Walking the Course!

[JohnV]

From day one, Pumpkin Ridge has provided free pull carts on both its courses.  They currently have the Rik-Sha (sp?) version that you also find at Bandon and they are great.  Because of this and the fact that power carts must stay on the distant paths, very few of the regular members take carts.

I still can't figure out why so many of the courses in the US are so opposed to them.

While watching the Senior British Open last year on TV, I saw a player's wife caddying for him and pulling his big tour back on a trolley.  I unsuccesfully tried to get the Futures Tour to allow pull carts but never one that battle.

[ed_getka]

What is the big deal about pull carts (other than ego)? You are still walking and experiencing the course the way it was meant to be. The pull carts at Bandon are great and make the slogs through the sand much easier. Generally I carry my bag simply because I am young, but it never occurred to me that people attached a stigma to pull carts.

[NicP]

An interesting discussion. Here in Australia it is as rare to see someone carry their bag as it is to see them in a golf cart. It just dosen't happen! All the clubs have a large supply of buggies, as we call them over here, for members and guests to use. At most clubs I know of it is actually encouraged for the players to take the buggies over greens. The theory is, and it has worked for a long time over here, that by letting people go were they like it evens out the traffic so no one area suffers 100% of the load. All of the buggies have wide wheels rather than the thin "bicycle" type of wheels.

Talking about stigma I travelled to the US last year to caddy for a mate who played on the Golden Bear Tour in Florida. Being a low marker myself I organised a start in the Eastern Amatuer at Elizabeth Manor in Portsmouth Virginia. Being from Oz I am no stranger to heat but I have to admit it was pretty hot the first two days and I couldn't believe I was the only player to use a buggy (pull cart!!). Everyone was carrying!!

[RJ_Daley]

Pete, I once took the seminar at GCSAA convo "scouting for pests" and I must admit that the insturctor really chanllenged the supers to get out of their maintenance vehicles and walk their course.  Also, I was interested and pleased to see that the entire crew at CC of Charleston are encouraged to play and walk after 3Pm tuesdays, free.  Even you,who happens to be one of the best in the business, misses too much managing from the cart passing by at 20MPH.  

But, I am very glad you put your thoughts about how much it means to you to get out there and walk again.  I also played in our men's club league today.  It blew at times 25+MPH. Our 4some teed off at 11Am and it was still only 41*, at about the turn it snowed sideways for about 20 minutes.  And, I looked across and around the old course and was proud to observe that 90% of our members were walking, and many of them (including me) over 50 and carrying, not just using the trolleys.  But the hottest thing in our part of the country are the remote control bag toting motorized trolleys (Dynamis, Minncota, and caddie pro).  I am all for them.  It is great to walk easy without the bag begining to knock you out of good posture walking alignment after 9-15 holes and finishing a little bent or spinally compressed.  

Please come and walk Lawsonia with me some day!  

[Dan King]

Pete, your post has inspired me.  

I've been getting lazy in my old age.  As golf has become a less important part of my life I've been riding more than I ever have. I was thinking how thankful I was to ride Barona since it was a six hour round and I liked having somewhere to sit my fat ass while endlessly waiting to hit my next shot.

No more. I'm going to get back to walking whenever there is opportunity. Whenever I'm feeling lazy, I'll just think about Pete and how he had to go all those years without the ability to walk.

It's back to golf for me.  

"Walking also enables us to watch a hole unfold in front of us. To walk a course is analogous to driving a long distance rather than flying. While driving, we see the country instead of racing over it. There's a human scale that flying cannot offer."
 --Lorne Rubenstein

[Joe Hancock]

Pete,

I just got back from a skins game at our course, and I also walked for one of the rare times. I did enjoy many of the same things as you. I walked mainly because of 45 degrees with a 30 mph wind and I wanted to stay warm. The greens were very quick, pin placements a challenge...what a fun round! Its the one time every week I get to "pay" to play my own course, and it's worth every dollar.

Joe

[Mike_Sweeney]

I recently played an outing with some high school friends which was a cart paths only shotgun, so you had to take a cart. I find it almost impossible to get any flow going to the round. You walk just as much to and from the cart, and spend most of your time wondering if your partner will move the cart. Walking is the only way for me to get into the round.

[Jeremy Glenn. (Guest)]

Pete,

I remember a e-mail you sent to me a number of years ago regarding walking, riding, and a golfer's ability to choose.

Great to see those choices now available to you!

All the best.

