108 - Glorious...

I woke up on Sunday relatively hangover free despite going to a lovely dinner party in a friend’s house (fantastic homemade meal, wine and bubbly around the table – we even had candles and napkins!) so I decided to visit the driving range to blow off the remaining cobwebs before going to the match to scream abuse at a load of overpaid Nancy boys who don’t deserve my continued support. Ahem...

Like just about every time I have ever been to the range, it was raining. Not only was it raining but it was blowing a gale too which only helped accentuate my cripplingly bad beginners slice. I warmed up with a few bombs from my 3 wood (I’ve all but given up on trying to tame my driver for now). All was good with my new weapon of choice from the tee but it was my iron shots that impressed.

When I go to the driving range I try to simply hit the same shot twice (immense ambition eh?) Consistency is the key to decent golf apparently but for the last year or so the only thing consistent about my shots is their inconsistency. At the weekend I had an epiphany as I successfully managed to hit the same shot over and over again.

I worked out how to set myself up the same way each time to produce a repeatable shot – the casual observer may have thought I knew what I was doing! Time and time again I hit my 5 iron long, straight and true. I could even pick out a spot and hit it. This may not sound like a big deal to those of you who can play golf, but for me it was the equivalent of monkeys using tools for the first time.

Just to check it wasn’t a fluke I tried the same thing with my 7 iron and found I could use that properly too! The frustration, anger and depression I had suffered at the hands of this son-of-a-bitch game melted away with each glorious, straight down the middle shot. I went through about 50 balls with a gormless grin on my face.

With my confidence soaring I moved on to my 52* wedge knowing that I was now an international ball striking legend. Things didn’t go as well as I had hoped as I discovered that I had completely lost any skill I had with wedges with my lovely little MP-R (above) taking a bit of a pounding as I slammed it into the mat with regular and bone juddering regularity. It took a lot of effort to get the ball in the air at all but it eventually came back to me.

I walked to the car happy that I now have something to indicate that all the practice, all the effort all the frustration wasn’t in vain. For the first time in 12 months I could say that I had something approaching a repeatable swing – something to build on and refine. I’m going back to the driving range later to confirm that the Sunday morning session wasn’t just a fluke.