Golf's a funny game

I played golf yesterday with my buddy. We both like golf. We are both quite bad at golf. I was thinking about what it would take to be good at golf. I think I figured it out...

 

A bunch of money.

 

Right now, I maybe 2 or 3 rounds of golf per year. I go to the driving range maybe 15 times a year. Which means that I spend maybe a little under $200 a year on golf. For me, this is a lot of money. So I figure, in order to get good, I'd have to end up paying much more than this.

Let's compare this to basketball. I have a hoop in my backyard so that I can practice on that whenever I want. I play every Monday night at my church for free. Every once in a while, I might buy a new pair of shoes. My last pair cost me something like $30. Last year, I had a big splurge and purchased a set of instructional DVD's for about $100. So even with those purchases, I'm still paying less than I pay for golf.

 

Although I did spend about $10k to put in my basketball court. But we won't talk about that.

 

I suppose I could practice on the putting green more. When I played yesterday, I shot a 60 for 9 holes. It would've been much less if I was better at putting. But I just can't see myself driving somewhere to practice putting. I guess golf just isn't that important to me right now. Say I put in a bunch of effort and took 9 strokes off of my 18 hole score. That would be pretty good right? But the way I'd see it, I'd only be 1 stroke better every other hole. Doesn't seem worth it to me.

When I played with my buddy, he would top the ball almost every time off of the tee. Actually, I take that back. I do believe that he managed to top every single ball off of the tee. Well, I have this one hybrid club that I can hit about 200 yards fairly straight. My buddy is pretty good at topping the ball and hitting a 90 yard dribbler. So basically, he can hit 2 shots and be at almost the same place that I am. Except that I have a better chance of slicing my ball off to where I can't find it. Seems to me that if I could master the art of hitting 150 yard dribblers that go straight up the fairway, I'd end up doing a bit better than I do right now.

I wonder if anyone has studied the best golf techniques for people who only play once in a while. Seeing as how I paid $35 for a 'How to play in the Low Post' DVD, I'd probably spend a similar about for this as well.