[Don_Mahaffey]

Pete,
Great to know your out walking the course. At Barona it looked like you would be out soon and I glad to hear your doing well. I know of a couple of very good supers who try to walk 9 every day. They carry a little tape recorder and record what they notice. I've promised myself a million times I was going to make time to start doing it, but as of yet I haven't. Maybe tomorrow.
Years ago I never took a cart, never wanted to spend the extra cash and I looked at the guys who rode all the time as either wimps or those who were out on the course for reasons other then to play real golf. Once I moved to AZ I started riding a lot because everyone rides here. Most of the courses are unwalkable. However my course is very walkable and I've walked about a dozen times in the last six months. My goal this summer is to walk 9 twice a week with my 9 year old, Ryan. He's got the golf bug and I just can't see letting a kid learn the game from the seat of a cart.

Congratulations on your improved health and I hope your walking 18 soon.

[Mike Duffy]

Pete,

A lovely personal post.

The emails and phone conversations we have shared over the past years have been a great pleasure for me, but I am so happy for you to hear that you are able to walk the golf course again, and in the words of Walter Hagen "take time to smell the roses".

May your walks on your golf  course be increasingly long and pleasurable, no man deserves it more than you Pete

Keep your chin up mate, and good golfing.

[JakaB]

My biggest concern about trolleys is that they would hurt the caddie program....to keep a good caddie program the members have to work at it...it is expensive...takes great patience at times...but is great for the club and worth the effort.   My wife and I are currently trying to budget a little...hell I might even be as bad off as that poor bastard friend of Gib who barely makes his Olympic dues...but I just don't feel right about cutting back on my caddie fees...in what a quandry I find myself.

[redanman]

What's great is that everyone here is going to walk more due to your good fortune and eloquent post, Pete.

I love to walk, do it if at all possible (As some here can attest to the times I've abandoned them in the cart when forced to take one-using the flimsy excuse of my achilles heel-back) and prefer to carry only if because pulling or pushing a trolley is actually harder on my back.  Anyone else ever experience that?

I've even tried those big-wheeled Rickshaw things and they are still uncomfortable for me because of the enforced posture to push or pull it.

But anyway Pete, this thread is about YOU.  I look forward to seeing you walk without that incredibly stiff-hipped gait you developed.  Keep up those exercises.   Those abductors have a loooooooooooooooooong way to go, trust me.   You are right to do the walking in a progressive fashion, it won't do you any good to overdo it early.

Go Pete Go!!!!!!!

[redanman]

This thread has inspired me to walk today, despite the quizzical looks I'm bound to get.  

Why Dave?  Excuse me if I should know.  If it's due to others being surprized, more power to you.


Those of you that are USGA members, you can get a BRIGHT yellow "Walker's  Bag Tag" saying that you will walk unless forced to ride for free just by asking.  Use it with pride.

Once in Colorado, I went to Columbine CC, a dead flat course that I had walked in three hours previously carrying, and was told that as a non-member I couldn't walk.  Not even pay for the cart and walk.  (Playing with reprocity during a tone-a-mint at my club.)  The Manager wouldn't budge.  Period.  I never went back.

[A_Clay_Man]

Pete- How will you know how far you are without your GPS?

How will you be able to order lunch, ahead of time?

I was forced to play Paa Ko Ridge yesterday and I must say, you have to look extremely hard to find something wrong there.
The only of which is was the virtual impossibility of walking.

 Ken Dye went for the dramatic finish and the routing on the closing holes, is to say the least, a trek. The other irony is the cart path only rule.

I'd say if you walked five at PV, you are more than ready for the back at PG.

Contratulations!

 And one last Q. HAs the surgery improved you love life?

[DMoriarty]

Congratulations Pete.  The simplest pleasures are surely the most satisfying.

I pulled into Rustic Canyon yesterday and almost all of the golfers on the first four holes were walking.  It was a beautiful sight.

[Bob_Huntley]

I am not sure about Bandon Dunes, but I used the Rick-Sha trolley at the Nantuckett Golf Club in a stiff breeze and the thing blew over more times than I care to remember. The Pro there tells me that only happens with light bags, mine was an Izzo, so I daresay that's the problem.

In regard to the perceived stigma of using trolleys, one does not see them at Cypress or Augusta and some other posh venues, but one can see a member, in his shorts, pulling one along at one of the most prestigious clubs in the country, namely The Valley Club of Montecito.

Now that Pete Galea has shamed some of us to get off our duffs and walk again, does anyone here use a battery operated cart. What to use?

