Byron Kalies

You’ve hit your 3 iron to 8 feet. You march confidently to the green and mark your ball. It’s your turn to putt and within 60 seconds you’re a nervous wreck – you three putt and walk off the green shattered, disillusioned and grumpy.

You’ve done everything exactly as they do it on the tele. You’ve looked at the distance from ball to hole from the left side, from the right side, from the hole side and from behind the ball. You’ve crouched behind the ball. You’ve held your putter like a plumb bob and looked at the hole closing your left eye then your right eye (you’re not too sure why you’ve done this but you have). You’ve lined the mark on your ball with the hole and stroked the ball 3 feet past the hole, twice.

What I think you should have done is walk up and hit it. I firmly believe that when you look at a putt you get enough accurate information in those first few seconds. The rest of the time you spend confusing yourself. .
In the next minute or so you spend time looking for confirmation that you were right in the first place. However, you start doubting yourself, looking at the slope again, guessing, getting negative thoughts, second guessing, remembering all those times you left this putt short, or long. You worry about your feet, your putter, your head. It’s a wonder you get any putts anywhere near the hole.

There is evidence from a variety of places that indicate that I am not making this up;
In the eye there are roughly 126 million nerve cells in the retina. What happens is that light hits the neurons and convert the image on the retina into nerve impulses. These impulses are then transmitted to the brain. Each neuron is capable of firing once a millisecond, yet the average activity is only four times per second. So, although it is estimated that your eyes take in a billion pieces of information every second, the brain can only process a fraction of this information – perhaps 4000 or so pieces of data. So the brain has to ‘fill in the gaps’ and ‘guess’. These guesses tend to be based on previous experiences and a set of schemata. This will invariably lead to mistakes and assumptions. The more time you have to ‘fill in the gaps’ the more you are likely to compound the errors.

You have to rely on your instincts to a great degree – it is biologically impossible to take in all the information you see, as described above. For instance – shut your eyes now and describe your watch. You may have seen this thousands of times in the past few months yet how well can you describe it. What colour is it? What writing is on it? Describe the strap. You see it yet you don’t see it.

You may well not be able to describe it very well, but does it matter? If you look at it for 30 seconds you will retain a lot more information about the watch face, the hands but has that helped you tell the time more accurately?

People make accurate assesments very quickly. Exactly how quickly was assessed by Artemio Ramirez and Michael Sunnafrank of the University of Minnesota. They carried out an experiment with 164 college freshmen. The students were split into pairs and selected to spend either three, six or ten minutes talking to each other and then completed a questionnaire asking them to predict how positive or negative a relationship they would have. Nine weeks later they were asked to reassess the relationship.

There was a high correlation between that first impression and how they felt now. They also tended to sit closer to them in class and talk to them more. One important result was that it made no difference if it were three, six or ten minutes.

In a 1993 study Professor Nalini Ambady, a social psychologist at Tufts University videotaped graduate teaching fellows as they taught their classes. She selected three random ten-second clips from each tape and combined them into one thirty-second clip for each teacher. She then showed these silent clips to students who did not know the teachers. The students then rated the teachers on a number of variables including “active,” “competent” “confident.” They combined these individual scores into one overall score for each teacher. These scores were kept and compared with the teachers’ end of term evaluations from actual students who studied under them for a year.
“We were shocked at how high the correlation was,” Ambady said” It was 0.76. In social psychology anything above 0.6 is considered very strong.” Ambady cut the length of the silent clips to six seconds. “There was no significant difference between the results with thirty second clips and six-second clips,” Ambady says.

More and more recent research seems to be saying more and more that you are right instinctively a lot of the time.  If there is something you know about, and feel is right – like when to take a putter or a wedge from off the green, go with your gut feeling. People often analyse things to death. You know yourself and you know your game. You really, really are the best person to judge.

The useful of this approach is summed up by Malcolm Gladwell in Blink. The basic idea is to sort through those first impressions to “figure out which ones are important and which ones are screwing us up.” While most of us would like to think our decision making is the result of rational deliberation, Gladwell argues that most of it happens subconsciously in a split second. This process, “rapid cognition”, is where room for both error and insight appears. Many of the snap judgments we make are based on previously formed impressions and are competing with subconscious biases such as emotions and projections. Once we become aware of this we can learn to control rapid cognition by extracting meaning from a very small amount of information.

All very interesting but all boiling down to the same message;

Trust that instinct.

