First Tee Panic Read online

  Copyright Information

  The First Tee Panic

  Copyright © 2014 by Dean Wesley Smith

  First published in slightly different form in Smith’s Monthly 1, 2 and 3, October, November, December 2013

  Published by WMG Publishing

  Cover and Layout copyright © 2014 by WMG Publishing

  Cover design by Allyson Longueira/WMG Publishing

  Cover art copyright © Julien Tromeur/Dreamstime, Andres Rodriguez/Dreamstime

  Smashwords Edition

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

  Help! I Don’t Want to Whiff the First Shot

  Help! What do I do While a Bag Boy Unloads My Clubs

  Help! How do I Act Like a Real Golfer in the Pro Shop?

  Help! Which Club Should I Hit First on the Driving Range?

  Help! Which Club Should I Hit Last on the Driving Range?

  Help! How Many Practice Putts is Too Many?

  Help! The Starter Has Just Called Our Group and I’m Frozen Stiff

  Easing the Tension

  Getting the Tee into the Ground

  Taking a Deep Breath, Maybe Two

  Visualizing the Path of the Ball

  ...Just Hit the Stupid Thing

  True Stories From the Front Lines

  Table of Contents

  About the Author

  Copyright Information

  1

  HELP! I DON’T WANT TO WHIFF THE FIRST SHOT

  IT’S A HORRID NIGHTMARE. For some reason, I have it just about every time I play in a golf tournament, or have a big game lined up with friends or other professional golfers. I’ve heard that other golfers have nightmares like it, but no one seems to deal with the dreams and the nightmares that come along with the game. I’m not going to either, but I am going to talk about what causes my nightmare.

  The first tee shot. (Sound effects here of those four words bouncing around in a massive echo chamber, then fading into the distance like a bad horror movie.)

  My nightmare goes like this: I’m standing on the first tee, the morning sun is just breaking over the rocks and cactus of the Scottsdale desert. The dew is still thick in the heavy rough, but the fairway is a green, freshly mowed road stretching impossibly narrow in front of me.

  In the nightmare, I always feel great, muscles loose, mind focused, hands warm. My three golfing companions have all hit their first tee shots, all perfectly down the middle of the fairway, and they are now waiting for me.

  The group behind us has arrived at the tee and are sitting in their carts also waiting.

  Here goes. I step to my ball, take a mighty swing...

  ...and miss.

  A clean whiff. A fly could have made a larger impact on that ball by simply landing on it. Not even the wind of my club passing shook it.

  My Titleist 1 ball with the “1” underlined stares up at me.

  Suddenly, I’m sweating in the cool morning air. My playing companions are snickering, two guys in the group behind us are shaking their heads, the other two are trying unsuccessfully to not laugh.

  I try to laugh with them. I make a lame joke about a practice swing, take my stance again, another mighty swing, and another clean miss.

  It’s as if the ball isn’t where it’s supposed to be.

  I’ve been playing the game of golf since I was three, been a professional for decades. Yet there sits the ball.

  Titleist 1 mocks me.

  My friends are sitting in the carts, laughing, making ugly snorting noises. The players in the group behind are laughing so hard, one of them falls to the cart path. Even the starter is laughing.

  It is not funny. Trust me.

  I swing again.

  Miss.

  Again I swing, this time even harder and faster.

  Another miss.

  I can barely breathe. My arms feel trapped, pinned against my side. I go to kick the ball, but my feet won’t move. The wonderful day of golf has turned into a swirling, sweating nightmare of laugher and humiliation.

  Then, thankfully, right at that point, I always wake up. Usually, I’ve twisted the sheets into a tight mess around myself, pinning my sweating body to the bed in a pile of sheet knots that would earn a Boy Scout a merit badge. After I get untangled, I glance at the clock. It’s usually about ten minutes before the alarm is supposed to go off.

  Ten minutes before I’m supposed to start getting ready for a beautiful day of golf. A beautiful day, that is, if I can manage to get off that first tee.

  Now, understand, this dream doesn’t come from any real event. No, my imagination has done this all by itself. Not once, not ever, have I whiffed a golf ball on a first tee, yet that reality doesn’t help kill the fear. The little voice, deep in the back of my head whispers, “There could always be a first time.”

  Am I the only golfer who has this type of nightmare, these kind of waking fears? Nope. Almost every golfer I’ve ever talked to has something like it. And almost without exception, every golfer has a deep fear of the first shot on the first tee, even if they don’t have nightmares that twist sheets into rags.

  Think about how many times you have heard a touring professional golfer talking to an announcer on television. The conversation always goes something like this:

  Announcer: “How was your round?”

  Professional tour golfer: “Once I got off the first tee and got settled down, I played pretty well.”

  The first tee scares the hell out of touring professionals. Trust me, the last thing those players on the big tours want is to roll their tee shot along the ground in front of a million people on national television. They think about it, have nightmares about it.

