evan

I'm a financial adviser, mainly dealing with life insurance recommendations

I hit a lot shorter than most of my golf mates, however I've found that it's not a big issue. On a 300m hole, hitting 100m 3 times consistently is just as good as hitting 250m, 100m and then 50m back the other way because you've overshot the hole! If anything, hitting shorter than everyone else just moves the focus onto more strategic playing, ensuring your shots will not only add up to the required distance, but also trying to choose your lies for subsequent shots.

If you can't hit up with them, would skipping a few holes and coming back to them be a good option? A few times I have skipped from hole 5 or 6 up to hole 10, played the back 9 and then come back to the remaining holes on the front. This way you get in front without actually playing though - and they would have to be ridiculously slow for you to play the back 9 and then come back and still be held up. Of course this only works if you can do it early in the round, once you only have a few holes left it doesn't really work.

The rule I used to always unknowingly break was when on the green to not walk through the imaginary line between anyones ball and the hole (where they will be putting over). Always walk around the back of the balls, or if you have to cross their path make sure you step over it without planting any feet in the balls future path.

One course I play at has mats for 3 of the 18 holes - I tend to just tee off from the grass either side of the mat. I don't like the feel of the mats when you would have otherwise taken a divot you end up with a bit of a shock up your arm.

The only time I took my girlfriend golfing, she ended up in a bunker just off of the third green. She took 5 or 6 shots getting it out with no luck, sand flying in all directions. Finally she connected cleanly with the ball and chipped it onto the green around 7-8 metres away, hit the flag on the full and fell straight down into the hole.

I tend to just lay my club on the ground pointing towards my target, then position my feet before picking the club up. No unusual equipment with the same result.

Every round I use GolfShot for scoring on my iPhone. It also has GPS and swing-by-swing tracking but as most of the time I play par 3's I tend not to use those features. My other must have accessory is my Clicgear cart - folds up nice and small to fit in the back of the car and then provides plenty of storage space for my wallet and phone as I wheel around the course in style. Unfortunately most of my friends have horrible carts and prefer to ride an electric one, but I enjoy the exercise.

A single bad shot usually doesn't phase me too much, however if I do a couple shockers in a row then I do get a bit angry which tends to put me on a bit of a bad streak. No throwing clubs though - I've spent too much hard earned money buying them to ruin them just because I have messed up a shot.