On the tee at the par 3 18th at Dewstow Golf Club I reached for a 7 iron. This was the first time I’d played the course but on meticulous investigation of the yardage (card), the wind (finger in air) and slope (downhill) I thought a 7 iron was perfect. I noticed my playing partner (a life long member at this club and a hitter of similar distance to me) reaching for an 8.

I put my 7 iron away and hit the 8. I was 10 yards short. My playing partner hit an 8 and was also 10 years short.

“I’m always short on this hole” he muttered as we walked after our balls.

Golfers are creatures of habit. We obey sets of regular, repeated behaviour often for no other reason than we’ve always done it - I leave a drop of tea in my cup even though I haven’t used tea leaves for 20 years, I read the newspaper from the back to the front even though the sports pages have long since moved to a special section of their own. I put 3 long tees and 3 short tees in my pocket at the start of each round. I always hit driver on the 8th - I think it’s the law.

“A golfer has more rituals than a catholic priest.” I’ve heard.

Consider this; the parable of the quiz show, the car and the 2 goats.

On a tv quiz show there are 3 prizes - 2 goats and a car. There are 3 doors in the studio and behind each door is either a goat or a car. The contestant chooses one of the doors. However this door does not get opened immediately. Instead the host of the show, who knows where all the prizes are, will give the contestant more information and allows them to change your mind, if they want to. The extra information you get is your host opens one of the doors not chosen to reveal a goat.

The intriguing question now is “Should the contestant stick with their original choice of door or change their mind?”

The initial thought may be that this seems ridiculous - surely your first choice should stay as you’ve a 1 in 3 chance of winning…. surely it can’t make any difference?

However it does and you should. You should change your mind and you’ll have a better chance of winning. Let me explain;

There are 3 doors - A B and C. Assume the car is behind Door A .
This means there are 3 possibilities;

1.You choose Door A. The host reveals the goat at Door B. If you now change your mind and choose Door C you only win a goat.

2.You choose Door B. The host reveals the goat at Door C. If you now change your mind and choose Door A you win the car.

3.You choose Door C. The host reveals the goat at Door B. If you now change your mind and choose Door A you win the car.

If you keep Door A you will only win a car 1/3 of the time.

The situation has changed. A few minutes ago at the beginning of the exercise you had a 1 in 3 chance of selecting the door with the car behind it. Now with the additional information there is a 2 in 3 chance.

OK - it’s a little contrived but the principle is the same - if you get more information don’t ignore it - reassess. Often I see players wandering off to chip with a wedge and find a bad lie. Instead of walking back to their back for a sand wedge they’ll try a ridiculous shot with the wedge then moan for the rest of the round. Or players will see their playing partners leave their putts short and will then hit their own putt short,and moan about it for the rest of the round. If things change - reassess and change with them.

Look through the lists below (not drawn from a remote, Southern States Country club or an English Home Counties club, or a Colonial backwater from the Victorian era  from 1940) and if anyone can give me a satisfactory, sensible, non-sexist, non-offensive, non-elitist, answer to one question I’ll eat my large, indiscrete Nike-logoed, backward-worn baseball cap.

Ready….… the one word question is ‘Why?’

“ Dress Code:
Women (all ages)
Conservative, tailored slacks, golf skirts, shorts
Socks should be knee high or no more than two inches above the ankle

Men (all ages)
Tailored slacks or Bermuda shorts
Shirts with both a collar and sleeves and tucked in at all times
Socks should be knee high or no more than two inches above the ankle

Prohibited dress;
Denim apparel in all colours,
Racer backs, tank tops or halters,
Front of shirt must not descend below the collar bone,
Bare midriffs in standing position,
Large or indiscrete logos are not acceptable,
Cargo pants with buckles and ties,
Stirrup pants,
Warm-up suits,
Pull-on drawstring shorts/slacks,
Skirts / shorts that are more than five inches above the knee or less than 18 inches when measured from the bottom of the waistband,
Hats worn backwards.“

I love the sport of golf. However I hate the nonsense that goes on around it. I don’t think I’m on my own;

Ask potential golfers that can’t afford the extortionate rates to join a club. This is assuming their face fits and they are allowed to part with their money.
We should be grateful, I suppose, that this isn’t as bad as it used to be. There used to be a time when you needed a 5 year wait, a thousand pound joining fee and a Masonic handshake to get into a golf club. We’ve moved on from that.
This is true. However, I’d like to believe the reason we’ve moved on is due to an enlightened attitude in the Committee room. I suspect though that it’s more to do with the recession and the current economic climate.

