Do you remember growing up and always wishing you were slightly older? Like when you were 10, you couldn’t wait to become a teenager. Then when you were a teenager you couldn’t wait until you turned 16 to get your driver’s license. Then you couldn’t wait until you were of legal drinking age and so on and so on. Now that I am 52, I can’t wait until I’m 70. Well, not really, but I figure my golf game will improve significantly once I do!
On Friday August 2nd, 2013, I woke up early at my Aunt’s place in Delaware, drove about 45 minutes to Woodstown, New Jersey and walked onto the Town and Country Golf Links. It was the first time I hadn’t pre-booked a tee time, especially considering I had to drive the better part of an hour to get there. But considering I had pre-scouted (on Google Maps) another course about 10 minutes away, I figured it was a calculated risk. Once again, I was paired up with another single player. The night before I had played an enjoyable round with a young college student, this time my playing partner was to be at the opposite end of the age spectrum. A 71 year old retiree named John.
Now, I have never been what one would consider a “monster” hitter. That being said, I can still connect pretty well off the tee. The problem is that lately, I’m never quite sure where the ball is going to go after it leaves the club face. I think most average golfers suffer through stages similar to the one I’m in right now. A month ago, I might have had two bad drives per round. This past week, it was the exact opposite and I was constantly scrambling and cursing myself for those dreaded penalty strokes on the scorecard.
But a stark contrast to my game was that of my playing partner John. I think there may have been one hole where he didn’t hit the fairway off the tee. And it was the same tee shot every time. He’d line up slightly right of target and draw the ball back into the middle of the fairway, between 175 and 200 yards every single time! His second shot was generally just shy of the green, chip on and either par the hole with a one-putt, or two-putt for bogie. I didn’t end up adding up his score for the entire round, but by rough guess it would have been in the mid 80’s. And MOST of us duffers would kill to shoot that score on a constant basis!
Bottom line, there’s something to be said about consistency and accuracy over distance. “Grip it and Rip It”, “No guts no glory” etc. are terms we’ve all heard on the course and because there are those of us who are physically capable of taking a good cut at a ball, we tend to live by those terms. However, my round with John really showed me that as a golfer, one should not fear growing old and losing some of that ability to just pound the crap out of a ball! Maybe next round I might just leave the driver at home and hit 7 iron off of every tee!
