the golf merry go round

by Harry
(UK)

I took up golf over 30 years ago after getting too old for soccer. I could not understand how it could be so difficult. Any other sport I had tried gave me results in proportion to the time I gave to it.

Golf was almost the opposite as the harder I tried and the more I practiced the worse I became. By trial and error I found a method and a grip that worked for me and after about 4.5 years got down to a handicap of 13.

I then came across the Tim Gallwey book “the inner game of golf”. This was very refreshing as explained why I was finding golf so difficult and perhaps why other sports I had tried had gave a better return on my time.

Putting the book in to play and practice the results came very fast. Within 3 months I was down to 7 HC and was breaking 80 almost every time I played. I shared the book with my golfing partners.

Two were accountants and just could not get it the third, a carpenter, got it immediately and within a few months he also was in single figures.

At this point I thought I was a real golfer and that if I could just improve my technique a little more I would be really good. I started reading everything by all the “golf gurus” and if truth be told I was never the same golfer again.

I was on the golf merry go round and jumped from method to method. I played on for many years with a handicap of 8/9 but I could never get back that sense of golf prior to my long journey into technique.

Now retired I am reviewing where I went wrong and my library of 200 books and videos. Still looking for that state of grace you enter when you play golf with no interference and no expectations.