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One of the reasons Paul is a top iron player is that he centres his chest over the ball and holds it there through impact.

www.golf-world.co.uk // MAY 2009 35

Quick tips

You can see from the building behind how Paul actually keeps his head very central in the takeaway.

Look how the right knee has worked towards the left – a classic leg action.

You can draw a straight line down from the right shoulder to the left foot in this textbook finishing pose.

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with the highly-respected sports psychologist Bob Rotella. “Enjoy the things you used to be good at”, he’s been telling him. “If you enjoy it, it’ll be there. It’s not like it’s going to have gone away”. Rotella has been telling Els to be himself.

But that, as they say, is easier said than done. Can the world No.14 remember who he once was? After all, the last time Els was on the edge of the top 15 players was way back in 1994. The Big Easy is not quite as big, in image terms, as he once was, and the game that he once dominated in his sleep is no longer “easy”.

“When you’ve had success and you don’t have the same success you really question yourself and you get hard on yourself. That’s been me,” he told Golf World. “Not playing the way I’ve wanted to play in the last few

Think of it like Pandora’s box. Once you’ve let those demons out, then rounding them up is going to be a bit of a

problem. Right now, Ernie Els is not where he wants to be. He’s not winning tournaments, he’s not contending as much as he’d like and, as he succinctly puts it himself, he’s become adept at “turning 67s into 72s”. Those demons are misbehaving.

What may also be alarming is that the scourge of Ernie’s dissatisfaction comes from two areas. He is looking to resurrect his short game and his mental goal is to turn the clock back to those halcyon days when he was laid back enough to enjoy himself on the golf course.

“My short game is a bit of a problem at the moment,” he says. “Take Hawaii, the first tournament of 2009, I was nine under par after the first two days. Then, I played really well from tee to green on the third day, but I really got tentative on the greens. Then, once you miss a few putts, and then you miss some greens, and don’t get it up and down, it snowballs. To keep your patience in those circumstances is very tough.”

Now, if we were all doctors and Els was sitting across from us discussing his symptoms, talk of short game woes may well lead us to demand more tests. ‘Tentative putting? Loss of confidence on the greens? How old did you say you were?’.

“Thirty nine.”Life may begin at 40, but golf these

days seldom does. Els, though, has not quite reached that landmark yet and, on the positive side, he sees that as a positive. “I’m 39, and yet I’m still really driven. I’m determined to get it right. If I didn’t have this drive it would be very easy to step back, design golf courses and enjoy the family. But, I’ve still got the drive to get it right and win Majors.”

As for turning the clock back, this comes from the work he’s been doing

years has been difficult to handle. I’ve been a pretty easy-going guy for most of my career, but...

“I’ve been looking to win golf tournaments when I haven’t quite had all areas of my game up to par. I’ve been looking for a win when my short game hasn’t been there and that’s not going to happen. And, that’s when you need to be patient; and that’s what I’ve found difficult. When you get under pressure when your short game isn’t quite there, you’re not going to win a tournament. One bad shot, at the

46 MAY 2009 // www.golf-world.co.uk

‘When you’ve had success and you don’T have The same success you really quesTion yourself’

Ernie’s relationship with new coach Butch Harmon is starting to pay off, especially in his long game.

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15charTing The ernie eraEls broke into the top 10 in the world for the first time in June ‘94 when he won the US Open.

Els was No.1 for one week after winning his second US Open in ‘97. His average ranking for that year, however, was third.

In ‘98, he had two spells of four weeks each at No.1. The second ended on June 7 – the last time he topped the world. In ‘99, he missed the cut in two Majors.

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