The Reality of Golf....High School Version

For those of you who don't know me personally, one of my coaching assignments is as a girl's golf coach for a large high school in the Upper Midwest. For more than 25 years, I have been diligently striving to provide a program that not only teaches the game of golf as a "life sport", but also serves as a competitive vehicle that trains the golfer mentally and physically to participate and excel at this wonderful game.

But it is not without it's problems and issues....

One of the more challenging aspects of my job is that springtime weather in the Upper Midwest can be...how can I put this....less than "spring-like". I have spent countless hours bundled up in caps, coats, and winter gloves at a time when the calendar says I should be in shorts. I have consumed gallons of hot coffee and tea - not for their culinary value, but rather to simply keep the blood flowing through my temperature-challenged body. I have watched matches played in the snow, sleet, and frigid wind chills that other sports would never even THINK of engaging in. Oh don't be fooled - there is considerable whining as to why we have to play in this weather day after day. But eventually they come to realize that this is our plight in being a denizen of the Great White North - so shove another hand-warmer in your mittens and let's play.

We may be crazy....but we are tough..... and eventually it warms up.

Another challenge we face is the administrator's hew and cry over the time missed from their classroom obligations. Let me state now - for the record - that I obviously understand that their academic requirements are what they need to master much more than how to hit a power draw. Very few, if any, will ever be cashing a paycheck from their acumen as a professional golfer.

But.....

I have heard sob stories relentlessly on how golf is destroying them academically - only to have at least 80% of them be recognized at the end of the season for their classroom achievements. Most of the problems that golfers face academically falls under the realm of their own measure of prioritization and time management. It's my thought that rather than bemoaning how golf is removing them from the classroom too consistently and therefore steps need to be taken to change how the schedule is designed, we need to use this as an opportunity to educate them on the topics of "structure" and "balance".

Also, who is to say that what they are experiencing on the golf course is not as meaningful and impactful in their growth and development as a calculus exam or a biology lab?

Education is about producing an adult who has a broad perspective of experience - and that is often best served with both an academic, as well as an extra-curricular activity template. Battling self-confidence, overcoming adversity, and humility in success are just a few of the lessons that are taught daily on the course - which are also obvious lessons of value they will use throughout their entire life.

An interesting thing to note about all of this discussion is that the problems we experience in delivering a quality athletic opportunity are often manufactured (and exacerbated) by administrators and coaches to be far more expansive and debilitating than they really are. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy - if the adults in charge make it out to be a big deal, it IS a big deal. For example, I have listened to coaches cry about how much time the matches take and that they are not getting home until well after 8:00pm....so we have to figure out a way for them to play faster. I have also witnessed a variety of strategies employed so as to get them to play faster. But in the end, it still takes as much time as it takes. We can make it a little bit faster, but nothing substantial ever gets changed. That is why after listening to the complaining for a number of years, I finally told the offending coaches that if it is too painful and time-consuming, then DON"T DO IT!

We (the adults in this equation - including parents) wring our hands over perceived hardships and challenges as if the young adults we are working with cannot ever be allowed to experience failure or face a daunting task to overcome. In an attempt to insulate their life from challenges, we fail to let life's challenges be their greatest teacher. In that same vein, we have coaches who actually believe that we are putting the athlete in danger by having them play on a cold day or in soggy course conditions. Danger? Really? Lightning is one thing to a golfer, but mud and chilly fingertips have never claimed the life of one golfer that I know of.

What we fail to realize is that high school golf in the Upper Midwest is not just about academic challenges.

Or physical discomfort.

Or the relentless consumption of everyone's time.

Or any of the myriad of reasons we can think of that cause us to lose our perspective and grasp of common sense.

There is much more at stake here that we often tend to forget amidst the angst and the complaints. For example....

Last year, as I stood in a cold caddie shack, collecting the final scores from a rain-soaked, chilly golf match (closing in on that nasty 8:00pm time-frame), a young lady from another school in our conference did something that will stick with me for the rest of my life as the truest example of what we REALLY do and why we NEED to keep doing it:

She reached out her cold, wet hand and shook it while stating:

"Thank you for letting me have a chance to play on such a beautiful golf course."

At that moment, I realized her score didn't matter....the time didn't matter....the weather didn't matter....her grades didn't matter....nothing else mattered except for this:

High school sports is all about opportunity

The opportunity to participate.

The opportunity to compete.

The opportunity to play at a course that she may never have the chance to play again.

The opportunity to fail.

The opportunity to succeed.

Her gratitude that night puts all of us adults to shame - those of us who think we know what is best for the young athlete, student, person. In that one moment of time she taught me more than I could ever have taught her. She showed me that in spite of challenges, hardships, and pain, the only thing more difficult than competing and falling is to never have had the chance to compete.

And when all is said and done, that is why I coach....