Sam Snead
Practice puts brains in your muscles.Collection: Fitness
Of all the hazards, fear is the worst.Collection: Fear
If a lot of people gripped a knife and fork the way they do a golf club, they'd starve to death.Collection: Sports
The mark of a great player is in his ability to come back. The great champions have all come back from defeat.
Until you play it, St. Andrews looks like the sort of real estate you couldn't give away.
Those who go along get along.
Nobody asked how you looked, just what you shot.
Forget your opponents; always play against par.
The only reason I ever played golf in the first place was so I could afford to hunt and fish.
To be consistently effective, you must put a certain distance between yourself and what happens to you on the golf course. This is not indifference, it's detachment.
These greens are so fast I have to hold my putter over the ball and hit it with the shadow.
Never let up. The more you can win by, the more doubts you put in the other players' minds the next time out.
Correct one fault at a time. Concentrate on the one fault you want to overcome.
Golf is played with the arms.
The greens are so fast I have to hold my putter over the ball and hit it with the shadow.
In golf, as in life, you get out of it what you put into it.Collection: Running
You've just one problem. You stand too close to the ball after you've hit it.Collection: Golf
'You know Bobby, when I was your age I'd drive the ball right over those trees at the corner.' Feeling challenged Mr. Cole hit a big driver right into those big trees. Snead then said 'Of course, when I was your age, those trees were only 10 feet high.'Collection: Golf
First and fore-most, you must have confidence. Your second mental problem is concentration. Think the shot through in advance before you address the ball. Draw a mental image of where you want it to go and then eliminate everything else from your mind, except how you are going to get the ball into that preferred spot.Collection: Golf
There is an old saying: if a man comes home with sand in his cuffs and cockleburs in his pants, don't ask him what he shot.Collection: Home
When I swing at a golf ball right, my mind is blank and my body is loose as a goose.Collection: Golf
Keep close count of your nickels and dimes, stay away from whiskey, and never concede a putt.Collection: Golf
You have more potential than you think.Collection: Thinking
No matter what happens - never give up a hole....In tossing in your cards after a bad beginning you also undermine your whole game, because to quit between tee and green is more habit-forming than drinking a highball before breakfast.Collection: Giving Up
I'd say that golf is about 75% mental. If your state of mind gets out of kilter, you're worse off than a tomcat floating on a log.Collection: Golf
The three things I fear most in golf are lightning, Ben Hogan and a downhill putt.Collection: Golf
To win you must have talent and desire but desire is first.Collection: Wrestling
Don't just play your way around the course. Think your way around way around the course.Collection: Thinking
Golf tip: Lay off for three weeks and then quit for good.Collection: Golf
Grip the club as if you were holding a baby bird.Collection: Baby
Most people who play golf have one big trouble: they think too much. To get any real mileage out of this game you've got to sit on your imagination.Collection: Real
A bad putter is like a bad apple in a barrel. First, it turns your chipping game sour. Then it begins to eat into your irons and finally it just cleans the head off your driver.Collection: Games
Of the mental hazards, being scared is the worst. When you get scared, you get tense.Collection: Hazards
Thinking instead of acting is the number one golf disease.Collection: Sports
Playing golf is like eating. It's something which has to come naturally.Collection: Golf
Golf course architects make me sick. They can't play themselves, so they rig the courses so nobody else can play either.Collection: Golf
Practice your swing until it becomes a habit of mind and muscle.Collection: Swings
Make the basic shot-making decision early, clearly and firmly, and then ritualize all the necessary acts of preparation.Collection: Decision
I shot a wild elephant in Africa thirty yards from me, and it didn't hit the ground until it was right at my feet. I wasn't a bit scared. But a four foot putt scares me to death.Collection: Golf
Golf got complicated when I had to wear shoes and begin thinking about what I was doing.Collection: Golf
The only reason I ever played in the first place was so I could afford to hunt and fish.Collection: Golf
What abandoned course is that?Collection: Golf
If I could have shot 69 in the last round every time, I would have won nine U.S. Opens. Nine!Collection: Golf
There are no short hitters on the tour anymore - just long and unbelievably long.Collection: Golf
That little white ball is always staring back at you, daring you to make a mistake.Collection: Mistake
What did I want with prestige? The British Open paid the winner $600 in American money. A man would have to be two hundred years old at that rate to retire from golf.Collection: Golf
If I had cleared the trees and drove the green, it would've been a great shot.Collection: Golf
Over the years I've studied the habits of golfers. I know what to look for. Watch their eyes. Fear shows up when there is an enlargement of the pupils. Big pupils lead to big scores.Collection: Eye
But you don't have to go up in the stands and play your foul balls. I do.Collection: Golf
Good golfing temperament falls between taking it with a grin or shrug and throwing a fit.Collection: Fall