If you’re a player who likes to play some money games with the boys, chances are you’ve experienced your fair share of chirping. And hey, let’s be honest — maybe the chirper is you!

If there’s anyone who knows a thing or two about giving and taking a bit of smack-talk on the course, it’s Subpar co-host Drew Stoltz. But in the latest episode of Emergency 9, presented by Cobra, he also shares the surefire antidote to any attempt to get under his skin: his Cobra OPTM driver.

Cobra OPTM LS Custom Driver

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“Every group, no matter what, always has that one hater, the guy that’s always chirping, always talking, always trying to get in your head,” Stoltz said. “Luckily, with my OPTM driver and practicing getting in my own head, I’ve become hater-proof.”

To prove his point, Stoltz demonstrated his new invincibility by lobbing a few choice one-liners — to himself! Some highlights:

“Hit me one of those ones like you used to at Q-school.”

“Talk about sub-par …”

“You sure you don’t need to move up a box?”

“All right, show me why you quit.”

Fortunately, with the OPTM driver in-hand, there’s no need to respond to these barbs. Stoltz is able to let his drives do the talking. When you hit nothing but stripes, any criticism gets quiet pretty quickly.

“There’s nothing a hater hates more than a guy who can’t be fazed,” Stoltz said. “And luckily for me, with my new Cobra OPTM Driver, I’ve become hater-proof.”

For more from Stoltz, check out the full episode of the latest Emergency 9 above.

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To master your long game, you’ll need to work on your driving to improve your range and accuracy. In this blog, you’ll find 10 handy golf driving tips and guidance on how to practice each one at home.

How to practice driving for golf

1. Perfect your grip

You can’t drive successfully without holding your club properly. Using the wrong grip is usually the culprit for slices and hooked shots. 

How to do it

Hold the club with your lead hand (left for right-handers) so that the grip sits diagonally across your fingers. Both of your thumbs should point down the shaft. Place your trailing hand so that your palm covers the lead thumb with your fingers wrapping around the grip. Use a neutral grip.

Practice at home

Use a spare club to rehearse your grip if you have a spare few moments. Focus on doing so correctly and building muscle memory so the correct grips grow to feel natural.

2. Use the right stance and ball position

Using the proper stance provides stability and allows you to put power into your golf swing. Correct ball placement also helps ensure solid contact. 

How to do it

Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, your knees slightly bent, and your weight evenly distributed between both feet. Your back should be straight with a slight tilt from your hips. Your arms should hang loosely from your shoulders. Position the ball in line with the instep of your lead foot. Of course, the club you’re holding will also affect your drive, and using a more forgiving driver will come in handy here. 

Practice at home

You can practice your stance and ball positioning with a club and a ball to ensure it becomes second nature. Alignment sticks can be a big help with this. 

3. Tee the ball high

A higher tee encourages an upward angle of attack, which helps with clean hitting and maximising the distance you generate from the force you use.

How to do it

Position the tee so that half the ball sits above the top edge of your driver. Roughly three-quarters of the ball should be above the club’s head as it strikes, allowing you to sweep into the ball with an upwards motion without the driver making contact with the floor.

Practice at home

Whilst this is most effectively practised at a driving range, you could use foam or plastic practice balls to rehearse your tee height and swing at home.

4. Master your backswing

A smooth backswing is essential for generating power and maintaining control throughout your drive.

How to do it

If you’re a right-hander, keep your left arm straight, and your wrists relaxed as you move through your backswing. Rotate your shoulders fully, creating a 90-degree angle between your upper body and your hips. Try to avoid over-swinging, though—you can stop when your club is parallel to the ground.

Practice at home

Practice slow-motion backswings in front of a mirror (in a room with plenty of room) to check your form. You could also record yourself going through the motion to work on perfecting it.

5. Focus on a controlled downswing

A powerful drive comes from a well-timed downswing that maximises energy transfer from the club to the ball.

How to do it

Your downswing comes from your core. Start by rotating your hips toward the target, following with your knees, then your arms. Keep your underarms relatively close to your body and tuck your trailing elbow in. Keep your lead shoulder down and make sure your hands and arms stay relaxed so you don’t skew your release.

Practice at home

As well as watching your swing by recording yourself at home, you can also use resistance bands to strengthen your hip rotation.

6. Improve your follow-through

You don’t want to ruin all that work on your backswing and downswing by not following through properly. A good follow-through ensures you complete your swing with full power and balance and strike the ball cleanly.

