The Boy Scout motto applies to every aspect of life. Without preparedness, we’re lost. Even on the golf course.

Let me relate a short tale of unpreparedness that bit me on Saturday.

I went out Saturday afternoon fresh off of a couple of swing changes and some serious mental game improvement work. To me, it felt like I was hitting the ball poorly but as I came to the 9th hole, I did some quick arithmetic and discovered that I had a 37 to that point.

Not a great score, but until then, my perception was that I was hitting the ball somewhat poorly, especially the long irons and woods. I was surprised to realize that I was hitting a decent amount of fairways and greens and I was recovering well from bad shots, especially mentally. In reality, I was hitting the long clubs poorly, but I was making up for it by not melting down and by exhibiting strength in other areas (NOT putting).

So, I came to nine, and teed off, somewhat in a hurry because of an approaching thunderstorm. I hit a fade up the left side that rode the wind a little and put me dead center of the fairway, 271 yards out.

I walked up to my ball and surveyed the situation. It was a decent lie but not sitting up completely. I had 258 to the center of the green. I debated whether I should lay up and virtually assure myself of a par, or take a chance going for it with my 3-wood.

I decided to go for it, even though I was struggling with that club (having topped it off the tee on the 6th hole). I set up and hit a huge snap hook, way left into an overgrown, swampy hazard area with a little creek running through.

Oh well, not a great decision, but not a big deal. I could go down and drop and still have a chance at par from about 100 yards out, but a pretty good chance at bogey. In competition, under all those circumstances, I would have laid up.

So I went down just in front of the hazard and picked a good spot to drop. I put my hand into my ball pocket on my bag and rummaged around for a few seconds and got a sinking feeling in my gut.

I opened the pocket the rest of the way and timidly looked inside and sure enough, I was out of balls.

Unbelievable. Out of desperation, I stalked up and down the hazard probing with my pitching wedge looking for a lost ball. No luck. There’s probably a rule against that, but so what. I did it.

The pro shop was within sight, but it was almost dark and it had closed over an hour before.

After several minutes hacking around the edge of the hazard, I gave up. Since I was acting as my own tournament committee, I disqualified myself. The big DQ.

I picked up my bag and walked straight to my car in disgust.

The lesson: if I had taken five seconds and opened my bag when I checked in before the round, I would have seen that I only had two balls left.

The positive spin: my game continues to improve a little at a time and a single day’s score doesn’t mean anything in the long run. There was a lot of good stuff to be taken from that 8/9th of a round.

The reality: I wanted to scream.

Golf is Not a Game of Perfect by Dr. Bob Rotella with Bob Cullen, is an interesting look at the mental aspect of golf.

He boils mental game keys down into simple, easy to understand instructions, going so far as to add an appendix called “Rotella’s Rules” that can be studied periodically to keep the ideas fresh in the mind.

The book flows extremely well, due mostly to the straight forward, yet interesting, writing style. It’s a relatively short book, with the hard cover edition weighing in at just over 220 pages (in a fairly small footprint), but there’s no shortage of valuable information.

Rotella relates some of the things he’s learned from a few of the various tour pros he’s worked with over the years. That’s one of the things that makes this book so fascinating. It’s not just about what Dr. Rotella teaches his players, but it’s also about what they’ve taught him.

Chapter List

1. On My Interpretation of Dreams
2. What Nick Price Learned from William James
3. Train It and Trust It
4. How Stuart Anderson Created His Own Reality
5. The Hot Streak: Staying Out of Your Own Way
6. Rediscovering Old Scottish Wisdom
7. What the Third Eye Sees
8. Your Rod and Staff
9. Let the Short Game Flow
10. What I Learned from Bobby Locke
11. Golf is Not a Game of Perfect
12. Anyone Can Develop Confidence
13. What Mark Twain and Fred Couples Have in Common
14. Fighting Through Fear
15. What I Learned from Seve Ballesteros
16. Conservative Strategy, Cocky Swing
17. Game Plan
18. Thriving Under Pressure
19. When the Scorecard Looks at You
20. Competitors
21. Practicing to Improve
22. What I Learned from Paul Runyan
23. Appendix: Rotella’s Rules

The Good

• Gives a great look at what separates the best from the rest.
• The book flowed very well and has a simple, easy to follow writing style that kept me interested the whole way.
• Includes looks into the minds of some of the great players in golf history.
• Gives practical advice that can help golfers of all skill levels.
• While I have never met Dr. Rotella, he seems like a person with an extremely positive outlook and I felt like I absorbed a little of that as I read the book.

