Joel Tadman runs through the 10 biggest problems only golfers can relate to. Whether it's temporary greens or leaving a club behind on the previous hole, we know how frustrating certain things can be to a golfer and we highlight them all here. Hopefully you haven't had to deal with too many yourself!
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00Hello everyone, Joel Tabman here from Golf Monthly and in this video we are counting
00:03down the 10 biggest problems that all golfers can relate to. Now at this point I need to
00:09remind you to click the subscribe button to the Golf Monthly YouTube channel so you don't
00:12miss any of our videos. Make sure you click the like button if you like what you're watching
00:16and also comment on the video, tell me if there's any problems that we've missed in
00:20this video I'd love to hear from you. But for now let's head on to the golf course here
00:25at Burley Park Golf Club in Stamford, Lincolnshire and count down the 10 biggest problems that
00:30golfers have to deal with, starting with playing partners offering advice.
00:40We've all got that one person in our four-boy who watches one instructional video on YouTube
00:44and suddenly he thinks he's Butch Harmon. And while I'm sure they mean well I do have two
00:49main issues with this problem. The first is that this person is almost certainly no
00:55better qualified than any other Tom, Dick or Harry to dish out swing advice and therefore
00:59I would advise you to take it with a pretty heavy pinch of salt. And the second issue I
01:04have is that people really shouldn't be giving advice during the round. Fair enough if they
01:08want to offer some sort of tip or a bit of feedback after the round because if you do it during
01:14the round that can really play havoc with your mind you start to think about it during your swing
01:18and it can have an adverse effect on the shots that you hit afterwards. So my advice to you would be
01:23that if you are thinking about giving advice really think about whether it's necessary and if you're
01:29on the receiving end of some advice maybe just politely ask them to wait until after the round
01:34to give you that advice and hopefully you won't have to experience this problem that much out on the course.
01:40Now the next problem on our list refers to putting on temporary greens like this one
01:53or holotime greens. Now I'm of course aware that temporary greens are important to maintain the
01:58integrity of the actual playing surfaces in wintry conditions but it is a frustrating problem you see
02:04the the pins in the fairways 20 yards short the green you get that instant deflation knowing that
02:08you're going to be playing on some pretty substandard surfaces let's be honest yeah the the surfaces are
02:14a lot bobbly they're a lot longer and it really is difficult to judge the consistency of the roll
02:18and hole out from short range and the level of ice and frost that thaws during the round is really
02:23difficult to judge when you're pitching and chipping onto those greens sometimes you get a really firm
02:27bounce that shoots over the green and sometimes it digs into a soft patch it's impossible to judge
02:32and the other problem i have with temporary greens especially is that it really does equalize the
02:36kind of handicap so the high handicappers have much more of an advantage because the course is
02:41a lot shorter and the skill that is required for chipping and putting is taken out of it from
02:46the lower handicappers it is more luck based so really high handicappers do have a much bigger
02:50advantage when playing on temporary greens similar for holotime greens to be fair although you are
02:56as likely to see a putt bubble back online as you are offline hopefully they kind of even
03:01itself out during the course of a round you know that's just another problem that golfers have
03:05to deal with unfortunately out on the course so the next problem golfers have to face relates to the
03:15rules of the game and i would say golf compared to pretty much every other sport out there has one
03:20of the most complicated sets of rules and usgea and the rna have made some changes for this year
03:26attempting to make them simpler but even then the players edition of the rulebook
03:30has 24 different categories over 120 pages so it's going to be impossible for golfers to know
03:36every single rule for example i've hit my ball in this penalty area now it's called it's got red stakes
03:42how are they different to yellow stakes you start dropping it from shoulder height and then you
03:46realize you've got to change the knee height there's an awful lot to remember and obviously
03:50you're playing an outdoor sport and you've got your ball can get in a whole host of different
03:53scenarios and there's been situations where i've been asking my playing partners for advice and none of them
03:59know what the actual rule is so you know it's an incredibly frustrating problem that golfers have
04:04they'll end up calling the pro shop asking for advice shuffling through the pages of their rule
04:08book maybe going on the app which is really good by the way but still can be difficult to find the
04:12ruling that you want so my advice to you would be try and learn kind of the basic ones the simply one
04:17that you're going to be experiencing most out on the golf course the golf month youtube channel has some
04:22great rules videos that you should definitely check out to swat up on your knowledge and if you do that
