When I started my leave of absence last fall, my goal was to improve my golf game as much as possible. Another goal was to find something I was passionate about that I could work on as a career after golf. I’m sure you’ve noticed that I haven’t posted in a few months and that’s because I’ve found that next thing, and it’s a dating app called Spottle.
Spottle Logo
I first got in touch with the Spottle team in December and learned that they were working on a dating app based on live video chats. I was very intrigued because it was a space I had been interested in for years. Eventually I signed on and that decision has completely shifted my priorities. While my handicap index is below 6 and I’m playing better than ever, I moved back to DC a few weeks ago so I can have a bigger impact with Spottle.
Why the change from golf to a dating app?
Some have sounded disappointed that I’m cutting my 12 months of golf short and “giving up” on it. Here’s the thing. Golf will always be there, but the Spottle opportunity wont. Spottle is something that I believe in. It will help people make better connections more efficiently and effectively, and will make them happier as a result. And I want to make it a success.
What is Spottle?
It’s a dating app that’s a mix of virtual spin the bottle and speed dating. Instead of ‘liking’ profiles based on a few pictures and a bio, users spin a bottle and when it lands, have a 30 second live video chat with another user before deciding if it’s worth continuing the conversation. The video chats only happen at set times throughout the week so this can’t turn into a major time suck. We also have facial recognition which will prevent this from becoming the next Chat Roulette.
Here are a few Spottle screenshots
The goal is to get a real impression of someone before spending time texting or meeting up in real life. We want to reduce catfishing and improve safety by making online dating much more transparent.
If you know anyone who spends too much time on dating apps or has lost faith in dating, see if they want to give Spottle a try by downloading here: get.spottle.app!
We all experience it. We have a great range session and then proceed to stumble through 18 holes, lacking confidence and consistency.
When I start playing poorly, it’s usually because I shorten up my backswing, or am too fast with my upper body on the downswing. These can lead to both pulls and slices depending on the execution, neither of which help to make pars or birdies.
Even though these are physical mistakes, the root cause is the 6 inches between my ears. It’s mental.
On the range there is no water and the sand isn’t so daunting. There is no OB. There are no penalty strokes if you don’t hit a good shot. Then you get on the course and you’re thinking about how you need to hit a decent tee shot or else it’s going to be difficult to par the hole. And if there’s water, oh boy. If you put the ball in the water then a double bogey is in the cards, and starting off like that will ruin your good score. These are my thoughts sometimes, at least, and they make me worse.
I’ve been working on 2 things to help with this.
Choose a shot that I know I can hit
This doesn’t translate to “always play it safe” but it does translate to “hit the smart shot.” If theres a wide fairway that narrows at 290 yards and beyond, I should hit my 3 wood and land in the wide area rather than trying to hit a GREAT drive that has to find the narrow patch. But if I’m 200 from the green with water in front, I’m going to go for it knowing that I can definitely carry that distance with my long irons.
Commit 100% to the shot I’m trying to hit
I tend to unintentionally make minor adjustments to be safe around hazards and while putting. If theres water on the left side of the fairway, there’s a good chance that if I miss, I’ll slice it to the right. If there’s a left breaking putt, I might think during my backswing “this might break more than I thought” and subconsciously open my putter face. What I’m trying to do is pick and shot and fully commit to it. Water on the left? Play a controlled intentional fade. Or aim right center and hit it straight. But only pick 1! And on the greet, pick a line and a speed and commit to it.
It’s easy to let your body adjust because the water is in the back of your mind, but that’s something I’m working to control better. Yes, the ball will sometimes find the water. But you have to try to hit the shot you want to hit. Your setup, swing, and everything else begins with your planned shot, and if you don’t execute on the planned shot, it won’t be pretty.
How I’ve unintentionally practiced this
Did you know that Tiger Woods is an avid SCUBA diver? While I’m a good swimmer and comfortable in any pool, I’ve never loved being in the ocean. But Michelle likes diving, so I started last year.
Last week we went to Dominica, a beautiful island in the Caribbean for a dive trip. Diving is like golf in the sense that you plan, execute, and have to be committed or things won’t work out well. I get a bit anxious before every dive, especially night dives, so going through the emotional process of committing and executing a plan even though there are other thoughts in my head has helped, I hope.
Michelle and me on the boat after diving one day in Dominica.