Ask women or juniors who frequently get shoved to an odd afternoon in the middle of the week or a few unsociable hours on the weekend when the men have finished their rounds and are in the bar.
However, all is not doom and gloom. There are exceptions. Not too many, but there are exceptions. The Celtic Manor 2010 Club, as I understand it has no different times for men, women or juniors on the 2010 course. Membership is the same for all and there is no discrimination of any sort. Fantastic and a role model to other clubs. However you shouldn’t need to pay £6,000 to buy fair treatment. Why wouldn’t all golf clubs do this? Answer on a postcard to the usual address.

Let’s go back to the nonsense that is symbolic of the attitude of golf clubs; the dress code. Now I believe there are occasions where you need a dress code; deep sea diving for instance, working in a nuclear power plant or being a catalogue model. These professions will require a certain standard of clothing and rightly so. I get that.

What I can’t quite grasp is the fact that I pay thousands of pounds, well hundreds, to spend my sparse and valuable leisure time being told what to wear. I’m not sure I’m keen on that. I don’t have this down the pub, in my lounge or in my garden. So what is it all about?

The dress code is so, so nonsensical. It’s a trip to an older, happier time when men dressed properly, there was respect, good manners, child poverty, a life expectancy of 28 and women knew their place. For instance - Why can’t you wear a comfortable tee-shirt? Why can’t you wear jeans to play golf?

Let’s look at the argument;
Denim / tee-shirts / etc.. look scruffy.

On at least 2 levels this argument is nonsense;

1. to most people under the age of 80 they don’t look scruffy and
2. so what?

Let’s not even get into the argument of jeans being more expensive that trousers and whilst a £300 pair of True Religion jeans are deemed unacceptable, a 20 year old pair of scruffy, ripped trousers is somehow perfectly acceptable. Let’s go straight for the ‘so what?’

Why on earth does it matter is someone’s shirt isn’t tucked in, or the shorts aren’t tailored, or the jeans are scruffy. You aren’t going to have tea with the Queen (although I’ve a few thoughts on that one). You’re playing a game. A game involving grass, mud, water, rain, etc… It’s supposed to be fun. Which does not mean everyone must wear jeans. It’s supposed to be pleasure.

In my own, personal, golf club the dress code would say; ‘Be Comfortable. Keep Warm. Don’t wear anything that could upset anyone else.’  I would not be bothered if your shorts were 6 inches above the knee or your socks were 3 inches above your ankle (what is that one all about?). It’s a game - enjoy yourself.

I suspect the reason behind the dress code is a wealth of old twaddle concerning class, Victorian values and often just plain prejudice and elitism around golf clubs (or tradition as some would deem it). Why do we take our hats off and shake hands on the 18th? It’s tradition. Why do golf courses have 18 holes? It’s tradition. Why don’t we have any women or juniors on our committees to make decisions unless they’re in a ‘secretarial’ capacity or are there basically as observers with no real voting power? It’s tradition.

Now I’m not an anti-traditionalist myself. I quite like the ‘hats off and hand shaking’ thing but I can’t really say I’m a fan of any institution where a handful of like-minded, similarly educated, similarly dressed 60 – 70 year old middle-class, professional men make all the decisions on when I can play, who I can play with and what I’m allowed to wear based on an archaic set of values that are deemed ‘proper’.

Oh, and sometime soon the argument will crop us, “Well what would happen if everybody behaved like you and wore what they liked and didn’t take their hats off when they walked into the bar?” I have a well-thought out succinct argument for that too, “Nothing would happen. Let people keep their hats on in the club if they wanted to. Why on earth would it matter?”

It’s tradition. So on that basis let’s keep a gang of small children around the back of the clubhouse and wheel a few out to carry our golf clubs and tee up for us for a few pence each round. Or let’s keep women out of the bar or stop blacks and other minorities playing golf altogether. These have been some of the traditions of golf clubs in the (not too distant) past.

Most members are glad some of these traditions have disappeared but seem to have trouble fighting the more subtle nuances of discrimination and personal freedom………
Or is it that somewhere deep down many men still want to cling to those Victorian values where they were obeyed?

So perhaps the recession has been a good thing in this one respect. Golf clubs are becoming more open about membership. It’s often a matter of survival these days – hopefully this will survive even if there’s a financial upturn. Perhaps not. For the sake of fairness and equality let’s hope this recession is here to stay

Note – The dress code list comes from ‘The Ladies Golf Club of Toronto’ which describes itself as ‘A Classic Club for Contemporary Women’.

