Golf Lessons
For those of you who don't know me real well, one thing I've been working on over the past 8 or so years is my golf game. I've played lots and lots of holes, and gotten pretty good along the way. Anywho, I thought I'd throw up a golf tutorial for those of you who might be considering taking up the sport... so here it is, my first live journal golf lesson.
Today's lesson is going to be based around the actual game I played today at Balcones country club. I'm gonna walk you guys through some of the high points, and let you know exactly what was going though my head on each critical play. So lets start out at the beginning, before the golf shoes even go on...
To play golf you must be prepared!!! There are some absolutely critical items each player must have:
1.) some type of golf club. (wood, iron, putter) it doesn't matter. The club is simply the item that goes in your non beer holding hand.
2.) Golf balls. These come in a variety of flavors, from ones that are perfectly obedient (rare), to that stupid f-ing c-s-ucking slicing piece of $#%!.
3.) Shoes. Hippies are not welcome on the golf course.
4.) Beer... self explanatory.
So after getting all suited up, I hit the first two holes as a warm up. Proper conditioning is important and starting off slow always helps solidify your game. Remember slow and steady wins the race. So all in all, I finished out the first two holes with two respectable +2's and beer number one down the hatch.
I really got into the swing on the third hole. I had a beautiful tee shot which carried me to the right side of the fairway. Now I had a decision to make: I could play the traditional second shot straight at the pin, or I could employ some advanced strategery (sp). Being a seasoned player, I decided to execute the advanced crisscross pattern to maximize my yardage covered. (see below) Over the next four shots I was able to double the yardage to the pin before a nice sixth shot onto the green.
Overall I finished this hole with the illustrious score of "%$#$!!"
Next up was hole four. Once again I had a beautiful tee shot straight into the right hand side of the fairway, and once again I had a choice on tactics. This time I chose a flanking pattern. When properly executed a flanking pattern moves the ball sideways across the fairway, rather than forward to the hole. This tactic allows the golfer to thoroughly exercise their sailor vocabulary. Some pros can make as many as six steps across the fairway without moving a single inch toward the hole. Talk about mad skills!!!
So after executing this textbook flanking pattern, I continued to finish out the front nine while finishing the first half of my beer stash. A quick note to beginners: By the end of the ninth hold you should have finished HALF of your beer. Remember in golf it is very important to pace yourself because if you run out of beer, you can't stop to get more until after the 18th hole. (though sometimes the magical beautiful beer fairy girl will come by on a cart and help refill your cooler)
Onto the back nine... we jump into hole number 12. Now those of you who went to college will be rather familiar with this hole. The way this hole works is you start on the tee box. You hit your ball and the lake gulps it up, and you in turn gulp up your beer (just like beer pong). you repeat this process until by some sort of miracle your ball floats past the lake and onto the green of this short par three. For those of you who didn't go to college I've included a diagram for clarification purposes:
If you aren't feeling good by the end of hole 12, you've got some serious catching up to do. Shit, most of the time, by hole 12, I've already lost my pants. Here's where we begin to separate the ams from the pros!!
The final hole we'll look at in this lesson is hole 16, a long par 4. Once again a good tee shot is an absolute imperative for good golf. The second shot in this case left me just to the right of the green, only around 10 yards to the flag. Now I had a decision. The green sits high up on a plateau and my shot was sitting in the valley below. The was a prime opportunity to employ the sisyphus maneuver. When properly executed the sisyphus maneuver consists of a little chip shot that just falls short of the intended target, then due to the extreme slope of the hill, the ball rolls back to the bottom of the hill priming the golfer for another iteration of the maneuver. This one requires extreme skill and lots of patience. When properly executed a professional golfer can virtually infinite number of iterations, each with their own appropriate seaman's phrase. The other interesting thing about this maneuver, is that each successive iteration becomes easier than the one prior due to the mental state invoked by the sisyphus maneuver. This is a textbook example of positive "@#$%!@#!" feedback.