Before you hit a shot you decide what you want to do and prepare for the shot. In diving you plan your dive with the other divers and check your gear to make sure everything is working properly.
When you hit the shot, you should try to execute your planned shot. The ball wont always go where you wanted it to go, but you need to give it a chance. With diving, once you are in the water you trust that the equipment checks that you did were sufficient and that your training to monitor buoyancy, air consumption, and depth will keep you safe (and that no deep see creatures will eat you).
When the ball doesn’t go where you planed, move on and prepare for the next shot. In diving you didn’t see what you wanted to, or someone in your group got low on air early and cut the dive short. Appreciate what you DID see and get ready for the next dive.
In both golf and diving you’re doing something that’s supposed to be fun. The experience and execution might not always be exactly what you’re expecting or perfect, but its part of the game.
Do you know of any other ways to practice the mental part of the game off the course? Send me a note at rosenbergmaxa@gmail.com!
I just competed in my first tournament in Florida. It’s part of Minor League Golf, which holds professional tournaments. They also have a training division for people starting to play competitive golf, which is what I played in. But these guys are really good and almost all of them have handicaps better than mine.
The guys I played with were friendly and nice (both amateurs) so I felt pretty good and calm from the start. Through 6 holes I was hitting fairways and greens and was 1 over but then I hit a rough patch. 3 double bogeys, 1 triple bogey, and 1 quadruple bogey were the result of 3 tee shots out of bounds, 1 tee shot that I topped into some bushes, and an easy approach that ended up in the water.
Obviously that’s a lot of bad, but besides that I hit the ball pretty well and had a lot of good shots. On all 3 of my tee shots that went out of bounds, my re-tee (third shot) was drilled down the middle of the fairway.
I miss a couple of 10 foot birdie putts, and had 1 3-putt and 1 4-putt, so as usual, my putting could have been better.
There are a lot of these tournaments so hopefully I’ll put up a good number the next time.
My December goals were mostly a miss if you look at the pass/fail count, but it was very close to being a lot better than that. Of the 10 goals, I only accomplished 2 of them, and they were the 2 not related to golf.
But 3 of my golf goals were missed by 1 or 2 shots. 3 others were off by a bit more. And 1 was a big fail.
Check out the details below.
Here is a list of my December goals with the outcomes
Get at least 2 eagles – FAIL
While I didn’t convert on an eagle, I did have multiple makable putts for eagle.
Average at least 2 birdies each round – FAIL
My average was 1.9 for the month, and if I had 1 more birdie I would have accomplished this goal. I had 1 round with 4, a bunch with 2, but also a handful with only 1 or none.
Average less than 1 double bogey each round – BIG FAIL
I actually averaged over 3 doubles each round this month. I had a few really bad rounds that skewed this number
Average score of less than 5 on par 5s – FAIL
My average was 5.5 on par 5s this month. I had a handful of water/hazards and have not been putting my approach shot close to the pin when I decide to lay up. A few of my birdies have come on par 5s, but I should definitely be able to bring this down if I can minimize the hazards and put the shots of 100 yards and in closer to the pin.
Average under 33 putts per round – FAIL
I averaged 33.1 putts per round this month. If I made 2 additional putts this month, I would have achieved the goal.
Break 80 3 times – FAIL
I only broke 80 1 time. I had a few close calls. A few putts here and a couple shots that don’t hit a hazard
Scoring average below 81 – FAIL
My scoring average this month was 82.
Lower handicap to 6.8 – FAIL
My handicap lowered to 6.9. Another goal that I barely missed.
Do yoga 3 days each week – PASS
This was one of the 2 that I was able to fully control.
Post at least once each week on the blog – PASS
This is another that I was able to fully control.
Goals for January
My goals for January are pretty similar to December.
As you know, I recently started a year long journey practicing and playing golf. I wanted to give myself the best shot at making big strides in a short period of time so I adopted a data-driven approach to improving my overall game. While this post is specific to improving my golf game, the approach can help improve anything. The three fundamental components are:
Understand what to focus on to maximize impact
Track current results/mistakes so you can make adjustments
Get the right help so you get the experience/knowledge of an expert
Understanding what to focus on
No matter what you do, it’s important to have data so you can perform some kind of analysis. If you’re a manufacturer it might be how long each step of the process is. If you’re in client services it might be ROI. It could be calculated by how much money you earn compared to how much time you spend on each client. You would see how valuable each client is on a per hour basis and could make adjustments to how you spend your time.
