We have all done it. You watch the pros in Hawaii on TV (while you are sitting in a freezing house in Ireland), and you make a grand declaration:
“This is the year I become a single-figure handicapper.” “I will never three-putt again.” “I am going to hit 300 balls every week.”
By February 1st, the rain has soaked your spirit, the three-putts are back, and your new driver is already in the “naughty corner” of the garage.
The problem isn’t your ambition; it’s your goals. Vague, impossible goals set you up for failure. This year, we are ditching the fantasy and focusing on the reality.
If you want to play better golf in 2026, forget the moonshots. Here are 5 boring, practical, and highly effective resolutions you can actually stick to.
1. Stop “Raking” and Start Practising
We see it on ranges all across Ireland. The “Machine Gun” golfer. You buy a bucket of 100 balls, rake one over, hit it, rake the next one, hit it… and 15 minutes later, the bucket is empty, and you’re sweating.
You haven’t practised; you’ve just exercised.
The Resolution: “I will play every shot on the range with a purpose.”
Switch your mindset. Instead of hitting 50 drivers in a row, play a “phantom round.” Imagine the first hole of your home course. Pull your driver. Go through your full routine. Hit the shot. If you sliced it into the virtual trees, your next shot isn’t another driver—it’s a punch-out 7-iron.
Quality beats quantity every time. You will learn more from 40 focused shots than 100 mindless ones.
2. Commit to the “Three-Foot” Rule
The quickest way to lower your scores isn’t hitting 300-yard drives; it’s eliminating the stress of short putts. We often ignore 3-footers on the practice green because they are “boring” or we assume we will make them. Then, on the 18th hole with a fiver on the line, the hole looks the size of a thimble.
The Resolution: “I will not leave the practice green until I hole 10 three-footers in a row.”
This is the “Clock Drill”. Set up around a hole and force yourself to make them all. It adds a little bit of pressure to your practice. If you miss number 9, you start again at number 1. It’s annoying, it’s tough, and it builds bulletproof confidence for the monthly medal.
3. Track One Stat That Matters
Data can be overwhelming. Strokes Gained, Spin Loft, Dynamic Lie… it’s enough to make your head spin. But if you don’t know where you are losing shots, you can’t fix it.
The Resolution: “I will track my Putts Per Round.”
Keep it simple. Just write down how many putts you had on each hole.
- 36+ putts? Your short game needs work.
- 30-35 putts? You’re doing okay.
- Sub-30 putts? You’re scrambling well (or hitting no greens!).
Once you have a month of data, you can show it to a pro. Instead of saying “I’m playing bad,” you can say, “I’m averaging 38 putts a round.” That is a problem a pro can fix in one lesson.
4. Accept the “Winter Mat” Reality
In Ireland, we play on mats for 3-4 months of the year. Many golfers use this as an excuse to stop playing or to complain that “it’s not real golf.”
The Resolution: “I will use the winter mats to fix my strike.”
Mats are actually a great lie detector. If you hit the mat before the ball, the club bounces, and you get a thin, ugly shot. On soft grass, you might get away with a “fat” shot. Use the winter mats to focus purely on ball-first contact. If you can nip the ball cleanly off a hard mat, you will be deadly from the fairway come April.
5. Stop DIY-ing Your Swing
This is the big one. We live in the age of YouTube University. You watch a video on “shallowing the club,” go to the range, shank it, watch another video on “fixing the shank,” and suddenly you can’t break 100.
The Resolution: “I will get a second pair of eyes on my game.”
You wouldn’t try to fill your own cavity, would you? A PGA Professional can see in 30 seconds what you might spend 3 months trying to “feel.”
Make 2026 the year you stop guessing. Even a single 30-minute check-up can save you months of frustration. It’s not about rebuilding your entire game; it’s about finding the one key thought that works for you.
Conclusion: Small Wins Win Big
The beauty of these resolutions is that they don’t require you to be Tiger Woods. They just require you to be a little bit smarter with your time.
Pick one or two from this list. Stick to them for January. And if you really want to lock in that improvement, head over to our Find a Pro page today. A lesson booked in January is a trophy lifted in July.
Happy golfing!
