Make your range session count: one hour that works

An hour on the range hitting drivers feels like work and changes almost nothing. Golfers who improve on a bucket of balls do three things differently: they warm up before they train, they work on one thing at a time, and they finish by rehearsing golf rather than swings.

Ten minutes warming up, then begin

Start with wedges at half speed and work up through the bag. The first fifteen balls are preparation, not training, and hitting them flat out is where most range injuries and a good many bad habits begin. By the time you reach a 7-iron the body should be moving freely.

One thought, one club, twenty balls

Choose a single change and give it a block of balls with the same club. Alternating driver and wedge while thinking about three positions means leaving the range having rehearsed nothing. If your swing thought does not fit into five words, it is too complicated for today.

Every ball needs a target and a shape

Range mats hide the fact that most golfers aim at nothing. Pick a specific flag or marker, lay a club on the ground to check alignment for the first few, and name the shape you intend before each swing.

Blocked repetition builds it, random practice keeps it

Repeating the same shot twenty times is how a change becomes comfortable. It is also why it vanishes on the first tee, because the course never gives you the same shot twice. Spend two thirds of the session repeating and the last third changing club and target on every ball. It feels worse and it transfers far better.

Finish by playing nine holes on the range

Take the card of the course you play most and hit the shots in order: driver, then the second shot that drive would have left, then a wedge to the flag, with the full routine each time. Twenty-five balls played this way prepare you better than a hundred hit at nothing.

Winter, mats and what they hide

From November most British ranges are mats only, and a mat forgives a fat strike that turf would punish. Use winter sessions to work on tempo, alignment and the short game, and be sceptical of any yardage measured off a mat. Range balls fly five to ten per cent shorter than a premium ball in any case, so compare clubs against each other rather than trusting the absolute number.

A session worth repeating

• Ten minutes of wedges before anything else.
• Twenty balls on one change with one club.
• Twenty balls changing club and target every time.
• Nine imaginary holes with the full routine.

That is about sixty balls and an hour. Less than most golfers hit, and considerably more than most golfers practise.