bluedot

Excellent post. It is remarkable, at least to me, how often advocates of two piece surlyn balls in effect claim what can only be described as magical properties for cheap golf balls. The idea that poor chippers see urethane balls check up well short of the hole, while OTOH surlyn balls NEVER roll out much too much is Harry Potter stuff. The reality is that not only is this a two-sided coin, but poor chippers don't generate much spin anyway; a lot of spin on a chip or pitch is caused by a lot of things being done correctly, and poor chippers just don't do that. The irony is that good chippers could use a surlyn ball effectively; bad chippers need all the help they can get, and a urethane ball provides at least some help.

“Worth it” is something only you can decide, and it’s a separate question from the potential benefits of doing a fitting and purchasing after-market shafts. Even if you find out that an after-market shaft(s) adds distance and/or tighten dispersion, you’re still left with the decision of whether or not the gains are “worth it”. To YOU… When I do a fitting, I always tell the fitter the same thing at the outset; if you can beat what I’ve got, I’ll buy it, but also I’m happy to pay your fee to find out that what I’ve already got is the best I can do. But that’s ME, and I have a lot of buddies who view the dollars:gains ratio very differently.

I'll take your word for it, though I must say that you're seeing things I simply haven't. And I think my database on this is pretty massive by any standard. I was a HS basketball coach for 40 years, and from the early 80's until I retired in 2013, my teams lifted year round; we went at it HARD during the spring, summer, and fall; we cut sets and reps but maintained weight during the season primarily to PREVENT injury, and we were very successful with that. Plus I was around the football coaches and players, in addition to my years lifting around "regular people" at the Y since I retired. I'm sure if I polled all my coaching buddies, or the employees and personal trainers at the Y, I could find someone who would remember a weight room injury other than fingers and toes. But it's certainly not commonplace, and not worth worrying about. And the benefits are just huge.

You provided an anecdote about an injury, with no context about the specific exercise, any previous injury, conditioning of the athlete, warmup, etc. You're offering that as "proof" that lifting, even with proper form, can directly cause injury. So if I said that I've lifted 2 or 3 times a week for 50 years (which, btw, is true) for a total of somewhere between 6000 and 7000 workouts and have NEVER been injured from working out, would that prove that you absolutely CANNOT be injured working out? Of course not, and I'd be silly to make that claim. You can get hurt doing ANYTHING, but I think any coach or trainer would agree with me that not only is lifting safe, but that it REDUCES the chances of injury. People that are stronger are typically also more mobile and more flexible (especially if they have a balanced and carefully planned workout routine) and are much less likely to injure themselves playing golf, or tennis, or running, or whatever else we could think of.

I ONLY agree with you that if certain compound lifts are done incorrectly AND with very heavy weights, it can cause injury, though in my experience even that is rare to the point of being unheard of and not a real risk. And fwiw, I don't know of any golf specific workout routines that include military presses or RDLs anyway. Even squats and deadlifts are relatively rare in golf workouts; a much more common set of exercises might be split squats using DBs or kettle bells, and something like a squat jump using DBs or kettle bells. Those exercises are easy to perform correctly, and primarily rely on body weight; they are essentially risk free unless you drop a kettle ball on your toe at the end. Beyond that ONE possible qualifier, there is literally NO downside to working out, and great benefits to be had; for golf, for general health, and for mitigating the aging process. Implying that injuries from lifting are common simply isn't true; lifting prevents injuries rather than causing them.

With all due respect, this isn't, on balance, good advice. I'm 73 and I've been lifting regularly for almost 50 years; my next injury CAUSED by lifting will be my first; same with my friends who workout regularly. It's possible to injure yourself doing almost anything incorrectly, including weightlifting. And overdoing anything, including weightlifting, is also a path to injury. That said, the number of people that workout regularly and get injured, either from the workouts themselves, or from another activity like golf, is very small compared to injuries and limitations suffered by the number of people that don't workout. There is a mountain of data available that shows the benefits of resistance training as we age; there's no disputing that. Beyond that, workouts for golf have come a long, long way in the last few years. Track athletes have been doing workouts that look nothing like their events but enhance their performance for decades; other sports have followed, and now golf has moved a long way in that direction. A good full body workout that is directly related to the golf swing isn't especially time consuming, and doesn't involve amounts of weight that risk injury. The proper techniques required to perform the exercises that enhance the golf swing are also not difficult to perform. As an example, a lot of golf workouts include either a farmer's carry or a suitcase carry using a kettle bell; this helps with spine stability and core strength under load, which is critical in a fast, explosive movement like the golf swing. Those exercises are about as low risk as I can imagine; the technique is simple, and if you can pick up the kettle bell you're going to use, it won't hurt you. I could go on, but you get the idea. People that lift heavy with compound lifts like squats, dead lifts, Military Press, and RDL's are doing something else; that is NOT in any way about the golf swing. I'll go one step farther with this. People that are serious about golf (or at least believe themselves to be serious) that do NOT workout regularly, are not only missing a great opportunity to swing better and perhaps faster, as well as staying injury free, but they are often utilizing a rationalization for not lifting. Fear of injury is high on the list of those rationalizations.

