How To Cope With First Tee Nerves

Advice and tips on how to cope with first tee nerves and hit the fairway in pressure situations.

How To Cope With First Tee Nerves

Stand on the 1st tee at Royal Birkdale during The Open 2017 week and the chances are you'll hear someone talk about nerves: "I don't know how they cope," or "I'd be a nervous wreck if that was me". It's easy to overlook just how impressive the world's best players are at coping with their nerves. In golf, there really are no hiding places.

Despite hitting hundreds of balls every day, and even though most of the field teeing up at The Open this week will have been in high-pressure situations before, there's nothing quite like a Major to stir the butterflies. This pressure will only ramp up a notch come the back nine on Sunday.

Mark O'Meara will hit the first shot at the 146th Open Championship, and he'll be nervous, despite having lifted the Claret Jug once before. He may not look anxious at 06.35 on Thursday morning, but he'll be feeling it inside. The difference is, unlike many amateur golfers, he'll be able to cope with his nerves, instead of advancing the ball a matter of inches. Does that sound familiar?

Fear not, because we understand what nerves can do to you on the golf course, we really do. This is why we asked Golf Monthly Top 25 Coach, Barney Puttick, for his advice on what do do in situations where the nerves take over and the knees start to wobble.

This video is not for Mark O'Meara, but the hundreds of thousands of golfers out there who struggle to control their nerves on the 1st tee, and perhaps the 2nd, 3rd and 4th....

Have a browse of the Golf Monthly website for more instruction videos, tips and drills on how to get the most out of your game.

Over to you Mr O'Meara...