Your 15th Club ─ The Inner Secret to Great Golf

Any golfer will understand this:

You go out to the driving range, you warm up with your irons, everything is going right. You pull out your utility clubs, you are hitting great. Your driver -- boom. The ball flies far and lands just where you want it. You head for the practice green...you drain every putt from 30 feet in.

Time to play with your friends. Eighteen delicious holes and you are going to show them how good you are. Your mind starts racing a bit. Am I too confident? Am I too relaxed? Thoughts starts creeping in, but you still believe. You line up over the first tee ready to drill it. Everything is going to be great....

Whack! You can't believe it -- you spray the ball 30 yards to the right, short and in deep rough. You try to punch out to the fairway...only it goes to the other rough. And so on . . you end up quadruple bogey. Your day is shot...

It happens to every golfer. The mind becomes their worst enemy. It's not physical. It's all in the head. How do listeners get their brains back to practice range? Why did it change?

The preeminent golf psychologist Bob Rotella, whose counsel and knowledge is sought by hundreds of thousands, including the world's top players, has spent years trying to discover a way to get golfers to stay in the mindset that they can thrive in. In Your 15th Club, Rotella has done just that: come up with a plan to help golfers play at their optimal best. It is something that every golfer will want to learn.

Dr. Bob Rotella was the director of sports psychology for twenty years at the University of Virginia, where his reputation grew as the person champions talked to about the mental aspects of their game. His client list includes Hall of Fame golfers like Pat Bradley, Tom Kite, and Nick Price as well as stars of the present, such as Darren Clarke, Keegan Bradley, Padraig Harrington, Graeme McDowell, Mark Wilson, and Rory Mcllroy. A writer for and consultant to Golf Digest, he lives in Virginia with his wife, Darlene.