Sunday 16 May 2010

The W.I.G. Game

Here is a practice game I got from Dave Alred (www.davealred.com or www.performingunderpressure.com) at a seminar recently. For those of you who don't know Dave he is Johnny Wilkinson's kicking coach and since he has stopped working with England Rugby full time he has become a free lancer working with quite a few performance athletes including a couple of performance golfers. Dave is also a part of the British Olympic Association elite coaching team that is headed by Clive Woodward...they did some pilot work with one of our leading amateurs Melissa Reid who has since gone on to turn professional and is having a lot of success on the LET.

Dave says that he designed the WIG game (which stands for 'WOW I'm Good') as a game which helps players learn what they are capable of and develops their belief in themselves. In the WIG game the player has an allocated number of attempts at each shot (in this case 3). The player takes their tee shot and ask themselves if they could play that shot any better, if the answer is yes they put an X on their scorecard and try again, if they think  they could improve on that they record another X and try again, the 3rd shot they must take the result of regardless.

The player continues like this for the entire round recording the Xs as they go.

Having 3 attempts at each shot means that players are likely to record a pretty good score which builds confidence and belief. The player works to improve by reducing the number of Xs on their card over time and getting into a state when they can hit the right shot first time.

Good luck with it and enjoy.