Reasons to start your golf season early

For many of us the golf season doesn’t really get going until the first shot is struck at The Masters at Augusta National.

As I'm sure you will all know by now, I am not one of those. I can understand why so many of you opt not to play during the cold, wet and miserable winter months. I play 12 months of the year and sometimes question both my own sanity and that of the guys I play with. It’s a time of year when you can never guarantee that you are going to be able to get out there.

Spring is supposedly just around the corner but it still seems a long way off. 

Who Plays Golf in Winter?

Do you ever question your sanity when it comes to playing golf at this time of year? Some of you tee off in near-darkness (what is that all about?), we all set off looking like Michelin men, wearing umpteen layers of clothing, sporting headgear we wouldn’t be seen dead in anywhere other than on a golf course. 

We come off the course with no feeling in our fingers, our trousers covered in mud and sludge. We hit perfect drives that travel no distance whatsoever. We lose golf balls in piles of leaves. We slip and slide all over the place. I don’t know about you but despite my best efforts the boot of my car closely resembles the civic tip! And we keep coming back for more. Golfers are indeed a very strange breed.

But those of us who do it simply love it.

If you are one of those who waits for Augusta before getting your clubs out of hibernation, I would urge you to think again. There are all sorts of good reasons for playing golf at this time of year.

Why You Should Start The Golf Season Early

(Image Credit: Kevin Diss Photography)

For a start, the days are getting longer, and that means we have more hours of daylight. It won’t be long before you will be able to finish your round in the evening and still be able to see the ball! 

Course conditions at this time of year tend to be pretty soggy. Now you may wonder how that can possibly be a good thing. 

Well, if you know that you are getting absolutely no roll on the ball you will quickly learn exactly how far you fly every club in the bag - and that is something that is going to help you enormously as things start to dry out. 

It is also fun to stand over an approach shot at this time of year and know that if you hit it anywhere near the flag then it is going to stop dead. Don’t forget to repair the massive pitchmark you will have left though!

Bunker shots are easier to play from damp sand. It’s a fact. You don’t have to worry about taking sand - you can simply clip the ball off the top and an added bonus is that if you make decent contact then you are going to impart backspin - a rare experience for most of us.

In these conditions you have to be more aggressive with pitch and runs and chip shots because you will get little or no roll. Again, as the season progresses, that can only benefit your short game. You also have to hit putts harder to get them to the hole, knowing that your ball is not going to run 15 feet beyond the cup.

This is also the best time of year to experience millionaire’s golf. With so many people looking out the window and thinking better of it, the chances are that your course will be far quieter than normal, which means you almost certainly will not have to endure a five-hour round. Another bonus is that when the course is quiet, there is nothing to stop you chucking another ball down. And you don’t have to adhere to the three-minute rule when looking for your golf ball because you will not be holding anybody up.

If you are out there on your own at this time of year, you can even give yourself "those" putts that your opponents would normally make you hole out.

If you are a golfing nomad, at this time of year you will be able to find reduced green fees. What’s not to love about that? 

Perhaps best of all, by the time the rest of your fiends emerge from their annual hibernation, you will already have your eye in and will be in prime position to give them a right good pasting. You will also have been able to identify which items of equipment should be replaced. Remember that there will have been a rash of new clubs launched and that means that last year’s models will all have been reduced. You have the opportunity to steal a march on your mates.