COMMUNITY

I think I have answered this one before , but here goes. While playing baseball my sophomore year of H.S. I blew out my knee. So the summer in between sophomore and junior year I bought a junior membership and started walking (to work my knee) one of our local course's in Ohio with a buddy of mine who was a golfer. I caught on quickly in one summer and when my junior year rolled around I decided to try out for the golf team and made varsity. Have been hooked on it ever since. I did take about a 10 year break in the action and within the last 4 or 5 years picked it back up.

to answer your question though my buddy is the one who talked me into playing with him that summer, so it's all his fault that I am stuck on this addicting, aggrivating, fun game.

Prior to the summer of 2008 I wasn't playing any sports since I was done with soccer and hockey and lacrosse had done nothing for me. All I would have been doing over the summer is playing video games and watching TV. So my mom got on my nerves telling me over and over again I needed a sport to do in the summer. I said golf just so I could get the woman to shut up. Turns out I played my first round on July 8th at the South Suburban Par 3 Golf Course and shot 44. After that I strived to get better and better and have become the golfer I am today. Best decision I ever made in my life was to start playing golf.

I started playing after watching Tiger Woods win the epic 2008 US Open.

i played a couple of times a long time ago but one day out of nowhere jdubs asked me to play and we played a few times in '08. i wanted to get into something else and saw golf as a sport i could play for the rest of my life. in the past, i've usually picked up sports pretty quickly but golf was a different story. as frustrating as it is, how challenging i found it to be was the biggest reason i got hooked. there are so many variables in golf to keep it different everytime you go out. it also was an excuse to get out of the house for a few hours and to enjoy being outside. i really started playing at the beginning of '09 and that meant trying to play every week, magazine subscriptions, Golf Channel, new equipment, and Stracka. it was pretty all of a sudden but i haven't grown tired or discouraged since i started. also, you can always get better and you always have a goal. once you think you might be happy to get down to a 12 handicap then you push to be in the single digits then scratch. instead of 33 putting you want to get to 28 putts. in every category and every aspect of the game, you never stop wanting more. throw in golfing trips, tournaments, places you'd love to play, events you'd like to see, and the friendships you can make because of this stupid little game and it never gets old. no wonder it's been known to ruin a few men over the years. one of the best descriptions i've heard was on here awhile back and i'm not religious at all but they summed it up when they called it, "Eden with tricks." we just can't help ourselves.

My dad played a fair amount of golf, especially when he was on shore leave when he used to be in the Navy...so my parents just surprised me with a set of clubs when I was 7 years old (Dad had been out of the Navy for many years at this point). I still remember the clubs...actually I still have them somewhere! It was a Northwestern JC Snead junior set. Had a metal-headed 2-wood, 5, 7, and 9 irons (blades, baby!), and a bulls-eye putter.

That was back in 1990, I think. Me and dad would go play probably once a month. I just LOVED it. I couldn't even sleep the night before a round. We would go play at South Haven, or Prescott CC, or DeGray State Park Golf Course. DeGray was the nicest one of those three, and Dad would often surprise me with it...we would drive the same way from the house as if we were going to Prescott, but then we would keep going...when it would dawn on me that we were going to DeGray, I would get so excited I would be jumping out of the chair! We'd get there at probably 8:00...dew on the grass, nice and cool outside...holy cow that was fun. I still play with Dad whenever I can convince him to go, but he hasn't been into golf since I left the house.

Oddly enough, I never liked watching golf much on TV. I do remember watching Nicklaus and Trevino and Chi Chi play the Senior Tour, but that was about it. I didn't even watch Tiger win the 1997 Masters. Actually the first time I actually watched Tiger play was probably during the 2008 Masters. Weird huh? My first golfing idol though, ever since I picked up a club at age 7, was Fred Couples...not even because of smooth swing, but because I thought he looked just like my Dad. (Everyone can say "awwwww" now.)

My dad started me playing when I was 13. played for 2 or 3 years. took back up with some guys at work when I was 19 years old played for 4 years, started again when I was 43 when my son asked to show him how to play and he wanted something we could do together. It's been a great love for 7 years now.

I remember watching golf on tv back in the day, I was 12-13 or something. I was intrigued by the bright green grass and how short it was cut. Then as a 9th grader, our PE Class took a trip to out local 9 hole golf course and fell in love with what I seen. Golf before that was not in any shape or form in our family. That Christmas 4 months later I asked my late father for a set of golf clubs, and there it was under the tree, my 1st set of Northwestern golf clubs, 1 & 3 wood, with a 3-5-7-9 iron. I bought my own putter and sand wedge. After practicing on many school grounds and parks, my 1st round was a 63 at our 9 hole course. 2 years later I was shooting in the upper 30's with the same set of clubs and by the 3rd year as a senior in high school I had broken par several times with the same set of clubs. So it goes to show you, its not the type of equipment but instead what you can do with it. 1 year later I moved to Lander, Wyoming, met the head pro at the golf course there, he hired me as a Asistant Pro and put me on Palmers staff using Palmer equipment, The Axioms. Seems like yesterday--life is such a blur~

Good posting discussion.
While stationed in Panama, we lived right on the golf course at Ft. Amador. (That golf course is no longer as the Panamanians dug it up. Who knows what they will do with it now). Anyhow, the son, at 12 decides he is going to take up golf. Spends darn near every day he can out there with the old guys whacking away. For months he is hounding me to go play golf with him, to which my reply is, "I have no desire to chase a little white ball 7,000 yards." Anyway, he finally shames me into it. First round was okay, all for the son, etc. etc. Second round, I hole out from the fairway on hole number one for an eagle. I'm hooked.!!! Been playing every chance I get since then. The wife went out in Panama with us a couple of time but tore a nail off all the way into the quick. Swore it off till we retired from the Army then started back in when it was obvious she would be golfer's widow otherwise. Now, she can't get enough golf either.
The son is really good, about a 4 or 5 handicap, three hole in ones, etc. Us, well, we have a great time at it. LOL.

A friend from church invited me to the golf range and I fell in love and the rest is history.

To make a long story short, I grew up on a farm during the 1960's about 8 miles outside of town and we lived there until I was 13. After my 2 older brothers went into the Navy (late '60s, Vietnam War) Dad sold the farm and we moved into town so now I could finally play with my friends, except my friends all played golf and I didn't! So they would leave to go play and there I was all by myself, just like back on the farm. I decided to learn to play so I could be with my friends. That's when my Mother, being the school librarian, brought home to me Ben Hogan's "Five Lessons", and that is how I learned how to play. I bought one of my friends old set of the "odds" (1 & 3 wood, 3,5,7& 9 iron w/putter, I'm sure many here will remember that's what you used to learn with) and practiced in our backyard until I thought I could play well enough to tag along. By the time we graduated my friends and I qualified for the regional tournament, not too bad for a little class 1A school in a town with no golf course!

Ben Hogan grew up in Dublin, Texas and played pasture golf. There was no golf course. You're in good company. !

Enjoying the stories guys. Here's mine.

NO ONE in my family played golf. This included all relatives I knew. But I loved sports. When I was 13 years old my family moved over 2,000 miles and for several months my mom, dad, two younger brothers and me lived in a cramped 27 foot trailer. Every day I rode the bus past the local golf course and all that open space looked very inviting. I remembered that when a beginners class opened up the following summer and convinced my brother Dale (2 years younger) to take the class with me.

After 6 weeks of classes my brother and I got on the course for the first time. I remember we lost 12 balls on the 1st hole, but I was hooked.