Practice plan

Golf Practice Before a Lesson

A focused 40-minute session so you arrive at your lesson warmed up, aware of your current patterns, and ready to get straight to work with your coach.

Driving Range40 minLesson PrepAll Levels

Who this plan is for

This session is for any golfer who has a lesson booked and wants to get the most out of it. Most golfers either arrive with no warm-up at all — asking their coach to diagnose a cold swing — or arrive having over-practised, confused about what they are working on and too tired to process new information well.

This plan solves both problems. You arrive warm, with clear observations about your current ball-flight and miss pattern, and with specific questions for your coach. That gives the lesson a head start and means your coach can spend less time diagnosing and more time helping you fix.

The key rule: do not try to fix anything in this session. Your job is to observe and report — not to solve the problem before the lesson starts.

Ready-made session

Your Pre-Lesson Practice Session

Work through each block. Keep notes — the Feel Notes and Questions blocks are just as important as the hitting blocks.

Practice Before a Lesson

Arrive warmed up, aware, and ready — without over-practising.

40 min

Driving RangeGoal: Lesson Preparation

Session blocks

6 blocks

1.Easy Warm-Up
Pitch shots and short irons at 60–70% effort. You are activating your body, not warming up a technique. Keep it easy and observe how your body feels today.
5 min
Warm-up
2.Baseline Contact Check
Mid-iron to a single target. Hit 10 balls without coaching yourself. Note the contact quality — fat, thin, or solid? Don't try to fix anything. Just observe.
8 min
Skill
3.Current Miss Pattern
Hit 8–10 shots with the club you most often struggle with. Pay attention to the miss direction — left, right, or both? You are building awareness, not solving problems.
8 min
Skill
4.Coach Topic Preparation
Hit shots related to the topic you want to work on in the lesson. If it's driver shape, hit 8 driver shots. If it's approach distance, hit 8 approach shots. Surface the pattern clearly.
10 min
Skill
5.Feel Notes
Stop hitting. Write down three things: what you noticed in contact, what the miss pattern was, and what felt different from your last session. This becomes your conversation starter.
5 min
Cooldown
6.Questions to Bring
Note the one or two specific questions you want answered in the lesson. Knowing what you want from the session makes it significantly more useful.
4 min
Cooldown

Why this session works

Easy Warm-Up (5 min)

A relaxed warm-up gets your body moving without locking in a compensated swing pattern before the lesson. Easy swings at 70% effort reveal your natural tendencies more clearly than forced full swings.

Baseline Contact Check (8 min)

Establishing a contact baseline before any coaching input gives your coach a clear picture of your current state. Hitting without self-coaching prevents you from masking the patterns your coach needs to see.

Current Miss Pattern (8 min)

Deliberately surfacing your miss direction with your most challenging club means your coach can identify the root cause faster. You arrive having done the diagnostic work — the coach can focus on the fix.

Coach Topic Preparation (10 min)

Hitting shots specifically related to your lesson topic before arriving means your coach can see live examples of the problem, not just hear a description of it. It focuses the lesson from the first minute.

Feel Notes (5 min)

Writing down observations immediately after hitting — rather than relying on memory in the lesson — makes the information accurate and specific. Your coach will get better data from a written note than from a reconstructed feeling.

Questions to Bring (4 min)

Golfers who arrive with clear questions get better answers. It signals to your coach that you are engaged and directs the conversation toward what matters most to you.

How to adapt this session

If you have less time

Keep the Warm-Up, Baseline Contact Check, and Current Miss Pattern blocks. Skip the Coach Topic Preparation. You can write your questions while waiting to start rather than at the range.

If you are tired

Shorten every hitting block by a few minutes. You do not need many balls — you need clear observations. 5 balls per block is enough if you are paying attention to each one.

If the range is busy

Focus on mid-irons where you do not need a clear view of a specific target. The goal here is observation, not accuracy — a busy range doesn't prevent you from noting contact quality and miss direction.

If you are tempted to fix things before the lesson

Don't. It is a natural impulse — you see the miss and want to adjust. Resist it. Arriving with an unfixed pattern gives your coach accurate information. Arriving with a compensated pattern wastes the first 10 minutes undoing what you changed on the range.

If you have limited balls

A small bucket is ideal for this session. You do not need volume — you need quality observation. 30–40 balls across four blocks is more than enough.

This static plan is useful. ParPlanr adapts sessions to your time, facility, goal, recent practice and current state.

Generate a session customised to your lesson topic, available time, and what you've been working on recently.

Generate your own practice session Join Early Access

Want adaptive practice plans instead of static guides? Join early access.

Related resources

Practice Session Generator Pre-Round Warm-Up 45-Minute Range Practice Improve Iron Contact Drills All Practice Plans