1. The Learning Curve - Myth

Ask anyone about ‘the learning curve’ and they’ll describe a nice, elegant smooth curve. It looks as if all you need to get through that difficult first ten years of learning to play golf is; time, an endless supply of money, patience and some resilience.

2. The Learning Curve - Reality

However, that hasn’t been my experience. Learning doesn’t happen in a nice smooth line. The way golfers learn is through a series of disasters interspersed with a few brief moments of pure delight. The delight is a tantalising glimpse of how the game can be played. A moment when you hit a shot as good as anyone on earth has ever played. It is as rare as a ghost orchid or a Youtan Poluo but it’s enough to make you endure the next 3 months of pain, false promise and shattered dreams.

Learning is not a curve – it’s a cross-section of the Alpine mountain stage of the Tour de France and you are Lance Armstrong. Each stage is more exhausting than the previous one. I lied when I said you were Lance Armstrong – you’re not Lance Armstrong – you’re Yauheni Hutarovich (2009 Tour de France Lanterne Rouge)

How it works;

1. You think you understand golf ….. then it bites you on the bum –

2. You hit a 210 yards three wood to 6 feet ….. then you 3 putt -

3. You think you understand golf ….then it bites you on the bum.

Incidentally the best sporting quote ever was from a cyclist – Bernard Hinault – “I attack when I’m tired. In that way no-one knows I’m tired.”. Translated into golfing terms this means – when you’re playing your 7^th out of the rough on a par 5 give it your full attention – make it your best shot (there’s a facile line that many a wizened golf writer would use here about counting the shots at the end of the round and that one shot you saved turning the 12 into an 11 will make all the difference. But we all know that that’s all tosh – if you’re shooting double figures on one hole the odds of getting in the top half of any competition are as likely as Tiger Woods three putting – oops hold that).

However I do feel that focusing on every shot, especially when you’re at your lowest, is fantastic for you as a person. I would recommend it unreservedly as one who has had a number of those moments when all you want to do is walk in. If anyone has played West Mon (the highest tee in Wales) you’ll know what I mean. It’s permanently cold, invariably blizzard conditions and there’s the 13th par 5 hole that starts uphill and keeps going uphill. It’s generally horrid – I’d like to see some of the spoilt US PGA pros leaving the South Coast of US to play a Cock of the North league match at Tredegar and Rhymney, West Mon or Mountain Ash. /RANT

Now focusing on your 6^th approach shot to the green when your clothes are as wet and cold as they used to be when you went out in the rain as a small child, your lips are blue, your seven extra gloves are all soaking wet, you can’t feel your hands, can be a bit of a challenge – but it’s excellent if you can do it. And you’ll laugh about it later… perhaps a long time later … but you will remember that and learn from it. You’ll learn far more about yourself from the hard times, than from the easy times – trite, undoubtedly, but also absolutely true.

Attribution Theory by Fritz Heider basically says that there are 4 factors that affect your behaviour; ability, effort , luck and the difficulty of the task.

At the start of a round golfers usually tend to be fairly jolly, optimistic and sensible. They congregate next to the first tee swinging cheerfully and joking with the group in front; “Now don’t be embarrassed about calling us through”.

Golfers tend to think that ability and effort are factors they have a fair amount of control over, whilst the difficulty of the task and luck are outside the control of the golfer. For instance if golfers practice they expect they will get better. If they have played regularly they expect to get better. If they are playing consistently well there is a belief they will continue to play well. This is all fairly sensible. However this can often be heightened in times of even the smallest increase in stress or tension.

For instance a golfer will drive well with his glove off a couple of times then he’ll never wear a glove again – ask Fred Couples. Suddenly Fred feels he has power over a factor outside his control – luck. We shall be returning to the concept of attribution theory and luck…. But first ……

One of the most interesting factors about golf and attribution theory concerns handicaps. A 16 handicapper playing with a 24 handicapper will often be amazed if the 24 handicapper out drives them, or hits a really good shot, “bandit.”, “24 ********* handicappers” they may be heard to mutter. In truth however there is only a few shots difference and it’s inevitable a higher handicapper will hit some better shots than a lower handicapper. Attribution theory will kick in however and all the effort the lower handicapper has put in to get their handicap down will feel wasted when the 24 handicapper birdies the trickiest par 5 to get 5 stableford points. Over the course of a round the high handicapper will make more mistakes and end up, usually, with a number of holes with no score. However, the 16 24 handicapper will forget this. This will affect their game as they spend more time worrying about their playing partner than their own game and consequently put less effort into their own game and fail. From experience you know this to be true.

