Anyone for Golf?

Part 1

Let’s get one thing clear, I’d never had any inclination towards learning to play golf. To be honest, I’d always associated it with old folk like my grandfather and my shorthand teacher, who was the first woman I ever knew who played. But with more and more younger people taking it up including an increased number of women, when my friend Sarah-Jane said she was thinking of having a lesson, I decided to give it a go too.

A quick Google search led us to the James Andrews School of Golf at Sedlescombe in Sussex. It is unusual in that the course came after the school, with most places the school comes as an afterthought. Thirty-six-year-old James Andrews started the school 8 years ago. He was practically born playing golf, has played professionally since leaving school and it was his ambition from the age of six to own his own club. His ethos was to build a course around a school with the sole intention of improving all levels of play whether old, young, male or female.

So armed with this knowledge Sarah-Jane, a Senior Operations Manager for Ernst and Young, and I drove down one Friday evening after work. We arrived in time for last orders in the clubhouse, any doubts we’d had about our learning potential were assuaged by the barman who told us without a hint of irony: “It’s all about you!”

Slightly taken aback at what most people might perceive as an insult, it dawned on us that he meant golfing is an individual rather than team sport, so you can learn at your own speed. Encouraged by this notion we headed off to our comfortable bedrooms to rest before the big day.

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