How Many Hours to Practice Golf Each Week? Scratch Golfer

Whether you have goals of becoming a scratch golfer, or goals of breaking 100 for the first time, there is one important element that stands between you and your goal. That element is time.

Golfers who practice more [spending more time working on their skills] generally will improve faster at golf than the average person who plays a round of golf once a week.

It seems obvious but we need to state it for the record in case someone was looking for proof that they can become great at golf without much practice. Unfortunately, it just isn’t that easy. You need to practice and put in the time it takes.

Golf Practice Needed to Achieve Scratch Golf?

I reached scratch golf for the first time when I was in high school. It took me about 2 years to achieve scratch golf status where my golf handicap index was below a 1.

During those two years, family and friends will confirm I was at the golf course almost every day each week working on my game. Some days I was practicing 4-8 hours and other days 1-2 hours.

But despite the time lengths of the practices, the most important takeaway was the consistency. I was practicing golf almost every day. Showing up consistently day after day allowed me to excel my skills faster and see improvement to my scores.

It’s like trying to build muscle at a gym. You can’t expect to spend 4 hours at the gym today and get lots of muscle by tomorrow. It takes months of showing up to the gym over and over working out your muscles to grow them.

Same with your golf skills. Consistency is the key solution to reaching scratch golf handicap.

If you’re attempting to become a scratch golfer, then I suggest you start setting a minimum of 5 days of golf practice per week. Each day can vary on how long you practice and what you work on but here’s a general example of practice routine structure for helping you reach scratch golf faster:

How to Reach Scratch Golf – Example Practice Routine

Start with this simple structure and mix it up occasionally by shortening drill time from 45 minutes to 30 minutes on days when you want to play 18 holes instead of 9 holes.

• Driving Range – 45 minutes per day
• Chipping Practice – 45 minutes per day
• Putting Practice – 45 minutes per day
• Play 9 Holes each day – 90 minutes roughly

All in all this comes in around 4 hours of practice. It allows you to spend time on the 3 core components of your game (golf swing, chipping, putting) and then go out and play on the course for 9 holes to gain on course experience.

On-Course experience is another super important component that is a must have in any golf training plan.

You can do lots of drills every day on the practice green and driving range but I’ve found that the more holes of golf I played during practice, the more my score decreased when combined with practice drills.

Doing only lots of on course practice will get you so far and do only practice drills in the practice area will get you so far by themselves. But when you combine the two together and mix drills with playing lots of holes, your score drops faster!

So use that above practice routine to spend 2 hours drilling hard, fine tuning your skills. Then go out and play golf and learn on the golf course too.

If you’re wondering what golf drills to do during the 45 minute practice windows for chipping, putting, and golf swing (range time) then check out my drills used in my step by step training plan: How to Break 70 Golf Plan

Overall, you need to spend 4-5 hours a day practicing golf. Instead of playing a 4 hour round of 18 holes, play 9 holes and use the remaining two hours to work on drills for putting and chipping. However, if you have the time, then practice for two hours on drills and then hit the course for 18 holes. This will be about a 6 hour day.

And don’t forget consistency. You need to come back 5 days a week so you’re getting the repetition daily to build habits, muscle memory, and skill.

Trust me, this is how I reached scratch golfer status in two years from scoring above 100 for 18 holes to being able to shoot 70-75 for 18 holes. It’s a grind. But it’s worth it if you love golf as much as I do.

Work hard this year

Nick Foy Golf