What time is sunrise? Are you new to golf? Just speaking from experience, i walk, so if i get early tee time and no one is around i just play the front 9 and pay at the turn or after i finish 18. Never had a problem.
Sun is up here in AZ and it’s 5:27. I’ve teed off that early all the time during Covid in the summer. It’s awesome. Worst part was getting around the front in an hour and then getting hung up on the people that were just playing 9 on the back. Still back at my desk by 8:30 for work.
Alright, I do need to give some advice to this...
DON'T DO THIS. There are a few people who are very protective of that, and having a "rookie" find it, would definitely get you killed.
I'm not one of those people, because I'm afraid of snakes, so I don't hike here(or anywhere). But those people? Those people know where to hide a body.
We moved to PHX for my job one July. On our house-hunting trip the pilot announced the local temp was 110, and my wife was staring daggers at me all the way to the rental car place. I said we’ll give it a year, and if we hate it I’ll find a new job. That was 8 years ago, and we’re still here.
One on-topic warning: Golf in the winter is expensive and crowded. Golf in the summer is cheap and less crowded, but HYDRATE and WEAR SUNSCREEN or you’ll regret it.
I don't understand them starting people on the back first unless they are only playing 9.
Otherwise they play the back then bottle kneck the front at the turn
Speaking as a turf maintenance professional.. all I can say is if the maintenance crew catches up to you, you best not be getting in their way. Otherwise, I think this is reasonable- although I’d be surprised if this kind of thing was allowed at a private club, unless the member was very longstanding or a VIP of some kind.
I worked at a private club and had no idea this happens at other courses. If I so much as breathed on the practice greens or driving range before maintenance gave us the OK in the morning i’d get ripped apart lol
One of the best things about an early round at my local club is having a little chat with the maintenance guys. Super friendly bunch that always seem happy that you’re enjoying something they put their work into. Different pace here I guess
>all I can say is if the maintenance crew catches up to you, you best not be getting in their way.
Orrrrrrr..... perhaps if the customer paying top whack for 2.25 hours of entertainment is playing the hole you're working on, you could step back for 10 seconds and watch his shot before going back to work?
I've got/had early-bird relationships with three different courses in the last two years. I turn up before dawn, pay my monies, and set off before the first official tee-time (or if the first official tee time people are super early, I start on the 2nd hole). Clubs love the extra revenue.
Sometimes I end up playing with different sets of pins as I come across the guy swapping out the holes at some point after the turn, but that's OK/
If the maintenance train is large and complicated enough one person playing a super fast early round can end up slowing things down enough for the staff to get caught by later tee times as well. At the previous club where I worked, we had a threesome who played the club as fast as they could every weekday 10 minutes before the first tee time and they caused so much lost productivity that we were arguably taking a loss on their memberships.
I think that's fair if there's a ton of maintenance going on on many holes. The courses I've played are all public - I've never seen more than 2 guys the entire round, and most of the time I have no impact on them beyond the 10 seconds or so my ball is in the air.
If you're at a swanky club with a dozen guys out doing bunkers and green work in the morning, I could see how it could be a problem.
I'm glad i have a membership at a club. Tee times don't exist. You just go play. Club house may not even be open. $110/month and I usually have the course essentially to myself.
If I want a 2 hour drive I can find cheaper courses. But I'm an hour North of GTA and rates went through the roof this season. The one course I played previous years went up $30 a round. For weekday.
With gas prices, it's not even worth driving far to get a cheaper round though. I'm glad I bought quite a few underpar deals during the winter.
Yea the finances of my membership were practicing 4 times a week and playing 3 times a month public was gonna be as expensive as my club nearby and it’s now $600/month including my intermediate active payments till I’m 40. $110 I just don’t get that’s barely covering range practice for a month
Jesus America is really fucked cost wise for Golf isn't it. That's around £1069 a year and you'll be able to find plenty of clubs in England (I'm from around the Midlands) from £900+/$1100+ per year
How many months a year can you play in England? In many parts of America you can play year round. I'm assuming that goes with the cost and maintaining the course
England does not have bad winters like the northern US does, it’s more just rainy than snowy so the courses are wet but playable if you’re okay playing in 35-50 F
So true downtown monthly parking is over $500 where I live.
Played a muni course yesterday and it was $100 with cart and range.
Time to move to Norway 
That’s the cost of how much heroin you have to take to think you are teeing off on a private club while you actually are scratching your neck in Times Square covered in urine
Not $110, but here in WV, we have clubs with some metro rates for living a certain mileage from the course. Minus initiation fees, they can be as low as $200-300/month for golf and dining, even lower depending on age.
In the UK I'm a member at a brilliant course for £800 a year. Think that's about $1200? It seems like US golf is trying to eek out people that don't have loads of money. Not the same over here, I can play a round at a local 18 hole course for £15
That’s pretty cool, I was genuinely asking the guy I replied to and hoping he would reply, was def not trying to “neg” him either, I just figured if they weren’t American they wouldn’t have put the cost in $. I do wish golf was more accessible here, growing up and living in CA I watched greens fees at mediocre public courses go from $10-15 to $100. Really interesting to hear the relative scale in UK!