When this happens they tend to not attribute this to themselves but look at their luck, “Trust me to get drawn to play with a 24 handicap 12 year old female bandit.”

Luck, fortune, fate, destiny and providence are very interesting aspects for golfers. In times of stress they can really kick in. Even in times of non-stress it kicks in. For example we use the same coloured tees, the same hat, socks, jumper, underwear, etc. If things are going badly it’s rarely the fault of poor technique, lack of concentration or over-optimistic shot selection. It’s habitually down to luck.

“Just my luck I haven’t got a shot in.” – translation: I shanked one behind a tree

“How come I always get a bad lie.” – “Because you keep hitting it in the rough.”

The difficulty of the task is affected very much by the mood. The difficulty of the task never changes. It is the same golf course for you and all the competitors. It’s the same as it was last week. OK the weather may change but again it’s the same for everyone. You can change, adapt your game, but this never changes – really. So, don’t spend any time worrying about it.

Let’s make it very simply. Of the 4 elements that affect your game only ability and effort are under your control. So go practice.

John Cook marks his golf ball only with US quarters (25 cent coins that feature different US States) that reflect pictures of states in which he has not only played, but played well. Arnold Palmer’s wife kisses each one of his golf balls before he uses them in a game. Doug Sanders refuses to play golf with white golf tees, as he considers them to be unlucky. Paul Azinger always marks his golf ball with a US penny, which features the head of Abraham Lincoln. He also makes certain to turn the penny so Lincoln is looking at the hole. He thinks this brings him good luck! Christina Kim doesn’t step on the edge where the fairway meets the green, as she considers this to bring bad luck to her golf game. Christina Kim doesn’t step on the edge where the fairway meets the green, as she considers this to bring bad luck to her golf game.

“90 % of the game is all mental - the other half is physical” - Yogi Beera

Yogi attempting to explain his philosophy to a group of non-cerebral golfers

You’re on the green at the uphill par 5 514 yard 3rd at West Mon Golf Club (the highest golf club in Great Britain). It’s blowing a gale and there’s that curious West Mon weather which is a mix of wind, rain, hail and snow. It’s like an angry, but dexterous, polar bear throwing hard rice pudding at you. It stings. You’ve hit the best driver, 3 wood, 3 wood, 3 wood and you’ve just 3 putted from 8 feet. You look at your frozen golf partners and silently ask “Why do we do it?”. They silently shrug back at you and you move to the next tee.

The mental side of Winter Golf is pretty much the same as Summer golf except that it’s magnified. It’s tough.The main problem, for me at least, seems to be an accelerated lack of confidence, and a short term memory. There’s also a concept called private logic;
.
The first day of Winter golf feels like you’ve never seen a golf club in your life before. Where a week ago( at least in your head) you’d hit an 8 iron to the centre of the green today you’re taking a 6 iron and still leaving it short. The logical part of your brain is saying - “hit a 5 next time. It’s obviously wetter - no run on the ball, colder air, bad lie, uphill ” yet the illogical (private logic) part of your brain would remember the 1 occasion you actually hit the green with an 8 iron and conveniently forget the dozens of times it fell short. It would argue that a 5 iron would be ridiculous and that your playing partners were all hitting 7s or 8s (irrespective of the fact that they were better golfers and still leaving their shots short).

Your mind is composed on 2 parts; logic and private logic. The logic part is well… logical. The private logic element taps in to all your private fears, insecurities, doubts.

For instance, setting aside the shot selection angle for a minute and turning to the condition of the course. Winter golf conditions vary considerably. Some days it’s frosty, the next day it’s raining - the same drive can go 290 yards with a good bounce and a following wind one day - then sink into the soft mud at 200 yards on another day. You know this and your logical part of your bran knows this. However your private logic part of your head still goes through the stages of change; immobilisation, denial, anger, bargaining, depression ………

As I said at the beginning everything is magnified. An 80 yard pitch to the green that would be fairly routine (to think about, not execute) in Summer is a potential nightmare in Winter. In Summer you’d select a club, aim for a spot on the green, swing the club, miss the spot, miss the green and trudge after the ball. In Winter you think about the ground (hard, soft, normal), the green (temporary, cut up, slow) the club you choose (pitch it all the way, bounce it in). In the end you’re so busy worrying about everything you’ll concentrate so hard on getting a wedge 2 inches onto the green 3 yards up from the pin that you forget how to swing the club and end up taking an air shot.

