[Patrick_Mucci]

enjoying the game of golf.

As high-tech improved performance, golf courses reacted by altering their defenses to offset the hi-tech advantages.

Had their been no advancement in equipment, I&B, courses wouldn't have had to react, hence, with exceptions, they would have remained fairly static, perhaps adjusting for bigger and better athletes, but certainly not for quantum leaps in hi-tech.

Had the courses remained fairly static, and had you continued playing with your old equipment, would you have enjoyed the game any less ?

Or, would you have continued your love affair with the game  ?

Would you have continued to have fun with friends and competitors alike ?

If so, then in terms of enjoying the game, how important is equipment ?

[Mac Plumart]

Patrick, I think you are on to something.

I prefer my hickories, but I have fun playing with any equipment.  Obviously, I can't speak for anyone else but myself.  However, the plain and simple answer for me is that I enjoy golf; golf played with any genre of equipment.

[Sam Morrow]

For some people equipment matters, I admit to me it matters, not as much as it used to though.

[Mac Plumart]

In what way Sam.  Please elaborate.

[Tom_Doak]

Patrick:

I have spent thirty years being teased by fellow golfers for not having the latest and greatest equipment.

It seems never to have occurred to them that since I am playing for fun, it doesn't matter.  I enjoy trying to get the most out of whatever club is in my hands, one shot at a time.  And as long as my handicap is based on using that equipment, it is not a competitive disadvantage.

I have drawn the same conclusions about course conditioning, too.  I enjoyed the game just as much thirty years ago, when the greens weren't 12 on the Stimpmeter, and when my weed identification class from Cornell still informed me on some of the plants that I'd see during the course of a round.

[Sam Morrow]

In what way Sam.  Please elaborate.

Mac when you meet later this year you will find that I'm a club whore, I have issues, I've had it ever since I was a spoiled country club kid and when I was in the golf industry. Even when I first got on this website I cared much more about having the latest and greatest clubs, playing a great course was only part of the draw for me. Now I'm more worried about the course I'm playing and grown to realize that I'm a crappy golfer not because of my clubs but because of me. In the bag today I have a hodgepodge,

Adams XTD Pro Driver (4 years old)
Callaway Steelead Plus 4+ (10 years old)
Mizuno CLK 20 degree
KZG Forged Blades 4-P (12 years old)
Mizuno MPT-11 52 wedge
Scratch 58 degree wedge
Slighter custom putter (6 years old)

[Ken Moum]

enjoying the game of golf.

As high-tech improved performance, golf courses reacted by altering their defenses to offset the hi-tech advantages.

Had their been no advancement in equipment, I&B, courses wouldn't have had to react, hence, with exceptions, they would have remained fairly static, perhaps adjusting for bigger and better athletes, but certainly not for quantum leaps in hi-tech.

Had the courses remained fairly static, and had you continued playing with your old equipment, would you have enjoyed the game any less ?

I think I might have enjoyed it more. but that's just a guess based on my experience with old equipment (see my next answer).

Or, would you have continued your love affair with the game  ?

Would you have continued to have fun with friends and competitors alike ?

I play a few rounds a year with a set of 1958 clubs that my dad bought new. And some with a set of hickories I assembled.  I usually choose to play shortish courses without any forced carries, like the "good old days" so I think those rounds are a pretty good approximation of what you're talking about.

And those rounds are lots of fun.  I tell people all the time that those old clubs are harder to play with, they are different. I feel like I have to maneuver the ball around the course, instead of trying to throw it up in the air. This game is more engaging, and less "fussy" than playing modern golf with a scorecard and pencil.

If so, then in terms of enjoying the game, how important is equipment ?

Now, that's a different question.  Equipment is a HUGE factor in my enjoyment of golf.  But that's because I am a horrible equipment ho'.  I have hundreds of clubs in my garage, and a big percentage of them make appearances every season.  I LOVE fooling around with golf clubs, I am addicted to lead tape, nobody has bent adjusted more putters than me and how many guys do you know with 75 wedges on the ceiling of their garage?  (FWIW, that's only part of my wedge agglomeration.

