Have manners gone in the game

[chrisd]

Last week we got stuck behind a 4 ball. The 3 men couldn't hit more than 100 yards, or straight, and the lady player was .... Well ... A not great, lady player, 2 of the men were aging and due to ill health struggling to walk the course. They were playing their back 9 and we, a slightly younger group, were on the first. We caught them after our first drives and by the 3rd we were getting really brassed off at being kept waiting ages to play.

They called us on the 3rd and accused us of "forcing our way through" they told one of our 73 year old players that " they wern't obliged to call us through when they were in range of us" I'm sure, one week later, that they are still out there somewhere!

 

[Foxholer]

Last week we got stuck behind a 4 ball. The 3 men couldn't hit more than 100 yards, or straight, and the lady player was .... Well ... A not great, lady player, 2 of the men were aging and due to ill health struggling to walk the course. They were playing their back 9 and we, a slightly younger group, were on the first. We caught them after our first drives and by the 3rd we were getting really brassed off at being kept waiting ages to play.

They called us on the 3rd and accused us of "forcing our way through" they told one of our 73 year old players that " they wern't obliged to call us through when they were in range of us" I'm sure, one week later, that they are still out there somewhere!

This is the sort of situation where (proper) Marshalls are of huge benefit.

No bad feeling, they can go ahead to see if the players really have lost a hole and come back and explain to the group behind who don't then become impatient. An a little communication/PR (even I could/can do it) goes a long way in this sort of situation.

 

[MadAdey]

This is the sort of situation where (proper) Marshalls are of huge benefit.

No bad feeling, they can go ahead to see if the players really have lost a hole and come back and explain to the group behind who don't then become impatient. An a little communication/PR (even I could/can do it) goes a long way in this sort of situation.

in a perfect world all courses would have Marshall's on the course full time. All comes down to though, you need to maintain and run a full time buggy and 3 or 4 Marshall's, probably another £70k a year for the club to fork out. But I have seen some pretty shoddy Marshall's before that appear to get off on the power they have.

 

[HawkeyeMS]

This is the sort of situation where (proper) Marshalls are of huge benefit.

No bad feeling, they can go ahead to see if the players really have lost a hole and come back and explain to the group behind who don't then become impatient. An a little communication/PR (even I could/can do it) goes a long way in this sort of situation.

Actually, this is the sort of situation where a bit of etiquette and manners wouldn't go amiss. A marshall would help, but shouldn't be needed.

 

[Foxholer]

in a perfect world all courses would have Marshall's on the course full time. All comes down to though, you need to maintain and run a full time buggy and 3 or 4 Marshall's, probably another £70k a year for the club to fork out. But I have seen some pretty shoddy Marshall's before that appear to get off on the power they have.

Not quite!

In a perfect world, the 4 ball would have taken the first opportunity and invited the 2-ball through. On the 1st or 2nd hole would be simplest.

I did mention 'proper' Marshalls. I too have seen poor ones, though normally just the token useless watchers rather than power-crazed. Proper ones are just noticeable and available, keeping folk informed. Some 2/3-balls are quite happy to stay where they are if they know that they would have to keep going through groups. Others, with time consraints like the OP, can be accommodated by skipping several holes. It's all about communication - all round.

 

[dufferman]

in a perfect world all courses would have Marshall's on the course full time. All comes down to though, you need to maintain and run a full time buggy and 3 or 4 Marshall's, probably another £70k a year for the club to fork out. But I have seen some pretty shoddy Marshall's before that appear to get off on the power they have.

I played a course close to me last year where 3 of us were stuck behind a 4 ball, who happened to be all women, of mixed age. The game was slow, and at a point on the course where you could see a few holes ahead, we realised that there was no-one in front of the women ahead for at least 2 holes. This was around the 10th / 11th hole.

We called the clubhouse to send out a marshall, as there were 2 groups behind us stacking up.

The marshall came over to US and told US not to be so pushy, it was a competetion of some sort ahead therefore we had to 'deal with it'.

This was a tee time of 9.30am on a Saturday, and WE were in the wrong for wanting to play through!!!!!!

The game took 5 hours.

I don't play there much anymore.

It's nothing to do with them being women, it was just ignorance of the rest of the course. The fact the marshall was on their side made it worse!