Golf - a wonderful game or a waste of a walk?

[Djnikon]

I'm an avid golfer, I love the game despite it being so frustrating. A load of colleagues reckon that it's just a waste of a walk.

Are there any fellow fairwaymen (or women) out there or are you of the opinion that golf is not so great?

Can we at least try to keep this one on topic please (in advance)? I feel that this, at least, is a subject that has no sinister undertones - please feel free not to prove me wrong on that

 

[joinerjohn]

Absolutely a fantastic game to play. "A good walk ruined " according to Marl Twain, but what would he know?
Favourite memories? Playing a local golf course and being a few inches off an ace. (brilliant 5 iron hit the ball so sweetly I hardly felt it) Watching the ball soar towards the pin and thinking , it's gone past, only to watch in amazement as the ball spun back towards the pin, rattled it and just stayed out.
In my youth, I used to be out at least twice a week in summer and once a week in winter, but now I limit my golfing activities to the fairer months . Play on the Wii now and again, but it's not just the same.

 

[Blasphemous]

I fail to understand how it can be a 'good walk ruined' (to be pedantic, I think he used the word 'spoiled'). You're walking, usually in some beautifully tended landscape. How the fact that you're hitting a small white ball every so often equates to a 'ruined walk' is beyond me. One assumes Mark Twain (who was a humorist), was trying to be funny.

I don't play personally but it looks a great game to me.

 

[alumni]

Many seem to like to so be it. Long may they enjoy it.
Me, i think it's a silly game and can't raise any enthusiasm whatsoever for it.

 

[Djnikon]

Blas, I think it's because many can see the point of the walking in beautifully tended landscapes but can't get the hitting the little white ball part.

My home course is a collection of 3 nine-hole courses right at the foot of the beautiful Ochil Hills in Fife, there is a hole named "Top O the World" and on a clear day you can see for absolutely miles along the Forth Valley.

 

[sooey]

I'm a fair weather player, used to play quite a lot. Talking of Fife, we went there for a few days once, played that Lundin links, thought it was beautiful, great part of the world.

 

[Djnikon]

Guy I'm sat next to in the office is a member at Lundin Links, great course - one of the hidden gems.
I don't think being a "fair weather" golfer is a bad thing at all, I'm an all year player but most folk thing I'm mad for playing in sub-zero temperatures and when it's raining heavy (lightening I draw the line at ).
Golf on a lovely day is one of life's rare pleasures IMO.

Other stunning courses in the area (that won't require a re-mortgage for the green fee), should you ever return, are Dunfermline GC, Aberdour GC, Balbirnie GC and my home course Muckhart.

 

[sooey]

Thanks for that list, we played craille as well which was nice, and a couple of the st andrews courses.

 

[Djnikon]

Crail is lovely (a hard course too, so I doff my hat to you that you survived it ).
St Andrews is, IMO, a tad over-rated and over priced. I have played the Old Course several times, but if I want to play a truly great links course, I head to a wee place in East Lothian (not far from Edinburgh) called Gullane, it is the greatest test of golf I have ever experienced.

 

[sooey]

I didn't say I parred it.

 

[Djnikon]

Favourite memories? Playing a local golf course and being a few inches off an ace.

JJ if that had been me I'd have fainted - first at getting any spin with a 5 iron and second at the distance
Closest I have been was about 10 inches, ironically on the longest Par 3 I have ever played (at 223Y - how it was a par 3 is anyone's guess).

 

[Djnikon]

I didn't say I parred it.

Nope, you didn't. but you survived and that's the important thing
I think my best at Crail was a 79 in August last year and that was me playing "out of my skin".

 

[sooey]

I honestly can't remember what I scored round there, I don't think I beat your 79 though. Though when we'd finished and we were back in the clubhouse a few of us thought it had gone too quick and went out for another round, so we played it twice.

 

[joinerjohn]

I've played quite a few courses in East Lothian, including Musselburgh GC (the one in the middle of the racecourse) generally acknowledged as the oldest gold course in the world and one that used to host the Open. Great sense of history there (imagine playing the same links that Mungo Park and Willie Park Jnr won the Open on. I've also played many rounds on the Royal Musselburgh GC, where my uncle, used to be club captain in the 70's. Played Dunbar, Gullane (2 courses), Longniddry, Eyemouth, Aberlady and Haddington. Once had the offer to play a round at Muirfield in the late 70's with my uncle, but couldn't afford the green fees (about a weeks wages at the time)

 

[Djnikon]

Sooey - 2 rounds is the way ahead, that's my normal Sunday . When you play a great course it often does seem to fly-by.

JJ - Muirfield is now about the equivalent of about 2 weeks wages
Aberlady has fallen in to a bit of disrepair, as has Longniddry.

I played in a charity Invitational at Gullane last Saturday (No.1 course) and on the tee at 1032 (two in front of me) was one Ronald Corbett of Gullane...

On a slightly different note, for those guys that have been playing for a long time (I've been playing about 26 years now) how do you feel technology is affecting the game?