04:27hopefully you won't face these problems and you'll become the john paramour of your four ball
04:36right so the next problem on our list relates to lessons which will usually take place on a driving
04:42range as you can see here and the big problem golfers often have with lessons is the fact that often
04:47they make you play worse before you play better now i'm not for one second advocating the idea that
04:54golfers shouldn't have lessons lessons are really important to improve your golf and they're
04:57definitely the fastest way of improving your golf over things like club changes or other methods but
05:04the problem with lessons is you have that phase of unfamiliarity with a swing change so maybe you
05:09change your grip or your posture or your swing plane and there is that inevitable kind of transition
05:14period where you're going from your old swing to your new swing where everything feels alien it feels
05:20strange and on the golf course you feel like you're not even going to make contact with the golf ball
05:24let alone hit a good shot and often golfers fall into the trap of going back to their old ways just
05:30because it feels comfortable for them obviously my bit of advice for you around lessons would be to
05:35really stick with it have a plan and really accept the fact that maybe your results out on the golf course
05:41aren't going to improve straight away there is that period of bedding them in getting them ingrained so
05:46that they feel more natural and if you do that hopefully those changes will then produce better
05:52more consistent results also think about when you have lessons so maybe peak height of summer
05:57isn't the best time to do it because that's when all the competitions and you can be playing a lot more
06:01golf so think about having lessons during the off season and don't space them too close together
06:06give yourself a few weeks apart so you can really work on it and embed it in time for your next lesson
06:12if you do that hopefully you won't experience the problem of lessons making you worse before you get
06:17better
06:23right so the next problem that golfers often face relates to leaving stuff behind without you
06:28realizing there's a lot of things that can potentially fall off for example your range finder
06:32if you haven't zipped up properly might fall out of its holder you might you drop your towel the head
06:37cover might fall off or the most common one is you've taken a wedge up with your putter to do a chip
06:42by the green here uh your hole out or you walk off without realizing you've left your wedge
06:47by the side of the green you might only realize that you've done it say four or five holes later
06:52when you come to use that wedge for your next shot and obviously there's two problems there the first
06:56problem is you haven't got that wedge that you really like to use for that next shot and therefore
07:00you have to use a different one you're unfamiliar with and the performance and the results could
07:04suffer as a result but then you've got the other problem the fact that you're worrying about where that
07:09club is who's got it whether they're going to hand it into the pro shop whether they're going to try
07:13and give it to you during the round and that can affect your concentration and affect the quality of
07:18your shots after that obviously the problem is compounded even more by the fact that product is
07:22often worth quite a lot of money and you're kind of worrying about whether you're even going to get
07:27it back at all but hopefully you know you will rely on the the good nature of your fellow
07:31members they would try and give it to you or hand it back into the pro shop afterwards
07:35often golfers will get into a bit of a flap and a panic and start waving at people frantically
07:40or two fairways across in some sort of unwritten awful golfing code as to have you got my club or
07:46towel or whatever it is you've dropped and it all can get a bit embarrassing but
07:50you know the problem that golfers face it is annoying but i guess the moral of the story is
07:54try and keep track of all your bit of kit and hopefully your playing partners will spot it
07:58if you have dropped something behind right so the next problem relates to winter mats now i know they
08:09are there to preserve the integrity of the actual tees and they are in use during the winter months but
08:16there's a lot of problems i have with winter mats the first is that they generally get a lot of wear
08:20and tear and they can become quite muddy and therefore quite slippy which is not what you want when
08:25you're trying to hit a drive but my main issue with winter mats is how it can be very difficult to get
08:30the correct tee height for the club that you're using now obviously a lot of golfers have different
08:35tricks on this and there are a lot of different heights of tea you can use so for example i use
08:40this pink castle tee for my driver it's the perfect height for it so if you can get it in the ground
08:45fully then that's problem solved but if you're hitting so for example this hole is a risk reward
08:51par four here at burleigh park the fourth hole i like to hit a three wood so i need to get the ball
08:55teed up ever so slightly but it can be quite difficult to do it especially if the mats are
09:00quite firm as they are at the moment you can get these very small castle tees which are ideal but
09:06they only work if you can actually get the tee physically in the mat which can be very difficult