  Yet it never happens.

  Why? Because they also know how to deal with the fear, how to make sure they don’t send a ball bouncing down the fairway to stop close enough to the tee that the television networks don’t even have to change a camera position.

  The pros and better golfers have methods of getting ready for that first shot, little ways of making sure they at least make contact with the ball. I’m going to detail out some of these methods, these tricks of the game, right from the moment you get out of the car to the mighty first swing.

  Step by step, I’ll get you from the bag drop and safely off the first tee. Trust me, it can be done without a nightmare of humiliation, just like the professional golfers manage it.

  I might not be able to help you hit the fairway, but sometimes the goal of the first tee isn’t to hit it straight, but to simply get the ball in the air and as far away from you as you can manage. Second shots are a whole lot easier if you’re still not standing on the tee box.

  Trust me on that as well.

  2

  HELP! WHAT DO I DO WHILE A BAG BOY UNLOADS MY CLUBS

  MAKING SURE YOU make contact with the ball on the first tee actually starts when you arrive at the golf course.

  Golf is a mental game. Keep repeating that.

  Golf is a mental game.

  To safely get that big driver’s club face on that tiny little white ball on the first tee, you have to start thinking like a golfer. From the parking lot to the bar after the round, you’re a golfer. The day job is gone, the family and all the chores around the house are forgotten completely. You arrive at the course, ready for a great day of golf.

  So getting ready, getting yourself in the right state of mind is important right from moment one. And that moment is when the bag boy is unloading your clubs from the trunk of your car.


  I’m assuming a big golf game on a big country club, on golf courses that cover deserts like those around Phoenix or Palm Springs, or beautiful tracks that wind through pine-tree-covered hillsides like those in Sun Valley or outside of Chicago or New York.

  You’re a golfer, a privileged member of the working class. You’ve bought the most expensive clubs, got new head-covers for your birthday from your kids, practiced after work and on weekends. You even make empty handed practice swings while in elevators and in front of mirrors. You’re ready, you’ve carved out the time, and you’ve finally driven or flown a great distance to a top golf course. You have the right to be there, you’ve paid for it, and you don’t want it spoiled by any first tee missteps, so start thinking like a golfer as you enter the gates of the club.

  If you’re like most of us and are used to just grabbing your sticks from your trunk or your locker at your local muni course, the first thing you’re going to notice different about these big golf resorts and country clubs is a sign as you drive up the landscaped driveway.

  Bag Drop.

  If you’ve never, ever been to one of these types of golf courses, just follow the sign’s arrows and stop your car when you see some well-dressed, smiling young man or woman approach as if they know what they are doing. This is not where you will park, but it is the first step in getting to the course.

  Sometimes, this bag person is the lowest assistant professional at the course, but more often he or she is just a college student who loves golf. Either way, their job is to greet you with a friendly smile, make note of your arrival through some hidden and high-tech communications system, get your clubs out of your car and put them on a cart.

  Don’t even think about walking the course and carrying your own bag. These top courses won’t allow it. The cart fee is required and is part of the massive amount of money you’re going to pay when you reach the pro shop.

  A small tip of a few dollars to the bag person is in order, combined with a thank you and a respectful attitude if you hope to see your clubs again before the round starts.

  One side note about timing. For years I played socially with a group of other top golfers. We would often go to Phoenix and Scottsdale to play golf in the dead of winter. Our goal while there was to play as much as possible, so we often had the earliest tee time allowed by any golf course. This bag boy stuff works fine and dandy for anyone scheduled at a moderate time after sunrise. I can’t tell you how many times I headed down a first fairway and the sun was just pretending to light the sky, let alone peak over the nearest cactus. Bag boys don’t exist at that hour and don’t expect them to be there.

  Also, let me say that playing golf before the sun comes up just isn’t fun most of the time and should be left to only the extreme golf fanatics. If you do tee off before sunrise regularly, seek help.

  So, what do you do to get ready for that first big shot on the first tee as the bag boy unloads your bag from the trunk of your car, cleans your already well-cleaned clubs, and straps them to the back of a cart?

  You could stand there staring. Or sit in your car waiting for the trunk to close, listening to the morning news. Or you could use the time to do something you’re going to have to do first thing anyway.

  Put on your golf shoes.

  There is no reason to carry a pair of shoes down into a club house locker room, then store your street shoes in some corner or in the cart while you play. Your time before the round is better served in other areas of preparation. So, while the bag boy is doing his or her thing with your expensive golf clubs, sit in the open door of your car and put on your golf shoes.

  But one warning. You still have to drive your car to the parking lot. Diving with your golf spikes on can get tricky. I don’t think the Federal Transportation Board has any figures on exactly how many car accidents are caused by wearing golf shoes while driving, but I would wager the number is pretty high. And we won’t mention that little dent in that Porsche at the Palm Springs Country Club back in 1973. I left a note before I went out to play.