How to do it

After impact, allow your arms to extend naturally toward the target. Finish with your weight on your lead foot and your chest facing the target. Your back foot should be on its toe, with your hips fully rotated.

Practice at home

Use a slow-motion drill to exaggerate your follow-through position and improve your balance. Speed up the motion once you’re sure you’ve got it right to make sure it becomes a natural motion for you.

7. Focus on a consistent tempo

A smooth, consistent tempo throughout a swing leads to better contact, and the Holy Grail of driving—better reliability. 

How to do it

Count in your head during your backswing and downswing to establish a rhythm. Most professionals recommend a 3:1 count for a drive, counting three on your backswing and one through your downswing.

Practice at home

Try using a metronome app or a swing tempo trainer to develop a steady rhythm.

8. Use your legs effectively

Your legs might stay reasonably still during a drive, especially compared to your upper body, but they provide balance and generate a portion of the power of your swing. Using your legs effectively can help you get more distance out of your drives and will aid in controlling your swing.

How to do it

Start with a slight bend in your knees. Push off your trailing foot during the downswing to transfer energy to your lead side. Shift over to your front foot during the downswing to add momentum. Maintain your balance throughout the swing and aim to move smoothly.

Practice at home

Use step-through drills where you step forward after impact to emphasise weight transfer and leg engagement.

9. Work on your core strength

Your core muscles play a significant role in generating power and stability during your swing. The stronger your core, the more strength you’ll be able to generate throughout a round on the links. The more you can engage your core muscles during driving, the more stable your drive will be and the more power you’ll be able to put into it.

How to do it

Focus on engaging your abdominal muscles as you rotate your torso. Avoid overusing your shoulder and arm muscles, and let your body’s rotation drive the swing.

Practice at home

Improve your core strength by exercising at home, including doing planks, Russian twists, and medicine ball rotations. When you practice your swing, focus on feeling and engaging your core muscles.

10. Incorporate visualisation into your game

Visualisation is a powerful mental technique where you mentally rehearse an action and its consequences, such as visualising your swing and the flight of your ball along the fairway.

Whilst it might sound like wishful thinking, visualisation really works and is practised by professional golfers and athletes from other sports, too.

How to do it

Try visualising your ideal drive before stepping up to the ball. Focus and try to make your visualisation as real as possible. See your ball landing on a specific target. This can feel odd at first, but the more you do it, the more natural it’ll become.

Practice at home

Spend 5-10 minutes each day visualising perfect drives and imagining yourself performing confidently on the course.

Specialist golf insurance through Golf Care

Developing a consistent drive can take a lot of time and perseverance. If you’re mastering your long game with the help of these golf driving tips, you may also want to consider protecting yourself with specialist golf insurance.

With Golf Care, policies include Equipment Cover up to £7,500, Public Liability of up to £10m, and Personal Accident Cover up to £50,000. Get a quote online today.

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Updated on November 23, 2025

You’ve watched the pros on TV and wondered what separates their effortless 280-yard drives from your inconsistent shots off the tee. Maybe you’ve even tried copying their swing mechanics, only to find yourself still struggling to break 90.

The gap between amateur and professional golf isn’t just about natural talent—it’s about how they approach training. While you might squeeze in nine holes on Saturday mornings, pros treat golf like the athletic discipline it is, with structured practice routines that make them worthy of being featured on sports shows and the best golf betting sites.

Most weekend golfers practice by hitting a bucket of balls or playing casual rounds with friends. But this scattered approach rarely leads to meaningful improvement. You need a systematic training method that addresses every aspect of your game—from your pre-round preparation to your off-course conditioning.

In this guide, we’ll break down the exact training methods that professional golfers use to stay at the top of their game, and show you how to adapt these strategies to your own practice routine. You won’t suddenly start hitting like Rory McIlroy, but you will develop the focused approach that separates golfers who improve from those who plateau.

Prepare Properly

Many of us look forward to a day out on the golf course so much that we just turn up and play. Golf should be enjoyed, obviously. If this is the one part of the week where you get a little personal time, who are we to tell you how to enjoy it?

But if you want to improve your game, you should think about how you prepare to play too.

Preparation involves both physical and mental aspects. The physical side should include stretching and warming up before heading out. Let’s say you arrive 30 minutes early. Spend 10 minutes on dynamic stretches like arm circles and hip rotations. Then hit 20-30 balls at the range, starting with wedges and working up to your driver.