I wanted to figure out what part of my game I should focus on so I started keeping detailed notes of each shot. I tracked the club, distance, quality of shot, if it went left or right, etc. After each round I entered the data into a spreadsheet. This is what my typical scorecard looked like.
This is what my typical scorecard looks like after a round.
After just a few rounds I had some actionable data. The most eye-opening visual I created showed how often I use each club in my bag.
This shows how often I use each club. Please note, while collecting the data I marked the putter down for “1” even if I had 2 or 3 putts, so the putter circle should be about twice as big.
Everyone says the short game is the most important part of golf. I, like most others, was spending most of my time taking full swings on the range. This visualization had an immediate impact. I only practiced pitching, chipping, and putting for a few weeks. That small amount of focused practice drastically improved my short game, and I’ve seen the results on my scorecard.
Tracking mistakes to improve
Hypothetically, let’s say your subordinate comes over and says “I’m sorry, I just can’t get this right. I keep messing up.” You might say something like “let’s take a look,” and start to diagnose what’s wrong. The important thing is that it helps to know how you’re messing up, so you can figure out what to adjust.
In golf, some common “mistakes” are hooking and slicing, and pushing and pulling the ball. All of these are caused by different “mistakes” and knowing how you mess up makes it easier to make the right adjustments.
It’s clear from the charts below that my typical mistake is a hook/draw (these were measured compared to my attempted ball flight. So if I tried to draw the ball and it drew the amount I wanted, I marked it down as straight).
This chart shows how often the ball curves left or right in the air for each club.
This chart shows how often the starts too far to the right or left for each club.
Getting the right help
Golf, like many other things, is very nuanced and technical. It’s important to get the right help so you know that the changes you make are actually going to cause improvements. This is consulting, and I like to view any lessons, coaching, training, or service as such. A consultant works with you. The answer is not one-size-fits-all, and the consultant is there to be your expert. Doctors, lawyers, personal trainers. They all should have recommendations and a plan catered to your needs.
From the charts above and below, you can see that my shot quality was not consistent, so I asked around and got a few recommendations for coaches. One stood out and I’m currently working with him. We’ve been working specifically on not hooking the ball and having a lower trajectory, both of which will help my game. Hopefully I can post a new and improved chart in a few weeks!
This shows my shot quality for each club.
One last chart
This last chart shows one reason why I chose golf for this journey. A lot of sports these days require you to be a physical specimen who has genetic gifts. Read The Sports Gene: Inside the Science of Extraordinary Athletic Performance if you’re interested in going into more detail (thanks for the rec, Shane!). In golf you just need to hit the ball straight and the correct distance. The one physical benefit you can have is hitting the ball far. That I can do.
This shows how far I hit each club.
Key Takeaways
If you want to get better at something, merely putting in hours is not the best approach. Get whatever data you can, do some analysis, and see what you can improve, and how you can improve.
“Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect” – Vince Lombardi
Focusing on where and how to improve will help you have the best value impact with your time and money. This, with the help of an expert, is a great approach for getting better at anything.
Please feel free to comment or email me at rosenbergmaxa@gmail.com if you have any questions or want help collecting data and doing your own analysis, even if it’s something completely different than golf!
Happy Thanksgiving! I just wanted to write a quick note about what I’m thankful for today (and every day). My friends and family are everything to me. Everything that I have done has been supported by my closest allies, or at least discussed with my best interests at heart.
When I started socializing my plan to pursue golf, almost everyone was super excited and supportive. And those who weren’t were still there to talk it through with me. Without this, I’m not sure that I would have actually ever started this journey.
While I’m able to choose my friends and girlfriend (and they are all amazing), I didn’t choose my family. I was just lucky.
My parents and siblings have always been my number 1 fans and supporters. My sister once tackled a “friend’ who I was wrestling with when she was 5 years old. My brother is happy to drive from New York to Boca Raton, Florida so I don’t have to do the drive alone. My parents biggest wish has always been that I am happy, and their actions, advice, and attitude always support that wish.
On the days that aren’t so great, remind yourself of your relationships. I’ve always found doing that makes me thankful, grateful, and motivated.
