All About Golf

Getting started

In order to get involved in golf it is first important to make sure you understand the rules and aims of the game.

Although it may seem like a simple sport – you stand at the tee, you line up your aim, and you hit the ball towards the hole – it is in fact quite complex once you get into the finer details of the game.One of the most important elements of golf is the par system. A par is a number allocation equivalent to the number of strokes that a well-practiced golfer would use to hit the ball from the tee to the hole. A difficult or longer-distance hole may have a higher number of strokes (a higher par number) allocated, a short or easy hole less strokes (and a smaller par). Generally speaking, a good golf course will have a nice variation in pars. A common equation is to have four par three holes, ten of the par four holes, and four of the five par holes.

Another area which you should become equated with – especially if you’re a beginner golfer – is the penalties that are given if a ball is lost, hit out of play, or hit into a water hazard. Not only do these penalties incur strokes (that is, even if you have not taken a stroke, to recover your ball you are allocated strokes regardless), but you may have to play the ball from a new location dictated by the rules of the game – for instance, in a drop-ball situation.