What is your biggest pet peeve you see people doing on the golf course?

[oldmotor]

Spitting sunflower seeds on the green or throwing cigarette butts just off the green.

Everyone in the foursome ahead of you standing around watching each other hit.

[jetsknicks1]

Standing on the green counting your shots. It's not advanced calculus people!

[saevel25]

Standing on the green counting your shots. It's not advanced calculus people!

Hey counting those 8's and 7's is tough man!!! Though I do that on the next tee box

[sopel10]

1.  Slow players not letting fast players play through, when they are behind or nobody in front. (just happened yesterday, single behind a 2 some, finally after putting balls in the water on par 3 they let me play through...)

2.  Packing up next to the 18th green.  I am in the fairway, waiting to hit, and you take extra 2 minutes to clean up your cart.  Horrible.

[Big C]

1. Looking for a ball for too long.  If you can't find it after a few minutes, just give up and drop.

2.   Not paying attention to the groups ahead and behind.  Keep up with the group ahead of you, don't hold up the group behind you.

3. Taking the game too seriously.  If you're a beginner or don't get to play very often, don't worry about high scores and bad shots, it will happen regardless.  People take a long time to line up a putt or shot when they'll miss it by a mile regardless.  It's ok to be bad, just be aware of it and try to have fun and not hold other people up.

4.  Swinging the exact same way for every single shot, and not hitting one good shot.  You just swung exactly the same way the past 50 shots and hardly made contact on most of them, why do you think it will work this time?

5.  Rudeness.

6.  Drinking too much.

7.  If you can't play fast, at least be aware that you're slow and act accordingly.  Let people play through, maybe skip a hole, etc.

8.  Following the rules too closely.  If you're not playing for money, or in a tournament (ie. just a practice round) you're allowed to do whatever you want.

Even with all my gripes, I still very much enjoy playing almost all the time.  I'm also joining a private club this year, so I hope I won't have to worry about some of these things as much.

Some good stuff on here, but I actually disagree with a lot of what you wrote as well.

1. I don't begrudge anyone using their full 5 minutes to look for their ball, as long as they make a point to catch up PROMPTLY if they've fallen off pace. I know how frustrating it is to lose a ball that you expect to find - there's probably nothing in the game that frustrates me more. As such, I'm sympathetic to people in front of me who might be in the same plight. Go ahead and use as much time as you are allotted to search, but make sure you catch up as soon as possible.

4. How is this a pet peeve of yours? Can you honestly say that the way someone chooses to swing the club bothers you? Unless it leads to slow play, let people play their game for better or worse.

6. Couldn't disagree more. Unless it leads to your point #5 above, drinking too much is one of my favorite parts of the game!

8. Again, as long as it doesn't lead to slow play, I will let people follow the rules as closely or as loosely as they desire.

[David in FL]

List you biggest pet peeve you see people doing on the golf course. Mine is when people hammer their tee into the ground of the tee boxes.  I mean really take you darn tee out of the ground....

I gotta ask. With all the contentious issues that can crop up out on the course, hammering a tee into the ground is your biggest hot button?! :-\ For me, slow play and not caring for the course.

[saevel25]

I gotta ask. With all the contentious issues that can crop up out on the course, hammering a tee into the ground is your biggest hot button?!

For me, slow play and not caring for the course.

Yea I agree, that is a bit picky, but hey to each their own pet peeves.

Easy fix for that, divot repair tool, easily takes out tees from the ground when stuck.

[David in FL]

Yea I agree, that is a bit picky, but hey to each their own pet peeves. :-D Easy fix for that, divot repair tool, easily takes out tees from the ground when stuck.

True. But really, where's the harm? Either to an individual like the OP, or to the course? Ah well, as you said, different strokes......

[lifeboy]

The course that I play most often is an inner-city dog track where the holes are pretty close to one another. For the most part you get what you pay for, but I shouldn't be able to hear your conversation two holes over with the guy you're in the same cart with. Have some courtesy and shut the hell up when I'm trying to putt.

[Aguirre]

I picked up somebody's ball last Friday.  Let me explain.

First, I only do this if it's impossible that somebody won't claim the ball.  And I was in that situation.  But I made a mistake.  There was a twosome ahead of us.  One guy had a distinctive orange shirt.  We had fallen behind a bit, and I found a nice ProV in the rough.  I had already passed up several balls that day in situations where I thought somebody might claim the ball.  But then I saw the twosome driving up the next fairway to the green.  I figured, hey, nobody else could have possibly hit it here (a literal impossibility given it's location) so I picked it up.  I, did, however, take note of where I found it.  Just in case, for some odd reason... that happened.

