Golf Practice Plan Template to Create Your Own Routine
The fast track way to success on the golf course is following a practice plan like this one. This is the strategy hundreds of golfers have used to break 90, break 80, and score under par!
Golf practice is more than just putting in time at the course and calling it a day.
You need structured golf practice that focuses your time on the best golf drills, quality practice reps, and statistical tracking so you can make sure you’re improving or else make adjustments!
Let’s jump into an example golf practice plan template you can use to help you plan out your own golf practice routines and drills to improve your swing and short game skills quicker.
Also, at the end we have several golf practice plans you can check out that give you more structure and are easy to follow with step by step routines and drills, eBooks, PDF downloads, worksheets, and more!
Putting Practice Template:
First up is putting. Putting can make up 50% (or more) of your golf score and therefore deserves the bulk of your focus during your practice session.
Below I’ll list out a variety of drills and reps/sets. You can break these up into separate practice days rather than trying to knock all of them out in one day. This let’s you customize your own practice plan going off this template.
- One handed putts from 3 feet, rotate hands after 10 reps. Repeat 5 sets for 100 reps total.
- Flat putts from 5 feet for 10 reps. Repeat 10 sets for 100 reps total
- Circle Drill – putt from 5 locations around a hole in a circle from 3 feet. Try to make all 5 in a row before moving to 4 feet, 5 feet, and so on.
- Breaking putts from 8 feet for 10 reps. Switch sides to change the break. Repeat 5 sets for 100 reps total.
- 50 “made” putts from 15 feet. Count how many attempts it takes and lower this number each practice
- 50 putts rolled within 24 inches of the hole from 35 feet away
- Ladder Drill – putt from 3, 6, 9, 12, and 15 feet with one ball at each distance. Try to make all 5 in a row
- Reverse Ladder Drill – start at 15 feet and work in to 3 feet. Try to make all 5 putts in a row
- Lag Putt Ladder Drill – putt one ball from 20, 30, 40, 50, and 60 feet. Try to get all 5 within 24 inches of the hole.
- Lag Putt Reverse Ladder – start at 60 feet away and work in to 20 feet. Try to get all 5 within 24 inches of the hole.
- Eyes Closed Lag Putting – develop feel by hitting putts from long range to a hole with your eyes closed. Try to guess where the putt feels like it ended up. Short? Just right? Too far?
You should aim to complete 300-500 putting reps in total during a putting practice routine. This is similar to a basketball player taking 300-500 jump shots, so don’t make excuses if you think 300-50o putts sounds crazy, haha!
300 putts is if you plan to take time between each putt lining it up and going through a pre-shot routine. 500 putts is more realistic if you hit putts one after the other with out going through a putting pre shot routine.
Chipping Practice Template
After putting, let’s move back off the green into the rough and start hitting chip shots to different holes on the practice green.
If your golf course has a green that says “putting only” then you’ll have to find a new golf course for practice days that allows chipping or break the rules (haha, you rebel).
Aim to complete 100-300 chipping reps during your practice routine, each day. This can add up to thousands of reps throughout the month if you’re consistent and do high volume each practice.
Here’s a list of the only chipping drills to add to your practice routine that serve as a template to help you schedule out your different practice days and different drills each day.
Start Chips On Line
Place a two ball markers or tees 6-12 inches apart so a golf ball can comfortably roll through them. Place these tees/ball markers 5-10 feet onto the green to give you some room to land the ball first. Hit chip shots on line to land before these tees and then the ball should roll through between them. If your chip is off line you’ll miss outside the tees.
Distance Control with a Towel
Distance control on chipping leaves little margin for error. Hitting the ball a few extra feet can add 6-10 extra feet of roll making your putt even longer if you chip past the hole. Same can be said leaving chip shots short, causing the putt to end up longer than you wish.
Therefore, use a small 1 foot by 1 foot towel to create a zone to land your chip shots on to practice distance control with your wedge. It will help you reduce your margin of error by giving you a small target to aim at but still allowing some imperfection.
Start off with the towel 5-10 feet away until you get better from short range. Move it back to 15-20 feet, then 30 feet, 40 feet, and 50 feet away.
Use a putter or strides (3 feet strides) to count off distances and lay down the towel.
Hole Out the Chip Shot
Another challenging chipping drill to add to your practice routine.
Pick a hole in the center of the practice green and try to hole out your chip shot. Then move around the green from all four locations (north side, east side, south side, and west side) until you’ve holed out the chip from 4 different angles around the green.
This trains you to practice distance control for different slopes and breaks. On one side you may have an uphill chip to the hill but when you move across to the rough on the other side the chip becomes downhill.
Within 3 Feet Pressure Drill
Set 10 balls down a few yards away from the green, in the rough. Pick a hole close by, pick a hole middle of the green, and pick a hole far side of the green.
Work through each set of 10 balls trying to get 7/10 within 3 feet of the hole. Once you succeed at the short range hole, move on to the middle hole in the center of the green. Then move to the far away hole on opposite side.
For the short hole you may need to hit soft, lob shots with more spin to stop the ball sooner depending how close the pin is to you and how much green you have to work with.
On the far away hole, we recommend working on low chips with roll, known as the bump and run chip shot. This gets the ball rolling sooner like a putt and makes it easier to land the ball on line using the previous drills above to build up this skill set.
Pitching Practice Template
The goal with pitching is to putt the ball within 10 feet of the hole to give yourself a chance of making the putt. Pitching happens when you get further away from the green, 10-100 yards.
You’ll often use a wedge for pitch shots and we recommend getting skilled with one wedge! This means learning how to hit full swings for 100 yard shots and half swings for 50 yard shots, using the same wedge.
It’s a lot easier to adjust your back swing power than trying to switch wedges at different distances.
Here’s a breakdown of pitching practice out on the golf course:
- Pitch the ball within 10 feet or better from 10 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 10 feet or better from 20 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 10 feet or better from 30 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 15 feet or better from 40 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 20 feet or better from 50 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 20 feet or better from 60 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 25 feet or better from 75 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 25 feet or better from 90 yards away
- Pitch the ball within 25 feet or better from 100 yards away
Hit lots of extra shots on the golf course from different distances inside 100 yards and focus on how close you get them to the hole. Measure each shot when you get to the green and over time you should notice your distances getting closer and closer to the chart above.
Driving Range Golf Drills
Here is an article we wrote detailing the best drills for the driving range and a practice routine to follow on the driving range.