Similarly putting - by the time you’ve worked out how much break to allow, what the wind will do, what would be the best position if you don’t make it, whether the mud is lying toward you or against you, you forget to hit it and leave it 6 feet short (which for a 5 feet putt takes some doing).

Now I’m not saying this doesn’t happen in Summer it’s just exaggerated.

The realisation I’ve finally arrived at is that Winter is not a enchanted time. Winter pixies do not sprinkle their magic Winter pixie dust over Bargoed Golf Club and reverse the principles of Nature - downhill is still downhill. The laws of physics still apply to golf balls in December. Greens that are on a slope in August are still sloping in January. The 14th is still 172 yards long.

Roll on Summer ………..

I finally get golf.

I understand all the mysteries of the game.

I even remember the day I achieved this state. It was the final competition of Summer 2009. I had been in a particularly relaxed frame of mind- I’d played some decent shots, some pretty poor shots- but it all seemed to fit. The ball went more or less where I wanted it to – If I hit a bad shot I ended up in a bad place. When I hit a good shot I ended up in a good place. I had reached the golfing equivalent of achieving karuna. Now if only life was as simple as this….

The following week Winter Golf began…

I’m not sure ‘Winter golf’ is the right term. It’s not really golf is it? Or ‘it’s golf Jim but not as we know it’. Perhaps we should call it something else – ‘flog’ perhaps..

The following week Winter Flog began…

In the course of 7 days the golf course had changed from a pristine, emerald, slightly undulating, tightly mown, interesting, tree-lined, water-featured, offering a different challenge on every hole, sandy bunkered and undulating (oops already said that), slick, challenging, but fair greens into a scene resembling the trenches from World War I. There were temporary greens, temporary tees, temporary everything. There were 487 new rules all designed to stop you hitting the ball, and a totally new attitude to go with it. A week ago there was a riotous rabble of jolly chaps and smiley ladies laughing and having such a hoot of a time. Now this was real male, manly, macho time. The testosterone was so intense you could sense that the neural areas of the brain the metabolites were influencing changing patterns of behaviour due to increased neural connectivity and neurochemical characterization.

Winter Macho Flog had begun…

It doesn’t help that this the golf club is at the top end of the Rhymney valley, feels slightly further north than the North Frigid Zone, is 29,030 feet above sea level and colder than a mother-in-law’s love (oops sorry).

There was a time when I was a big, big fan of 365 days a year golf. I even played in the ultimate macho competition – The Winter League – ‘Cock of the North’ as it was called, which summed it up on so many levels. One of the many, many rules of the league was that you had to play on a Sunday morning - whatever the weather – or forfeit the match ( and feel the shame and derision of not playing). The only way out of this was if you and your partner and your opponents mutually agreed to call it off and call it a draw. The winners of the Cock of the North and the club poker champions were invariably the same pair;

Scene – 8:28 on a Sunday morning in the clubhouse looking out at a blizzard;

“I really fancy it today.”

“Me too. I had an early night and whacked down a load of vitamins so look out today.”

“Me too. I love it when it’s nice and fresh.”

“Bracing”

“I find I play better with a touch of frost bite in my fingers – helps my putting.”

pause…..

“Let’s call it a draw and I’ll get the first round”

“Agreed”

“Agreed”

“Brandy for me.”

……………………………. happy days

But non-league Winter golf is supposed to be fun. When you’re teeing off from a rectangle the size of a small face flannel it’s not too much fun. When you’re slipping around in the mud like Bambi on ice it’s not the best feeling. It has prompted one of the best retorts I’d heard on a course though. After getting harangued for putting his opening drive out of bounds a colleague was heard to remark that it was because he had a bad lie on the tee.

However, you eventually succeed in getting your drive away and march resolutely after it praying it’s in the rough or 151 yards from the green. Because (and I’m not sure how universal this is) in our club if you’re 150 yards or less away from the flag you must play off Winter mats. These abominations ( and yes I know all the arguments about why we use them) are the most annoying piece of gold equipment since tassels on the front of golf shoes, and just as useful. They are roughly 2 feet long, 1 foot wide, six inches thick and curled up at the edges like a 3 day old cheese and lettuce sandwich. To be honest it’s easier to play out of a bunker.

