OK, so who is the biggest golfing bandit you have ever played with?

OK, so who is the biggest golfing bandit you have ever played with?

You know the type of person I’m talking about.

The golfer who plays off some massively false handicap and comes in with 53 stableford points, blasting away the opposition and then staggering back to the car after a good day’s ‘banditry,’ laden with crystal glasses, bottles of alcohol and the old, ‘I’ve never hit the ball so well’.

Umm, are you sure?

It’s funny to laugh at – away from the course – but it’s not funny when it actually happens to you after a round when you feel you couldn’t have played much better.

I remember that happening to me one Sunday morning.

I was playing off 19 at the time and in this particular stableford competition I single-putted the first FOUR holes to be on 14 points.

As the round went on, little changed. I kept driving well and putting even better.

By the end of 18 holes I had amassed 42 stableford points – by far and away my best-ever score.

Back in the bar I sat with my playing colleagues, half preparing my speech, half thinking what to spend the winning club shop voucher on.

The captain arose with the results: “Third, with 44 points . . . .”

My heart sank.

The winner got 48 points, playing off 25!! OMG, what a bandit.

And of course the great thing was, I was cut to 18, despite not being able to win a bean while playing off 19.

Invariably golf has a good handicap system, although you try explaining to someone who knows nothing about the game why some amateurs play off plus two, while Tiger Woods plays off scratch . . . We’ll save that for another day!

DO you have a problem with people smoking on the golf course?

I know this may appear to be a bit ‘left-field’, but I’m interested to know if anyhow has a big deal with it.

Personally I don’t, but am I in the majority or not? With smoking more and more taboo will we see ‘smoke-free’ golf courses in the future?

Certainly Miguel Angel Jimenez and Darren Clarke will hope not!

LET me know your golfing stories: Mike Bacon, Love Golf, 30 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich IP4 1AN.

Or e-mail me: mike.bacon@archant.co.uk

Follow me on twitter: @Mike_Bacon