Graham Averill has turned 50 this year and he’s freaking out. Instead of buying a motorcycle or getting a tattoo, he’s decided to try to get really, really good at golf. He started this project as a 13 handicap attempting to reach scratch in a year. He is now a 7.2. Welcome to his midlife crisis.
It was the best of times; it was the worst of times. (With apologies to Charles DIckens, a 22-handicapper aspiring to single digits.)
I played my lowest round yesterday, shooting a score I didn’t think was possible given my current skill set. And, somehow, it was also the most frustrating round I’ve played in a long time.
I shot two over par on my home course. Sounds great, right? Not so fast. I was even par going into the 18th hole and finished with a double bogey.
What. The. $%&K?
I can justify bad play with a litany of excuses. Here are some of my favorites: I didn’t take ibuprofen this morning, I took too many ibuprofen, I didn’t warm up at the range, I warmed up too long at the range.
But I have no excuses for the painful finish. You know how golfers always lament that they can’t put all of the elements of a good game together on the same day? If they’re driving well, they can’t putt. If they can putt, their irons are off. If they could only put it together, they could go low, right?
Well, I put it all together yesterday. I was relaxed and my swing felt effortless. I found fairways off the tee and greens from the short grass. If I missed a green in regulation, I got up and down for par. I started the round with a birdie and followed that up with a par, birdie, par, birdie, par. I finished the front nine at two under and braced myself for having to hold on through the back as my game broke down but my swing stayed consistent. I didn’t find more birdies on the back but I parred holes that usually result in bogeys.
There’s one long par-5 in particular that usually gets the better of me but I played it smart, laying up twice with 5-woods, reaching a severely elevated green in regulation and two-putting from 10 feet for par. Beautiful. Just like the course designer laid it out.
That’s not to say my game was perfect. There were two missed chips from about 80 yards out that I want back, both of which resulted in bogeys. And I missed a few birdie putts in the eight-foot range. But I played golf. Good golf. Through 17 holes with a solid chance to shoot an even par round for the first time in my life as I approached the 18th tee.
And here’s the thing about the 18th hole: it’s one of the easiest on the course. It’s a 500-yard par-5 with a monstrous uphill tee shot that sucks the life out of a good drive. But there’s room to miss on both sides of the fairway so most tee shots set you up for success. I par this hole often. Birdies aren’t unreasonable so, in theory, an under-par round wasn’t out of the question.
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Read story →I hit a ballooning slice far right of the fairway off the tee followed by a worm-burner 5-iron that went 70 yards into the rough. From there, it got worse. I clubbed up for my approach shot but not enough and hit a dud short of the green before shanking a wedge away from the hole. Then I three-putted from 20 feet.
Double bogey. The bloated number looks ridiculous at the end of my scorecard. A glaring mistake on an otherwise solid round. There was no logical reason for me to suddenly forget how to golf on 18. I wasn’t hurt. I wasn’t fatigued. I didn’t make any rash or questionable decisions.
It was a mental collapse.
If I’m being honest, there were moments on the back nine when I questioned whether I deserved to play an even round of golf. I told myself I hadn’t put enough work in. That my swing wasn’t good enough and my game wasn’t complete enough for a score that low. This is classic imposter syndrome stuff here. Even though I have been putting in the work and I have shot low scores recently, I was convincing myself that I didn’t deserve this kind of success.
I tried to dismiss the thoughts and forge on but the damage was done. I was infected with self-doubt and I fell apart with the finish line in sight.
I’ve thoroughly enjoyed taking apart the physical aspect of golf—learning the nuances of my own swing and trying to maximize it to the best of my ability—but this mental stuff is the real gold mine of the game. And it’s obvious I have more digging to do.
The really frustrating part? That 18-hole round was my only chance to play golf all week. I was pulled back home by some family issues and couldn’t even drag the putter out to practice for most of the week. But as frustrating as that closing double bogey is, GHIN doesn’t care. A 74 is a 74 and that score was good enough to take a nibble out of my handicap and bring me down to a 7.2. And while the seven bad shots on my last hole certainly stick in my mind, I’m going to spend some time reflecting on the rest of the day until I get to tee it up again. I played some good golf. I can’t wait to do it again.
Dig deeper into one golfer’s struggle to get better at golf in middle age and read last week’s Scratch By 50 where Graham details how his practice has evolved since starting this project.
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