I PLAY GOLF WEEKLY WITH MY BUDDY GENE. His brother Joe happened to join us this week. I don’t usually look at other player’s clubs but on the eighth tee, as I was waiting my turn to hit, I looked over at the other cart and noticed Joe’s bag brimming full of clubs.
Holy Jesus, was my first thought - the collection must have had an earlier life in a garage sale. I’ve posted this assortment of clubs in the above photo to prove that I am not exaggerating.
My next thought, “How does his brain decide what club to use?” I’d be frozen in indecision by the number of choices. My minimalist ways have me down to ten golf clubs today and I’m hoping soon to move to seven. In 1913 Francis Ouimet won the US Open carrying just seven clubs. He’s my new hero.
There have been many changes in the rules of golf these last couple years, so I checked on the USGA website to see if a “cancel culture” had crept into the rules of golf on the number of clubs allowed.
Rule 4-1b of the Rules of Golf: The player must not start a stipulated round with more than fourteen clubs. He is limited to the clubs thus selected for that round, except that if he started with fewer than fourteen clubs, he may add any number, provided his total number does not exceed fourteen.
The big question from our round today, “was this a stipulated round?” I certainly know it was some kind of round because I lost three dollars.
You got to love the game no matter how many clubs you carry.
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