The Game of Golf

PLAYING A GAME

The object of the game of golf is to hit a small, hard ball—the golf ball—as few times as is necessary for it to travel from its starting point, a tee, into the hole located on each green. Each player must hit his or her ball in the desired direction using one of a variety of clubs called woods or irons. Each attempt to strike the ball is called a stroke. Your score for a hole is the total number of strokes it takes you to hit the ball from the tee into the hole.

You may play a game of golf alone or in a group of 2, 3, or 4 players. Golf is played on golf courses with 9 or 18 holes, which vary in length from 85 to 600 yards long. If a golf course is 7,200 yards long, how many miles would you walk? ____________________________

In addition to the lengths of the holes, golf courses have other characteristics that provide challenges to players. Each hole begins with a tee box from which the first ball must be hit. Each hole ends on a green, which has a 4 ½-inch diameter hole, or cup, cut down into the earth. Between the tee and the green is the fairway.

All golf holes have the five components described: tee box, fairway, rough, putting green, and cup (hole). The central path from tee to green is the fairway, and it is preferred place to hit your ball. These fairways may have trees, shrubs, water, sand or bunkers on them. Surrounding the fairways are taller grasses called rough, which may also contain trees, shrubs, and water.

SCORING

Your ability as a golfer is measured by the number of strokes it takes you to complete each hole. The count begins with the first attempt to hit the ball off the tee. One stroke is counted each time you attempt to hit the ball until it goes into the cup on the green of that hole. Your score for a round of golf is the total number of strokes for the 9 or 18 holes played. When playing with others, low score wins the match.

You may also wish to measure your ability against a designated standard of excellence called par. Par is the number of strokes judged to be necessary for a very good golfer to complete a hole. It is assumed that a golfer requires two putts once the ball has landed on the green. If you add to the putts the number of shots it should take to reach the green, you can determine par. On a typical 18-hole course, there are four par 3s, ten par 4s, and four par 5s, for a course par of 72.

Par	White Tee Yardage
3	Up to 250
4	251 to 470
5	471 and over

There are terms in golf that reflect how you score on a hole relative to par. An ace is a hole that took only one swing to land the ball in the hole, otherwise known as a __________-________-__________. An eagle refers to 2 strokes under par on a hole. A birdie is one stroke under par. Taking 1 stroke more than par is called a bogey, while taking 2 strokes over par is called a double bogey.