The Different Types of People on the Range

Honestly – I’ve never spent so much time on the driving range before (pre- MCO2.0). Because of the implementation of the new swing, to groove it, I was hitting the range, 2 -3 times a week. That’s 2-3 times a week more than I ever did for the past 3 years I think. The reason, as mentioned before, was when I was on my ‘old’ swing, I ended up with a backache hitting diggers on the mat. With a more rounded swing, I am less digging and more hitting, and I don’t have any more backaches after even 200 balls anymore.

But boy. When you are on the range – there is so many, many strange and weird people there. It’s like going into a circus, and seeing all sorts of weird and fantastical creatures. The more public the range, the stranger the creatures, and they are as strange as they come on the Kota Damansara public driving range.

Behold, the fantastical beasts of driving ranges:

a) The Teaching Instructor Uncle or TIU

Let’s start off with this specimen. Every range (except maybe the extremely high class ones that specifically have a ban on them) has this person. He is the uncle that sits and watches other people and makes comments and gives instructions. Very loudly. And often with very flowery language, either cantonese or Hokkien. The TIU guy is often smoking, if not, he is there almost every day, because he is probably retired and prefers not to lounge around his house. He often has a teh tarik or kopi O that can last minimally 8 hours, or until spiders start building their nests there. He is the greatest advisor. Sitting down, he will tell his unfortunate victim golf tropes like: your head move lah, you look up! Keep your elbow together! You are not shifting your weight! Stay still! etc etc. He barks these instructions as if he is running a military camp and he ALWAYS wins. When his victim hits a bad shot, the victim is blamed for not following his (often conflicting and confusing) instructions. When his victim hits a wondrous shot, he would nod his head in satisfaction and confirm that the victim is improving directly due to his supreme advice. The TIU almost never touches the golf club himself otherwise the club would turn to gold at his greatness. Wonderful TIUs are found all over driving ranges across Malaysia.

b) The Talk Cock Uncle  (TCU)

This is the distant cousin on a). Instead of instructing, the free talking uncle is visually identical to the teaching uncle, except – well, he doesn’t teach. He just talks. About everything. And almost as loud as his cousin. His subject can range from golf to drinking to politics to sex to sex to sex and back to golf. His voice range, while usually loud, usually increases exponentially when a girl or aunty with short skirt walks by.

c) The Teaching Boyfriend (TB)

This is a relative to the teaching Uncle. But instead of sitting down and barking orders, the teaching boyfriend can often be found going to and fro from the chair to his girlfriend and adjusting her swing for her, oftentimes regarding her posture, and almost invariably improving her butt protrusion by physically adjusting that abdomen for her, as if it’s a car tyre. The TB is considered a hazard on most ranges because he would be standing in parallel to his girlfriend to observe her swing, not knowing the guy in the next bay is swinging a driver and the back swing would almost chop his head off while his eyes are afixed to his girlfriend’s front assets…i.e her swing.

d) The Family Guy

The family guy treats the golf driving range as his family vacation plan, bringing his entire family (often with a glum faced wife) to the range, ordering copious amount of food and drinks and allowing his cretins kids to roam freely as buffaloes on the prairie. The problem with this guy is that one of his kids invariably runs up and down other people’s bays screaming their little heads off, and in an early age, is then introduced to the wonderful world of cantonese, malay, hokkien, tamil and other language cuss words which will be well remembered and responsibly used as they continue to grow up.

e) The Inspector Gadget

This is quite a guy. Inspector gadgets takes around 15 minutes to set up their tools and another 15 minutes to calibrate the cameras, the swing analyzer, the launch monitor, the alignment sicks etc. Watching him is like watching Thanos getting all the infinity gems together, so intense is this pursuit of absolute greatness. Unfortunately the inspector spends so much time on his gadget, and almost never enough time for his swing and usually plays golf only slightly better than a cat with leprosy.

f) The Millionaire Golfer

This is a relative to Inspector Gadget, but instead of gadgets, he has all the latest clubs. The SIM2? His. The Envroll Putter? His. Honma gold clubs? His. While this beast is rarely seen in public ranges, sometimes they tend to appear and his golf clubs is oftentimes more expensive than the entire property the driving range is built on. They are often serviced by running servants, and have variations to their titles including Dato, Tan Sri, Your Emminence or God.

g) The I-Don’t-Give-A-F*ck Golfer (Or IDGAF)

The IDGAF are often in flocks together. They are the ones who sits in one bay behind the chair, often 5 – 6 of them together, usually in jeans, slippers or inappropriate dressing for golf. They sit together the same way as they would when to do bowling or other social group activities. They often either just have finished karaoke-ing or would be karaoke-ing after the range session, and they would be laughing, talking and ribbing each other. VERY loudly. They can be identified by taking turns in hitting the golf ball and sharing a beat up 7-iron that they found in the trash bin. They are very dangerous species as they generally have no f*cking clue how to hit the golf ball, and often shank, miss, hit backwards or sky it – resulting in dangerous flights of balls whacking into the bay separator with a loud CRASH! and making the other golfers jump and take cover, under their hyena-ic laughter. Generally, we also don’t want to f*ck with them as sometimes they are armed with very impressive tattoos.

