And setting aside the guy who's shot himself out of the stroke play competition, I wonder what effect going for birdie on many holes has over the course of a round, even for guys who are playing reasonably well. Same goes for closest to the pin competitions.

What I don't understand is if EVERYONE complains about it, WHO is actually perpetrating the slow play. I think the answer is that although everyone hates being held up, most people don't actually know that they are going slow.

A common example is groups of choppers off high handicaps who simply don't think about how slow they are playing whilst on the course. I've seen foursomes of choppers, all in carts, who all drive to everybody's ball and watch each shot (with the accompanying 20 practice swings and painstaking pre shot routine). This is a tremendous waste of time. In their defence, at most clubs low handicapers seem to play with each other and not want to mix with choppers, where they are most needed to show them how to speed up play. Another major reason for slow play has been touched upon by Erik. Choppers who don't know how far they can hit it, or old codgers living in the past when they could actually hit a ball, waiting for greens to clear from 250 plus out when their drives are only about 200. This annoys the hell out of me. A third major reason is slow players whose inflated egos won't allow them to call groups through. In 20 years of playing golf I have been called to play through less than five times, but regularly watch the groups in front lose 1, 2 and sometimes more holes.

I think the solution is complicated and multi faceted. Clubs should encourage good players to mix with choppers to show them how to play faster. Starters should hand out out a brochure with the score cards (1 brochure per group) containing tips on how to avoid slow play. Other measures that I've seen on some courses that work are: Marshals patrolling the course issuing warnings and making players skip holes, or forcing the group to suffer the indignation of calling the group behind to play through (any group that suffers this humiliation more than a couple of times will soon speed up play). I've also seen signs around the course on tee boxes stating how long it should have taken you to reach that point on the course.

I think slow play is the only negative in the game of golf, but with some tough love the problem can be solved and we can get to playing weekend rounds in under 4 hours.

mike said on May 1, 2007:

7000 / 1760 / 3 * 60 = 80 minutes just to walk. 90 * 4 * 20 / 60 = 120 minutes to play shots. 200 minutes is 3.33 hours, and of those 90 shots, as I said above, many of them are going to be tap-ins, concessions, pickups, etc. that don't take anywhere near 20 seconds.

Well i stand corrected. I still for the life of me wish i could figure out why the 3 other guys i play with can't seem to break closer that 4.5 hours.

Though I have to say while we seem to slow some people down behind us, it does seem like that trend is started by us having to wait for groups who are too slow in front of us. So maybe if we played on a clear course, with no one in front of us, we'd probably break under the 4 hour barrier.

I do think I'm going to take all this and try and convince the guys I play with to speed up a little.. cause I feel sometimes like I'm the only one with a sense of urgency.

Also, switching from a Pinseeker laser range finder to a Skycaddie GPS has helped me speed up. Now I have the yaradage as soons as I set my bag down. Not as accurate, but MUCH faster!

Too optimistic. Terrain, weather, club selection, ball cleaning or other random factors are not at all considered. People walk slower uphill, tee-boxes can be 100+ yards away from greens and people shoot 110+, etc.

A bunch of sub-ten caps could do very well under four hours, but it's almost impossible this day and age for the weekend hacker. The real solutions, play at uncrowded times or go private.

You know, calculations can only go so far. I've seen a walking foursome with a combined score above 400 play a reasonably difficult course in well under four hours.

If shaving 10 seconds can have such a dramatic effect as the one I illustrated above 90, I'm sure the math will still work out for people shooting 110 and taking 17 seconds per shot, on average. Again, there are always tap-ins, pick-ups, etc., even at that level. Hopefully they aren't playing from 7000 yards, either.

I will agree that if you cannot play quickly you should do what you can to play at off-peak times, but that is still no solution for simply playing faster.