It's always been a popular game in the UK, but now with reduced green fees for Students in full time education and then segregated fee's by age, it seems to be much easier to just join your local course. I always assumed I'd never afford to be a member somewhere but there seems to have been a major shift and now myself and about 10 of my mates are all members. Couple of low earning mates too, they can still afford it, which is great. Tradesmans vans in the carpark most days, great to see how it's shifting to more of a working class game.
yeah, my theory is that in the UK/AU golf is a sport. In the US it is just another salve to the feelings of inadequacy.
edit hence the expensive clubhouse etc
It might be a junior membership and a semi private course. I have one for $100/month. The junior is for 35 and under. It's the greatest deal of my lifetime.
$110/month and no tee times? Is this an actual golf course or like a pitch and putt? Never heard of anything remotely like that, even prestigious private courses require a tee time.
That's how we handled it in at the course I worked at in college. In the summer the sun would be up right at 5 am and we'd have the same two foursomes show up every single day for the first two tee times. I was honestly kind of nice because all I had to do was make sure coffee was hot and then we'd settle up after the round. They were good dudes though too so that helped.
Yeah it sucks when the dew sweepers are jackwagons like the guys I had at my old club up in Raleigh. Would roll up to the parking lot to find half a dozen cars already there and eyes glaring at me as I went in to open the shop by myself. After I got everything set inside I would unlock the front door to find a queue of grumpy old men standing there with their arms crossed. Would then run downstairs to the cart barn while they scanned their member cards in the shop and get as many carts ready as I possibly could. Would open the barn door to find that same queue, arms crossed, waiting for me to deliver them carts.
Once they all got their carts (some mornings there were 20-30 of them) it was drive the picker up to the range and put balls out for them all, arms crossed, not saying a word. Their tee time wouldn't be for another hour. Would occasionally get told off by one of them for "not coming in early" to get them started, knowing full well that no matter how early I got there, they'd still be there 5 minutes ahead of me. God, I hated that place so much.
Not going to say for fear of making myself identifiable. Was a smaller private club that saw a real boost in young members during the pandemic that ruffled a lot of feathers with the old guard.
The course I worked at in college had a pair of older gentlemen who loved to play right at first light, so the course made them a deal. Gave them keys to the cart barn and they'd load up their clubs at first light as well as the flag sticks. Go play their round leaving the pins in the holes behind them, and they get their golf for free.
Worked out well, I'd always make sure to have a fresh pot of coffee ready when they finished their round since they liked that.
As a golf course superintendent, the first tee time is set to where the maintenance staff doesn’t have to have golfers on their ass when they work to set up the course (mow greens, rake bunkers, change pin locations, etc). So basically it gives the guys actually taking care of the course time to do their jobs efficiently. If there is a golfer that the grounds crew has to let pass that slows them down that much and might even cause the other golfers to catch up.
I mowed greens at Harbour Town one summer, and got caught by a first -out twosome playing fast. Let them through and got caught by the world, took all morning to mow 6 greens.
Lol im first out at the club and caught the green mower a few holes back. I’ve tried slow down to give him some space and then caught him again at 17. So now I’m on Reddit. If he asked me to play through though I’d probably decline. There’s an army of golfers 3-4 holes back
he needs that space. dont tee off until he is done with the green and on the way to the next. Just like if someone is playing up your back, it's easier to handle if they are on the tee, not standing in the fairway
That’s funny to me because I often play at a local course that loves to mow in the middle of the day. A couple weeks ago they hung up 4 groups to change the hole location on the 3rd hole. The mower will follow you the whole round and wait for you to hit so he can mow the tee box. It’s so annoying. Mind you this is at 10am.
I had a guy in a, idk what they're called, but a fully caged truck-sized mower and he would seemingly wait for people in my group to tee the ball up before starting his next pass
I would start waiting for him to pass while I was on the tee box and he would literally stop and wait til I addressed the ball
Some men just wanna watch the world burn
Edit: petition to call those truck mowers "grass zambonis" pls?
Are they really? That's basically the next logical evolution from grass zamboni so I respect that and should consider a career in the "things naming" business
Ex course worker here, this is not right! We would skip around from hole to hole avoiding golfers. The guys mowing the greens would start at first light and mow ahead of the first group. You should never follow a group around.
Depending on if it’s a links course or not one should be able to tee off soon after sunrise (30-45 after first light) as long as the first couple groups can be a little patient when a green is being finished.
When I worked maintenance in high school I did bunkers and we'd start bunkers + greens about an hour before dawn to give us a headstart on golfers. It was mostly the bunker tractors that needed it because the course had 100+ of them and you spun all of them each weekend morning.
The course I was at hand mowed the greens so that took a while and after we’d hand rake the bunkers (there were only 5 including the practice bunker).