But I see golf equipment and playing golf to be complementary games. Hell, I bought a used driver and wedge last week...

[David Harshbarger]

Pat,

For a high handicapper like myself the equipment has made a big difference in making it possible to have more better shots on the slight mis-hits. As noted earlier, many older courses now setup well for players like me who can carry 225-230 with confidence.  

The older equipment, for someone of my skill, resulted in many more unpredictable, and bad, mis-hits.  Now, more of my mis-hits have good distance, at least, or manageable issues with direction.

When playing from the proper tees, I feel like golf is a great, full throated challenge.

Dave

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tom Doak,

Interesting that you say that.

One of the times in my life when I enjoyed the game the most was when my game deteriorated dramatically due to illness.

I recall a really big drive being 180, not being able to get my irons airborne very well and having to completely change the way I navigated around the golf course.  

In particular, I remember several rounds at GCGC and NGLA where I had to tack my way down the fairway, avoiding bunkers and positioning myself for the most ideal angle of approach since getting the ball airborne was so difficult.

Yet, I loved playing.  I loved hitting well thought out and well executed shots even though I would never have considered them a year earlier.

My love of the game and my desire to have fun were the driving forces, not my score in relation to par.
As you say, with the handicap system making the inherent adjustments, you can still play against anyone, and have fun.

Perhaps we've become to medal play oriented, or score driven and perhaps, handicaps have misguidedly become the "Red Badge of Courage"

[Tom_Doak]

Tom Doak,

Interesting that you say that.

One of the times in my life when I enjoyed the game the most was when my game deteriorated dramatically due to illness.

I recall a really big drive being 180, not being able to get my irons airborne very well and having to completely change the way I navigated around the golf course.  

In particular, I remember several rounds at GCGC and NGLA where I had to tack my way down the fairway, avoiding bunkers and positioning myself for the most ideal angle of approach since getting the ball airborne was so difficult.

Yet, I loved playing.  I loved hitting well thought out and well executed shots even though I would never have considered them a year earlier.

My love of the game and my desire to have fun were the driving forces, not my score in relation to par.
As you say, with the handicap system making the inherent adjustments, you can still play against anyone, and have fun.

Perhaps we've become to medal play oriented, or score driven and perhaps, handicaps have misguidedly become the "Red Badge of Courage"

Patrick:

Exactly.  It's all about the medal play, post-every-score mentality in America, which we've decried here before.  But, no one has ever thought that perhaps the equipment companies are partly behind it, because if we just went out to enjoy ourselves and play matches against friends, we wouldn't need their $500 drivers.

I know plenty of older gents who are in their declining years golf-wise, and a few who can barely hit it out of their shadow.  And I would rank them among the keenest golfers I know.  They've finally realized that what they really enjoy is not breaking 80, but just being out there, and they relish every chance they get.

[Mike Policano]

Pat,

Yet another good topic. Like Mac, I like playing hickories. Played 18 today at Yale and it was a blast. Playing classic courses with hickories from DC to Boston is quite a treat.

Cheers

[Kyle Harris]

Tom/Patrick:

I enjoy trying to break 80 with not-so-technologically advanced equipment. (I occassionally swap out an old Cleveland 360 or even Titleist persimmon with the driver you used back in January, Tom) I think the medal/match-play thing is overblown. There are plenty of golfers I've seen that are trying to outdo their opponents with equipment even in friendly matches.

For me, Patrick, the key to your opening post is the word "game." When a golfer realizes the point of the game is to maneuver the ball into the hole, the golfer can then break free of this so-called equipment fetish.  

