What Do We Each Want From Golf?

That’s an easy question for me: I want poetry.

I have led a torturous yet charmed life, I am able to find poetry wherever I look. But in sport it has assumed a beauty of its own:

In the distant past running so fast and effortlessly that one ‘floats’ over the ground, breathing no faster than normal, sliding through time and space and becoming at one with oneself. A deep meditation where high physical activity goes unnoticed and one becomes acutely soul-aware within an inner golden silence.

I found the same as a tenpin tour player, and nowadays equally so as a golfer.

Playing on my own shortly after first light; frost still on the greens; the only living thing on the course being me, my breath, and the wild animals relaxed and playing.

I am not selfish. I could share it, but it would take a silent friend who likewise loves the sound of a crisp shot out the centre of the club, and who sees the majesty in perfect ball flight, who smiles at the putt lines in the early morning dew.

Someone who would be pained by scoring, competition, and being otherwise distracted by superficiality.

Golf is a spiritual thing which possibly few golfers fully experience, perhaps seeing it as a sporting extension to their everyday highly competitive lives.

I am not anti-competition. Far from it! I LOVE competing. Just not all the time as such would dearly cost me. And that’s not a price which I’m willing to pay. But everyone to their own.

What turns you on in golf?

Making that perfect shot. The one that fully achieves your aim, is made effortlessly, and feels oh so right! It doesn't come very often but when it does, it's what brings me back.

any ball that comes right out of the middle, always does it for me, that and the fact that the guys in my sunday society are there every week, all year, rain snow hail ice whatever.

You know that feeling when you have 3 or 4 holes to go and you know you have done a half decent round. It starts to become harder to concentrate and focus. Apparently you do get used to it and start to welcome it because it means you are playing well. I would like to get to that stage so I don't go to pieces at the end of a good round.

That one perfect shot that you will have every few rounds. When your swing feels effortless, the ball does exactly what you want, and you know it looked f*cking awesome.

For me it sometimes happens when I hit a great 3 wood off of the deck, but it can be when you nail that long putt, and you see it all they way.

The odd birdie and to have good competitive round with your playing partners and to have fun

I love those effortless balls that you hit during practice with the Pro. For me I look for those shots every time I play( and they are beginning to come). My goal is still the same as it was when I started, that is to hit the ball straight.....all the time............. with the average distance for each club