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1963The castingmethod ofmanufacturingclubheads isdeveloped,allowing massproduction of irons.

1965Richard Parmley is granteda patent for a “body pivotputter” that Phil Rogersuses on the PGA Tour in thelate 1960s. Paul Azingerstarts using a similar con-cept in 1999, leading to thepopularity of today’s belly-length flatsticks.

1966The PINGAnser putterdebuts.

1968Dupont’s Surlyn® materialenters the scene and is used for golf ball covers.

Spalding unveils the Execu-tive, its first two-piece perfor-mance model that allowsconsumers to buy golf ballsless expensively.

Many golfers refer to competing “in the zone”—momentsin time when they see shots so clearly that they know theexact swing needed for a perfect result. While players willtell you they have glimpsed the zone, they’ll also tell youthat it’s rare to achieve. Why is it so rare, and where theheck did that great feeling come from? Or, better yet, howcan the zone feeling be captured more often?

A recently completed 15-year study by the Institute ofHeartMath®, led by Doc Childre and others, discovered ascientific method for performing without negative emo-tions. This research focuses on the heart’s connection tothe brain’s emotional centers. Doc Childre and his teamreport that the heart, in addition to pumping blood through-out the body, generates an electrical wave that is 60 timesmore powerful in amplitude than electrical waves gener-ated by the brain. The heart has its own nervous systemthat sends critical information to the brain. These mes-sages profoundly affect emotional control, mental clar-ity and reaction times, dramatically affecting our physiologyand performance as human beings. This has had pro-found implications in the medical community and, re-cently, in the golf world.

Here’s how it works. Nerve impulses from the heart tothe brain are received at the first brain level. This is the

portion of the brain that regulates our basic life func-tions, blood pressure and the autonomic nervous sys-tem. Then the first brain signals the higher levels of thesecond brain, which includes the thalamus and the amyg-dala. The amygdala monitors heart rhythm and other bodyresponses, sensing how the body is feeling. The patternof the signal sent from the first brain tells the secondbrain what the heart and body are experiencing, whilethe third brain monitors the second brain and catego-rizes the feeling, such as fear, worry, anxiety, anger, etc.

A feeling such as stress produces self-poisoning hor-mones that negatively affect athletic performance, es-pecially in “feel” sports. Doc Childre reports that everyindividual can learn how to teach the brain to produce apositive shift in emotion and hormonal balance with Heart-Math’s Freeze-Framer® software. The program allows anygolfer the chance to play the game at enhanced levels.

The Freeze-Framer interactive learning system is a sci-entific technology that combines heart-focus techniquesfor clear decision making, anxiety reduction and improvedhealth. These methods create an immediate and profoundshift in how we view a situation by removing the pres-sure source and this, in turn, breaks the stress cycle. TheFreeze-Framer teaches the ability to make on-the-spot attitude and emotional adjustments, ensuring we don’tget trapped in a self-inflicted emotional roller coaster thatnegatively affects our performance.

In a series of golf-specific studies conducted by PGAMaster professional JoeThiel at his World WideGolf Schools, use of theFreeze-Framer programresulted in increasedclubhead and ball speedand improved path. TheThiel study suggests thatemotions and physiologycan be managed using,of all things, the heart,which, in turn, can ac-celerate the developmentof improved techniqueand emotional control.

For more info, visitwww.heartmath.com.

—Mark Thiel

HEART TO HEART

HeartMathTECHNOLOGY&YOUPlay Golf “In The Zone” All The Time

1969PING designs the K1 iron, whichis a perimeter-weighted, invest-ment-cast ironmade of 17-4 stainless steel.

®

Your ticker can con-trol emotions on alevel equal to thebrain. Regulatingemotions that release damaging hormones is key tofinding “the zone.”HeartMath can as-sist this control.

Posted with permission from Golf Tips Magazine. Copyright© 2001 Werner Publishing Corp. Learn more about this magazine by going to http://www.golftipsmag.com