h) The Sweet Young Thing (SYT)

This is quite a sight. Golfers are usually male when they are in the public driving range. So when there is an occasion where something in a skirt flashes by, everything becomes hard. As in harder to play because cannot concentrate. What were you thinking? To be a SYT in public ranges, the standard is fairly low. As long as there is a short skirt and slender legs, you will qualify as an SYT. There is no other standards above the waist, except that an SYT should not have a beard. Whoever is next to the SYT, especially the bay directly to her left (if she is right handed) will benefit for viewing her ample…skills in swinging.

i) The Booby Auntie (Boobs)

This is a variation of the SYT except Boobs are usually aunties. Who has large and ample…appetite for golf improvement. The aunties are almost all very serious, usually with lean bodies with tight fitting clothes that announces their assets specifically well. Unlike the SYT, they aren’t as eye pleasing, but to some strange golfers who find the Boobs auntie attractive, these golfers in the next bay usually converts themselves into left handed players to enjoy the…fruits…of their labour.  Whatever rocks their boat. Speaking of lefties:

j) The Phil Mickleson

These are actual golfers interested in improvement but unfortunately they are born left handed, and learnt golf left hand. Because of this, they need to switch around the bay, which isn’t a problem in high class ranges. But in public ranges where the bays are as small as homes in Hong Kong, pairing a left handed golfer swinging a driver, next to a right handed with a driver = disaster. It’s often an excruciatingly experience seeing their driver heads miss each one by milimeters, akin to watching a cable car swinging in a 150mph hurricane.

k) The Entitled Prick Golfer (EPG)

We all know golfing bays are difficult to get during CMCO. The normal SOP is for us to sign in and wait patiently for the attendants to tell us which bay is available. The EPG is the guy that comes in, walking quickly with a large stride as if he has a dongle the size of a horse and brushes everyone aside and demands from the attendants whether there is a bay, ignoring all the disapproving stares from other patient golfers. The EPG is often associated with a large, fast and expensive car that double parks in front of the entrance and has what we term as “Muka Ch*bai”. Everything about the EPG is loud and large, except, invariably the most important thing to be large in life, they usually have a very small variety of.  Hence, they need to compensate.

l) The Neverending Yawning Assh*les (NYA) 

While not as assholic as the EPG, the NYA is just as bad. They are the ones who sits down in a bay, with 100 balls, and hits at the average rate of 1 ball per 15 minutes. After one ball is hit, he stretches, and yawns and sits down again and start looking around, usually for the Booby Auntie or Sweet Young Thing. They never , ever finish their balls and they enter into the twillight zone when they are down to their last 10. It’s like watching Inception where the dream level passes 10x slower than normal. They often can also be found whistling or humming a tune instead of finishing their balls, and this subspecies can be termed as NYA SING due to their singing nature.

In fact, this species can be sometimes amalgamated with the first species (Teaching Instructor Uncle)  and the resulting creature is called TIU NYA SING. Very, very special creature.

m) The Legend

I believe there is only one Legend. This guy is found in the KD range. He is the legend. I was practicing one day when I heard a thunk behind me of the ball hitting the bay separator. Thinking it must be either the IDGAF or a beginner golfer, I didn’t think much of it. Just at my topswing, I heard another thunk! It wasn’t a loud thunk as it would be for a IDGAF doing a full swing with a trash bin 7 iron. It’s not so loud as would make me run for cover. So I stopped and restarted my swing again. Right on my downswing, another Thunk! on the bay separator and made me stop. WHAT THE FOO-CHUK was going on? I looked behind me and glimpsed the first time, The Legend.

He is the legend because he only has ONE range ball. One range ball. But instead of hitting it into the range as all normal species do, he is practicing chipping, and chipping against the bay separator between us. Thunk thunk thunk thunk thunk….he is chipping with ONE range ball, using an entire BAY. Against the separator that’s around 2 feet high, separating him and me. He is so legendary that his chip is unerring, otherwise, it would be hitting me.  Thunk thunk over and over. Chipping with one range ball, oblivious to the distraction he is causing to the golfer trying to swing with this damn sound going on.

WHAT.A.LEGEND.

MCO2.0 What a timing!

What is worse than having a really shitty game on the course?

When you have planned for golf and it gets cancelled by MCO2.0.

Now I get it. I get why we need to enter into a second phase of MCO. We have 3000+ cases every single day so yeah, I don’t think people are too bothered about playing golf. But, DANG! Just when you are getting used to a new swing and grooving in, this lockdown means another month (at best) or two months (expected) or 3 months (at worst) without golf.  I guess, it should sync up with the next time I go for a round, I would have my new wife (The TSi) in the bag.

