Rory McIlroy says the way he beat his first-tee nerves was to picture the ball in the trees and walk the worst case all the way to its end.
“I say this all the time. It’s counterintuitive to a lot of people to do this, but I do. If you’re trying to overcome anxiety or nerves or on performance, I do try to think about, well, what’s the worst that could happen?”
“I’m not gonna die on the golf course, thankfully.
“I used to have, like, first tee nerves, like, big time. I would struggle on the first tee. And so I would say to myself, well, what’s the worst that could happen?
“So if you hit it in the trees, okay, then what do you do? You go up there and you figure it out, you know, you’re skillful enough to hit a punch shot out of the trees and, you know, get it up to the green and get it up and down and make a par and move on.
“For whatever reason, imagining, like, the worst-case scenario, give me a level of comfort, because I felt like any worst-case scenario that I could bring up in my head, I’ll be able to deal with.
“Especially on the first tee for me… if you get nervous on the golf course, you get tight… it gives me a sense of freedom. And like, if I can swing free, that’s when I play my best golf.”
“So whatever thought process I need to get into to get there, whether that’s imagining the worst-case scenario.
“I think I’m not standing behind a tee shot and visualizing myself hit a bad shot. Like, I’m visualizing myself hitting it where I want to. But I think just even before I get to that point, thinking, well, what’s the worst that can happen?
“And then if the worst that can happen isn’t that bad, it’s like, well, that’s okay. You’ll be able to manage it.
“What I find wild is that he never once tries to calm himself down. He walks into the scary version instead, all the way through the punch shot and the par, and the nerves lose their grip because nothing is unknown anymore. The thing you are dreading shrinks the same way once its worst version has an ending you have already seen.”
Article Link: Beating first tee nerves: Rory tells you how