Just how do you 9-5'ers do it?

[bluewolf]

I've recently been promoted and for the first time in my working life I'm not working shifts. 5 days a week, finishing at 5, 45 minute drive home. Just where do you fit in the golf?

I know I could play on Saturday/Sunday, but my golf has always fitted in perfectly around my family life (of which I'm fiercely protective). At best I can fit in a round on Saturday morning and an occasional round on Wednesday after work in the height of summer. However, just how do you improve on such a meagre diet?

Any tips welcome. Especially as I now haven't played 18 holes since December!!!!!

 

[Blue in Munich]

Short answer; you don't! Like you, I worked shifts for a number of years; everyone told me "I don't know how you do it" when the truth of it for me was I didn't know how they did. Shopping when the supermarkets were quieter, golf either before or after work depending on the shifts, travelling when the roads were emptier, only downside occasionally was having to work weekends but most of the time that wasn't an issue.

Sorry that's not a great deal of help but I never found a way around it.

 

[bluewolf]

Short answer; you don't! Like you, I worked shifts for a number of years; everyone told me "I don't know how you do it" when the truth of it for me was I didn't know how they did. Shopping when the supermarkets were quieter, golf either before or after work depending on the shifts, travelling when the roads were emptier, only downside occasionally was having to work weekends but most of the time that wasn't an issue.

Sorry that's not a great deal of help but I never found a way around it.

That's exactly what I'm finding mate. I've just realised that I loved all the benefits of shift work 😂

 

[Blue in Munich]

That's exactly what I'm finding mate. I've just realised that I loved all the benefits of shift work 

As did I. Best I've managed to negotiate with the new firm is a permanent 7 - 3, which is pretty good and means I usually get an hour's head start on the work before the phone starts going (or a couple of hours if I forget to log it on….. )

 

[chrisd]

Ah the eternal conundrum - how to tell the other half you've got a comp on Sunday morning!!

 

[hovis]

i couldn't do it. i work two day shifts, two night shifts and four off. even then i feel I'm always at work.

 

[Imurg]

Haven't worked 9-5 for a dozen or more years now and can't imagine having to do it...
When I did, k played weekend mornings as Hid was either working or sleeping....
Once The Boy came along that was curtailed to once a weekend.
Now I'm self-employed, I play when I want as long as it doesn't impact work...
Don't envy 9-5'ers at all...

 

[bluewolf]

I used to do 3 days or 3 nights a week. Before that I was on permanent nights. In bed at 5, up at 10, golf course at 11, pick kids up at 15:30. The weekends were the price I paid for it.

I should be able to leave early on Wednesdays for the weekly comp and Saturday mornings shouldn't be too much of an issue, but it feels like I'm shoehorning it in to my week.

 

[jak kez 187]

Last summer was great because my two playing partners worked shifts as well as myself so we would get random days off midweek and play golf.

However they've now both got Mon-Fri 9-5 jobs and have a hefty commute so midweek golf is now off the cards.

Not sure what I'm going to do this year now!

 

[ScienceBoy]

In the winter I went to a floodlit range and played at the weekends.

In the summer I drove the 15 mins to my course and played until dark or until the then girlfriend/fiancée finished work and needed picking up.

Now I just visit the range across the road on my lunch break.

I've been lucky I think

 

[huds1475]

However, just how do you improve on such a meagre diet?
!

You've seen how I 'improve' :rofl:

Two hour round trip, 8/9 hour day + a couple of of hours with the little one doesn't leave much.

I grab the odd practice when I can and count myself lucky the wife doesn't mind me playing.

Then get frustrated at being rubbish as it feels like I'm cheating my family of family time!!!

Vicious circle.

 

[Hobbit]

Or, if your shift pattern includes weekends, how do you put up with only playing a comp every now and again, not every week?

Winter is the worst time for 9-5er's. Only weekends, no week night golf.

 

[GG26]

I struggle to get out during the week other than the odd nine holes of an evening in the middle of Summer. Really struggled to get on the course in the Winter as my lad has football training Saturday mornings and matches on Sunday mornings. This afternoon will be my first 18 holes since November.

 

[HowlingGale]

The honest answer is you don't get to play. I have 2 kids at 4 & 2 and had to give up my membership a couple of years ago.

I teally have no idea how so many people with families play so regularly. Especially young families. They tend to say their other halves encourage it, but I just can't see it. They're either parenting gods the rest of the time or they're kidding themselves on about how much they actually do with their family.

It's hard work. But we all know that 😛

 

[Lord Tyrion]

You look forward to the clocks changing so you can do 9 holes in the evening after work. Any golf in winter is a bonus.

I used to live opposite a prison officer who worked shifts. He would play 5 x 18 holes every week during the summer. Cracking golfer but then he should be playing that much.

 

[Deleted member 15344]

Love doing shift

2 days 7 till 7 then two nights 7-7 then four days off

Manage to get a round in all my days off plus at times inbetween my nights as well

Sometime it's a pain when you are working weekends but I get to play loads during the week

 

[Hobbit]

Love doing shift

2 days 7 till 7 then two nights 7-7 then four days off

Manage to get a round in all my days off plus at times inbetween my nights as well

Sometime it's a pain when you are working weekends but I get to play loads during the week

Get as many in as you can Phil. You'll be too tired once the wee one arrives...

 

[need_my_wedge]

Been on flex-time for about 8 years now. My boss' ethos is as long as the work gets done we can be as flexible as we like. My office is an hour and 40 mins each way, been doing that for 16 years, apart from a 2 year stint in Tokyo. I work at home 2 days a week now, the drive days I get to office at 7am and leave at 3:30, do the same hours working at home. The work at home days get me to the course by 4 in the lighter evenings, giving me 4 rounds a week for a large chunk of the year. I do Aikido 3 nights a week on top of that. Mrs wedge also works shift as a nurse, very fortunate that she plays golf and does the Aikido too. Matters not whether she is working or not, if she is, I'll play in a swindle, or with the boy, if she's not, we'll play together. Win win for me.

 

[chrisd]

Aaaaahhhhh!

The only joy of retirement!

 

[DCB]

Had similar problems myself after a change of job a few years back. Something had to give and although I was able to keep on playing regular comps at the weekend, it was the extra games I missed. End result was a slow decline in the standard of my golf.

Juggling work and family life is hard enough without having golf and anything else thrown into the mix.