My stack and tilt adventure has gotten me so far to a somewhat middle ground. I don’t think I can fully implement the stack and tilt yet – so I have sort of gravitated to keeping stacked on the left, and minimizing my head movement. I still feel my body shifting a little, and I can’t keep my elbows too tight to my body throughout the backswing, but it could be a combination of age/flexibility that makes this swing different from the classic S&T I see on youtube. I don’t know, I still feel the same on the backswing in terms of my arms movement, its just that I am stacking on my left this time throughout.

One of the things I observed when I did my fitting was that I was much more confident of my swing path. I demonstrated a consistent inside out swing with my misses to the left. So the fitter set me up to play on a nine hole (with just drives) and with the new swing, I felt I was able to at least manage my swing path much easier. With the limited movement and sway now, when I need to carve an inside-out swing, I make sure I start my path flatter and more circular. At some holes where a fade was needed, I started my swing path more straight to the back and steeper. In my previous swing, because I was moving my body back first along with my hands, my swing path was only one way, inside out. I could never fade to save my life. It feels much better to be able to call the shots when needed now, although this obviously needs a lot more bedding in.

Unfortunately the MCO2.0 is upon us, so practice is going to be difficult to get  in. What I am feeling now (positively) is that I am beginning to forget how my old swing was and this current swing seems to be almost like what I am getting used to.

Here Cometh the TSI

In almost 20 years of golf, I have been an absolute miser when it comes to equipments. My first set was a hand-me down Maruman set from my brother. After hacking around with that, I decided to splurge on an iron set – the Taylormade RAC LT. I honestly don’t remember how I purchased it – I think it was either second hand or it was on a fairly cheap sale. From there on, all my clubs were second hand, purchased from E-Bay or elsewhere.

I really don’t remember any club I purchase brand new. Even my Mizunos I am gaming now – the MP54 was a set sold to me second hand from a friend. My MP-57s were purchased second hand from a shop. All my drivers were second hand or on cheap sale – my first real driver (the first few years I was using those that came with the set) was the R510 I bought in Bangsar cheap sale. Then I got the R5 Dual from E-bay which I gamed for many years, before making the jump to the Hi-Bore Cleveland and Hi-Bore XL. Gamed that for a bit, then moved back to Taylormade – the whitewolf we call it – the R11. Because it’s white. And because we like wolves.

I gamed the R11 for the longest – I think close to 4 years before switching to a second hand Cobra Flyz+ (which I am using right now), for about a year + and went to buy on sale the Titleist 917 D2 which took a while to bed in but after getting used to it, was really smashing it. The Titleist by far, was the one driver that looked best, even if it was gray. But the shape was just perfect.

So I sold it off.

I sold it and a Titleist hybrid, a mizuno wedge, a Titleist 915 5-wood, a golf mat, a golf trolley, a Ping 60 degree wedge and I think a few more things that I can’t remember to prepare to purchase a nice Christmas Present for myself – a new driver. As in a really new driver.

However, in November, I decided to institute this swing change to move to stack and tilt, just as I sold off the Titleist. So, without a proper driver, I just gamed the Cobra for a few more rounds, at least until I groove this new swing in and have a more consistent way to whack the ball.

So, now, all ready to go, I headed to MST Superstore at the Federal highway for a fitting session and to try this:

A year plus ago I went for a session with these guys as well, as described here

Lesson Learnt: Don’t Binge Buy

Back then, my results were around

BallSpeed: 137.9

Total Spin: 2475

Carry: 212m

Total: 230m

Club Head Speed: 96.2mph

That was with my Titleist 917D.

Fitting into this TSi3 10 degrees with a Tensei AV White Stiff Shaft. My results were…meeh…

You would think it’s a lot of difference.

BallSpeed: 138.1

Total Spin: 2663

Carry: 215m

Total: 233m

Club Head Speed: 98.3mph

It’s slightly faster. But the spin is much higher and of course, things vary.  My longest drive was around 248m while my shortest were the hooks into the forest. Am still grooving this swing in so it’s not easy.

And honestly, trying out the TSi2 and the SIM MAX from Taylormade, I was able to hit these two slightly better.

But have you seen how the TSi3 look from the top? Take my money.

So against better judgement, and opting for the better looks instead of better performance, I told the fitter OK, I know I don’t deserve her, but I need to have her, so since the TSi2 is going for the same price as the 3 – why not the 3? It’s like you know that the vegetable burger that cost 20 bucks is good for you but when you see a same priced burger with double stuffing and wagyu beef next to it – why wouldn’t you go for it, even if it gives you a heart attack?

So there you have it. It takes 6 – 8 weeks for them to deliver – as the TSi3 is out of stock and the tensei shaft is also unavailable. But hey, since we are heading into another lockdown, I guess waiting won’t hurt anyone.