Turns out that two groups in front of us was also a twosome with a guy wearing an orange shirt (what are the odds?).  So about ten seconds later I see the correct twosome driving off the tee on the adjacent hole.  Ooops.  When they came towards me I drove back to the spot and waived him over.  I asked what he was hitting, explained what happened, and told him I had marked the spot.  The guy thanked me profusely and said, "Nobody has ever done that!"  I still felt like a dumbass.

To top it off, I was wearing an orange shirt.  I just bought it.  Must have been orange shirt day.

But yeah, ball hawking is bad.

[Aguirre]

Actually, I forgot to mention my absolute biggest pet peeve.

Players who don't wait for you to clear the green before hitting approach shots.  Just because the flag is in the hole doesn't mean it's time for you to start swinging.  A dozen times a year, I have to give a wave to a group behind us who hits too early in this situation.

If I have to do it twice, I wait until they are in earshot (say, when a tee and green are close by) and say, "Excuse me, could you please wait until we completely clear the green to hit your approach shots?  Thank you."

If I have to do it a third time (which is rare), I get mad.

On Memorial day around 2010 I had already gotten through phase I and II on the tenth hole.  The group I had spoken to caught us on the tee.  So remember, they are right there watching us tee off.

It's a short par 4 and I laid up with a 5 iron off the tee, so I'm not down the fairway much.  It's cart path only, so I grab a few clubs and start walking across the fairway to my ball and crack!  Some guy teed off!  I mean, they just watched us finish teeing off and drive away.  I'm in the middle of the fairway like 180 yards from the tee.

I couldn't believe it.  The guys ball was headed right at me.  It bounced twice, I caught it, and proceeded to throw it directly into the woods.  I also had some not so pleasant words to say.

One guy in the group caught up to us on the next tee and apologized for his friend.  My partner talked to him but I just ignored them.  I was too fired up.  That stuff is dangerous and foolish.

[CoachinPA]

1. Looking for a ball for too long.  If you can't find it after a few minutes, just give up and drop.

2.   Not paying attention to the groups ahead and behind.  Keep up with the group ahead of you, don't hold up the group behind you.

3. Taking the game too seriously.  If you're a beginner or don't get to play very often, don't worry about high scores and bad shots, it will happen regardless.  People take a long time to line up a putt or shot when they'll miss it by a mile regardless.  It's ok to be bad, just be aware of it and try to have fun and not hold other people up.

4.  Swinging the exact same way for every single shot, and not hitting one good shot.  You just swung exactly the same way the past 50 shots and hardly made contact on most of them, why do you think it will work this time?

5.  Rudeness.

6.  Drinking too much.

7.  If you can't play fast, at least be aware that you're slow and act accordingly.  Let people play through, maybe skip a hole, etc.

8.  Following the rules too closely.  If you're not playing for money, or in a tournament (ie. just a practice round) you're allowed to do whatever you want.

Even with all my gripes, I still very much enjoy playing almost all the time.  I'm also joining a private club this year, so I hope I won't have to worry about some of these things as much.

These for sure.

[pepsiplusconker]

Counting their score and writing it down while stood on, or near the green while I'm right up their arse.

As far as my experience goes, only on a few courses in the UK, including the one I'm a member at, everyone is really quick, I was behind a 4 ball not long back, and they probably played the round in 3:45 max.  Saying this, I don't play when it's really busy, so you're probably looking at 4:30+

[PA Golf Info]

Yea I agree, that is a bit picky, but hey to each their own pet peeves.

Easy fix for that, divot repair tool, easily takes out tees from the ground when stuck.

Reason is it just must be engrained in me as in my younger days I had a maintenance job at a course for summer work.  For a 16 year old you got to do all the fun things like clean the tee boxes, rake the bunkers and repair divots at 5am. So I have that suck in my mind if a person does hammer their tees into the ground in the tee boxes they more then likely do not fix their divots, rake the sand after they were in it or repair ball marks on the greens.  It is just the fist thing that adds up to total disrespect for the property.

[That is Good]

Pin attenders who are oblivious to their own shadow cast.

[Lihu]

Ones who yell at you for "hitting into them" after waiting patiently for them to take their second shot and clear the area (and you happen to hit the cart path and go 20 yards past them. Obvious accident), then declaring that they are going to "hit it to their ancestors" while you patiently wait behind a tee box for them. Then they proceed to drive <150 yards again.

Macho does not really belong on the golf course, the driving range would be a better place for them to demonstrate it.

[drew17777]

Oblivious slow players that don't let faster players through

i have to agree^, that is the absolute worse

[MS256]

People that complain about everything they can think of about the course and have every excuse in the book (except their own lack of ability) for every bad shot they hit.