Quitter

Went to my second Virtual Golf Society outing on Saturday having decided on Friday evening to get out an play.  This was at Pedham Place Golf Centre and when I turned up at 7am I was the only car there.

The drive from Essex has allowed me to listen to the weather forecast which was cold, dry in the morning, not necessarily clear.  I thought I was wrapped up enough with three layers and a coat. I wasn’t too cold but nor was I warm.

After hitting 50 balls on the range, and a coffee and a bacon roll, I joined my fellow competitors at the first tee just before 9.

I was the last to tee off, didn’t hit it well, had no idea where it went and was told it went out of bounds on the left.  After slicing a 'third'shot and then under hitting a fourth  we realised we were playing on ‘winter greens’.  Each green was about the size of good dinner table.  I scored 7 to start including the penalty stroke and hadn’t hit a clean shot yet.

On to the second. A poor tee shot which went 50 yards, a topped 6 iron which only went as far as it did because of the frozen ground, an 8 iron hit fat (and well short) and then a pitching wedge which I didn’t see but ended up through the green. A couple of scuffed hits and a couple of putts later and 8 goes down on the scorecard.

The third tee. A nice 120 yard par 3. My tee shot is another fat 8 iron which goes 50 yards if I am lucky.  I am cold, frustrated, miserable and fed up. So I picked up. And walked the next 6 holes before going back to the clubhouse after the 9^th.

When I got to the car and switched on the engine it warned me the temperature was minus 0.5 degrees C. Still cold then.

From what I saw the Pedham course is quite nice although there are a lot of blind or semi-blind shots given the number of doglegs and mounds bordering the fairways. There are some cracking views across the chalk downland and, apart from being frozen, the course seemed in good nick for the time of year.

Clearly I wasn’t.

At about £20 a hole it was an expensive exercise (green fees, lost ball, petrol, breakfast, range balls). I can only apologise to my fellow competitors for being such a grouch but I didn’t want to go around a course topping the ball 75 yards each shot holding everyone up and making myself more miserable.

Two VGS outings so far – one good fun with me playing okay golf but getting some good results from bad hits. One less so (for me anyway).

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