How to Become a Pro Golfer: How You Can Build and Sustain Long-Term Competitive Advantage Playing on the Pro Tour

Imagine 100 exceptionally skilled and ambitious male and female professional golfers from around the globe fresh from successfully graduating tour school and starting out on their first year on tour.

Now if I asked you how many of them you think would still be competing on tour 10 years from today what would your answer be?...

Are You on the Path to Professional Golfing Success or Failure?

I asked one of our professional tour clients Steven Jeffress (on tour for 15 years) who plays on the Japan Tour his estimation of the percentage of golfers that would still be playing on tour in 10 years and he said without hesitation that "90 to 95 percent of those 100 golfers would not be playing on tour in 10 years."

          "90 to 95 percent of those 100 golfers would not be playing on tour in 10 years!"

And you know what? He’s right; most of those exceptionally skilled male and female golfers will have given up on their dream of becoming a successful tour player well before their 10 year mark on tour.

Why is this the case? Here are some of the reasons.

For the majority of them they realize that the grind of tour life (travelling, away from home, the financial investment) is not for them and they decide to settle down, find a steady job and possibly start a family.

Others simply don’t play well enough to stay on tour as they soon discover that it costs a lot of money to pursue their career choice and because they don’t perform consistently well enough on tour they run out of funds enough times that eventually they go and do something that's less stressful.

Still another percentage of the 100 will stick at it for a while longer making enough checks to get by, but never really breaking through to earn the big checks that will change their life. 

Eventually they also give up because they start to believe that they don't have what it takes anymore to make it on tour.

And then finally there’s the few who stay on tour and realize their dream of playing successfully on a pro tour and are reaping the rewards of their commitment to the journey.

Building Competitive Advantage
So how do this last group of the 100 do it? They do it by building competitive advantage into their game that allows them to become a competitive force on tour. 

The following quote is the most accurate description I have found that aptly describes competitive advantage for golfers on a professional golf tour.

“The term competitive advantage is the ability gained through attributes and resources to perform at a higher level than others in the same industry or market.”

With so many professional golfers never realizing their dream of a successful life on tour, and who never reap the benefits of their hard work and commitment, this quote is very helpful and insightful for those that are on tour now, or are contemplating it. 

So let's look at it a little closer at what it means.

Basically this quote describes the two essential elements in the formula - attributes and resources which are the elements you need to help you to build competitive advantage in your game.

What Attributes and Resources Do You Need?
In our last article I described the 4 key mental attributes that keep you playing golf on tour for the long-term, and if you are to build sustainable competitive advantage for the tour you will need the resources to be able to identify, isolate and improve the golf skills and routines that increase your ability to produce a low golf score average over a season.

With about 156 golfers in the field each week competing for the prize money on offer, golfers who have developed a sustainable competitive advantage on their respective professional tour are those that primarily do 2 things really well;

1. Finish consistently within the 70 best scores out of about 156 golfers in the tournament for the first 2 days
2. Make a high percentage of cuts over a season

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Are You a Boom and Bust Style or Steady Style Golfer?
And it makes sense that if you make more cuts in a season you should potentially make more income right? 

Well yes, however there are a few exceptions, as some professional golfers on the major tours do make less cuts on average over a season but play well enough to get into contention - or finish high up the leader board more often than their counterparts.

These professional golfers have a boom and bust style where they can go really low over 4 rounds when they are in form and can win, but when they are out of form they quite often miss the cut or finish way back in the field. 

These players will have cuts made percentages that can often be around 50 to 60 percent for the season which is quite low.

Some professional golfers don’t go as low throughout the year but their scores are consistently good enough to make a higher percentage of cuts in a season to earn their income. We call these golfers "steady style golfer."

For example in 2013 Justin Rose made 15 cuts from the 17 events (88%) he played in on the PGA Tour and earned $4,146,148.00 ranking him 8th on the money list.

Zac Johnson made 20 cuts out of the 24 events (83%) he played in and earned $4,044,509.00 ranking him 9th on the money list. Justin earned his tournament income from 15 events and Zac earned 100,000 less than Justin from 20 events.

Then there are golfers who are not only consistent but also earn more income playing less events than average over a season. Steve Stricker ranked 7th on the same 2013 money list and earned about 300,000 more than Justin, and 400,000.00 more than Zac with earnings of $4,440,532.00 from just 13 events.

His cuts made percentage for the season was an incredible 100 percent.

These 3 World Class Professional Golfers Have High Cut Making to Golf Earning Styles

Many Ways to Learn But Fewer Ways to Earn
We want you to understand that your primary goal for each season is to develop your competitive advantage by making more cuts over a season than less with a steady style game. 