09:10my advice to you would be try and use holes that have been previously used and don't go forward
09:16with the shot if the ball isn't teed up to the correct height because you'll only end up
09:20either roofing the shot and putting a horrible mark on the top of your club if you've got it teed
09:25up too high and if you give up all together and use the off the mat especially on a par three and
09:30you like to use a tee with the orions and you give up and don't use a tee then you probably end up
09:34thinning it or hitting a pretty bad shot so persevere with it invest in some very small green castle
09:40tees like i've got here and hopefully this won't be a problem for you
09:44right so the next problem golfer's face is a pain so excruciating i wouldn't wish it on my worst enemies
09:55it is the dreaded ankle bash where you knock your putter head against the little bone that sticks out
10:02on the side of your ankle i would liken the pain to standing on an upturn plug or a piece of lego in
10:08barefoot it's that bad and really something you want to try and avoid because it can leave you
10:12hobbling around the side of the green it often happens also if you're in the bunker maybe you've
10:17played your bunker shot and you're tapping the sole of your shoe to get the sand out of your cleats
10:21and suddenly you miss your shoe and the club strikes that part of your ankle so
10:26my only advice to you would be to be very careful where you swing your wedge or your putter
10:41right the next problem that golfers face comes in the bunker and specifically if you're playing
10:45on a dry windy day often the sand when you're hitting a bunker shot will pop up and if you're
10:51hitting into the wind it will then fly back right into your face and that can be a really uncomfortable
10:57situation you get sand in your eyes it's incredibly painful but also the sand can get down your top
11:03and it gets very very itchy in all sorts of different places and it's very very uncomfortable
11:07and difficult to shake off you find yourself walking funnily after in the next few holes trying to shake
11:12it out and get it all out of the areas where it feels uncomfortable i guess my only advice to overcome
11:18that problem is to turn away as quickly as you can so you hit the shot you know the sound's gonna be
11:23blowing into your face obviously don't turn away too soon you need to hit the shot properly but then
11:27just kind of turn away hopefully the sand won't get into those places where you don't want it to
11:32but that's the best advice i can do i'm afraid it's a problem golfers have to experience sometimes
11:38unfortunately out on the course
11:39now the next problem that golfers have to deal with relates to these premium golf balls now we
11:50all know if you want the best performing golf ball you have to pay a premium price for example this
11:55pro v1x golf ball that i play comes in around about 50 pounds per dozen which equates to just over four
12:01pounds a golf ball which in the grand scheme of things is quite a lot of money when you consider
12:06how long these balls potentially last we've all done it we've pegged up a brand new pro v1x
12:11on the first tee that brilliant white finish is gleaming back at you and then you hit a raging snap
12:17hook into the cabbage or the out of bounds never to be seen again and that four pound golf ball has
12:21lasted literally 10 seconds of course titleists have less expensive offerings that might well be worth
12:27considering but if you don't want to go down that route the chances are at some point you will lose a
12:31brand new premium ball and unless you're on tour that's a pretty painful experience but unfortunately
12:37it's just a problem golfers have to deal with
12:45right the next problem on our list relates to pockets now pockets are really important for
12:50a golfer because golfers have to store a lot of different items during a round whether it's tees
12:54markers pitch mark repairers pencils that sort of thing and often those sorts of things can be left
12:59in your pocket for longer than you might like so for example maybe you're out shopping and then you
13:04suddenly realize you've got left your glove in your back pocket and you obviously feel incredibly
13:09embarrassed about it and another problem that golfers have to deal with when it comes to pockets is
13:13perhaps leaving your scorecard in your pocket when you put your trousers through the wash taking your
13:18trousers out for its next outing having put it through the wash and then finding that you've left your
13:24scorecard in the pocket and it's turned to that horrible papery mush material that's almost impossible
13:29to get fully out of your pocket and you spend the next few days really trying to brush everything
13:33out of there it's a horrible feeling hopefully you haven't done that after your competitive round but
13:37after your social round you might have left your scorecard in there so that's one of the big problems
13:41golfers leaving things in their pockets for too long right so that concludes the 10 problems that all
13:48golfers can relate to hopefully you really enjoyed this video and if you did make sure you give us a
13:52thumbs up by clicking the like button and comment down below i'd love to hear from you how many of these
13:57problems have you had to deal with and have we missed any out so make sure you let us know but
14:03for now from burley park golf club here in stanford it's goodbye from me we'll see you next time