You reach the ‘green’. Green it ain’t. The dictionary describes green as;

a. “The hue of that portion of the visible spectrum lying between yellow and blue, evoked in the human observer by radiant energy with wavelengths of approximately 490 to 570 nanometers; any of a group of colours that may vary in lightness and saturation and whose hue is that of the emerald or somewhat less yellow than that of growing grass; one of the additive or light primaries; one of the psychological primary hues.” ,

i.e. a colour

or b “ The culmination of a golf hole, where the flagstick and cup are located and where a golfer will “putt out” to end the hole. The area of closely cropped grass surrounding each hole.

i.e. a green

Well green the colour it definitely is not – more a greyish, reddish, blacky-brown and ‘an area of closely cropped grass” - I don’t think so either. It’s like trying to putt on a field that has been ploughed by an angry farmer with a team of heavy, drunk shire horses.

However this is only part of the problem – the physical. Mentally….. next time………..

“A game is an ongoing series of complementary ulterior transactions progressing to a well-defined predictable outcome.” – says Eric Berne

“OK”, I reply, “tell me more”

“in time…” he replies cryptically.

We play golf. Eric and I, against some friends, let’s call them Alan and Des. Eric is, by nature, a little deliberate, but we toddle along happily enough until I hit a nice 4 iron approach to the 5^th which takes a bad bounce into the bunker.

“Typical” I rant. “Always me. I must be the unluckiest golfer in the world.”

Eric looks on

“Seriously though – if there are any bad bounces going around I’m sure to get them.” I chunder.

On the green I ask Eric to have a look at my putt. I’m not sure if it’s straight or slightly left to right. Eric refuses. I miss the putt.

Alan and Des help each other out and, of course, start winning. By the turn they’re 3 up and smiling – which is unusual for Alan and Des.

On the 10^th Alan steps onto the tee with an iron. Des advises him to hit a driver. Alan feels that an iron would be safer. They discuss….vigorously. Des, as acting captain, decrees that Alan must hit a driver. Alan asks Eric what he should do. Eric says nothing. Alan calls Eric a shit and hits a driver out of bounds. Glaring, at Eric, Alan snatches an iron and also hits it out of bounds.

An hour later Eric and I win 3 and 2.

I await the debrief in the bar.

Eric decided early on that he wasn’t going to help me. In his words;

“ You seemed to be playing some sort of ‘poor me’ game….’boo hoo’”, he mimed, fairly accurately, “ I’m a bad person. Nobody loves me.’ This gives me a clue to the type of reaction I could expect if I did help you.”

We time travel back to the 5^th green……

Eric looks at my putt and advises ‘left lip’. It is – it goes in – we halve the hole.

On the 6^th I ask for advice. He advises me – I miss. The game continues and pretty soon I’m asking for advice for every shot. I’m not blaming Eric, quite the opposite – I’m joking and happy to have someone to sympathise with. Eric’s game however goes to hell.

We time travel back to the bar.

“Look out for “poor me’s” – they want sympathy and support which can be useful but psychologically it’s incredibly draining. It’s not healthy.”

“But what about Alan and Des?” I ask

“It’s a potential drama triangle “says Eric as we time travel back to the 10^th…..

… Des, as acting captain, decrees that Alan must hit a driver. Alan asks Eric what he should do…..

Eric skilfully freezes the scene and talks to me.

“It’s a classic drama triangle. Alan is the victim. Des is the persecutor and I’m the potential rescuer. “

“So why don’t you rescue?” I ask

“Look and see,“ Eric says in that strange tone people adopt in training videos. He then unfreezes the action.

Eric gets into a discussion with Alan about what he wants from the hole – does he want to go for a birdie, or is he happy with a steady par.

Des asks Eric what the hell his game is, “Don’t confuse my partner.”

Alan joins in and asks Eric what the hell is to him anyway.

Before long the roles have completely changes – Alan and Des are now the persecutors and Eric’s the victim. I join in and try to rescue Eric;

“Hey leave my mate alone.”

Pretty soon we’re all dancing between persecutor / rescuer and victim and we end up having a free for all on the 12^th green and are being questioned by the police for causing a public affray. Before they can arrest us we time travel back to the bar.

“I think I’ve learnt a very important lesson today” I say.

“Which is?” asks Eric.

