Barry Smith
1.8K posts
Barry Smith
@bcs4isu
Director of Technology @ Knoxville School District. ISU GRAD '92. avid golfer, Cub fan. Proud husband and father. GO CYCLONES! Go Panthers! #KCSDPride
Knoxville, IA Katılım Haziran 2010
861 Takip Edilen378 Takipçiler
Barry Smith retweetledi
What a showing at the Doane Spring Invite! Smith ties the individual single-round record and the Raiders tie the team record!
#RaidersStandOut
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Barry Smith retweetledi
Barry Smith retweetledi
Barry Smith retweetledi
Most junior golfers practice. Very few practice efficiently.
After watching thousands of hours of range sessions over 25 years, here are the most common practice mistakes I see:
1. No goal, plan, or purpose. Showing up and figuring it out as you go is not training. It’s killing time. Elite players walk onto the range knowing exactly what they’re working on, why it matters, and how they’ll know the session was successful. Purposeless practice builds lazy habits.
2. Not warming up dynamically before starting. Stretching your arms across your chest and hitting a few wedges is not a warm-up. Your body needs to be activated before it can perform its best. Dynamic movement, mobility work, and a progressive build from short to long prepares your nervous system for what’s coming.
3. Too much technique, not enough skill development. Working on mechanics has a place. But if every session is about swing positions, you are building a range player, not a golfer. Skill development means learning to control the ball under conditions that simulate real golf.
4. No clear idea of separation value. Most players practice what they enjoy, not what actually separates them from the competition. Separation value is simple: what parts of your game, if improved, would translate directly into lower scores?
5. All range, no course. Hitting perfect 7-irons from a flat lie in silence is not golf. It’s a drill. Real golf has uneven lies, wind, nerves, and consequences the range removes entirely. You cannot simulate pressure in a vacuum. Schedule at least as much on course practice as range time. Play games. Create competitions with yourself. That ratio alone will change your scores faster than any swing change.
6. Practicing strengths. Players naturally gravitate to what they’re already good at. It feels productive. It isn’t. Find the pattern in your data and go to work on what actually hurts you. Comfort is the enemy of improvement.
7. No sense of urgency or consequences. Hitting ball after ball with nothing on the line is not preparation for competition. It’s just repetition. Elite practice creates stakes. Hit this shot or you run. Make five in a row or you start over. Compete against a partner. Invent a game with a loser. If nothing matters in practice, nothing will feel familiar when everything matters in a tournament.
8. Skipping mental reps. If you’re not going through your full pre-shot routine in practice, you’re not practicing golf. You’re practicing mechanics. The routine is the bridge between thought and execution. Build it on the range so it’s automatic on the course. Under pressure you don’t rise to the occasion. You fall to your preparation.
9. No feedback loop. Practice without measurement is guessing. Track something. Face contact. Face to path. Strokes gained. What gets measured gets improved. What gets ignored stays broken.
10. Ignoring speed training. Distance is the most undervalued asset in junior golf. Coaches value it. Courses reward it. Speed work is non-negotiable. Clubhead speed is trainable at every age with the right protocols.
11. Phone and social media distraction. The phone is one of the most underrated killers of productive practice. One notification pulls you out of the work. One scroll breaks the focus you spent 20 minutes building. Practice demands presence. Leave the phone in the car, turn it off, or give it to someone else for the session. The players who protect their practice environment protect their development.
12. Never planning for creative and fun exploration. Not every session needs to be structured and serious. Some of the best development happens when players give themselves permission to experiment, try things that might fail, and play without judgment.
Work harder than everyone else. But work smarter first.
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What College Golf Is Actually Like
Most junior golfers dream about college golf.
Almost none of them know what it actually looks like.
After coaching at Duke and Ohio State, and sending 165+ players into programs across every division, here’s what college golf is really like:
1. It’s a job. Early morning workouts. Film sessions. Travel weekends. Team meetings. The romance fades fast if you’re not truly committed. You are an athlete first, a student second, and a normal college kid third. In that order, most days. The players who thrive treat it like a profession from day one.
2. The jump is real. The gap between the best junior golfer in your state and the average D1 player is significant. Prepare accordingly. The speed of the game increases. The courses are harder. The fields are deeper. Most freshmen are humbled before they’re ready to contribute. That’s normal. Plan for it.
3. You will sit the bench. Most freshmen don’t play right away. How you handle not being in the lineup defines your trajectory more than your talent does. Coaches watch practice players just as closely as tournament players. Nothing is invisible. The ones who stay ready when they’re not playing are the ones who earn the spot eventually.
4. The coach relationship is everything. You will spend more time with your college coach than almost anyone in your life for four years. Choose that person carefully. A great coach at a smaller program will develop you faster than a disconnected coach at a prestigious one. Ask hard questions on your visit. How do you communicate with players? How do you handle conflict? What happens when I’m struggling?
5. Teammates matter. You travel with these people. You compete with them for spots. The culture they create will shape who you become. Talk to the players on a visit without the coaches present. They’ll tell you the truth. The best programs feel like families. You’ll know it when you walk in.
6. Academics are harder than you think. Golf travel means missing class, managing makeups, and studying on the road. This is not optional. Programs that don’t support your academic success aren’t programs worth attending. Ask about graduation rates and academic support before you ask about the practice facility.
7. It’s a short window. Four years goes fast. The players who are present for the journey enjoy it. The ones always looking ahead miss it. Freshman year feels long. Senior year feels like a weekend. The players I’ve coached who were the happiest competed hard and stayed present. Both. At the same time.
8. Not everyone turns pro. The goal of college golf is not the Tour. It’s becoming the best version of yourself as a player and a person. Keep perspective. Less than 1% of college golfers play professionally. Plan your four years around the 99%. The discipline, teamwork, and work ethic you build will pay dividends for the next 40 years of your career. That’s the real return on investment.
9. The right division matters more than the prestige. Playing every weekend at a D2 program beats riding the bench at a D1 program for four years. Fit is the most underrated word in recruiting. Academic fit. Cultural fit. Geographic fit. Golf fit. I’ve watched players thrive at NAIA programs and wither at Power Five programs. The division does not predict the experience.
10. You have to want it. Coaches can feel the difference between a player who chose their program and a player who settled for it. Be somewhere you chose. Motivation borrowed from your parents doesn’t survive the first hard stretch of college golf. The players who last are the ones who chose the game, chose the school, and chose the grind. All three. On their own.
The dream is worth chasing. Just make sure you understand what you’re chasing.
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Barry Smith retweetledi
Clones are battling and playing well. Wish Milan was knocking these good looks down though.
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@mostcommonname2 @mbhoops119 Mr Worrall working to bring the golf team over our way this spring. Hopefully it works out!
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@mbhoops119 Congrats on a phenominal coaching career! You taught me a ton growing up! Love ya cuz.
GIF
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After 26 years as head boys basketball coach and 6 years as an assistant in the mediapolis boys program I am officially retiring I will always love my time and will always be a big time supporter of bulldog basketball
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Barry Smith retweetledi
Fun stat: Iowa State could have scored zero points in the second half and still won today. Cyclones ended the first half with 45 points, and Arizona State scored 42 points in the game.
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Barry Smith retweetledi
Barry Smith retweetledi
Thank you cyclone nation for showing out this senior night!! 🌪️🌪️
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