Overall I finished the course 25 over par with 3 "#$%!@#". There was also a distraction handicap, due to phone troubles that is worth 3 strokes and 5 expletives! The expletive count for today's game was well under average at around 368 expletives over the course of six cold beers. All in all a nice day on the links. Till next time...
Today's lesson is going to be based around the actual game I played today at Balcones country club. I'm gonna walk you guys through some of the high points, and let you know exactly what was going though my head on each critical play. So lets start out at the beginning, before the golf shoes even go on...
To play golf you must be prepared!!! There are some absolutely critical items each player must have:
1.) some type of golf club. (wood, iron, putter) it doesn't matter. The club is simply the item that goes in your non beer holding hand.
2.) Golf balls. These come in a variety of flavors, from ones that are perfectly obedient (rare), to that stupid f-ing c-s-ucking slicing piece of $#%!.
3.) Shoes. Hippies are not welcome on the golf course.
4.) Beer... self explanatory.
So after getting all suited up, I hit the first two holes as a warm up. Proper conditioning is important and starting off slow always helps solidify your game. Remember slow and steady wins the race. So all in all, I finished out the first two holes with two respectable +2's and beer number one down the hatch.
I really got into the swing on the third hole. I had a beautiful tee shot which carried me to the right side of the fairway. Now I had a decision to make: I could play the traditional second shot straight at the pin, or I could employ some advanced strategery (sp). Being a seasoned player, I decided to execute the advanced crisscross pattern to maximize my yardage covered. (see below) Over the next four shots I was able to double the yardage to the pin before a nice sixth shot onto the green.
Overall I finished this hole with the illustrious score of "%$#$!!"
Next up was hole four. Once again I had a beautiful tee shot straight into the right hand side of the fairway, and once again I had a choice on tactics. This time I chose a flanking pattern. When properly executed a flanking pattern moves the ball sideways across the fairway, rather than forward to the hole. This tactic allows the golfer to thoroughly exercise their sailor vocabulary. Some pros can make as many as six steps across the fairway without moving a single inch toward the hole. Talk about mad skills!!!
So after executing this textbook flanking pattern, I continued to finish out the front nine while finishing the first half of my beer stash. A quick note to beginners: By the end of the ninth hold you should have finished HALF of your beer. Remember in golf it is very important to pace yourself because if you run out of beer, you can't stop to get more until after the 18th hole. (though sometimes the magical beautiful beer fairy girl will come by on a cart and help refill your cooler)
Onto the back nine... we jump into hole number 12. Now those of you who went to college will be rather familiar with this hole. The way this hole works is you start on the tee box. You hit your ball and the lake gulps it up, and you in turn gulp up your beer (just like beer pong). you repeat this process until by some sort of miracle your ball floats past the lake and onto the green of this short par three. For those of you who didn't go to college I've included a diagram for clarification purposes:
If you aren't feeling good by the end of hole 12, you've got some serious catching up to do. Shit, most of the time, by hole 12, I've already lost my pants. Here's where we begin to separate the ams from the pros!!
The final hole we'll look at in this lesson is hole 16, a long par 4. Once again a good tee shot is an absolute imperative for good golf. The second shot in this case left me just to the right of the green, only around 10 yards to the flag. Now I had a decision. The green sits high up on a plateau and my shot was sitting in the valley below. The was a prime opportunity to employ the sisyphus maneuver. When properly executed the sisyphus maneuver consists of a little chip shot that just falls short of the intended target, then due to the extreme slope of the hill, the ball rolls back to the bottom of the hill priming the golfer for another iteration of the maneuver. This one requires extreme skill and lots of patience. When properly executed a professional golfer can virtually infinite number of iterations, each with their own appropriate seaman's phrase. The other interesting thing about this maneuver, is that each successive iteration becomes easier than the one prior due to the mental state invoked by the sisyphus maneuver. This is a textbook example of positive "@#$%!@#!" feedback.
Overall I finished the course 25 over par with 3 "#$%!@#". There was also a distraction handicap, due to phone troubles that is worth 3 strokes and 5 expletives! The expletive count for today's game was well under average at around 368 expletives over the course of six cold beers. All in all a nice day on the links. Till next time...