Sadly the golf season for the majority of us north of the 49th is over.
I thought instead of lamenting the end of golf for 2014 why not arm you with some trivia to impress your buddies next year?
So here we go!
– The term ‘birdie’ comes from an American named Ab Smith. Back in 1899, so the story goes, he played what he described as a ‘bird of a shot’ and it stuck. It is a term I am vaguely familiar with.
– The ‘tee box’ came from back in the early days when players used a mound of sand to build a tee to hold their ball so they could hit some form of driver. The sand was kept in a small box near each green.
– A lot of golf terms are nautical in nature as most of the early players were sailors who played the courses which were mainly on the coast. For example, the ‘fairway’ was the term used to describe the best way of navigating a ship safely into a harbour. The term ‘bunker’ was an area on the ship down in the bowels which was not a very nice place to be at anytime. I can relate.
– Sam Snead was the youngest PGA player in history to shoot his age, which he did when he was 67-years-old.
I can do that but I still have eight holes to play when I hit that number.
– While filming the 1938 movie Carefree actor Fred Astaire used a driver to hit 12 golf balls during a dance that was filmed as one continuous scene. To the surprise of the crew the 12 balls were found within eight feet of each other.
– A typical 18-hole golf course produces enough oxygen to support between 4,000 and 7,000 people. Golf courses nationwide filter a total of approximately 13 million tons of dust from the air every year. Thank you golf courses.
– “Reverse every natural instinct and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having a perfect golf swing.”- Ben Hogan
– “Golf tips are like Aspirin – one may do you good but if you swallow the whole bottle, you will be lucky to survive.” Harvey Penick
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