Lessons learnt from my amazing round of golf:

I am now playing my golf of handicap 6 thanks to a famous victory one fine Saturday afternoon at Limuru Country Club in the Standard County Golf Series where I emerged overall winner out of a field of almost 200 golfers. My photo recieving the winner's trophy even appeared in the local dailies as a factual confirmation that I had done it and the many congratulatory messages both from my golfing and non golfing friends suggested that they were mighty proud of my achievements!!

Non golfers stop right here as the jargon is about to flow fast and furious!! Every year I assign myself a handicap target to achieve in my golf. The lower the handicap you want to play off the more difficult it is to attain that target because you need to spend more time on the chipping green and putting green simply because the sharper your short game around and on the greens is the easier it shall be for you to score points, play better and avoid expensive mistakes……………something that all golfers are well aware off!!

However many golfers do not assign themselves an annual handicap target so they go on playing tournaments and friendlies hoping to shoot a good score and play a great round and somehow reduce their handicap by sheer luck which is mostly a fallacy since if you need to get somewhere you need to set yourself a target and then consciously work towards achieving that target. Many golfers also go straight from the changing room to the tee and do not warn up or do any practice which is a big disservice to their golf game………and handicap.

My handicap target for the year 2015 is a modest 5 handicap (down from 7 handicap at the start of the year) which is quite achievable given that many of my scores while playing of handicap 7 have been mainly within my buffer zone of 34 stable ford points or 74 stroke play points hence my handicap did not vary much for over a year within handicap 7 or 8. My analysis of my game made me realise that playing two handicaps better was well within my reach and all I needed to do was find out where my mistakes were and correct them.

So on that amazing Saturday, having studied and analyzed my game and having figured out where I was going wrong and determined to prove that I was right in my analysis, I shot an amazing 13 pars, 1 birdie and 4 bogies for an amazing 75 gross points and 40 stable ford points with a 1st nine of an excellent gross level par score and three dropped shots on the 2nd nine. As someone commented, if it were a professional tournament I would have qualified for the second round based on my score of +3!!

Common mistakes amateur golfers often make thus retarding their ability to reduce their handicaps include too much body and foot movement during the swing, over or under clubbing, taking your eyes off the ball, cutting your swing particularly when chipping, using too much strength, the wrong grip and posture, the wrong attitude, using the wrong length of clubs for your height, opening the club face on the strike etc. As they say, "golf ne thwingi"
!!
My mistake was somewhere within that general mix of mistakes that I have mentioned above. However, details are not important given that everyone has a unique style of swinging, putting and yes even temperament and they are the only ones who can accept and correct their mistakes so as to improve on their handicap.

While I am happy with my achievement during such a big tournament, I still have a ways to go to get to handicap 5 (my actual handicap is 6.2) and I need another big win of 40 stable ford points or better (or 68 gross or better on stroke play) to achieve this which is not impossible, after all I have shot a round of 42 last year off handicap 8 and emerged overall winner in another big tournament having dropped only two shots in the process.

So that was that and I look forward to accomplishing my amateur golfing handicap target of 5 for the year 2015 as golfing to me is a way of life and an important source of exercise and a healthy lifestyle and needs to be given the respect that it deserves.

The people you team up with in your four ball also play a big role in sharpening your golf game when you are playing well so kudos go to the guys (you know yourselves) who played with me on that Saturday because they were supportive of my efforts, did not offer unnecessary criticism or advise and let me get on with my game and at my pace even when I fumbled on those three strokes on account of nerves!!

As for the non golfers who choose to read to the end.....poleni sana if I lost you somewhere along the way, but you had been warned!!!Just decide to take to the course and see what all the excitement is about golf and you'll be hooked.