  Honest.

  3

  HELP! HOW DO I ACT LIKE A REAL GOLFER IN THE PRO SHOP?

  AT THESE BIG COUNTRY CLUBS, the pro shops are major businesses, large rooms filled with a massive number of golfing attire, bags, clubs, and balls. The main desk is usually a beautiful, wood-carved monster of a counter that three or four people can fit behind without even touching. It’s usually elevated so that the professionals behind it look down at the customers.

  Or so it seems to me. Maybe I just slouch every time I go into a major pro shop. The places, for some reason, are just not that comfortable, and I’ve spent my share of years working in them, standing behind those elevated counters. The problem is, the last thing any of us need in our quest to get the ball airborne off the first tee is added nervousness caused by the giant, looming monster of the pro shop.

  But you can’t avoid the place. The pro shop is like the narrow part of an hourglass, with the outside world filtering down through the pro shop to emerge out on the golf course. Luckily, on the way back to the real world, you don’t have to make a return voyage through the pro shop. The bar, maybe, but not the pro shop.

  So, let me suggest a routine to get you safely through the pro shop and outside again into the crisp morning air.

  First off, find the right entrance.

  Sounds simple, right? Nope, often this is a lot harder than it sounds. These big country clubs have Members Only areas and really fancy restaurants with tiny little signs warning you and your golf shoes away. Problem is, those little signs are so small, the only way you’re going to see them is if you know they are there. I’ve missed many of those signs and ended up in a swank dining room, on expensive carpet that was never meant to see a golf spike.

  Trust me, making this kind of wrong-turn-blunder can really set you back, especially when some waiter has to lead you firmly, but oh-so-politely back the way you came.

  Once you are safely in the pro shop, the first thing you want to do is pick up a putter out of the two hundred putters lined up along the wall on a rack. Pretend to be considering buying it by making a few pretend putts.

  For heaven’s sake, never hit a ball in these practice putts, even though there will be some hanging around a practice ball return. Banging a ball off a display case and under a rack of woman’s blouses is not the way you want to start your day. The thought of that kind of putt will haunt you on the third green.

  Just pretend putting. Got that? Act cool.

  Of course, you have no intention of spending five hundred bucks on a new putter right before a big round when your old twenty-six dollar yard-sale-special is working just fine. But pick one up and look at it seriously anyway.

  Next, find the ugliest putter in the bunch, the one with a club head bigger than a toaster, and make a joke about it to the nearest person.

  That person will always respond with a joke in kind, unless you happen to be talking to the representative for the putter company. Early in the morning, there is little chance of that happening.

  After a few laughs, head directly for the counter to check in and pay for your upcoming round. While there, spending the big bucks on the green fees and cart rental, go ahead and buy a sleeve of golf balls with the club’s name on them. Yes, I know you brought enough golf balls along in your bag. These new balls are only for emergencies and if not used, take them home as a reminder of your great day and how much you spent for one round of golf. Sort of like a Disneyland set of Mickey Mouse Ears, only you don’t have to wear the golf balls.

  Don’t ask the pro what kind of balls are the best. Just buy Titleist or the new Nike ball because Tiger uses them. The country club will have their logo on either type.

  And when you ask for the balls, ask for an exact brand. For example, say, “Oh, and give me a sleeve of the Titleist Professionals.” Or whatever they are called these days. Don’t say, “Give me the gold pack.” Not golfing cool and might get you looked-down-upon by the professi
onal even more.

  Then, and this is critical, ask about practice balls, or participate in a conversation another player is having with the professional about practice balls. The pro will tell you how to get them and where the range is at that point.

  Thank him or her, but never tip them. I saw one man in California try to tip a golf professional in his golf shop and I thought the professional was going to take a driver to the side of the guy’s head. You tip bag boys, cart boys, waiters, and bartenders. Never golf professionals, unless they give you a really good lesson on the driving range that you have already paid a bunch of money for. Then just add in a little extra.

  But never in the pro shop.

  So, you have paid, you have the knowledge of where to get the practice balls. Mission accomplished.

  Now, without another look at the putters or drivers or six thousand sand and flop wedges, head for the door with a sure stride of a person with purpose.

  You’re going to go hit practice balls.

  Repeat that thought in a very deep-voiced way. You’re going to go hit practice balls.

  Practice in golf is a very serious thing, especially right before an important round, so act the part. It’s time to go to work, to get ready to get that first shot off the first tee and into the air.

  Just make sure you take your new sleeve of recently purchased golf balls with you as you leave the pro shop. Turning around and going back to get them can really break a serious practice mood.

  4

  HELP! WHICH CLUB SHOULD I HIT FIRST ON THE DIVING RANGE?

  YOU’VE FOUND THE MASSIVE open green expanse of the hitting area of the driving range, parked your cart along the edge of the concrete path, and have gone around to the back of the cart to your bag to get a club.

  But which club to hit first?