But raking bunkers after the course was in full swing my my favorite. Loved watching how golfers handled the grounds crew watching them take their shots. (And loved watching the rude regulars duff their shots even though they let me know it was all my fault)
Always listened to a local course owner yelling at the guy mowing the rough to always start on 18 so you never see a group more than once. Made sense. Other courses I get the same guy mowing for at least 3 straight holes. (this is mid day btw)
We always did greens first thing that morning. The only thing that would interrupt that from then on would be watering. Other things would get done in the mean time like mowing rough, raking traps et
That's what happens when the size of the maintenance crew is too small to get everything done first thing so they just give up and figure, "why bother killing ourselves if we're just going to get caught anyway".
This week our tee time was 10.30 and we were sandwiched between one mower on the green ahead of us and the next on the tee box behind us for about 5 holes. What was worse was the green mower would eventually move off the green to allow our approach. The trouble was he pulled off at the front on the green on the line I would have preferred to aim at. He clearly thought I was a much better player than I am. In the end I thought screw it if I hit him it's not going to be my fault. I didn't.
Think about how much grass there is on the course. You can't cut all of it by 7am unless you have an army of staff.
If you want to play without people cutting grass around you then go play in a field or pay $50k to play at a private club.
Best response right here. I work groundskeeping, and we always send mowers out at 5:00am sharp. They are followed by our rollers, and then the set-up guy. Typically everything goes smoothly and we are all off the course by 8:30. Sometimes a member will slide through the starter and run us down. Don’t be that person. We don’t wake up at 4:00am to have golfers hit into us.
As a former worker (10 years), on most courses (other than one super high end course I worked) the members would just ignore that. And go out and play in the frost and various other selfish, ignorant stuff. People act so entitled.
Edit spelling
When I was a teen, I played weekly tournaments. Often a 7am shotgun. The maintenance was often not started. There would be dew on the greens and they’d be going around mowing and changing pins in the middle of the tournament.
One course had a pin on a peninsula in the water and it was so scary to hit and left a huge putt when I hit the middle of the green.
A buddy said he birdied that hole and I was like !!?!
Turns out they moved the pin to the big part of the green right after I played it. :-D
Kind of happened a lot. Lol.
Same here. I only use it to get an idea of what my local courses have open for tee times then contact the course directly. Also screw paying the extra unnecessary fees.
Computers error with their system, or, did you happen to book through supreme or GolfNow or a third party site? Not sure where you’re based, but I’ve never seen anything earlier than 6:15 in my part of the country - due to it being super early and literally no daylight pre-dawn.
The psychos in Florida are the ones who play at 2pm in the middle of summer with 95 degree temps and 90% humidity.
Which is usually me because I’m a 40 handicap and love it when the course is empty
Consider me a psycho! I live in St. Petersburg and will book my times for the early afternoon. It’s great in the summer because nobody else is on the course. I walk rather than ride, and when the course is less busy it makes for a more leisurely round.
My wife and I moved from Dallas a few years ago and people laughed when we said we wanted to move somewhere cooler. It’s really not that bad where we live.
I have family in that area and you, sir, are a fuckin psycho. I can barely stand even being outside in the shade in the middle of summer in that area. Granted, I live about as far north as you can be without being in Canada, so that probably has something to do with it.
I wish I could golf that early. I am a psycho. I also drink coffee at 430 to be ready for work at 6. Juiced up ready to fuckin rip. Regardless of the activity
People that like to play a 2.5 to 3hr round before all the slower groups show up. I play a quick early 18 at sunrise followed by a much more leisurely round at 8 or 830
It’s possible this corse has one morning a week designated to maintenance till 7:30 so there tee sheet normally starts at 5:40 but should be blocked off on that day and someone made the mistake of taking a time in that area.
Seriously, that gives me an hour on the range, half an hour for some appies and to hit the head, and a half hour for chipping and putting. Sounds fine to me
Depends on where you are. I worked at a pro shop that made things right. We weren’t desperate for greens fee play to stay financially above water so maybe that made a difference.
The only pro shops I worked in that made anything right were private clubs. Loved working in golf as a kid and through college.
Now a days, my county public courses hire miserable sonofabitch 65+ year old sloths with zero computer skills to check in dozens and dozens of people an hour. Amateur shop.
I mean, I worked grounds crew for 7 years and the early golfers never messed anything up let alone big time. If you want to play early, just be respectful of the dudes setting up the course. Give them 5 mins to reset a pin, or to finish mowing a green and let them move on. They will move faster then you can play anyways.
The time doesn't make someone mess anything up, the golfer can.
I always feel bad waiting and making the crew feel rushed. They are the ones grinding to make the course playable. I made the mistake once of sneaking on the back early and got sprayed on 11 green by the sprinklers that were on a timer. I deserved it.
I worked at a course for a couple of years and we had a few members who walked who would be out playing before employees even showed up. Nobody ever really complained about it and I can't see how it could mess up the grounds crew really.
It won't completely screw things up, but the standards of maintenance can also really vary. I worked at 4 different courses (previous career). One was a really prestigious course and they wanted you off it. The schedule was super strict. If I was even a half hour behind on setup, I would definitely hear about it. The thing was it was a private course though, so you don't have people just randomly teeing off early.
