One White Hand, the early years…..

“Alan’s lent me his golf clubs. Do you fancy a go on the driving range at lunctime?”

Seemingly innocuous words, but they were the real beginning. Ashle (pronounced ‘Ashley’ by his wife, ‘Ashull’ by anyone taking the piss out of him), drove us there. We paid out £2.50 and filled baskets with balls and walked out.
There followed about 10 minutes of ‘Urgh!’ and ‘nearly’ and then, during a quiet spell, a perfect ‘click’ followed by a ‘Jesus!’ and I’d hit my first good shot. I was instantly hooked and many say I’m still trying to replicate that moment. Bastards.

Incidentally, a few weeks later I went to the range on my own, put my money in but forgot to put a basket under the chute. Cue one gormless looking bloke with white balls scattering all over the floor, scrabbling round trying to scoop them all into a basket.

Then, one week later, I went back with Ashle. I was telling him this story as I started to count my cash out and feed it into the machine. As I was popping the last 50p in I finished with “That’s the sort of thing you only do once”. His knowing, barely contained grin suddenly vanished and was replaced with full-on braying laughter. I thought “well, it was funny, but not that funny” and then rolled my eyes into my head as the first of 100 golf balls sprayed out of the machine and between my legs.
He was still laughing so hard, even when I’d scooped them all into a basket that I had to help him up from the floor, by his knackers.

Anyway, our first few games of golf were at little nine-holers around Chorley. Highfield, Yarrow Valley, places where we wouldn’t stand out too much if we were hacking very badly, and we were.
We then progressed to our first real 18 holes of golf, Duxbury Municipal Golf Course, Chorley. Wonderful day, great weather, good company, awful golf (this will be a recurring theme).

Then, a bombshell.

I buy a lot of ‘stuff’ from a huge IT company. This company have a number of sponsorship deals, corporate days etc, all over Europe. I worked with a Client Services Manager called Neil. Our conversation one morning…..

Neil: “I’ve heard you’ve started playing golf Mark. I’ll try to get you on the CSC corporate day next month if you fancy.”

Me: “Yeah alright, where’s that then?”

Neil: “Wentworth”

Yes, my second full 18 holes of golf was played out (sort of) on the West course at Wentworth.
On a blazing day we set off, started by a proper starter, in front of the imposing white gothic clubhouse, and I only had to clear about 150 yards to reach the fairway. Gulp.
Thankfully, it was fairly straight and long, for once. No pressure or anything.

Anyway, I had a great time, played awfully, managed to hit our playing partner’s buggy not once, but twice, and generally hacked my way around one of the country's most prestigious courses.
Afterwards in the bar, knowing full well I would never be invited back I confessed it was only the second time I had been round a full 18 holes. The expressions around the table were priceless.

The absolute best memory isn't actually of the course. 3 months later we were watching the World Matchplay Championship. Paul MacGinley is teeing off on the 10th, uphill, par 3. He strikes the ball, up, up, up. Down, about 8 yards short of the green.

Me: “Yeah, I did that too”.

4-iron in the soul….

In the 90’s Lawrence Donegan became a caddy. Well, he actually became a bag-carrier. There’s a difference.

Lawrence is a bit of a jack of all trades. Ex number 1 singing pop star, journo, layabout and golf hacker, he decided he ought to become a top sportsman. He quickly figured it wasn’t going to be actually ‘playing’ golf, but it might be walking about with a bag over his shoulder.

The book is a genuinely funny look at the world of caddies, golfers, officials and the bizarre world of professional golfing events.

Random quote:

“I was later told that if a bomb had gone off by the coke machine it would have killed six ministers, three generals, the heir to the throne and every top-class hooker in North Africa”.

Imagine a place beyond sight and sound, beyond reason….. you are entering, the ‘Walk in’ zone.

Walking in, or walking off, the same thing really. It’s when you are so completely hacked off with your game you walk in. I’ve only done it once, but I came very close on Saturday.

Invited to play by a guy I used to work with, turned up, and set off out with our group of 3. The weather was incredible, just so hot you could hardly breath, much less play. After about 12 holes I pretty much stopped caring and would have killed, or at least maimed, for a cold shower. I didn’t walk off, but I pretty much walked the last 3 holes.

“Hey, we can’t find your ball on this short par 3. Want to go back and hit another? There’s nobody on the tee.”

“No, can’t be arsed, put me down for a blob, and the reason there’s nobody on the tee is that is it about 1 million bloody degrees out here!”

Full-on sense of humour failure.

The only time I have walked off was about a month ago at Southport. Society game. Last group, 3 hours for the first 9 holes. Unbe-friggin-lievable. 3 hours! Playing stableford! Watching guys take 7 shots to reach a par 4 green and then all stand about watching each other putt out for no score while people back up on the tee behind them.

I may be shit but even I know that point of stableford is to keep things moving.

OK, so now I’m fuming again. Never mind, playing with them again next Friday, we’ll see how it goes then. It’s on one of my favourite courses too so I might be a bit calmer. We’ll see.

My favourite ever walk-in? Richard Russell, first tee, Sunningdale. Hit one drive, it was rubbish, he walked in.

From Richard’s superb book “My baby got the yips”, available from Amazon, here.

It really is an excellent book in every regard, laugh out loud moments for any golfer, plus the secret of golf. Well, the 2 secrets of golf. OK, actually the three secrets of golf……

How it all began....

I first played golf just over 2 years ago, at the age of 32. I’d watched golf for ages on TV, but none of my friends or colleagues played. Or at least, that was what I thought.

It’s funny, as soon as you mention that you have started playing, they creep out of the woodwork… “Hello, Emma tells me you’ve started playing golf. Well, if you ever fancy a game (at my £1000 a year club) just give me a shout”.

Repeat this about 20 times.

As a result, without ever having been a member anywhere I’ve been able to play some very good courses, very very badly.

You see, I’m rubbish. I mean really, really rubbish. I’ve never broken 100, only broken 50 for 9 once. I regularly take huge divots while moving the ball about 50 yards forwards and my ‘fore’ response is almost instinctive, out of my mouth as I hit the ball sometimes.

But, sometimes, just sometimes, it comes together for a hole or two. Decent drive, decent wedge, 20-foot putt with a 3 foot borrow and “Yes!”, I’m the best golfer in the world, for about 10 seconds.

17 terrible holes, ready to pack it all in forever, birdie the 18^th, and all is right with the world again and you start having delusions of mediocrity. Thoughts of trophies start to drift in and out of your mind, men holding very big cheques shaking your hand while people applaud……..

“What did you do?”

“Hundred and eighteen”.

Reality’s a bitch.