12/13: Here is some perspective on Practice Rounds and Long Term Development
This is something I wanted to share to help families understand long term player development and help create better decision makers. This is something we have done since day 1 and hopefully this explains it better today than in the past:
Parent Question: Happy holidays Chris!! Will there be a scorecard available for us to see what the yardages will be like for boys 9-10 tournament on Jan. 4-5? Will the greens be marked the day before the tournament starts? Thanks
My response: Hey how are you? We typically do not… the yardage is posted in the site but we keep it up to our team to decide up to last minute depending on many factors. We have gone back and forth on this since we first started in 2007… our goal is at the junior level to provide the environment that makes the kids become good decision makers in the moment rather than create that environment where those that have time or resources to prepare more don’t necessarily have that much advantage. Honestly I love changing it up sometimes and having the tee on par 3s 10-30 yards different than what was prepared for…. in the short term this may not make sense but when these guys are 18 and this stuff really matters I promise they will be much more prepared… the best players are the best decision makers, have the most shots, skills, and adjust the best to what’s thrown at them… sorry for the long answer but hope that makes sense! Thanks! Chris