MY FOREST DALE NIGHTMARE! GOLF ETIQUETTE BY GOLFING PROFESSIONALS

By Doug McAllister

So, have you been boning up on what golf etiquette is and how you can be an even greater good practitioner of it? Reading from THE RULES OF GOLF? Becoming more determined to be part of the solution and not a continuing part of the problem?

Great! Because today we need to address what might be an even bigger part of the problem: GOLF PROFESSIONALS in the form of Course Managers, Starters and Marshals who need, themselves, to step forward and be greater practitioners of good golf etiquette.


MORE IS MORE, RIGHT?

Ever teed off at your favorite course, right on time and giving the group in front of you an appropriate amount of space before letting the pill pop — only to find that, within minutes, the group following you is breathing right down your neck? In my experience, it's happening more and more and more as golf courses try to pack foursomes and threesomes and singles onto the course in numbers more befitting sardine cans than golf courses.

It's true! Many of the problems with golf etiquette are being started and exacerbated by irresponsible course managers and employees, trying to squeeze as much revenue as possible from crowded courses. Let me share with you the most irresponsible case of this that I have ever experienced.


A NIGHTMARE AT THE 'DALE'

Forest Dale Golf Course is a treasure. The oldest golf course in Utah, it sports a wonderful nine-hole track that is both quaint and challenging. I have consistently made it a point to play the Dale in order to savor a true piece of Utah Golf History. That is before my last round turned into a laughable nightmare.

Last November my foursome decided to play Forest Dale. We called the course in the early afternoon in order to see whether a tee time was available. PLEASE NOTE THAT. We didn't just show up at the course and ask to be worked into the rotation. We called and asked whether a scheduled tee time was available.

Now, I don't know about you, but scheduling a tee time means buying and reserving a playable piece of real estate — a reasonable block of time — on the course for a given day. It means that you are allowed to play reasonably over the course of — in the case of Forest Dale — nine holes. Two and a half hours, at the most, if good golf etiquette is followed by the players AND the course managers. Seem rational? I thought so. What ensued was the most bizarre and laughable episode of golfing experience that I have ever had.

We were given a tee time, placed on the schedule and arrived about twenty minutes early and checked in at the clubhouse. The first red flag that I should have recognized was that there were no motorized carts available. NOT ONE! I brushed that one aside and ran right smack into the next warning signal: a practice green stuffed with more golfers than I could imagine the place could hold. There were, literally, five players putting to each practice hole. That's right! At least fifty people (yep...5-0 people!) milling wildly on the practice green. By this time I was sufficiently benumbed that I stopped looking for dangers signs, otherwise I would have noted that there were three groups of golfers waiting on the first tee!


AND THE HITS JUST KEEP ON COMIN'!

You are smarter than me. Had you seen what I had, you would have packed things up, gotten a refund and headed for the parking lot. Right? But, as noted, you are smarter than me. I shrugged it off, rationalizing that things would surely open up once we got out on the course. Wrong!

To make a long story short, after three hours on the course we had completed — are you ready for this? — we had completed just four holes. FOUR HOLES!! Less than half of the round completed in 30 minutes longer than it should have taken us to play the entire track!!

My mind tried to rationalize what was going on. I thought back. On the second hole, a par 5, I had counted six groups — two waiting to tee off, one teeing off, two in the fairway and one on the green putting. Six groups!! There must have been, I thought, a huge slow play logjam somewhere ahead. I finally couldn't take it any longer. I called the pro shop on my cell phone and reported the situation. The person to whom I spoke assured me that he would get right to bottom of things.

Nothing improved. As we waited behind the plethora of players waiting to play and playing the fifth hole, I made my second call. AND HERE COMES THE REVELATION THAT YOU HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR — THE WHOLE POINT OF THIS ABYSMAL STORY. "Well, we sent a member of the staff out on a cart to check things out," the pro calmly assured me, "and there doesn't seem to be any group out of order."

Okay, did you catch that? The pro was telling me that there were no open holes ahead of me on the course! As if he were describing business as usual, he was telling me that, GIVEN THE NUMBER OF GROUPS ON THE COURSE, PLAY WAS PROCEEDING AS IT SHOULD!! Holy crap! He was saying that he was aware of the etiquette crime being committed on the course at that very moment and that HE WAS THE MAIN PERPETRATOR! In other words, he had scheduled, probably, twice as many tee times as the course could — in accordance with good golf etiquette — appropriately support! And when we, abandoning the travesty of which we had been reluctantly a part, asked for at least a rain check (why I would ever want to play there again is the greatest of mysteries!) he, at first, refused.


THE MORAL OF THE STORY

You can see the problem. What is to be done when the keepers of the game and its rules and its etiquette become, themselves, the major problems? What do I think should be done? Simple:

1. Golf courses need get back to being the keepers of etiquette. They need to start groups at time intervals that allow for appropriate play, under the rules of the game and in keeping with good golf etiquette. Leaving players to police themselves off the first tee is a recipe for disaster.

2. The courses need, also, to step up and police play on their greens and fairways. In all of my years of play I have only played one course — the incomparable East Course at the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs — that had the gumption to put offending players in their place. They warned slow players to move on and, if offenses kept on coming, players were required to pick up and move on to the open hole or be expelled from play! I am sure that there are many other courses out there that follow these procedures. The East Course is the only one that I have actually witnessed.

3. NOW I HATE THIS ONE AS A PLAYER WHO ENJOYS AN INEXPENSIVE ROUND OF GOLF, but — If it becomes a matter of cramming courses full of groups or raising greens fees to bridge the gap, chose the latter. I know I would far rather pay a few more kopecks than put up with a disaster again, the likes that I experienced at Forest Dale.


It's high time that Golf Courses, their managers, keepers and staffers become a part of the golf etiquette solution. Since my disastrous day at Forest Dale, I have wondered how a PGA-approved golf professional could sit in his clubhouse, load up the course with as many golfers as he did and keep his PGA card?

While you're mulling that one over...remember...Hit 'em Long & Straight!