[Tom_Doak]

Tom/Patrick:

I enjoy trying to break 80 with not-so-technologically advanced equipment. (I occassionally swap out an old Cleveland 360 or even Titleist persimmon with the driver you used back in January, Tom) I think the medal/match-play thing is overblown. There are plenty of golfers I've seen that are trying to outdo their opponents with equipment even in friendly matches.

For me, Patrick, the key to your opening post is the word "game." When a golfer realizes the point of the game is to maneuver the ball into the hole, the golfer can then break free of this so-called equipment fetish.  

Kyle:

My opponents are welcome to try to outdo me with equipment any time they want, as long as they give me a couple more shots in the match.

[Kyle Harris]

Tom/Patrick:

I enjoy trying to break 80 with not-so-technologically advanced equipment. (I occassionally swap out an old Cleveland 360 or even Titleist persimmon with the driver you used back in January, Tom) I think the medal/match-play thing is overblown. There are plenty of golfers I've seen that are trying to outdo their opponents with equipment even in friendly matches.

For me, Patrick, the key to your opening post is the word "game." When a golfer realizes the point of the game is to maneuver the ball into the hole, the golfer can then break free of this so-called equipment fetish.  

Kyle:

My opponents are welcome to try to outdo me with equipment any time they want, as long as they give me a couple more shots in the match.

Can it really be that much of an advantage? I can't think of a situation, though my experience is limited, where I've truly felt out-gunned by my opponents equipment.

[Steve Lang]

 .. having fun.. yes true.  along the way one may:

_  stop keeping score while still trying to score,
_  go to a d-4w-5-7-9-sw-p  7-club setup,
_  carry 4 balls and either scrounge or walk in if they're lost,
_  walk/play a course backwards
_  only play match play...

[Mac Plumart]

Tom/Patrick:

I enjoy trying to break 80 with not-so-technologically advanced equipment. (I occassionally swap out an old Cleveland 360 or even Titleist persimmon with the driver you used back in January, Tom) I think the medal/match-play thing is overblown. There are plenty of golfers I've seen that are trying to outdo their opponents with equipment even in friendly matches.

For me, Patrick, the key to your opening post is the word "game." When a golfer realizes the point of the game is to maneuver the ball into the hole, the golfer can then break free of this so-called equipment fetish.  

Kyle:

My opponents are welcome to try to outdo me with equipment any time they want, as long as they give me a couple more shots in the match.

Can it really be that much of an advantage? I can't think of a situation, though my experience is limited, where I've truly felt out-gunned by my opponents equipment.

It is not an advantage.  Tom is "getting over" on these guys.  If he keeps a valid handicap with this old equipment and his opponents keep a valid handicap with the new equipment, it is an apples to apples comparison.  Watch that Doak guy...he is sneaky!!!

[Colin Macqueen]

Pat,
I can only really answer your last question slightly out of context "... in terms of enjoying the game, how important is equipment ?"

I don't think I have a fetish for garnering new equipment as I had a rag-tag set of mis-matched clubs for the first twenty years then Ben Hogan Apexes and persimmon woods until 3 years ago when I bought a matched set of Mizunos.

BUT at about that time my long-irons became atrocious with much more than "...a hint of the hosel" and my joy of the game diminished markedly. Twelve months ago no doubt sensing how downcast I was becoming my better half went, unbeknownst to me, to the golf club pro shop. There she got them to order two hybrids (17 & 20 degrees) which have now been supplemented with a third. Suffice it to say I had the second best game of my career last Saturday winning the comp. in a canter!

So for my enjoyment of the game the equipment has turned out to be very important.
Thank goodness for an informed woman and new, modern equipment!