You could also add strength work at the gym if you have the time.

Mentally, you should also visualize rounds and shots to help you focus when you start your round. For example, while driving to the course, picture yourself hitting your opening tee shot down the middle of the fairway. Visualize the ball flight and where it lands.

Set Your Own Goals

Someone like Rory McIlroy or Scottie Scheffler will start the year setting their goals to win as many tournaments as possible and often target one of the majors. If it is Ryder Cup year, that will also be a priority.

Those lofty goals are obviously beyond reach for most of us. However, you can still set your own standards.

Think about what you want to improve in your game. Identify specific weaknesses. This is not to put yourself down, but to target specific areas for improvement.

Let’s say you typically shoot 90. Your goal might be breaking 85 by the end of summer. Track your fairways hit, greens in regulation, and putts per round. If you’re only hitting 5 fairways per round, work on driver accuracy first.

You can practice these skills during training. Then apply what you’ve learned when you play an actual round.

Play Skill Games

Much of our advice in this article might seem like work rather than fun. But if you are serious about improvement and want to train like a pro, you should break your game into manageable components. You will then be able to address each one with more precision.

Breaking your swing down is an obvious starting point. Your swing fundamentally affects every shot, and working on stance and placement pays dividends.

But you can also play small skill games, concentrating on other golf aspects. For example, play “up and down” challenges around the practice green. Drop 5 balls in different spots and try to get each one up and down in 2 shots. Or practice the “clock drill” for putting: place 12 balls around the hole at 3 feet, like numbers on a clock face, and try to make all 12 in a row.

These can be fun and take your mind off the fact that you are not playing as normal, but improving your game.

Practice

There is nothing better than actually playing golf if you want to improve, of course. Practice and training should always include hitting the driving range or the putting greens. But playing a course provides real-world experience.

You should stay focused on improvement of your skills, however.

To really train like a pro, you should also enter events and tournaments. Move away from just playing with your buddies on weekends. Competition against strangers adds pressure that helps you improve.

Let’s say you normally play relaxed rounds with friends where you give each other mulligans. In a tournament, every shot counts. This pressure reveals weaknesses in your mental game and course management that casual rounds won’t expose.

Work on Off-Course Factors

We touched on this when we mentioned strength training in the gym, but fitness and mental conditioning directly impact your swing and stamina. Professional golfers treat their bodies like athletes in any other sport.

Conditioning your body and mind can significantly affect your golf.

This should also include how you take care of yourself. Eating well and staying hydrated matters for your wellbeing, but it will also help you maintain energy through 18 holes.

For example, Tiger Woods famously does 30-40 minutes of cardio, followed by core work and stretching every morning. Dustin Johnson focuses on rotational exercises using medicine balls. You don’t need their exact routine, but adding 20 minutes of planks, Russian twists, and bird dogs three times a week will strengthen your golf muscles.

When it comes to the gym, prioritize cardio work and core exercises. You can always add exercises tailored to your individual body needs to support your golf goals.

Ask for Feedback

Sometimes you need other people to tell you how you are playing. Self-evaluation helps, and it is something that you should do regularly. But the opinions of experienced friends and colleagues accelerate your improvement.

If pros have entire teams of coaches analyzing every move, you can benefit from honest feedback about your swing occasionally.

For example, ask a low-handicap friend to watch you hit 10 drives and note any patterns. Do you consistently aim left? Does your head move during the swing? Record yourself with your phone from behind and compare your swing to a pro’s swing on YouTube.

By listening to the advice of others, you will be able to identify which aspects of your golf game need the most work. It will also be nice to hear some positive opinions too!

Professionals listen and learn constantly. They follow all these areas of training we have outlined here.

There is no guarantee that you will be able to quit the day job and chase the dream of being a pro. But your game should get better. And shooting your personal best score beats any weekend victory over friends.

August Noble

August Noble was first introduced to golf at 7 years old. In 2013 he started seriously working on his game and was able to reduce his handicap from 19 to 3.4 in less than two years. He’s been helping other golfers do the same ever since. Current Handicap: 4

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Ping’s s259 wedges replace the s159 line with six grind options, refined shaping and Hydropearl finish for more consistent spin and turf interaction.

Gear: Ping s259 wedges

If you’re looking for something to mix up your standard fourball round and add a bit more jeopardy to proceedings, then a wolf golf game might be for you.

