[Photo: zulufriend]
In September, early-spring green aerification is just something we all suck up and deal with. Like biting down on an ice-cream stick while someone removes a giant splinter from your foot. It’s a necessary evil at this time of year, but it’s never easy news to hear. Or learn via email.
Why? For starters, it’s about this time when golf courses are emerging from their winter slumber. The days are getting warmer and longer. Those hoodies, vests and Q-zips are beginning to spend more time in your closet than adorning your upper body. Shorts emerge from their chosen drawer more frequently.
RELATED: Stupid Golf Problems – How angry should you be over someone not yelling ‘FORE!’?
You get your weekend morning round all planned. Fourteen degrees at 8:12am? It’s going to warm up on the back nine! There’s going to be finals footy on in the clubhouse afterwards. Is this heaven? No, it’s spring golf. Then, wham! the pro shop hits you with the crushing news. “We’ve just cored, that’ll be $150, the same amount it would be if the greens weren’t cored. Pay up, sucker.” That’s not verbatim, but it’s pretty close.
The thing is, in two weeks’ time, the greens are going to be perfect again. That’s the whole point of coring multiple times per year. But you’re already at the course and there’s no turning back now.
The question is, if you learn the greens are aerated before arriving at the course, whether it’s the night before via your host or online when somebody else booked the tee-time but didn’t read the fine print, is it OK to bail on that round?
This topic, in general, is something we’ve covered ad nauseam here at Golf Digest – the idea of when is it OK or not OK to bail on a round. Somehow, I’m not sure we’ve ever specifically covered the aerification bail, which, to be frank, might be the biggest loser move there is in the bail-out game.
Family emergency? Absolutely. A 100 percent chance of rain? I’ll listen. Last-minute invite to a far superior golf course? Fine, but the rest of the group is going to let you hear about it for the rest of your life. Cored greens? You simply need to get over yourself.
RELATED: Coring greens, as explained by a top course superintendent
No one, myself included, is good enough at this sport to think some holes in the greens are going to stop us from shooting the course record. In fact, they might help some players. Not to mention the fact that the machinery they have now can often make the holes so microscopic that the difference is negligible. Yes, you’ll have your cases where they are crater-sized and sandy as hell and negatively affect the playing experience. But so what. You’re outside, you’re (ideally) with people you enjoy being with. There are far worse things happening in the world than your ball darting left at the cup due to a core hole.
Again, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t sink the shoulders to hear the aerification news, especially at a top course. Maybe one where you’ve planned a bucket-list round. Just recently, I played with a woman who told me she took her family to Hawaii, and on their trip they booked a tee-time at Kapalua, one of the iconic courses in professional golf. The greens were cored. “I couldn’t care less about that,” the woman told me. She was there with her kids. She enjoyed the views. It was still a once-in-a-lifetime experience she’ll never forget.
The first time I played Pebble Beach, the greens were cored. I remember at the time thinking it was absurd they were still charging full price. My memories of the round some 13 years later? Making a birdie on the seventh. High-fiving my dad. Somehow backing it up with a par on the eighth. I actually forgot the greens were cored that day until this woman’s Kapalua experience triggered my memory.
So no, it’s not OK to bail on a round because the greens are aerated. You show up and suffer together as a group. The course record would not have been in jeopardy regardless.