That sounds good, depending on whether or not it will stay that way, and the length of commitment (if any) required of you.

This. I feel the same way about this as I do indoor vs outdoor club fitting. If the fitter or instructor is good enough, they’ll be able to get done what needs to be done either way. Instructors often aren’t nearly as concerned with ball flight as students are. Instructors are about process; they know that if you do it right, improved ball flight will come. In fact, you could even make the case that seeing ball flight down range might be a distraction for the student. As to hitting off mats vs grass, same thing. And there are a lot of teachers that have students hit outdoor shots off a tee, even with irons, so that the student isn’t trying to “lift” the ball. Go with the teacher that’s the best fit for you, and don’t worry about the venue.

This is a subject near and dear to my heart; I was a HS basketball coach for 39 years and constantly dealt with players who were, and were NOT, good students. So here are things I believe; I think these apply to every sport, including, obviously, golf: 1. The average person has NO concept of the reps that go into being really good at something, and they likewise have no idea of the reps that go into making changes. 2. The average person thinks of practice as hard work; really good players think of practice as fun if they think about it at all. Practice is just what they do; they may like it almost as much as they do actually playing the game. 3. If you’re working with a good coach/teacher/instructor and they give you a drill, it is very possible that you are going to HATE that drill. Which probably means that it’s the exact drill you need to be doing. (The same thing is true in the weight room, btw) Now to golf: 4. Golf is the only sport I know of in which people spend vast quantities of time and money, but are resistant to instruction. That resistance takes the form of refusing to take lessons at all, or refusing to commit to the changes, or simply not understanding that a 30 to 60 minute lesson by itself won’t make the change. When I was coaching basketball and was working with a player of their shot, the universal comment when we changed something was, “That feels weird!” My answer was always the same: “Well, if you shoot 200 times a day all summer that way, it not only won’t feel weird anymore, but you’ll enjoy watching the damn ball go in the basket!” Some players did that; most didn’t. But it’s made me a great student, I think. I work consistently with a great teaching pro, and I commit to what he tells me to do. I NEVER tell him that something feels weird, and I do the drills he gives me to death, even when I hate them. And above all else, I put in the reps.

I’ve belonged to both, and IF money isn’t a limitation, there’s no comparison for golf and amenities. Private clubs typically offer dining, swim and tennis, sometimes a fitness center, better course conditions, ease of making tee times, and better practice facilities that are included in your dues. Yes, those dues are higher, but that’s a lot of added value. Of course, we’re talking in generalities here; there are lots of possible variations. Some private clubs are member-owned, while others are for-profit, with pros and cons both ways. And some semi-privates treat members like they are part of a private club, while others treat members as money already in hand and favor the public because they are paying a higher rate. As Drwoods2017 said, if you’re comfortable sharing more detail about the particular area and courses, perhaps you might get more help.

Ok, bear with me here… IF you have ever had floaters of any significant size, you know that your brain will eventually learn to simply ignore the floaters; they are still there, but you don’t “see” them. After a detached retina, I had floaters that looked like Greenland or Cuba, and sure enough after a period of months, I stopped “seeing” them. BUT once I took my eye off the ball in flight, I couldn’t pick the flight back up; sometimes I could pick up the bounce, but mostly the ball had just disappeared. I talked about this with my ophthalmologist and retina specialist, both of whom are jocks, and they agreed that what was happening was that my brain was simply ignoring a small dark spot in my field of vision, treating a golf ball in flight, in effect, as just another floater. Knowing this doesn’t help me see the ball, but it does make me feel a little bit better to know what’s going on.

You’re being MUCH too hard on yourself about breaking 80! The back 9 at Longleaf is a par 37 (front is par 35) so you played a par 74 golf course 5 over. That’s breaking 80 the hard way IMO. And show no mercy in the club championship!

Opinion from a 73 year old who walks almost all rounds, was a runner for 50 years, and has had plantar fasciitis in both feet as well as Morton’s neuroma. Shoes are about the fit for your particular foot. I can wear Ecco and ASICS; I can’t wear Nike or most FJs. That’s about comfort. But there is NO shoe that will help with conditions like plantars or Morton’s; that is 100% a matter dealt with by therapy and orthotics. If you have those conditions, stop hoping that a particular shoe will fix it; that won’t happen. Whether you use OTC orthotics like Super Feet or Sole, or go to a doctor to be custom fit, that and PT are the path forward.

They do not shed rain. But they are very lightweight, so they don’t absorb lots of water either. I never worry about wearing them in the rain with a short sleeve rain jacket and rain gloves.

I have friends who won’t play fantasy football on the same grounds. I’ve never understood that mentality; not only is there no scriptural prohibition against gambling, but where you draw the line makes all the difference. Someone already mentioned investing as gambling, and there are lots of other examples from daily life. All of that said, I do understand why a pastor might decide that gambling as it is normally defined, wouldn’t be a good look; he might end up doing counseling for someone with a gambling problem. Alcohol might be much the same for someone pastors. It’s a complicated job, and I’ve had several pastor friends over the years who really valued friendships where they could relax at least a little bit and know that they weren’t going to ace constant scrutiny.