Cheers Colin

[Peter Pallotta]

Patrick - we have had totally different experiences with the game.  You have been a golfer, and a very good and competitive one, for many many years. For me, except for a brief exposure to the game when i was 17 (and working on a maintenance crew at a local course), I didn't take up the game again until my mid 30s, and even then played only occasionally. Only in the last few years have I gotten in a round a week or so during the summer. In short, I have never been any good, and only now am I slowly getting better.  But starting off from such different places, we've arrived at the same spot -- and that is one of the beauties of the game. I enjoy the game immensely, taking the golf course (any golf course) as it presents itself, one shot at a time, with the equipment I have (including an old set of Hogan blades that, as Garland B knows and supports, I bought specifically in order to improve my game).  For me it is a game of mishits and recovery shots and patience and plodding and what might have beens, punctuated by the occasional joys of a purely struck 4 iron, or a 3 wood to the smart/right side of the fairway. One man's opinion/experience, but if technology or gca or golfer's expectations or maintenance practices ever manage to take the plodding, patience, joys and what might have beens out of the game, I'm not sure what would be left.  

Peter

PS - Colin, just saw your post. Congratulations on the win! (and in a canter no less!)

[Garland Bayley]

Keep it up Patrick, you are catching up.

The one equipment issue that made me unhappy was the ability of the high handicapper to put big smiles on a golf ball, rendering them useless. Once solid ball technology came along, I was happy. Didn't even care if I spun the ball or not.

[RJ_Daley]

Equipment can or doesn't matter, when it comes to your enjoyment of the game.  But, if the game has a competitive objective, even if it is a quarter skins game among your pals, you will always seek any edge (valid or falsely perceived) to win that competition.  Match play or medal play, if you are competing, you are doing physical exercises or repetitive swing drills, to get you that edge to help your chances to win.  And, you are being marketed to constantly to inform you that you can buy that edge, beyond hard work and practice.  Unfortunately, it is true that the new equipment gets you some better or easier swing stress, and distance, perhaps more forgiving ball flights.  Yet, the average golfer is still about a 13-15 handicap (correct?).   I don't think the average handicaps of all casual golfers have improved over 30 years, have they?  

So, equipment doesn't matter to enjoyment if you can get to that mindset, non competitive in any manner.  But, if you desire to improve, and win, you will have plenty of marketing people to tell you you can buy a swing, get that edge, and out compete you opponents.  You can justify it and believe it or not, as you wish.  
 
One other thing about equipment, is that the newest materials do seem to easy the physical wear and tear of the golf swing process.  As we all get older, that is a valid consideration, it seems to me.  Less pain soreness, more enjoyment.  Do you think that is valid, Pat?

[Garland Bayley]

.... And as long as my handicap is based on using that equipment, it is not a competitive disadvantage....

DING! DING! DING! We have a winner!

[Colin Macqueen]

RJ,

My response may suggest that I liked new equipment for the sake of competition but I didn't really mean that to be inferred.  Why I get such joy out of the hybrids is that the soaring ball flight is now back in play from 150 metres and out. I think my atavism gets fed!
Cheers Colin

[Stewart Naugler]

The only reason I'm obsessed with the latest shaft technology is to stay competitive in tournaments. My driver carry is only around 265-270, so it's very difficult to keep up with the guys that consistently carry the ball 290+. I can putt and chip better than 95 percent of my opponents. But it's still hard to compete when I'm hitting a 4 iron or hybrid into the green and they're hitting 7 and 8 irons.

I would love to go back to my younger days when everyone used persimmon heads and steel shafts.

[Tommy Williamsen]

In some ways I enjoyed the older equipment more.  For instance I had to learn a flop shot with a pitching wedge and hit a toe hook with a persimmon driver.  I actually carried a 1 iron.  I've tried playing with my old clubs but the old balls worked better than the new ones. I still have Macgregor Tourney persimmon woods and Haig Ultra Irons that I saved up to buy. but the game changed and so did the courses I played. I never hit my 1 iron high but could bend it and make it run like rabbit chased by a dog.  I have a 16 degree hybrid that can almost do the same thing but I can't make it bend like I used to.  I used to average hitting 12 greens a round.  I don't do that anymore, even with the new equipment. 

[William_G]

The game of golf can be enjoyed with any type of equipment.

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