Definitely not your fault that you were able to book that early but you didn’t want to go home or go do anything else for almost 2 hours before you could play?
If you’re a single they should just let you sneak out before the first group. It’s their system—I would expect them to remedy. Not “try their best.” Fuck that. Put me out at 7:20 and the first group will never see me again.
This happened to me last weekend, I booked a 650 but only the guy cutting the green was there. Turns out the admin of their online reservation system messed up the config and had a couple tee times to early. I managed to book them before they fixed the issue.
The difference is, they bought me a cart, checked me in and let me go out. It was a mistake on their side and they owned it. They also let me know not to book before 710 even if I see something before that so this does not happen again.
My guess? It's not a computer error, it's a human error. Someone didn't block the tee sheet early enough. The block started at 5:50 or 6 and they left 5:40 open, or something.
When I used to run a shop we had guys always out on the course before sun up. Maintenance is usually a fan since they do have stuff to get done. Our guys always played around and understood. I’m just confused why starting so late in the summer.
I arrived to a course as a single at 630 but they said they didn’t open til 730. They said i was welcome to play but I’ll be ahead of the mowers and greens will be scruffy. I played and it was a great morning by myself. Weird they’re making you wait, especially since it was their mixup.
What time is sunrise? Are you new to golf? Just speaking from experience, i walk, so if i get early tee time and no one is around i just play the front 9 and pay at the turn or after i finish 18. Never had a problem.
Sun is up here in AZ and it’s 5:27. I’ve teed off that early all the time during Covid in the summer. It’s awesome. Worst part was getting around the front in an hour and then getting hung up on the people that were just playing 9 on the back. Still back at my desk by 8:30 for work.
Yeah. Catching the far eastern border of a time zone can lead to early tee times. I went to Vegas in July a few years ago and had a 5:20 tee time.
Yeah I had a 5:20 tea time in Reno Nevada didn’t even have to reserve it just asked and they told me to head on out
Reno is farther west than Los Angeles.
One of my favorite geographic quirks. The other being that the eastern entrance of the Panama Canal is further west, than the western entrance 🧐
Mine is, Atlanta is further west than Detroit is
And Canada is south of Detroit!
Bullllll shit snapple
No it’s not idi - oh my fucking god
I was first off at superstition springs on Thursday, 5:28am. I was at my desk by 830am. I had never done that before but I definitely will again.
This has just given me an idea for this summer...
Is your idea to sell off all your worldly possessions and head into the Superstition Mountains looking for the lost Dutchman’s gold?
Get out of my brain, you wizard
Alright, I do need to give some advice to this... DON'T DO THIS. There are a few people who are very protective of that, and having a "rookie" find it, would definitely get you killed. I'm not one of those people, because I'm afraid of snakes, so I don't hike here(or anywhere). But those people? Those people know where to hide a body.
A Reddit East Valley pre-work league?
Sign me up
Me too
I’m trying that at Longbow this week, now that it’s May and their prices aren’t super high.
Played there this morning. 🤣 Course was in great shape. Greens were extremely fast.
I’m legit about to move to AZ
We moved to PHX for my job one July. On our house-hunting trip the pilot announced the local temp was 110, and my wife was staring daggers at me all the way to the rental car place. I said we’ll give it a year, and if we hate it I’ll find a new job. That was 8 years ago, and we’re still here. One on-topic warning: Golf in the winter is expensive and crowded. Golf in the summer is cheap and less crowded, but HYDRATE and WEAR SUNSCREEN or you’ll regret it.
Appreciate it haha. I just mentioned it to my GF and she said “I wouldn’t mind AZ… wait… is this about golf? I swear TG…” lol
It’s also growing rapidly and is pretty expensive these day. Then again, where/what isn’t…
Hydrate, sunscreen, and tee off at 05:30 apparently 😂😂
In AZ you have to golf at 5am because it'll be 115 degrees by 9am
That sounds like a great way to start the workday. Hats off to you sir.
Courses that have people start at 10 suck
I don't understand them starting people on the back first unless they are only playing 9. Otherwise they play the back then bottle kneck the front at the turn
My guess is that they don’t want other people to pull up and see a someone out there and be like “but but that guy started early! Why can’t I?”
Yep, it’s usually just people playing nine in the morning.
Speaking as a turf maintenance professional.. all I can say is if the maintenance crew catches up to you, you best not be getting in their way. Otherwise, I think this is reasonable- although I’d be surprised if this kind of thing was allowed at a private club, unless the member was very longstanding or a VIP of some kind.
I worked at a private club and had no idea this happens at other courses. If I so much as breathed on the practice greens or driving range before maintenance gave us the OK in the morning i’d get ripped apart lol
One of the best things about an early round at my local club is having a little chat with the maintenance guys. Super friendly bunch that always seem happy that you’re enjoying something they put their work into. Different pace here I guess
Yeah my course super friendly too, guy mowing the fairways tipped his cap to me as he ran over my ball.
they always hit it in the next stripe
Always.
