Kletus

Not nearly as far fetched as you may want to think. The speed and feel of a ball as it comes off of the putter is the major factor I use in what ball I use. Some of it is surely mental, such as how the sound interacts with your brain and changes the way you may feel about it. However, I can tell a big difference between the way balls putt, and some of them just simply don't work for me. I'm fine with a ball that I'm consistently long or short with.. but some balls I tend to be very erratic and do not putt consistently with them. Those balls go into the shag bag very quickly. Currently playing two balls: 1. Srixon Tri-speed Tour - Tour Yellow. This is my go to ball. Great 3-piece ball at a good price. I finally found a ball that I absolutely love, and they discontinued them. Have found nothing in the Srixon lineup that replaces them, but luckily I can still find them online. Bought 10 dozen at $15 ea. earlier this year. 2. Titleist ProV1x - I play these on courses with faster green speeds. These come off of the putter a little slower than the Tri-speed tours. If I find that I'm hitting all my putts long, I make the switch to the ProV1x and it normally brings my putting speed back where I want it. I bought 5 dozen high grade (not sure of the exact grade) used balls off of ebay earlier this year for $30 / dozen.

I love my Callaway X2hot Pro's. Very forgiving, long, and a flushed shot feels just as good as a pure hit from my old mp53's

Mine has the Date, Course, and hole number marked on it in sharpie. The ball is on the bottom level of my logo ball case (keep a logo ball from every course I play) and is sandwiched between the scorecard from the round my hole-in-one came from and the scorecard from my lowest round ever.

Nice round of even Par! Dang right you need to post it!

Played yesterday and two of my playing partners each found hex chrome on the course. Not sure it if was the hex chrome +. Both balls looked almost new and had no issues when they started playing them. About a hole later, each ball had a slash in them. Once again.. this was just a random sampling from golf balls found on the course.. but we weren't impressed with the durability.

I'm a firm believer in always playing the same type of ball. My buddies love me for it... because I always give them any nice new balls (including) ProV's that I find on the course. I just feel like using the same ball promotes a consistent feel around the greens. I've been playing the Yellow Srizon TriSpeed Tour's for about a year now. A friend of mine gave me a box of E6's and I feel like they play very similar for me (probably around 85 driver swing speed). Now that the Trispeed Tour's have been discontinued I've tried the new Q'stars as well as the Yellow Soft Feel. I like the E6 better than both of these offerings. Other's have noted that the cover on the Yellow E6's seems to be different than the whites.... I've found this to be true with both the Bridgestone's and the Srixon's. I feel like the yellow golf balls are more durable than the white ones. This is probably only psychological, and due to the fact that the yellow seems to mute out any scuffs and dings.... but it's possible that the yellow color has a slight formulation difference than the white. All in all... the E6 seems to be a very playable ball. I haven't had the chance to try the NXT Tours yet.... but so far the E6 is my favorite yellow offering besides the Trispeed tour.

I'm a firm believer in the idea that the less loft you use.. the less variability in the shot. If the fringe allowed I would use my putter. Otherwise I would either choke down on my 4 hybrid or my 7 iron and use a putting stoke. The 4 hybrid putt from around the green has saved me a ton of shots and is very repeatable with just a little practice.

It rained on my clubs while I was playing this past Wednesday... does that count as cleaning them? My course has club washers on the carts. I generally give them a wipe down or stick them in the club washer every couple of shots. Once or twice per season I'll pull all of them out of the bag and give them a full wash. Grips get replaced once to twice per season depending on how they are holding up. If they ever start to feel the least bit slick to me then they are gone.

Fourputt, I understand what you are saying.. but you are missing the point of my original post. Instead of looking at each of my posts with the intent of disagreeing... try actually reading them with the intent of agreeing with me. I think you will find that the context will change some. My original post was referring to a marshall who was adamant about NO MULLIGANS. I made the point that 2 off the first tee for EVERYONE would actually speed up play because it has the unintended consequence of adding the small buffer between groups that most courses fail to implement. I am fully aware that the fivesome's we play at our course wouldn't be welcome elsewhere.. even though they play surprisingly fast. Don't get hung up on the fivesome... or even the 2 off the first tee... the original point was about the buffer between groups. Most courses with 9 minute windows between groups don't actually enforce the 9 minute window. The starter just states "your up after that group" and the next group plays as soon as the group ahead moves away from their second shot. If you actually enforced the 9 minute window... my group (even with 5) would be long gone before it was time for your group behind me to play. If you weren't standing behind us at the tee box watching us tee off.. you would never have any clue that we did anything different than you. If courses would actually enforce the buffer then golf would flow much more smoothly.

http://grandharbor.net/privateclubamenities/thepatriotgolfcourseatgrandharbor

All joking aside... this is a standard afternoon group that consists of 15-20 golfers at a private club. We have reserved tee times and there will be no one behind us. For whatever reason they tend to prefer to play fivesomes vs threesomes. I would prefer 5 threesomes.... they end up teaming up 3 fivesomes. The groups start teeing off a few minutes after 1 pm and we are almost always back in the clubhouse, bets settled and heading to the parking lot by 5:30. Takes about 4.5 hours to get 3 to 4 groups off of the same tee box (everyone hitting 2 off the first tee), get back into the clubhouse... settle bets.. grab a drink.. and head to the parking lot. Maybe I'm wrong... but that doesn't seem like all that slow of play to me. The point that I was trying to make is that most courses don't put enough of a buffer between groups. If you allow groups to follow right behind each other then a slowdown in the first group creates a traffic jam that just gets worse and worse if any of the groups that had to wait end up having issues on their next shot. The ripples move back all the way through the course and play slows down dramatically. The course may get more golfers on the course.. but the pace of play suffers.

I have a couple of different groups: 1. Members of the courses I'm a member of. We have normal times each week where people just show up and play. 2. I carry alot of people out to the course for work.. and sometimes they turn into golf buddies. 3. I've met most of my current social golf crew simply from random pairings on the golf course.

I think we have reached the point where all we are doing is arguing the semantics of specific situations instead of addressing the OP's question. Simply put. In many situations it will be faster to ride. In many situations walking will be at minimum.. just as fast, and in some situations actually a little faster. I personally think that all things being equal... riding will be faster more of the time than walking. However, In real world applications.... very seldom will there be enough of a difference that it will cause either party in a mixed group to be uncomfortable or upset. To the OP.... go out and walk. Try 9 holes and see how you do. You will either love it or hate it and you can decide from there how you want to proceed. If you play ready golf... and are ready when it's your turn.. you should have no problem keeping up unless the course is just poorly designed for walkers. I personally tend to walk during the cooler months for the exercise and to stay loose. I tend to ride when it gets hot.. because walking then just simply isn't fun for me and my health doesn't allow me to take the chance of getting too hot.

1. I would simply have looked at the Starter and told him I was playing my provisional in case I didn't find the first one. 2. If the course is putting any sort of break between groups like they should... then the extra 20 seconds wouldn't matter. 3. My normal friday group plays 2 off the first tee and often plays fivesomes. Yes, it takes a minute or two extra to get off of the first tee... but that also creates a natural space between the groups. I've found that those rounds flow much smoother with very rare waiting because that buffer is there to absorb a slow hole by the group in front. Your starter might be surprised.. but I would be willing to bet that if they REQUIRED everyone to hit 2 on the first tee they would probably speed up play. Of course... there would always be THAT guy that has to look 10 minutes for his topflite in the woods that would still bring everyone back to reality.

I use whatever ball will give me the best chance of striping one down the middle... which is usually the newest one.