While the days of gender-blind clubhouse changing rooms might be some way off, the news that a growing number of golf clubs in the UK are choosing to do away with separate tees for men and women is long overdue and has been widely welcomed by golfers whose forwarding-thinking committees and owners have officially made the switch.
The biggest winners from this timely change will be those old boys whose best efforts with the big stick barely clear the heather at 150. Now, they can plonk their ball down on the forward most tee without having to endure the ignominy of ‘playing off the reds’. Whether it will end the humiliation of men having to unzip their trousers when they fail to clear the front tees remains to be seen, but that’s not under discussion here.
Elite female amateurs have being playing off the men’s tee for decades, but at least now women of all handicaps can chose to play off the tee that suits them best, rather than simply marching to the reds.
While the idea of playing off the tees that you feel most comfortable on has always struck me as good one, there will always be golfers who will want to play off the competition tees, especially on bucket-list courses where they want to measure themselves against the game’s best.
The Old Course at St Andrews plays 6,721 yards off the whites, 6,377 from the yellows and 6,032 off the reds. Despite playing off a mid-teens handicap, and rarely driving the ball more than 250 yards, I have always played the Old Course – I say ‘always’ like I play it twice a week, more like twice a decade – off the whites, as, apart from the 455-yard 17th, I don’t think there’s a green on the course that I can’t physically reach in regulation if I was to play to the best of my limited ability.
It’s the nature of my job – and my highish handicap – that I’m often paired with players significantly better than myself, and consequently spend most of the time on media days and press launches hitting fairway woods into greens on par fours and long irons to par threes, while my partners are reaching for their wedges, but on any other day, especially when I’m playing a friendly game with a mate of similar ability, its yellows all the way and we’re all the happier for it.
Golf is a hard enough game as it is, and there are times when playing off the whites – and beyond – has worn me down to the point where it’s no longer enjoyable and just becomes, quite literally, an uphill slog. So, while I’m not quite ready for the most forward tees, I know that when the time comes to make that shift 40-50 yards nearer to the green, they’ll be there waiting for me, hopefully with welcoming arms, without a snigger or a sideways glance, or questioning whether ‘my husband plays’.
Here’s to happy golfing in 2022, whatever tees you choose to play off.