” Rose said. “I was joking, the finger was heading towards the panic button a little bit.”

At that exact moment, Rose drew a line on his scorecard. It was a clever mental trick that shifted his mindset and turned his day around completely.

“I just changed my mindset a little bit and started to play match play against the golf course,” he said. “[I] told myself I was three down and could I go ahead and beat the golf course from that point on.”

The trick worked.

Much like his back-nine flurry on Thursday, Rose flipped the switch on No. 8. The line he drew on the scorecard changed everything. From there on in, he was a different player.

Rose didn’t make a bogey the rest of the way home. He steadied himself with pars on Nos. 8 through 12 and then took advantage when he needed to. He birdied 13 and 14 before adding another circle to his card at No. 16. With the lead back safely in his grasp, there was only one matter left to tend to — his match with the golf course.

“I had a putt on 18 to win my match 1-up, but unfortunately it just slipped by,” Rose said. “But an honorable draw.”

He might not have beaten the golf course quite as handily as he did on Thursday, but Rose did get the best of everyone else in the field. A 36-hole lead at the Masters is always a good position to be in.

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