Golf Etiquette

Hi all,

I’m not going to nag you with too many things, just a few etiquette requests to help things run smoother at our Golf course, and at the same time, make it an even nicer place to play:

1) TEED OFF
After you tee off, if you break your tee, please don’t throw it about. It helps our maintenance guys a lot if we place them either in a bucket, or at least next to a tee block (in one spot). When they arrive on a tee box to cut it, if there are broken tees everywhere, they have to pick them up before they cut because the tees are very hard on the mower blades.

2) CUT ACROSS SHORTY
The old cutting across to #10 trick is popular at our course. Don’t get me wrong, I do this many times, however, without a starter, we have to make sure we check with the pro-shop to make sure it’s ok. Also, the rule of thumb is not to do it if there are golfers anywhere on #9 (that the pro shop tells you are playing 18 holes). Our current route across to #9 is behind #18 green and across #9 fairway. We should actually be going behind both greens, especially if pulling a cart or in power cart. Also, there is nothing more frustrating than coming up #9 while somebody is walking across to #10, then, being held up by that group the rest of the way around. We all have the luxury of being able to start on #1 or #10 most times, but we need to realize that the groups on the front 9 have priority. Also, it is not the pro shop’s responsibility to book you a time for #1 if you started on #10, you need to time it accordingly and make sure you have a time.

3) HURRY UP AND SLOW DOWN
Our course has very little issue with speed of play. Actually, it’s probably the best course I’ve ever played for getting around 18 holes. I’ve played courses in PEI where it takes over 5 hours to play a round! However, I just wanted to mention a couple of points about when to let somebody “play through”. First thing, DON’T RUSH! There is no point to rush because somebody is behind you, you’ll never get better at this game if you are worried about playing too slow. If there is a group behind you that seem to be always waiting for a shot, let them play through on the next tee. Obviously, there is no point to do this if you are not the group causing the slowness (ie. you are waiting every shot because of the group ahead of you). So, a good benchmark to use is, if there is a full hole ahead of you with nobody on it, and a group is pushing behind, let them through. This lets you relax, and also lets the faster players play at a comfortable speed for them.

4) ON THE BEACH
If you happen to go into bunker, please rake your pitch mark, swing mark, feet marks and your path in/out of the bunker. Would you like to be in somebody’s footprint if you had to hit out of the bunker? Rake the bunker to leave it in a fashion that you would not be mad about hitting out of it. Try not to leave any ridges with your rake either. I am asking this because with almost about 40 traps on our course, 30 of which are on the front 9 which sees the most traffic, our maintenance guys do not get a chance to groom the bunkers every day, so we need to do our part to show etiquette to your fellow players.

5) DIGGIN’ A HOLE
Replace your divots! Most golfers take a “sod” when they swing at the ball. It may not seem like a big deal, but if you grab the sod while it’s still damp (before the roots die) and put it back in it’s place giving it a little stomp (to make sure the root surface is back where it was), it will grow back. There are too many dead sods lying about the fairways which obviously mean there are also divots left where they came from. Again, you wouldn’t want to land in a divot, right? This game is hard enough as it is, haha.

6) PITCHED OFF
Fix your ball pitch marks on the green! Our greens are on their way to being the best we’ve seen, however, we need to keep them that way. Believe it or not, there is a wrong way to do this, and you can do more harm as leaving it alone if not done correctly. The jist of it is, DO NOT push your repair tool in and push down as to lift the depression back up. That just detaches the roots. You have to go around the diameter of the ball mark and push in towards the centre, bringing the grass into the depression. Pat it down with your foot or putter after. Here’s a good video to show you:
http://www.ehow.com/video_2357647_etiquette-fixing-ball-mark-golf.html


Not trying to pitch you off, but these are easy things we can all do to make our course even better!

Thanks to everyone!

Justin House
HSL Golf Captain