If you really sit back and think about it, golf seems more aggravating than it was fifty years ago (not that I was around fifty years ago but…). I mean with the advancement in technology and the overall progression of the game, shouldn’t we be better golfers? We should be…but for some reason the majority of us still stink.
Interesting isn’t it? We still dominate the demographic as average golfers and all the while there are so many golf improvement gadgets, videos and what not that supposedly make us better players. Now, if we all improved our game, that would still make us average.
Not to get all Sigmund Freud-ish but, if we all lower our scores that would change the national average from 100 (more or less) to 90 or 80 for example. And if the majority scores a 90 or 80 that would make it the national average – therefore grouping us back into the average golfer category all the while trying to improve our game.
Can you see why it’s frustrating? We bust our friggin’ ass to be better golfers only to be…average. Fifty years ago golfers were shooting the same scores as they are today even without all those golf gadgets we have now. Hmmmmm…sounds like a racket. Golf stinks but man I love this game.
In the last fifty years golf popularity grew and along with it the growth of golf courses. As technology changed somewhere along the lines we felt like we had to design and build golf courses to put that technology to use – thus longer and harder golf courses. We designed ourselves right out of that improvement that the new technologies provided. It’s our own fault. Still I think the average would have only come down a couple of shots, but still come down.
Resisting the lure of a seductive woman or an unopened bottle of the finest crafted beverage? Piece of cake. Maintaining composure at demo day while handling the latest clubs from one of the many well-known manufacturers? Forget it. They had me at hello.
National average score may be 100 or so. Average handicap, for those that maintain them, is 15-16ish. The same 15-16s that I get paired with in tournaments that proceed to shoot 100.
There is also the small fact that – the more technology advances in the game the more the tees go back.
I do however feel that the average golfer should be doing better however when you consider more and more people are getting into the game then you can see