One Shot at a Time: What Scottie Scheffler Can Teach You About Presence on the Golf Course
"The most important shot you'll ever hit is the one you're standing over." It's a phrase you've heard before—but Scottie Scheffler lived it this weekend at the 2025 PGA Championship.
At Quail Hollow, with pressure mounting and challengers circling, Scheffler didn’t speed up. He didn’t chase. He didn’t tighten. He stayed present. One shot at a time. One commitment at a time.
And he walked away with his third major.
The Power of Presence
Presence isn’t just a motivational buzzword. In performance psychology, it’s a measurable mental skill. Staying focused on the current task—not the previous mistake, not the potential outcome—is what allows elite athletes to perform under pressure. It's called "task-relevant attention," and it’s the cornerstone of clutch performance (Beilock et al., 2004).
Scheffler's swing told the story. Even as several shots leaked left on the front nine, he didn’t flinch. He didn’t steer the ball or manipulate his motion. Instead, he trusted the work he’d done—his feels, his shape, his sequencing.
He didn’t try to overhaul anything. He trusted the swing he’d worked on and let it play out. Over time, the ball flight started to straighten out. The swing held.
Most players might’ve panicked and searched for a fix. Scheffler didn’t. He kept things simple: one swing at a time, one target. In his post-round interview, he said he knew if he kept making good swings, the ball wouldn’t keep coming out left. His caddie kept it practical too—just aim a little more right.
Mental Skills in Action
Sports psychologists refer to this as "cognitive quiet." You’re not trying to block thoughts; you’re letting the right thoughts take the lead. For golfers, this often means:
Having a repeatable pre-shot routine that locks in attention
Building mental stability that anchors your identity in effort and preparation—not just in results.
Using visualization and breathwork to calm the nervous system before high-stakes shots
Scheffler has spoken about these tools. He leans on preparation and trust in his routine: “When I show up to compete, I remind myself I’ve already done the work.”
Pressure Is Real. So Is the Process.
Golfers fold under pressure when they abandon the process. They start aiming for results instead of shots. They swing to not lose rather than to commit.
Scheffler doesn’t try to play perfect golf. He stays faithful to his process and trusts it will add up. And that’s what makes him lethal on Sundays.
Even as shots weren’t perfect early in the round, he stayed patient. He let his swing settle. And as the pressure increased, his execution did too.
What You Can Do With This
Build your own routine: Keep it simple. Breath. Target. Feel. Swing.
Practice under pressure: Use competitive games and scorecards on the range.
Use a performance journal: Track what helps you stay locked in. Build awareness.
You don’t need to be Scottie Scheffler to think like him. You just need to treat each shot like it matters—because it does.
At ATX Golf Performance, We Train This
At ATX Golf Performance, we don’t just coach technique—we coach attention.
Presence under pressure is a skill, and like any skill, it can be trained. We help players:
Build pressure-ready routines
Train focus with targeted mental reps
Use movement and breath to reset during rounds
Stay grounded in the process, no matter the stage
When you control your attention, your swing has a chance to show up. That’s what we train.
If you're ready to stop overthinking and start scoring, come train with us.
Sources:
Beilock, S. L., & Carr, T. H. (2004). "On the fragility of skilled performance: What governs choking under pressure?" Journal of Experimental Psychology.
Cotterill, S. T. (2010). "Pre-performance routines in sport: Current understanding and future directions." International Review of Sport and Exercise Psychology.
Interviews and coverage of the 2025 PGA Championship (CBS Sports, The Guardian, Reuters).