The Bad

• The book was a bit short. It’s certainly complete, but when I got to the end, I wanted more. I guess that’s not bad, so much, but I always try to balance out my reviews and I needed to put something here.

Conclusion

This book has definitely earned a place in my “must-read” list. As I read it, I began to try and incorporate the techniques into my own game. In the several rounds I’ve played since I started reading it, I believe I have seen a serious improvement in my game. Some of that is due to swing changes I’ve been making, but my mental outlook on the course is miles ahead of where it has ever been previously. I feel like I have the ability to always follow up a bad shot with a good one, without question.

I feel like this book connected with me in a very positive way. I was even more thrilled when I got to the end and started reading “Rotella’s Rules” in the appendix. The first two have stuck with me:

1. A person with great dreams can achieve great things
2. People by and large become what they think about themselves

These are two simple, yet powerful ideas. They capture perfectly the reason that some people melt comfortably into the status quo while others dare to dream and find a path to greatness.

Several times in the past, I’ve mentioned that I’m recovering from a herniated disk in my lower back that kept me from playing for the better part of two years. After some excellent rehab, I’ve been able to play again this year.

However, it’s not all roses. I don’t have a tremendous amount of pain, but after a lot of play and/or practice, I get pretty sore and tight.

Up to this point, I’ve stayed on top of my exercises and they’re like a magic pill. If I want to play and practice several days in a row, then I really need to stay on course. If I falter, then I start to pay with a little more soreness and tightness.

You may remember that I’ve been talking lately about various fixes I’ve been making with my swing. One of the big ones was getting back to the basics: grip, alignment, stance, posture. I started trying to mimic textbook posture as much as I could, and it definitely felt strange, telling me that I was doing something different for a long time.

Well, because of all the swing issues I’ve been having, my workouts have lapsed for over a week. I’ve been spending all my spare time at the range.

After about a week of new posture, I have to say, it’s like night and day. I’m not “cured”, but I haven’t been doing any exercise (don’t worry, that’s changing tonight), and yet, I’ve been able to practice (and now play again), back to back to back (no pun intended) without much discomfort or tightness.

In fact, it took a week to hit me because I’ve been so intensely focused on my swing issues. One day, I realized after a really long session that I felt great and it occurred to me that I hadn’t worked out for several days. Not even my basic stretching.

I’m not an expert in fitness or physiology, so I can’t really explain what’s going on, but something is different.

I intend to fully continue all my exercises, but I have to wonder if bad posture contributed to my original problem. It first happened in winter, so it wasn’t like I took a swing and hit the dirt. But could years of improper mechanics could do it?

Early this year, after my rehab started to work for me, I read up on the issue some. I couldn’t find much online other than a lot of people saying that people with lower back problems should fix their golf posture. At the time, I thought it was fine, so I went looking for more info.

It would be nice if there was some more information out there about how bad posture leads to specific back problems. Like, what exactly about bad posture causes problems? Bending from the waist? Keeping the chin down? Maybe it’s there and I couldn’t find it.

Even if you don’t have back problems, it’s worth checking the quality of your golf posture. If anything, it may help your swing and it may even prevent future wear and tear on your back.

Here’s a great primer on proper setup, including posture, by Michael Lamanna over at About.com. There are some helpful photos there to show you the aspects of correct setup.

As I set up to the ball, I now go through my standard posture checklist:

• Bent at the hips
• Back not slouching
• Arms hanging freely, about a fist-width from my zipper for short irons, a little more for the driver
• Chin up a little to allow a free shoulder turn
• Knees flexed
• Rear sticking out just a bit, indicating a proper bend from the hips, not from the waist

Doing these things makes my swing feel a lot more free, and while I can’t prove it, I think it’s helping my back too. If you have trouble with your back related to golf or if you just suspect your posture might not be up to par (pun intended) try and focus on making it better and see if you have improvement.

If you’re not sure exactly what to look for or would feel more comfortable with someone else helping you diagnose the problem, then it’s a good idea to schedule a lesson with a local teaching professional. He or she will be well-versed on basic setup and should be able to help you immediately.

