Rediscovered the game: New clubs inbound!

[PocketGroove]

Hey Everyone,

After 11-12 years away from the game, I find that I've somehow caught the fever and the links are calling me back. I'll have my new clubs in a day or so.
Needless to say, I'm pretty excited to go out and hit some balls, develop a consistent swing, and walk the local courses, but; my stroke was never that good in the first place, so. I want to consult the old interweb community and find out what you devoted (and tech savvy) golfers would do in my position.

Should I head to the range or should I go grab a refresher lesson? Should I focus on the short iron swing, like when I learned all those years ago? Should I be spending $50 a half hour on a PGA pro who works at Dick's? I've watched enough youtube vids. to remember the fundamentals and I've hit some (nervous) balls at the stores proving that contact is possible.

Well, what would you guys do in my position... if you could start all over again?

Any help or comments are greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
Matt

[B-Con]

I played golf as a weekend duffer for about a year, then took a year off and started playing only in the last few months. Granted that's a lot less time off than you took off, but since I had just barely gotten into any rhythm before I stopped, it felt like starting over.

I started over with my irons and putting to get the feel back, and then started on my chipping and driving. I'm not a very good player, but using that to get back into the feel helped me.

One thing that I didn't realize -- that I'm sure you do -- is that I couldn't play as I had just before I stopped. I had to back off a lot of my power on my hits in order to concentrate on accuracy.

So, don't rush things. I'd start off just hitting by yourself. You might want lessons, but they will probably help better once you're back into a semi-familiar rhythm.

[Greg]

Id spend some time at the range to get the feel of how you want to hit the ball, I've been going more this year instead of playing as often, used to play 9 holes maybe 2-3 times during the week and and on sat and sunday, now I mostly just play on the weekends and go to the range during the week, I've got to where I hit my driver, 3 wood and hybrids ok, been concentrating more on my mid and short irons which is where i need the most work so I can hit better approach shots and tee shots on the par 3's and hit more greens, I love those birdie puts even If I seldom make them.