[Evan Fleisher]

Bob,

I do not use the bettery operated jobs like you mentioned (I prefer my bag on my shoulders), but many of the older members here at home use the battery operated "Kangaroo" carts due to the extreme hilly nature of our layout (I know...that is quite a shock for a course in Iowa, but it's true!).

I say...anything that encourages golfers to walk is a GOOD THING...and these electric trolleys fit the bill nicely.

[JohnV]

In thinking about it last night, I came to the conclusion that the stigma about pull carts came about because in the old days, private clubs had caddies while munis and the like didn't.  People who played the munis probably used pull carts, while the rich had caddies.  Because of this the pull cart came to be looked on as a poor man's implement.  The stigma does seem to be more prevalant back east.

BillV, while my back isn't as bad as yours (the advantage of being the younger twin I guess I also have noticed that my back does bother me when I don't carry my clubs.  I also experience this the few times I've had a caddie.  It seems that the weight and the way it bends my back makes carrying the most comfortable way to play golf for me.  My back bothers me when I go for long walks or walk around a mall for a while.  Perhaps I should get a backpack for those times also.

[RJ_Daley]

Bill V, I agree that there is something about the "pull" cart that somehow throws you out of whack and allignment by late in the round.  The reaching back to pull it along seems to make my back get into a positon that then makes me feel very awkward when I set up and try to take a comfortable stance as the round progresses.  I found that pushing my pull cart is better.  But, I got a bag that seems even less bulky and lighter than my SunMountain.  It is a "Hippo" like me!

I hope I hold up with using it because the layoff of nearly 6 weeks late last summer was very depressing.   I think the injections over the winter helped so far this year.  Time will tell.  But, if I were relegated to the cart all the time, I seriously would probably go back to trout fishing and leave the golf go.  Carts can be OK as respites from grinding the walk every day.  Or for the occasional times you need relief, like from a hangover or lack of rest, (Baronamates), but it would kill the invigoration of physical enjoyment factor if mandated everytime one played.  We have many if not most of our senior players in our county league (many in their late 60s to mid 70s) walking/carrying or pulling/pushing a cart. That is encouraging and takes some of the dreadful thoughts out of the idea of getting older.

[redanman]

A few bad back comments for those walkers out there.  (Free medical advice)

Thingey (remember those days!)  

If the course is extra hilly, I am under the weather, etc., I will carry less than the usual 14 clubs.  My steel shafted extra length clubs make for a heavier bag, so I limit the rest of the stuff in the bag.  Very limited. The caddie carries much more than I ever do, but I never abuse the caddie.  Just one club can make a difference some days.  Pull carts are hell for me.

John, my Bro'

I  suspect that what you are doing is leaning forward (Flexing your lumbar spine) to balance the bag.  Men with sore low backs develop this feature of posture.  When the caddie carrys or you walk the mall (Slower pace of walking is a killer, too) you are in more extension and it puts more strain on your anterior (front part) hips.  Work on the extension.  We'll talk about this.  (It will help another important physical activity, too.  

The other thing is that a double shoulder bag is not necessarily better.  Alternating shoulders with a single strap is very very good.  Every double strap is not good either.  Experiment.

[Dave Wilber]

Pete...

It was really good to see you at the Nor Cal Supers meeting at Peninsula G&CC!!

Wonderful news about your hip. I was really happy for you!!


--Wilber

[ed_getka]

Pete,
 Its been a few more weeks now. Any chance you can do PG back nine Tues morning the 28th? Or else lets pick a date in June after the Open.

[Peter Galea]

Ed,
I'm ready! I've been walking nine almost daily. I'm loving life!
However, when we play it would have to be an afternoon for me. I have used up all my time off for surgery. Now PT is 3 days a week. 'fraid I won't see a vacation day till I retire.
Besides we can't play a seaside course without the wind!
Perhaps we could make it a "walkapalooza" (Sorry TD, I couldn't resist). Anyone else want to get together and hoof it?

[scott_wood]

Pete, so pleased  to hear the news, and HAPPY for you...your disappointment at not being able to walk Olde Kinderhook was VERY evident....Pete and I are waiting for you to return east to visit your mom and REALLY experience those 67 steps UP from 8 to 9!!!!
CHEERS

[ed_getka]

Pete,
  I can't play the afternoon next Tues due to work schedule next week on night shift. We'll do it right after I'm back from the Open if you can wait that long. Awesome to hear you are walking nine at a time. I think a walkapalooza is a great idea so lets get some guys lined up for mid-June. I'll call you after this weekend when I get back from the Sierras with my sons to set a date. Have a nice Memorial Day weekend.