Basic Golfing Tips For Beginners: 1
The popularity of the game of golf has increased tremendously over the past forty-five years, giving us great champions like Arnold Palmer, Greg Norman, and Tiger Woods and world-renowned courses like Pinehurst, St. Andrews, Augusta National and the Blue Monster at Doral.
Why has golf become so popular these days? Its the opportunity to be outside, to get a good whole body workout, network with friends or business colleagues at a leisurely pace, and to play a game that you can never play perfectly.
Your scorecard, over time, will demonstrate your improvement, which keeps you playing time and time again.
This is the first lesson for the novice golfer who doesn’t know anything about golfing.
A round of golf is usually played on an eighteen hole course. Each hole has its ‘par’, which is the total number of tee shots (drives), fairway shots, chips (short shots near the ‘green’) and putts on the green, it should take to sink the golfball in the hole.
‘Par’ is determined by the length and difficulty of each hole and can range from three to six. So, if you get the golf ball in the hole in six shots on a ‘par six’ hole, you ‘made par’; if you make it in five, it’s a “birdie” or seven, a “bogie”.
‘Hazards’ or obstructions are usually placed before all the holes. Ponds, sand bunkers and trees are positioned in such a way as to make it more difficult to reach the green. Novice golfers should try to find a course with fewer hazards, which is therefore easier to play.
Players mark their own scorecard with the cumalative total of shots taken for each hole. After playing all the holes, the players add up their own scorecards and the one with the lowest score is the winner.
Please don’t take your score or your lack of skill to heart when you are a beginner golfer, because, although the professionals make it look simple, it takes many years to play the game well.
It makes very good sense to take a few lessons from the course pro, when you are just beginning to learn to play golf, because then you will learn how to stand and swing the golf club correctly.