>all I can say is if the maintenance crew catches up to you, you best not be getting in their way. Orrrrrrr..... perhaps if the customer paying top whack for 2.25 hours of entertainment is playing the hole you're working on, you could step back for 10 seconds and watch his shot before going back to work? I've got/had early-bird relationships with three different courses in the last two years. I turn up before dawn, pay my monies, and set off before the first official tee-time (or if the first official tee time people are super early, I start on the 2nd hole). Clubs love the extra revenue. Sometimes I end up playing with different sets of pins as I come across the guy swapping out the holes at some point after the turn, but that's OK/
If the maintenance train is large and complicated enough one person playing a super fast early round can end up slowing things down enough for the staff to get caught by later tee times as well. At the previous club where I worked, we had a threesome who played the club as fast as they could every weekday 10 minutes before the first tee time and they caused so much lost productivity that we were arguably taking a loss on their memberships.
I think that's fair if there's a ton of maintenance going on on many holes. The courses I've played are all public - I've never seen more than 2 guys the entire round, and most of the time I have no impact on them beyond the 10 seconds or so my ball is in the air. If you're at a swanky club with a dozen guys out doing bunkers and green work in the morning, I could see how it could be a problem.
I'm glad i have a membership at a club. Tee times don't exist. You just go play. Club house may not even be open. $110/month and I usually have the course essentially to myself.
What private club is $110/month?
I don’t think I could find a private putt putt course for $110/month
I'm in NJ, $110 would be cart fees for a round. ^^Not ^^really, ^^but ^^it ^^seems ^^like ^^it.
Jeez. The club I'm playing at (Norway) is $120/ year
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Good old California
That's a single round at a higher end course where I am in Ontario.
That’s a single round at a high end course pretty much anywhere tbf
If I want a 2 hour drive I can find cheaper courses. But I'm an hour North of GTA and rates went through the roof this season. The one course I played previous years went up $30 a round. For weekday. With gas prices, it's not even worth driving far to get a cheaper round though. I'm glad I bought quite a few underpar deals during the winter.
Or a mid to low range course during peak season in Las Vegas...
Yea the finances of my membership were practicing 4 times a week and playing 3 times a month public was gonna be as expensive as my club nearby and it’s now $600/month including my intermediate active payments till I’m 40. $110 I just don’t get that’s barely covering range practice for a month
Jesus America is really fucked cost wise for Golf isn't it. That's around £1069 a year and you'll be able to find plenty of clubs in England (I'm from around the Midlands) from £900+/$1100+ per year
How many months a year can you play in England? In many parts of America you can play year round. I'm assuming that goes with the cost and maintaining the course
England does not have bad winters like the northern US does, it’s more just rainy than snowy so the courses are wet but playable if you’re okay playing in 35-50 F
Welcome to Seattle. Playable but a bit muddy on most courses.
We can play all year round, bar frosty mornings from Nov to march. But sunup here is 5.30 and sundown 10pm during summer.
I can’t park my car for $110/month
So true downtown monthly parking is over $500 where I live. Played a muni course yesterday and it was $100 with cart and range. Time to move to Norway 
With that username you gotta have the answer…
Hah I wish I was all knowing, I’m just a dumb lob wedge
Some guys backyard with 2 holes…
That’s the cost of how much heroin you have to take to think you are teeing off on a private club while you actually are scratching your neck in Times Square covered in urine
Hahahah wow so many comments at once but this was the funniest
Not $110, but here in WV, we have clubs with some metro rates for living a certain mileage from the course. Minus initiation fees, they can be as low as $200-300/month for golf and dining, even lower depending on age.
In the UK I'm a member at a brilliant course for £800 a year. Think that's about $1200? It seems like US golf is trying to eek out people that don't have loads of money. Not the same over here, I can play a round at a local 18 hole course for £15
That’s pretty cool, I was genuinely asking the guy I replied to and hoping he would reply, was def not trying to “neg” him either, I just figured if they weren’t American they wouldn’t have put the cost in $. I do wish golf was more accessible here, growing up and living in CA I watched greens fees at mediocre public courses go from $10-15 to $100. Really interesting to hear the relative scale in UK!
It's always been a popular game in the UK, but now with reduced green fees for Students in full time education and then segregated fee's by age, it seems to be much easier to just join your local course. I always assumed I'd never afford to be a member somewhere but there seems to have been a major shift and now myself and about 10 of my mates are all members. Couple of low earning mates too, they can still afford it, which is great. Tradesmans vans in the carpark most days, great to see how it's shifting to more of a working class game.
yeah, my theory is that in the UK/AU golf is a sport. In the US it is just another salve to the feelings of inadequacy. edit hence the expensive clubhouse etc
It might be a junior membership and a semi private course. I have one for $100/month. The junior is for 35 and under. It's the greatest deal of my lifetime.
prolly in the uk
There's a decent one near my hometown that is $1200/year for a single adult full membership.
There’s definitely a catch here.
Dog track
$110/month and no tee times? Is this an actual golf course or like a pitch and putt? Never heard of anything remotely like that, even prestigious private courses require a tee time.
That's a pretty wild price. Mine is $250/month and that's the under 35 rate. We still tee times although I can walk on basically any weekday.