Every bit of effort you invest into your game both on and off the tour is to achieve this end because the golfers who have been able to stay on tour the longest are the same golfers who year-in-and-year-out make the highest percentage of cuts.

About 45 percent of the field each week (about 70 golfers plus ties) will make the cut each week and out of the 70 or so golfers who play day 3 and 4, those that finish in the top 20 percent of the field will earn most of the prize money available for that tournament.

Once you get outside of the top 15 to 20 golfers the prize money thins out dramatically.

So the big question to ask yourself is "what are the resources that would help me to lower my tournament score average - particularly on day 1 and 2 so I can make more cuts over a season and earn more income?"

In-fact it’s the only question that you should continually ask yourself if you want to develop a sustainable competitive advantage on a professional golf tour.

So What Exactly is a Resource?
A resource in the context of golf improvement and sustainable competitive advantage is any technology, methodology or strategy that you use to influence your skills to meet your goals. 

Simply put, it is a vehicle for driving your golf scores down and keeping them there. 

The three primary resources (we call 'T' resources) that will influence improvement in your golf skills and performances on the golf course are: 

• Technical Resources
• Tactical Resources
• Temperamental Resources

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Your Weakest-Most Important Skills (W.M.I.S) Ranking Procedure
You need to sit down with your golf instructor, coach or caddy to carefully evaluate your performances on the golf course in the 4 primary performance categories.
 

1. Putting Ability
2. Short-Game Ability
3. Approach Shot Ability
4. Driving Ability
   

You need to determine your current standards in these 4 basic areas of the game to start with before you decide which specific resources you will need to positively influence your performances on the golf course. 

The resources you ultimately choose will help you to make more cuts than you miss, and make more money than you spend.

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Step 1.
Your first task is to download our W.M.I.S Golf Skill Assessment sheet (below) so you can identify and isolate your weakest-most important golf performance category (that houses the sub-category of golf skills) that keeps your tournament score average high, making it harder for you to make the cuts in tournaments.

w.m.i.s-golf-skill-_assessment-form-pro-tour-golf-college.pdf
File Size:	126 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

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The 4 Primary Performance Categories Are:

1.      Shots played on the greens (Your putting ability)

2.      Shots played within 90 metres or 100 yards of the green (Your short-game ability)

3.      Approach shots into the green from outside 90 metres or 100 yards (Your shot-making ability)

4.      Tee shots (Your driving ability)

So let's start and like I said with the help of your instructor or someone who is very familiar with your game like a caddy give yourself an honest and realistic grading by circling A, B, C or D on your assessment sheet in each of the 4 primary golf performance categories of putting skills, short-game skills, approach shot skills and driving skills which have been broken up into the 3 primary resources of technical competence, tactical competence and temperamental competence:

The 3 Primary Resources Are:

• Technical Competence (the reliability of your techniques under pressure)
• Tactical Competence (the reliability of your planning and strategic thinking under pressure)
• Temperamental Competence (the reliability of your thoughts and emotions under pressure)

Each grade A, B, C or D also has a numerical value associated with it that relates specifically to your knowledge of how to execute the skills within the category, and also your ability to execute these skills under pressure. 

Step 2.
So give yourself an honest and realistic rating based on the following: 

A = 75 to 100 percent (Very knowledgeable in it and can perform it anytime under pressure)

B = 50 to 75 percent (Somewhat knowledgeable and can perform it most of the time under pressure)

C = 25 to 50 percent (Lack knowledge in it and mostly fail to perform it under pressure)

D = 0 to 25 percent (No knowledge in it and can't perform it under any pressure)

Now that you have identified the weakest to strongest golf performance primary categories you will need to rank them from your weakest - most important golf performance category to your strongest. 

Place a number from 1 to 4 under the primary performance category that when this category is improved it will have the most positive effect on improving your golf score average in tournaments.

The thing to understand here is that your techniques, tactics and temperament are inextricably linked in the golf performance equation and being weak in any one area will have an influence on another.

Once you have completed the first part of the assessment it will look similar to ours and you will have completed the first step in identifying and isolating the primary performance categories that house the skills that are keeping you from building sustainable competitive advantage on tour.

Now within these 4 primary performance categories are the sub skill categories that house the specific skills like putts made from 5 feet, or proximity to the hole from 65 yards etc. that you must constantly track, test, measure and manage to determine specifically where you should aim your focus and energy to upgrade them.

Next week in part 2, I'll show you how to do this by designing a simple yet highly effective training plan for identifying and improving your weakest-most important golf skills in the sub skill categories.

This unique approach will help you to stay on top of your golf skill improvement and will also help you to build, manage and sustain your competitive advantage on tour for the long-term.


Lawrie Montague and David Milne - Pro Tour Golf College
Your Success On Tour is Our Business