local amatuer league

[robryche]

There's a local amatuer league ( all handicap levels ) that starts up here in march that i'm thinking about getting into. I'd be in the +20 and up category. If anyone has any experience or advice for this? I'd like to hear it.

Thanks

[ezra76]

I'm interested to hear the responses as well. I have been thinking of joining a league now that I'm have a little consistancy. Not sure how to sign up or go about joining one though.

Welcome to the board btw.

[robryche]

Thanks Ezra. powerful looking swing in the vid you posted. looked like you was trying to hit the white outa the ball lol. anyways, i found out about the league down here by luck. there were some flyers for it laying around the pro-shop at a local course where i was having some club work done which had this year's schedule along with the point of contact and membership application form.

[ezra76]

I do try to kill it too often... and that's my "control for the camera" swing. You should see my "go for the green 255 with a 3W out of the rough" swing. That one usually nets about 74yds. topped, lol.

I think I'll try asking around about leagues. The course I learned to play on has been bought out and they are making it a 7000yd. course. I'd love to get into playing there in a league. It should be the best/toughest course in the state once it's done. Good luck.

[Slingblade61]

I'll use my league as an example.

Many public courses have a men's league (mine) a thursday night league and sometimes a womens league.

I pay a fee of $165 to join each season then I pay my normal greens fee for each tourney I play in.

The men's league runs from april thru October with a tourney every saturday and sunday. I can join as many or a few as I like...prize's are awarded in pro shop credit with some cash games at the end of the season.

You do NOT need a handicap to join but you will need it to stay on....5 games submitted for a handicap.

It's easy to join, it's fun and you can win free stuff.

[goatster]

most leagues have preseason meetings where people can sign up.i know our league has a 26 team max.its only a nine hole course.

our league has everything from guys who avg. 3 to 4 over par to guys who avg 30 over.we pay $40 league fee and also run a 50-50 to pay for banquet night.food for fun night.league prizes and hole prizes on tourny nights.

our league gives prefernce to prev yr. members and prev. yr. subs that played rounds in the yr(the more they sub the higher up the list). if they want into the league the next yr that there is room.

[robryche]

hey ezra, do a google search for rhode island golf association, then check their member clubs link. i think you might find what your looking for there.




-rob

[robryche]

sling, goat, thanks for the replies

[SiberianDVM]

This the amateur league I joined. Much cheaper than the one being advertised on the Golf Channel, but it is not in all states.

www.amateurgolftour.net

[gwlee7]

Originally Posted by SiberianDVM

This the amateur league I joined. Much cheaper than the one being advertised on the Golf Channel, but it is not in all states.

www.amateurgolftour.net

I have played the Down East, NC division of this tour a couple of different years. The year end national tournament was in Myrtle Beach the last time I played but is now in Hilton Head. This is a very well run tour and at least in my experience, has been fair with people who try to "sandbag" in a flight being given two choices: move up to the next flight or don't come back. I highly reccomend this and intend on playing again this year.

[SiberianDVM]

Originally Posted by gwlee7

I have played the Down East, NC division of this tour a couple of different years. The year end national tournament was in Myrtle Beach the last time I played but is now in Hilton Head. This is a very well run tour and at least in my experience, has been fair with people who try to "sandbag" in a flight being given two choices: move up to the next flight or don't come back. I highly reccomend this and intend on playing again this year.

I've only played in one tourney, the very early Stableford one, and I thought the tourney director did a good job. The 3 guys I played with were "C" flighters and it showed in their shotmaking abilities. Some very wierd ball flights.

But they could putt.

I joined the Columbia, SC tour, and it has a pretty nice schedule. I local guy is starting an Augusta chapter, but it will probably be a year or two before he has a full schedule and an appreciable number of players. I plan on playing a few of his tourneys as well.

[warbirdlover]

I used to play in our company leagues but found I hated playing so much on one course. The comradery is nice but I quit playing leagues because I enjoy playing a different course each time. I'll play some of my favorites more often but it makes it more interesting for me. The bad thing is trying to get someone to play with or playing with strangers. Never had any bad partners yet though. Played with a couple old ladies once and they moved right along and both scored under 100. (No, they didn't beat me Ez)..

I'm thinking about entering some local tourneys this year. That would be a new experience. Not sure my ego could take it though.

[My Name is Nate]

About three years ago, my golfing buddy and I decided that we were going to take the league plunge. We golfed together many times a year, but now that we were both married, finding time on the weekends was getting harder and harder until the point where we were going out maybe once a month.

We each sat down with our spouses, who both knew that we loved to golf with each other and all parties agreed that we should find a league to join. We searched around and talked to various courses to find out what their league had to offer, costs, etc. Since we live on opposite ends of Minneapolis we wanted to find something in the middle that we could get to after work.

We ended up finding a very reasonably priced league at $585 ea/year. The league runs 18 weeks and usually ends on the first week of the NFL season. This price includes cart and a meal after every week. There are weekly prizes (closest to pin, longest drive, longest put, etc..), a nice steak dinner at end of season, playoff tourney for cash at end of season, and other non-monetary offerings such as discounted greens fees before league, early tee times, discounted range balls, proshop coupons, blah blah blah. One of the major things we liked though was a shotgun start. We both work pretty hectic jobs, and our hours are 7-4ish, getting out early each week to meet a variable tee-time just wasn't going to work. In comparison most of the other leagues we looked at didn't offer a dinner, had variable teetimes (anywhere from 3-6 each week), little to no prizes, more expensive (800 ea - 1000 ea). We now are guaranteed to golf together at a minimum of once a week, and can still convince our wives to let us out of the house one weekend a month.

I would suggest contacting various courses in your area. Find out what each have to offer. I would also highly suggest getting a friend or two to join you. It makes it all the more enjoyable. In our league there are some teams of three that rotate every other week, it works out well for them because they might not be able to make it every week, split league cost between 3 instead of two. There are also 'individuals' who join and don't have a partner. In those cases they are placed with other individuals. When we play against those teams it is very frequent that only one guy shows up. We played one of these teams in week 12 of the season. Only one guy showed up and said he had never met his partner !!!!

All in all I would highly recommend the league experience. It is a ton of fun, you get to meet and network with all sorts of people. Vast array of skillsets so no need to feel like only great players join leagues. We played against one guy who had never shot below a 130, but joined a league just to get out of the house.

Sorry for the rambling.

[15andlife]

Defeniatley do it, from my experience its been great, you meet a lot of nice people and you end up making some friends and some golfing buddies.

[robryche]

thanks guys. now on a side note, would you consider playing in weekend tournaments a better golf learning experience versus playing the usual non-tournament weekend games?