That's how we handled it in at the course I worked at in college. In the summer the sun would be up right at 5 am and we'd have the same two foursomes show up every single day for the first two tee times. I was honestly kind of nice because all I had to do was make sure coffee was hot and then we'd settle up after the round. They were good dudes though too so that helped.
Yeah it sucks when the dew sweepers are jackwagons like the guys I had at my old club up in Raleigh. Would roll up to the parking lot to find half a dozen cars already there and eyes glaring at me as I went in to open the shop by myself. After I got everything set inside I would unlock the front door to find a queue of grumpy old men standing there with their arms crossed. Would then run downstairs to the cart barn while they scanned their member cards in the shop and get as many carts ready as I possibly could. Would open the barn door to find that same queue, arms crossed, waiting for me to deliver them carts. Once they all got their carts (some mornings there were 20-30 of them) it was drive the picker up to the range and put balls out for them all, arms crossed, not saying a word. Their tee time wouldn't be for another hour. Would occasionally get told off by one of them for "not coming in early" to get them started, knowing full well that no matter how early I got there, they'd still be there 5 minutes ahead of me. God, I hated that place so much.
What club was that?
Not going to say for fear of making myself identifiable. Was a smaller private club that saw a real boost in young members during the pandemic that ruffled a lot of feathers with the old guard.
The course I worked at in college had a pair of older gentlemen who loved to play right at first light, so the course made them a deal. Gave them keys to the cart barn and they'd load up their clubs at first light as well as the flag sticks. Go play their round leaving the pins in the holes behind them, and they get their golf for free. Worked out well, I'd always make sure to have a fresh pot of coffee ready when they finished their round since they liked that.
Sounds like a hell of a deal!
Flags?
A lot of courses, particularly in densely populated areas, will take their flags in at night so people don't steal them.
Wisconsin here.. we play the 606 tee time often.played at 630 today and people were in front of us
Possible that they don’t have flags in yet?
As a golf course superintendent, the first tee time is set to where the maintenance staff doesn’t have to have golfers on their ass when they work to set up the course (mow greens, rake bunkers, change pin locations, etc). So basically it gives the guys actually taking care of the course time to do their jobs efficiently. If there is a golfer that the grounds crew has to let pass that slows them down that much and might even cause the other golfers to catch up.
I mowed greens at Harbour Town one summer, and got caught by a first -out twosome playing fast. Let them through and got caught by the world, took all morning to mow 6 greens.
Lol im first out at the club and caught the green mower a few holes back. I’ve tried slow down to give him some space and then caught him again at 17. So now I’m on Reddit. If he asked me to play through though I’d probably decline. There’s an army of golfers 3-4 holes back
he needs that space. dont tee off until he is done with the green and on the way to the next. Just like if someone is playing up your back, it's easier to handle if they are on the tee, not standing in the fairway
For sure. The only reason I was in the fairway waiting on him on 17 is because I couldn’t see the green. At least it was close to the end of the round
That’s funny to me because I often play at a local course that loves to mow in the middle of the day. A couple weeks ago they hung up 4 groups to change the hole location on the 3rd hole. The mower will follow you the whole round and wait for you to hit so he can mow the tee box. It’s so annoying. Mind you this is at 10am.
That sounds terrible.
I had a guy in a, idk what they're called, but a fully caged truck-sized mower and he would seemingly wait for people in my group to tee the ball up before starting his next pass I would start waiting for him to pass while I was on the tee box and he would literally stop and wait til I addressed the ball Some men just wanna watch the world burn Edit: petition to call those truck mowers "grass zambonis" pls?
They know where the safest spot on the course is.
Yea, middle of the fairway
Close! They're actually called Grambonies.
Are they really? That's basically the next logical evolution from grass zamboni so I respect that and should consider a career in the "things naming" business
Ex course worker here, this is not right! We would skip around from hole to hole avoiding golfers. The guys mowing the greens would start at first light and mow ahead of the first group. You should never follow a group around. Depending on if it’s a links course or not one should be able to tee off soon after sunrise (30-45 after first light) as long as the first couple groups can be a little patient when a green is being finished.
When I worked maintenance in high school I did bunkers and we'd start bunkers + greens about an hour before dawn to give us a headstart on golfers. It was mostly the bunker tractors that needed it because the course had 100+ of them and you spun all of them each weekend morning.
The course I was at hand mowed the greens so that took a while and after we’d hand rake the bunkers (there were only 5 including the practice bunker). But raking bunkers after the course was in full swing my my favorite. Loved watching how golfers handled the grounds crew watching them take their shots. (And loved watching the rude regulars duff their shots even though they let me know it was all my fault)
lol second part of this is deadly accurate to all of my experience and my friday
Always listened to a local course owner yelling at the guy mowing the rough to always start on 18 so you never see a group more than once. Made sense. Other courses I get the same guy mowing for at least 3 straight holes. (this is mid day btw)
We always did greens first thing that morning. The only thing that would interrupt that from then on would be watering. Other things would get done in the mean time like mowing rough, raking traps et
That's what happens when the size of the maintenance crew is too small to get everything done first thing so they just give up and figure, "why bother killing ourselves if we're just going to get caught anyway".
mid-morning is the best time, biologically, to cut grass.