In wolf, each hole is different. Your group of four is separated into two teams, with one player designated the ‘wolf’. Their role is to determine the teams and decide whether to partner up or take on the other three players on their own.

One of wolf’s best characteristics is that it keeps a round fresh from start to finish. No two holes are the same, with teams and stakes constantly changing.

Some people will play a wolf golf game for cash, others for points. Whatever you choose, you’ll be sure to discover a new way of playing golf, and it just might become one of your favourites.

How to play wolf golf

As mentioned, wolf golf is played with four players, all of whom should be numbered. This determines the order in which each will become the wolf. For example, player one is the wolf for the first hole, before player two is the wolf for the second, player three for the third, and so on. Once everyone has been the wolf, the rotation begins again. 

The role of the wolf

It’s the wolf’s job to decide who their partner for the round will be. There are multiple variations to the game, but typically, the wolf will tee off first. From there, they have a small window to decide which player, if any, will be their partner.

After a player tees off, the wolf must decide whether they will partner up with said player before the following player tees off.

So, once player two tees off, the wolf must decide whether to partner up with them before player three begins their turn. If they decide not to join up with player two, the same process begins again between players three and four. The reason for this is so that the wolf can’t just wait for the best shot and pick them as their partner.

If the wolf then picks player four as their partner, players two and three would join together and make up the other team. 

The lone wolf

However, the wolf may instead opt to go it alone and partner up with no one, becoming the lone wolf in the process. This increases the stakes, meaning the wolf will either win double points or be forced to owe double points to all of the opponents.

The wolf can even take this a step further by becoming the blind lone wolf. This is when they declare their solo status before anyone has teed off, including themselves. Then, points would be tripled instead of doubled.

It’s important to remember that all of this is only the case for one hole at a time. Each hole makes up its own mini contest, keeping the game fresh from start to finish. 

Points scoring in a wolf golf game

The exact figures for points (or cash) available in a game of wolf golf can vary.

As a general rule, each hole is decided in accordance with the better-ball scoring format, whereby the team’s score for a hole is decided by the best score from one of its players.

For example, if players one and four were in a team together and player one finished with a birdie while player four finished with a bogey, the team’s score would be a birdie.

If a team wins, both players would earn one point (or, for example, £1 if there was money involved). The other team would win nothing or be made to give the cash in the event of betting. However, if the lone wolf won, they’d win two points. If the blind lone wolf won, they’d win three. In the event of a tie, the points or money would carry over to the next hole.

This is just one variation. In others, the lone wolf could win as many as three or five points. Another great aspect of a wolf golf game is that you have a lot of freedom to score it however you’d like.

Ultimately, the winner of the entire game is the player who has accumulated the most points (or cash) across 18 holes. 

Why play a wolf golf game?

Wolf golf adds a different dynamic to standard fourball or foursomes rounds.

By making each hole a distinct contest, you’ll find yourselves gripped by all 18 competitions. Everything is different from hole to hole: the score, the stakes, the winner, the teams, and even the number of players on each side.

There might not be a more constantly refreshing system by which to enjoy a round, which is what makes wolf a one-of-a-kind game.

It’s all about freedom and choice, too. You can choose whether to play for cash, a prize, or simply pride. You can choose by which system you award points, and you can choose exactly how a hole plays out when you’re the wolf. No two groups will ever play an identical game of wolf, and that’s one of the things that’s so great about it. 

Final thoughts and tips

In a wolf golf game, it’s important to be strategic as well as bold. For example, while you have a limited window to pick a partner when you’re the wolf, it would be ill-advised to dive in and pick someone without properly considering your options. Sometimes, it is genuinely advantageous to play as the lone wolf, so don’t rush into picking a partner just because you feel like you have to.

It’s also important that everyone understands the rules before you begin. For a format which has so many different scoring systems and ways of playing, there is potential for arguments and disagreements if everyone’s not on the same page beforehand.

Remember, wolf golf is all about having fun in a friendly setting. Don’t feel the need to play in any way you’re not comfortable with, and have a good time with your friends. You might just find you want to return to a wolf golf game time and time again!

Now you know all about wolf golf, read up on match play and stroke play golf, too. 

Specialist golf insurance through Golf Care

However you play the game, you may want to think about protecting yourself and your gear with specialist golf insurance.

Through Golf Care, policies include Equipment Cover up to £7,500, Public Liability of up to £10m, and Personal Accident Cover up to £50,000. Get a quote online today.

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