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Raise Your Game: Why golf?

Breanne Loucks: I was nine-years-old when I started and I just got hooked. My brother and my dad got me into golf. People said I had potential and it went from there really.

Once I started winning medals at my club I wanted more and more. It got quite addictive. The more I learnt, the more I wanted to do it. It's such a good sport. It takes a lot of concentration. You spend a lot of time on your own. I get a lot of satisfaction from golf. When you win or when you do something well, like striking the ball, you want more. It's like an addiction (laughs).

RYG: What skills have you learnt from golf?

BL: Over the last three years I've become very organised. I like to have everything just so. I'm constantly asking questions.

You meet lots of people and that means you learn to respect grown-ups, and you learn how to have a conversation with them. It's helped me with social skills and talking to people. It's even helped me talking in public, because I've done some after dinner speaking too.

It allows you to grow in confidence as a person, not just as a golfer. I see a lot of difference in the juniors in the club where I play. A lot of the kids there have got respect for older people. They're respectful and they're polite. It's very social.

RYG: How important is etiquette when you're playing golf?

BL: Etiquette is a huge part of golf. When someone's first learning how to play golf, you notice all the things that they don't do right. Holding a flag for someone when they're putting out is like holding a door open for someone. In golf the person that's furthest away from the hole gets to go first. That's like moving out of the way for someone if they want to walk past.

It makes you more open to people. When you play you turn up on the tee sometimes without knowing who your playing partner is. In life you need to be open to meeting new people, and you need to be polite to those people. It's a great sport for getting out there and learning new life skills.

RYG: What can golf do for your fitness?

BL: People do just play golf for fitness. It keeps me really fit. You're walking for four hours so it helps a huge amount. Sometimes I play 36 holes in a day. You're walking for eight hours and you don't realise how much you're actually doing. If you're playing at my level, you need to go to the gym and work hard so that you're able to tackle any situation on the golf course.

A lot of people play to get a bit of fresh air and to keep fit. It's not very often that you see unfit golfers. I play with people in their seventies and I can't believe they look so good. It keeps you looking young, even though the sun's not too good for your face (laughs).

RYG: Is it important to set yourself goals?

BL: Yes. My whole life is goal-oriented. I'm constantly setting goals. Most people make New Year's resolutions. They say 'Right, I'm going to lose weight for the New Year, I'm going to join a gym.'

Write it down, and you say to yourself 'I'm going to join this gym, I'm going to go this many times a week, and my goal is to lose a stone.' If you stick that on the fridge you've set a contract with yourself. You can't get away with not doing it as easily.

At one point I wasn't really enjoying my golf that much. I felt I needed something to help give me a bit more ambition and drive to achieve something. I sat down with my coach and we wrote down some goals. I look at them constantly to check if I'm achieving the things I want to. That's when I started to achieve things. I don't think I'd be able to play golf unless I had goals.

RYG: How do you handle the pressure of competing?

BL: I only feel pressure when I have an expectation of myself based on what other people think. I think 'They expect me to win this tournament, or to hole this putt.'

Rather than worrying about all that I go through my pre-shot routine. I try to take my time and relax myself. I focus on my breathing skills. If you sit and focus on your breathing, you stay in the present. You don't think about what's happened in the past or the future.

Sometimes I think about how the air coming out of my mouth would look if it was purple. That way you're focused on the here and now, and there's no way of you getting anxious, nervous or worried.

It's a really good technique to use. In a pressure situation, where you feel yourself starting to panic, you can just slow yourself down. Sometimes I can almost hypnotise myself so that I'm almost meditating. It's really relaxing and it's lovely to play golf when you feel like that.

RYG: What have been the highlights of your golfing career up to this point?

BL: The Curtis Cup in 2006 was unbelievable. I didn't really know what I was doing when I was there, because I was so in the zone. It all came so quickly and I did really well. That was an amazing moment.

I won the South African stroke play and match play championship this year (2008). They call it the South African double. That was an amazing experience. I was waiting to win quite big, so to get some experience under my belt of winning was unbelievable.

What topped them all off was the last Curtis Cup (2008). It gives me shivers just thinking about it. Being around thousands of people, just watching you play your shots. At one point we were five down with six to play. We got it down to one down with one to play.

On the last hole my partner hit a great shot off the tee, and I hit the next shot to within five or six foot of the pin, in front of three thousand people. People were shouting my name and I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes. That's what golf's all about, being a hero for a few seconds, with people cheering and whooping. It was unbelievable.

RYG: And the lowlights?

BL: Just the frustration of not achieving, and always being second best. Being in and around the area where you were close to winning but not finishing it off. That was really difficult, because you start to panic and ask yourself if you're really good enough. You ask yourself if you're ever going to win. Those were the real lows. It's something that you've always dreamed of and you start to worry and doubt yourself.

RYG: How do you turn things around when you're in that position?

BL: By setting goals and being single-minded. I cleared my mind of all the expectations. I almost wanted to show people that I could achieve. People were asking 'Why isn't Breanne achieving? Why hasn't she won yet? Why isn't she doing this?' I started to worry about what other people think.

You almost put that expectation on yourself. What I had to do was turn it around and ask myself 'Why am I playing golf?' and 'Who am I playing golf for?' Once I started to realise that I wanted to play golf for me, I realised that all I could do was my best. I started to enjoy it then.

RYG: What advice would you give to young people looking to be the best that they can be?

BL: Whatever you're doing, you've got to enjoy it. Golf, sport or anything that you want to be good at takes long term commitment. You need to enjoy the journey that you're on.

You're not going to be at the peak of the ride all the time, you've got to accept that there are going to be lows, so just enjoy them. You're learning from the experiences. Don't play sport for someone else, do it for yourself and enjoy it.

RYG: What are your future goals?

BL: I'm turning professional at the end of the year (2008), which I'm really looking forward to. I really want to be a successful professional.

I want to be part of changing people's perception of golf, especially women in golf. I think women tend to see it as a fuddy duddy sport for old people. It needs to become a younger sport and I'd like to be a part of that.

I'd also like to be number one in the world. If I keep working hard, I believe I can do that.

RYG: Can anyone play golf?

BL: Yes. Anybody can play golf. It's getting more and more popular because so many people can play. Every age plays, from kids to people in their eighties and nineties. It's one of those sports that, when I was growing up, everyone played together.

When I played with my dad, I played with his friends as well. When I played in competitions I played with the older ladies, or when I played in junior competitions I played with the other juniors. It's becoming a huge sport.