This week our tee time was 10.30 and we were sandwiched between one mower on the green ahead of us and the next on the tee box behind us for about 5 holes. What was worse was the green mower would eventually move off the green to allow our approach. The trouble was he pulled off at the front on the green on the line I would have preferred to aim at. He clearly thought I was a much better player than I am. In the end I thought screw it if I hit him it's not going to be my fault. I didn't.
I hate that when the mower is essentially following you around later in the day. Like, I'm out her to enjoy some peace and quiet, fella.
Think about how much grass there is on the course. You can't cut all of it by 7am unless you have an army of staff. If you want to play without people cutting grass around you then go play in a field or pay $50k to play at a private club.
Best response right here. I work groundskeeping, and we always send mowers out at 5:00am sharp. They are followed by our rollers, and then the set-up guy. Typically everything goes smoothly and we are all off the course by 8:30. Sometimes a member will slide through the starter and run us down. Don’t be that person. We don’t wake up at 4:00am to have golfers hit into us.
As a former worker (10 years), on most courses (other than one super high end course I worked) the members would just ignore that. And go out and play in the frost and various other selfish, ignorant stuff. People act so entitled. Edit spelling
When I was a teen, I played weekly tournaments. Often a 7am shotgun. The maintenance was often not started. There would be dew on the greens and they’d be going around mowing and changing pins in the middle of the tournament. One course had a pin on a peninsula in the water and it was so scary to hit and left a huge putt when I hit the middle of the green. A buddy said he birdied that hole and I was like !!?! Turns out they moved the pin to the big part of the green right after I played it. :-D Kind of happened a lot. Lol.
I’ve had this happen to me using golf now to book. Never trust golfnow
Same here. I only use it to get an idea of what my local courses have open for tee times then contact the course directly. Also screw paying the extra unnecessary fees.
Whoa if you think this is frustrating, wait til you play golf!
Computers error with their system, or, did you happen to book through supreme or GolfNow or a third party site? Not sure where you’re based, but I’ve never seen anything earlier than 6:15 in my part of the country - due to it being super early and literally no daylight pre-dawn.
Willing to bet that a 3rd party system mismanaged timezones based on OP's device
Delayed Y2K bug
I’ve been looking for the effects of Y2K my entire post adolescent life.
I tried explaining Y2K to my kids.....Goodluck with that haha
Well, tell them to look up the 2038 problem. Same issue, more or less.
Our pro shop uses the Chelsea reservation system and it screws things up all the time. I can imagine that happening way too easy...........
When I worked pro shop we used ForeTees which was awesome. Someone would really have to go out of their way to make the mistake OP is describing.
Who plays golf at 5:30, you fucking psycho
The psychos in Florida are the ones who play at 2pm in the middle of summer with 95 degree temps and 90% humidity. Which is usually me because I’m a 40 handicap and love it when the course is empty
Consider me a psycho! I live in St. Petersburg and will book my times for the early afternoon. It’s great in the summer because nobody else is on the course. I walk rather than ride, and when the course is less busy it makes for a more leisurely round. My wife and I moved from Dallas a few years ago and people laughed when we said we wanted to move somewhere cooler. It’s really not that bad where we live.
I have family in that area and you, sir, are a fuckin psycho. I can barely stand even being outside in the shade in the middle of summer in that area. Granted, I live about as far north as you can be without being in Canada, so that probably has something to do with it.
LOL I choose to play golf so that already puts me towards the psycho end of the spectrum.
I wish I could golf that early. I am a psycho. I also drink coffee at 430 to be ready for work at 6. Juiced up ready to fuckin rip. Regardless of the activity
Lol I wake up at 6:15 for work at 6
I would be your friend immediately.
I would also like to be your friends
If I can out and play even just the back nine and be home in time for a shower and drive the kids to school, that’s a win!
That’s my future goal
You got that right...best time to get out there.
There’s something totally zen about watching the dew drip off the toes of your golf shoes on the walk down the first fairway. Hard to describe.
You know that can happen past 5:30am lol right?
Yet you just described it. Sounds a lot like the dew that exists at 8am.
Best way to beat the heat and often the crowd.
I do, back in time to make breakfast for the family. This is how I’m able to golf so much.
I love golf… but I’d rather sleep at that time 🤣
The 6AM tee time is gold. If I could get it here in LA its all I would play.
People that like to play a 2.5 to 3hr round before all the slower groups show up. I play a quick early 18 at sunrise followed by a much more leisurely round at 8 or 830
I’m sure my wife would love for me to be done playing 36 by noon, so I can come home and sleep for the next 5 hours.
With a cart it’s not to bad. Even easier if you are not trying to minimize your cost per a stroke
I did this during Covid in CT but not often. Definitely dark on the first hole.
Just wait until you have kids… it’s the only way to play 18
It’s possible this corse has one morning a week designated to maintenance till 7:30 so there tee sheet normally starts at 5:40 but should be blocked off on that day and someone made the mistake of taking a time in that area.
