My loyal reader will not be surprised to learn that once again I was out playing golf today, this time with my pal Campbell at the excellent Tall Pines course at Lulsgate, by the local aerodrome. It is a very fine course on which, for at least the first eight holes, I did not disgrace myself. Since I have only been playing for slightly under three years, I am well aware that I shall never reach the giddy heights of a low handicapper – in fact, getting any kind of handicap at all is currently well beyond my capability – it’s a game that I love, a sport at which in middle age I can compete, albeit sporadically.
The main problem for the older sportsman – and I know I am stretching things to describe myself as a sportsman of any kind these days – is wear and tear. I can get round the course in one piece all right, without feeling worn out before the end, but I also know that I am not going to get much better. In fact, the odds suggest I might get even worse.
All those football injuries of my youth have re-emerged as if to remind me, as if I needed reminding, of my mortality. That broken ankle, that Bennett’s Fracture Disclocation, those frequently broken toes and the endless bumps I took on my legs in crunching tackles – I can feel them all over again, returning as they have in varying forms of arthritis. And I have the occasional twinge from what my GP describes as “tennis elbow”, which was certainly news to this man who had not played the game seriously for 20 years. Most of these twinges and aches do not appear as I am marching briskly through a round punctuated by a mixture of occasional inspiration but mainly dross, but they do afterwards.
The first noticeable effects of fatigue registered in the 19th hole after we had indulged in a healthy lunch of, in my case, a sausage and bacon sarnie on white bread and Campbell’s cheese and onion toastie. I stood up and my legs were not as supple as they were four hours before. My muscles and bones got me round the course easily enough, but they needed a rest now for sure.
Golf is my gym. I am not interesting in gyms per se because they involve what I regard periods of intensive and pointless exercise. Not pointless in terms of fitness, granted, but certainly in terms of, well, being pointless. What could be more boring than the cross-trainer or the treadmill? Go for a walk if you want to get fitter. The air is much better outside. But why not do something like a sport? Running is the same. Most people I see out running look really miserable. They have pained expressions and look like they are not enjoying a single step. And why should they? It’s not as if they ever win anything. There is a bloke who lives down the road from me who is as fit as a butcher’s dog, does not have an ounce of fat on him, runs almost every day, has run in countless 10ks and marathons over a long career and has never got close to winning a single race. I would rather have a good walk of three hours plus, at a decent pace, taking in at least seven miles and just now and again winning.
Tall Pines also enables me to enjoy two hobbies at the same time. Golf is my passion but so are aeroplanes and right next to the course, parallel with a number of holes is the main runway of Bristol Airport. The combination of the smell of the countryside and kerosene is a heady one indeed.
Do I regret not taking up golf much earlier? Not really. There’s no point in regretting what I never really had the inclination to do and anyway I was usually too busy doing something else. I would probably have been a better player than I am now, but who knows by how much? If I had started as a small child, well who knows that, either? But I didn’t and it doesn’t matter.
I have no more golf scheduled until at least tomorrow – don’t call me obsessed! – and after that I won’t be playing again until Monday of next week. You can’t get enough of a good thing, can you? I recommend the obsession. I have made a good number of friends during my introduction to golf, although I suspect one of the reasons they like me playing against them is because they know they are going to win! I do like to win, but golf, uniquely, is a game where you genuinely want the person you are playing with to hit a good drive, chip into the heart of the green and sink that long putt. I was almost as happy today when Campbell hit a brilliant chip and run to leave a simple putt as I was when I scored a rare, almost unheard of, birdie.
And the thing about golf is that you never really crack it, unless you are Rory McIlroy, that is. Today, I went on a run when I really didn’t think I could hit a bad shot, but suddenly bad shots were all I was hitting. It is shots like my second shot to the eighth, a five iron from around 170 yards, that made today all worthwhile, not my disastrous 10 at 17! And the hope for the future, the reason I’ll keep coming back, is that there will be more of the former, even though I know in my heart there will be far more of the latter.
