Back In The Day…
I was looking for golf balls recently at our national chain sporting goods store, and though it’s been this way for 10 years now, it struck me that there are dozens of golf ball types to choose from. I can’t imagine being a beginner and wondering what ball to choose. On the up side, you can’t really buy a bad golf ball nowadays because even the low-end balls are still pretty decent. But it got me thinking, and…
When I was twenty-something, I hated “old guys” telling stories that began with “back in my day…”, and I swore I’d never do that to others when I was an “old guy”. Of course, I’m not an “old guy”…yet, but I am going to reminisce about the days when I started playing golf. I got hooked on golf in 1973, really hooked. I was single, in the service, and I lived at the golf course when I wasn’t working at the airfield.
I was fortunate enough to have the head pro take me under his wing for 3 years and I progressed fairly well and eventually became a 10-handicap. I was happier than a … well you get my drift. My point is that back then there were only two basic types of golf balls: balata and surlyn. Balata balls were the ones “real” golfers used because they had a soft cover and you could really move the ball if you were that good. Surlyn balls were for everyone else because they had a harder cover and thus, harder to cut if you hit a bad iron shot. And given that all irons were blades back then, it was easy to cut a balata ball. Titleist was the number one golf ball but it wasn’t until they came out with the Titleist DT surlyn ball that even hacks felt special because they too could play a Titleist.
And never mind what the clubs were like back then, but that’s a story for another day.