“You should be extremely wary of helping golfers.”

“…. or real people” adds Eric

Keith’s specialist subject on Mastermind

There’s feedback and there’s feedback. Feedback in business / management / offices type environment is supposed to be constructive, positive, helpful, observable, blah blah blah. All good, all sensible and all designed to help. It works too. It even works in real life.

Unfortunately it doesn’t works on the golf course. The golf course is a strange, other worldly, parallel universe type- place which doesn’t always obey the laws of the rest of the world. It’s a place where different rules seem to apply;
What would happen if you followed the training courses rules giving feedback on a golf course? For example;

“When you hit your last shot I noticed your head lifted a little sharply and as a result your shot only travelled about 10 yards. As your partner I was disappointed in you and would advise you not to raise your head the next time. I hope you appreciate this feedback?”

Once you’ve extracted the 5 iron from your bottom you’d probably think twice about offering feedback like this in the future.

There are some golfers though that seem to have no problems offering feedback - whether you want it or not. These people tend to belong to that strange indigenous tribe called “the vets”. Not wishing to stereotype them, but I’ve got to, they are a bunch of no good, irritating, interfering old gits who are obviously so bored and have so little going on
in their lives that they’ve got to make your life a misery. Now this obviously doesn’t apply to all of them… but I’ve yet to meet one it doesn’t. For instance, I’m happily playing the back 9 around 8 o’clock in the morning. I’m on my own and can’t see a soul. Playing down the 12th I duff a 6 iron and it trickles along the ground into the bunker, so I drop another ball and hit the 6 iron onto the green. Before I can congratulate myself there’s a vet racing toward me in his golf cart giving me a earful for practicing on the course and reminding me of the standing, or lack of standing of a single player on a golf course. Plus others things such as dress code etc.
Before I can respond he’s zooming away into the distance in a hurry to tell others what he’s done. Don’t you just love them ……. Jerry Sadowitz has similar thoughts on old people and feels they should be shot at birth. I laugh and have to remind myself that it won’t be too long for me…

Beyond vets though there are others that are gifted in the feedback process - your playing partners. Or, more specifically, one of your playing partners… there’s always one and they tend to be called something innocuous like, oh I don’t know… let’s call him Keith.

The Keith’s of this world are really, really trying to be helpful, I suppose, but ………..
“It’s all to do with the position of the tee after the drive,” come the words of the wise. Keith was bending down looking at a 2 inch piece of plastic that you stick in the ground to support your golf ball, as if it were a medieval gold coin on an archaeological dig. He examined the area looking for all the world like a native American tracker from those old cowboy films. My florescent pink tee landed a few feet left of where I had hit my shot and a few yards behind it.
“The sign of a good drive is when your tee end up directly behind you.” he announces, untroubled by the fact that my golf ball is in the middle of the fairway and has travelled over 200 yards (a rare feat, granted).
“Tees to the left mean it’s a slice. Tees to the left equals a hook.”
“And how is that supposed to help?” asked one of the others in our fourball.
Unconcerned he continues, “Tee in front signify a slight fade with a touch of draw if you’re playing into a left to right wind.”
He looked at us as the Dali Llarma looks at his followers, “It’s a scientific fact.” This signified the end of the conversation.

The next hole he picks up a discarded tee. It’s plastic. He doesn’t approve. “Pros would never use rigid tees like this. They’re too hard and would alter the flight of the ball.” The 24 handicapper who owns the tee, is distraught. Keith can barely keep the distain from his voice as he holds the tee up. ” No. You’ll never find a pro using a plastic tee. It’s good to be wooden. It’s a scientific fact.” This, again, is the end of the conversation.

Keith knows a lot about tees. He is to tees what Gillian McKeith is to poo. Whilst the rest of us watch the ball soaring from a good drive, Keith keeps his eye on the tee. Somehow he even manages to do this on his own drives. He has never lost a tee in his life.

‘Rubber tees and winter mats’ would be his specialist topic on Mastermind.
He’s never lost a tee and rarely loses a ball. To be fair, no-one playing with him ever loses a ball either. He knows the course so well that he has some kind of mental map of every blade of grass, every tree, every ant, in his head somewhere. Halfway through your backswing he’ll announce, “Just short of the bunker behind the small bush.” And of course that’s where you’ll find it.

He’s also an expert of the rules of golf, local rules, the committee, the captain, the relative merits of 18 different makes of golf ball …. but that’ll be for another time….