Golf guru: don’t keep them waiting

December 12, 2014 06:48 pm | Updated 06:48 pm IST

Andiamo is Italian for “Lets go, hurry up!” This word captures the very ethos of the way golf needs to be played.

“They call it golf because all the other four-letter words were taken,” are the immortal words of the great Raymond Floyd. True enough, it can be excruciatingly painful when you team up with a golfer who cares a hoot about the pace at which it is played.

Novice golfers, nay, even the ones who have been at it for a while, do not learn the correct drill when someone else is playing a shot. Ideally, it is to stand opposite him or out of his peripheral vision and importantly not fidget or make any noise.

Nonetheless, this is not a hard-and-fast rule and all one needs to do is to ensure that any action does not put the player off and delay the proceedings. Indeed, the last thing one would want is to see the player go through his laboured gyrations!

Slow play is the curse of modern golf. The cause for this is the age-old ritual of waiting for the other player to complete his shot. If four players in a group are at different points on the fairway, there is no reason why each player cannot commence his routine such as checking the yardage, visualising the shot, selecting the club and then be ready to play in an instant after the person who is away, plays.

Everyone knows that the preparation for a shot is like launching a trebuchet while laying siege to a city! If all such launches were to commence one after the other, the time saved would be immense.

This is particularly true on a putting green where we often observe three players politely lounging around while the fourth goes through an excruciating routine: circling the hole to get a read from all points on the compass, then holding up his putter at arms length to get a plumb line read and then shuffling his feet interminably before making the stroke, all of two minutes later. One may ask, “What is 2 minutes?” But multiply that by 4 in a group and by 18 holes and you will see the difference; that’s so much time less at the 19th hole.

Festina lente or “hasten slowly” is a mantra that one would do well to remember while playing golf. True, some pundits may argue that playing good golf may involve a thorough study and proper execution of each shot. But do remember that there is a limit to which all this extra fretting can help. Mind specialists argue that it is best to make up one’s mind and then proceed to quickly execute the shot so as to eliminate doubts and ensure greater success.

Most people have a problem following road rules, so asking them to follow some of the rules of golf, regarding right of way, is like carrying coal to Newcastle.

There is always a dichotomy as to whether it is more frustrating to be held up by a slow group or be chased by a faster group. However, it is a matter of fact that if a group is slow and loses its position, it must “invite” the group following to go through.

The moot question is, how does one gently remind the group ahead of this priority. Certainly not by yelling out “fore” or hitting a ball into the offending group, an act that might see the ball being hit back to you, or most often, out of bounds. Being irascible is not the order of the day; a quiet word with the sensible one in the group ahead or with a marshal or club official will go a long way in easing unpleasantness.

“He was clean-shaven when we teed off and his beard was a stubble after a round,” said Lee Trevino on the notoriously slow Bernhard Langer. As the book says, play fast, replace divots and rake bunkers and we will all be one happy family.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.