By Alan M. Watson, President, GOLF+ PCB
A few days ago I was able to enjoy some time away from the shop with my son and one of my employees on the golf course. This was the first time Jon, my newest team member, had ever played this particular course, so I was trying to be helpful off each tee box with a brief explanation of the hole. The course has water on many holes, fourteen of eighteen to be exact, and I tried to point out water and other hazards when I could. On hole 15 there is water at the end of the hole near the green, but since it is a long par five I honestly didn’t think about mentioning the water at the tee box. Jon hit his drive a little left while I was in the middle of the fairway. We were a ways apart when he hit his next shot, and without the knowledge of the water, he did, in fact, get wet. That was on me. I should have warned him to lay up or to play left side as he approached the green so as not to flirt with the hazard. When he got up to the pond he looked at me and said, “I didn’t know there was water here.” I felt pretty bad since I could have warned him but I failed to do so.
Life is a lot like golf isn’t it? Hazards everywhere but rarely enough people around to warn you. And sometimes we probably wouldn’t listen anyway. I remember when I was in my late twenties thinking to myself that my father was full of all kinds of good advice. Too bad I didn’t stumble upon that realization until I was 26 or older. Not that his words weren’t true before that; it’s just that I wasn’t listening.
I think the best advice my father ever gave me was this gem – If you’re going to make adult decisions you have to be prepared to live with the adult consequences. Wow! That one hits home over and over as I look back on my life. But I digress.
Golf is pretty similar to my father’s advice. If you’re going to make golf decisions you have to be prepared to live with the golf consequences. Driver and then 3-wood into a long par five. Maybe. Or maybe a better play is to hit 5-iron then 5-iron then 7-iron into the green and have a birdie putt. Maybe driver off the tee goes out of bounds or 3-wood from the fairway just results in a topped shot that only wanders fifty yards. You need to reach a par three but the wind is in your face. Maybe the smart play is two extra clubs, choke down, and swing 75% rather than trying to muscle your stock iron up to the distance. Choices abound in golf as in life.
One choice I see lots of golfers get wrong is wedge selection around the greens. Choosing whether to bump and run, chip, or flop at a target on the green is dependent on many things. Flag placement for one. How much room do you have between you and the flag that is green versus rough? Are you in a fluffy lie or on a tight lie? What bounce options do you have and what shots have you practiced? We’ve all hit the dreaded chunk and run when we didn’t mean to from a wet lie right on the collar of a green. And many golfers have slid a wedge right under a ball while in a thick fluffy lie resulting in a shot that goes barely anywhere. Having the right wedge loft, bounce, and grind AND the skills to use them are tough to come by these days. More golfers should spend time chipping and putting before a round to get a feel for the unique grass and soil conditions at the course rather than banging balls on the driving range. Just my two cents. Find out what shots you are most comfortable with and work on those. Not every golfer is great with a flop shot. Most people would do well to learn how to bump a pitching wedge or gap wedge and get it rolling to the cup. Tap in putts for par are awesome! Long come backers are not!
Whatever hazards you face on the golf course or in life just know you’re not the only one and much like life, if you keep doing it over and over again you’ll figure it out eventually. Effort and repetition is the key to getting better at golf. Effort for sure usually outweighs smarts in life also. Again, just my two cents.
Fairways and Greens!
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