Every golfer I know wants to improve his or her golf game, and they are prepared to spend a lot of time and money to make it happen. Unfortunately most of that time and money is wasted unless practice can translate to play.

This past January I attended a workshop at the PGA Merchandise Show led by Dr. Bob Christina, of the Precision Golf School in Greensboro North Carolina. His work as a mental game coach has been featured in the NY Times, Golf Magazine and Golf Digest. When it comes to taking the game from the practice range to the first tee, he knows what he’s talking about.

According to Dr. Christina, the key in making the transfer from practice range to tee box has a lot to do with the method of practice. He and his colleagues have done extensive research on the best way to practice for success and found that transfer is best when learning is done in a playing mode. In other words, rather than just going to the range and hitting a bucket of balls for an hour, which does little more than teach you how to hit a bucket of balls, you should structure your practice session to closely simulate play on the golf course.

Practice as if you were playing on the course, i.e. hitting to different targets, using your clubs in a typical sequence—driver, followed by fairway wood, then long irons, short irons, each from different lies if possible. Retention is increased if you keep “score” while practicing. Determine a target and commit to it. Keeping track of which shots “succeed” in reaching the target you selected.

This method of practice takes a lot of focus and a lot more time than you might think. But the researchers discovered that when golfers practiced to play using this method, transfer from the practice range to success at the first tee increased dramatically.