Sunday, I got back on the course for the first time in almost three weeks and shot a 46. For 18 holes. OK, that’s ridiculous, it was nine holes.

It’s been a long time since I was satisfied with a 46. Given where I’ve been, though, I’ll take it. It’s like someone tied me down and was burning me with a branding iron and then decided to stop and just slap me in the face a few times. It’s a strange sense of relief, but I’m certain it actually is relief.

I got a couple of tips that put me on the right track. If you read regularly, you might remember me talking about having an issue with my takeaway and an issue with my grip pressure causing me to not square the club face at impact.

Two quick tips and it was like night and day. I decided to play a round about ten range balls after the switch was flipped so there was a little uncertainty there. Just to be clear, I ran out of range balls, I wasn’t inflicted with some sudden delusion of grandeur. I’ve hit many more since then.

I was also half way through reading Golf is not a Game of Perfect by Dr. Bob Rotella (review coming soon). I believe that had me in a better frame of mind so it probably wasn’t all from the two tips.

Looking at my stats, you might not understand why I’m satisfied with a 46. Well, for starters, you’ll notice that my last round posted in there was over a month ago. Things were going so sour that I wasn’t playing much. Then after July4th I didn’t play at all. I was practicing a lot, though…if you can call it that.

I was spraying balls into the woods, into the water, and off the property. I was losing balls by the dozen.

A couple of quick tips on the range, and I lost only one on Sunday.

Losing only one ball is not really a source of satisfaction for me. I’m satisfied because I played way better than a 46 indicates. These are the things I’m taking into consideration:

• I hadn’t played at all for over two weeks
• I have three new wedges in my bag that are taking time to adjust to
• Prior to this round, I couldn’t keep the ball on the course

My misses were actually decent misses. Like fading a little too far and ending up in the rough. The regular rough, not the stuff that had never been mowed since the place opened in 1999. Like ending up in a green side bunker after hitting my 3-wood approach to the 9th hole trying to get there in two as opposed to ending up on the 18th hole or 50 yards from where I started. Like coming up 10 yards short because I under-clubbed in a steady headwind.

I can tolerate that stuff. Those are things I can work with. I can sharpen my short game. I can work on my knowledge of how to play the wind better. I can live with ending up in a green side bunker trying to get there in two from 250+ yards out. What I can’t live with is wild inconsistency and confidence-shattering uncertainty.

The fact is, I had 4 pars. I hit 3 greens. I hit 3 fairways. I only had 16 putts even after 4 putting a hole (that was just dumb laziness there). And I had one blow-up hole where I hit into a hazard then my approach got into some nasty rough under a huge tree right next to an elevated green. That was a little ugly.

There were three shots where I regressed back to my old mistakes. But that’s OK. In time, I’ll ingrain the good stuff.

So why am I telling you all this? A couple of reasons.

First, there’s usually something positive to be taken out of a bad round. Positive thinking is always good. You don’t have to ignore the bad, but dwelling on it doesn’t do much good. I’m doing that here, and I hope you do the same.

I can feel some of you thinking that you’d be perfectly happy with a 46 any time and wondering why I keep calling it a bad round. That’s OK, but trust me, once you break each successive barrier, there’s no going back. When you break 100, then 90, then 80, birdie a hole, eagle a hole, get under par at some part of a round, chip in, whatever, there’s simply no going back. If your handicap is a 20, but you manage to shoot a 75 one day, you’ll be chasing that for the rest of your life.

The second reason I’m telling you all this is that I’m perfectly happy with a 46. Right now, after what I’ve been through, a 46 shot the way I did it with some positives and some near-misses, I’ll take it.

Next time I hit the course, I’ll feel different, but right now, I’ll take it.

The Happy Rock went on vacation this week and put out an A.P.B. for guest posters.  Naturally, your pal Double Eagle heeded the call.

The Happy Rock’s primary theme is increasing personal finance through self improvement.  In a rare divergence from the normal Life in the Rough theme, I mixed golf and finance in a post covering ten ways to save money on golf (OK, I admit it - the idea was his).

The Happy Rock’s focus on self improvement is something I think you’d benefit from, even though it doesn’t normally involve golf.  Check it out regularly.

He also honored me with admin privileges so I can watch over and make sure everything stays happy over there.  With the keys to the front door in hand, all I can say is:  “Party at the Happy Rock’s house!!“