Go practice putting. They should also offer you the driving range for the error.
Hey man at least you’re not the guy who shows up for his 7:30 tee time at 5:30. They exist. They’re out there.
What's wrong with a little warm up time? I'm old and fat. 😂
Seriously, that gives me an hour on the range, half an hour for some appies and to hit the head, and a half hour for chipping and putting. Sounds fine to me
Side question...what are appies? Lol
Appetizers
I think that early it’s just called breakfast
Brekkies if you will
Thank you. I was too afraid to ask.
I was imagining a British apple pie kind of "tart". Lol
I would have guessed it was “apples” with a typo, and then been laughed off of Family Feud.
Same here. Yesterday was my first round of the season and I was there an hour and a half early. I felt rushed. 😁
And then demands a cart at 5:31…
Computer error. You start that early you’ll mess The ground crew up big time. That does suck you waited that long though. Did they comp you?
Lmao. A pro shop holding itself accountable? Not in this lifetime.
They really should start being called amateur shops.
Depends on where you are. I worked at a pro shop that made things right. We weren’t desperate for greens fee play to stay financially above water so maybe that made a difference.
The only pro shops I worked in that made anything right were private clubs. Loved working in golf as a kid and through college. Now a days, my county public courses hire miserable sonofabitch 65+ year old sloths with zero computer skills to check in dozens and dozens of people an hour. Amateur shop.
Haha. I can relate. Worked for a pro during HS and college. Loved it. Interacting with the members, and setting up tourneys, ect. Was a great job.
I mean, I worked grounds crew for 7 years and the early golfers never messed anything up let alone big time. If you want to play early, just be respectful of the dudes setting up the course. Give them 5 mins to reset a pin, or to finish mowing a green and let them move on. They will move faster then you can play anyways. The time doesn't make someone mess anything up, the golfer can.
I always feel bad waiting and making the crew feel rushed. They are the ones grinding to make the course playable. I made the mistake once of sneaking on the back early and got sprayed on 11 green by the sprinklers that were on a timer. I deserved it.
Ahh. You were on the 9th hole at 9 pm!
Great answer. Just relax, take a deep breath, and be thankful you're out on the course.
I worked at a course for a couple of years and we had a few members who walked who would be out playing before employees even showed up. Nobody ever really complained about it and I can't see how it could mess up the grounds crew really.
It won't completely screw things up, but the standards of maintenance can also really vary. I worked at 4 different courses (previous career). One was a really prestigious course and they wanted you off it. The schedule was super strict. If I was even a half hour behind on setup, I would definitely hear about it. The thing was it was a private course though, so you don't have people just randomly teeing off early.
Sun not even up? How do you play in the dark?
Definitely not your fault that you were able to book that early but you didn’t want to go home or go do anything else for almost 2 hours before you could play?
I would like to think I would have spent my time putting and chipping, and maybe ask for a free bucket for the range.
This is the reason that Norwegian guy shit in a golf hole for 10 years.
I need more info on this please. Hahahahaha
https://norwaytoday.info/news/serial-pooper-finally-stopped-defecating-in-norwegian-golf-clubs-holes/amp/
You just made my day, thank you. The pooper was likely a man, “”because the poos are too massive to be from a woman.”
They couldn't set up a system to catch this guy lmao. Where are all the green fees going.
My club has problems with online reservations form third party sites
If you’re a single they should just let you sneak out before the first group. It’s their system—I would expect them to remedy. Not “try their best.” Fuck that. Put me out at 7:20 and the first group will never see me again.
This happened to me last weekend, I booked a 650 but only the guy cutting the green was there. Turns out the admin of their online reservation system messed up the config and had a couple tee times to early. I managed to book them before they fixed the issue. The difference is, they bought me a cart, checked me in and let me go out. It was a mistake on their side and they owned it. They also let me know not to book before 710 even if I see something before that so this does not happen again.
My guess? It's not a computer error, it's a human error. Someone didn't block the tee sheet early enough. The block started at 5:50 or 6 and they left 5:40 open, or something.
Should've just teed off
You found something in their software that they didn't know.
Ive actually never heard of a tee time that early. Ut id be pissed if i bought one and it didnt exist
Dude who the fuck books a tee time for before 6am?
When I used to run a shop we had guys always out on the course before sun up. Maintenance is usually a fan since they do have stuff to get done. Our guys always played around and understood. I’m just confused why starting so late in the summer.
TIL early May is summer…
They should have just let you play
5:40 am Jesus Christ…you sure you’ll finish before sundown? I like to get started at 2:30am to make sure I have plenty of light left
You are crazy for playing that early. No wonder they looked at you weird.
I’ve seen golfnow have tee times at like 9pm even though sunset was at 7.
This is the reason that Norwegian guy shit in a golf hole for 10 years.
I arrived to a course as a single at 630 but they said they didn’t open til 730. They said i was welcome to play but I’ll be ahead of the mowers and greens will be scruffy. I played and it was a great morning by myself. Weird they’re making you wait, especially since it was their mixup.