This golfer wanted to break 100. She shaved nearly 20 strokes off the spot

A common goal for golf beginners is to simply break 100, which is a way to score correctly. how much progress they have made from the beginning of receiving a set of clubs.

Like all goals scored, breaking 100 takes effort to achieve, as well as a lot of patience. Players often shy away from learning the basics like grasping the club and improving their setup or attitude, for it raising the ball in the air AND making strong contacts more consistently. Once they are comfortable with those aspects of the game, they can then look towards lower scoring.

Unfortunately, many amateurs become discouraged if they don’t break 100 times in their golf career. But one player, a 33-year-old with a disability named Nikki, wanted to make sure she accomplished her mission — so she worked with GOLF Top 100 Teachers Ed Oldham really commits to doing this.

Not only did Nikki meet her goal, but she did so with flying colors, going from a consistent 105 shooter to a career round of 87 earlier this year after working with Oldham.

Naturally, I was intrigued, so I contacted Oldham to get his secrets on what he did to help Nikki shave nearly 20 strokes off her regular score. You can check out his tips below, which can help you see great benefits as well.

How a 33 handicap went from breaking 100 to shaving nearly 20 strokes

Oldham told me that Nikki first contacted her in May, hoping that continued work with a good teacher might help her break 100 for the first time.

“Nikki was a 33 handicap with an average score of 105,” Oldham told me. “Her original goal was to break 100 for the first time and, ultimately, shoot regularly in the 90s.”

First, Oldham referenced some information from Mark Broadie’s book “Every shot counts,” which helped Nick realize how many shots he was costing himself during each round simply from bad shots.

“In Broadie’s book, terrible shots are basically a shot that doesn’t improve your situation much – like a tip shot that goes into the water where you should be diving, or a shot that goes out of bounds. A golfer who regularly shoots 100 putts has, for Broadie, an awful 10 shots a round,” he said.

“When we started, Nikki’s bad shots were chops, uppercuts and chops. Her grip was poor, the toe face remained open, and she had some typical open face compensations, including poor weight transfer and early release. She had a lot of terrible strokes.”

Oldham then explained how he helped Nick correct these flaws, which, in turn, led to fewer missed shots each round.

“As a coach, my main priorities are to have a good club image at the top of the return and impact, as well as making solid contacts,” he explained. “We made Nikki’s grip stronger and moved her fingers more on her left hand. This helped to bring the club to a better position.

“Then we spent most of the time during the first lesson improving her contact. In fact, we spent the first five lessons working on different ways to improve her control and clubface contact.”

So what does it take to create more lasting lasting contacts? Oldham said it’s all about being the first ball at bat.

“For hard contact, you want to hit the ball first and then ground, making sure the split is on the target side of the golf ball,” he said. “Most of the first lesson (with Nikki) was spent hitting the ground in the right spot.”

He then described an easy exercise to try to practice this.

“We did a Goldilocks drill where she hit the ground too far back, hit the ground too far forward and then hit the ground in the right place – as the brain learns from variation,” said Oldham. “We also did a fairway drill where I would hit a ball similar to how high it would be on a par-3 hole, then put another tee into the ground two inches to the target side of the ground. Nick’s job was to hit the ball and then hit the ground.”

Tee training helped Nick get instant feedback, telling him exactly what he did right or wrong.

After seeing Nikki start to make better contact, Oldham then said they worked to control the face of the club, leading to better results.

“To improve club control ability, we did a drill called the variable club drill,” Oldham said. “With the variable club practice, I ask the student to change the face each swing: one to the left, one to the right, then one to the middle. This is a great workout for players of all abilities, with better players having smaller variations.”

After just five lessons together, Nikki not only broke 100 for the first time—she shattered the goal by breaking 90.

“By working on the club site and improving her contact, Nikki was able to meet her goal of breaking 100,” Oldham told me. “She shot a 96 and a 93 within three weeks of our first lesson, and recently she even shot an 87, while regularly scoring in the low 90s now.”

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