In this video, Michael Harris and Alex Narey played speed golf at The Springs. They were joined by speed golf expert Luke Willett to see what this unique version of the game is like. How fast can they play a full 18 holes, what will the added speed do to the scoring, would they recommend you give it a go?
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00:00 Hello everyone, Mike Harris from Golf Monthly,
00:02 and you join me at the Springs Golf Club in Oxfordshire.
00:07 It is a fairly ungodly 6.30 in the morning.
00:12 Set my alarm for 4.45 to get up to get here.
00:16 This is not just a general easy Friday morning knock though.
00:21 I'm playing 18 holes of speed golf
00:25 with PGA Pro Luke Willett, aka The Iron Golfer.
00:30 Luke is an incredible athlete along with being a PGA Pro.
00:35 He's able to play 18 holes.
00:37 I think his record time is 44 minutes
00:40 and having only 78 shots.
00:43 I don't think I'm gonna get anywhere near that today,
00:46 but I'm out here to find out
00:48 what it's like to play speed golf.
00:50 I'm playing with Alex Neri,
00:51 one of my colleagues from Golf Monthly.
00:53 We're not athletes, we're not runners.
00:56 We do a bit of fitness and we play quite a lot of golf,
00:59 but how are we gonna get on?
01:00 What are we gonna learn today?
01:02 Luke says he loves speed golf
01:04 because it disconnects him to make him feel connected.
01:07 It's all about being stripped down,
01:09 really eyeballing shots, not overthinking golf.
01:13 Certainly something that I probably struggle with.
01:14 So today, really light pencil bag,
01:18 just got a half set of clubs.
01:20 Interestingly, you'd see Luke has only got four clubs.
01:23 He told me not to take a driver
01:24 because not to waste time pegging it up,
01:27 but I'm afraid the driver is my straightest club in the bag.
01:30 I'm worried about spraying it around.
01:32 We'll see how I get on out there,
01:34 but just a minimal half set of clubs.
01:37 It is literally hit it, find it, hit it again,
01:40 keep on going for the 18 holes.
01:43 It's about four and a half miles round the 18 holes.
01:45 Luke reckons we might be able to do it in about 17 minutes,
01:48 which is an awful lot quicker
01:51 than I normally play 18 holes.
01:53 Let's get to the first tee and see what happens.
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02:51 We are halfway round in 31 minutes.
02:54 And that was for a five, a par.
03:02 I'm actually playing quite well.
03:05 Short and straight off the tee, definitely the play.
03:08 It doesn't matter if you duff it.
03:11 It's much harder if you are running offline
03:13 looking for balls.
03:15 Although a couple of times Alex has hit it offline,
03:18 has allowed me a chance for a breather.
03:19 So, just about to go on the 10th hole.
03:24 This is unbelievable, I'm loving it.
03:26 Par three, how far?
03:29 (laughing)
03:32 Oh, great swing.
03:33 - Yeah, I love your shot, 180, I guess.
03:35 - Okay.
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04:08 Hole 15, 55 minutes.
04:12 Think we might break that 70 minute target that Luke set.
04:15 Definitely, nudge it down the middle is the play.
04:22 Every time, I'm actually playing all right.
04:24 I overthink my golf and in this format,
04:27 you just can't overthink it.
04:29 Can't be looking at your hard edges,
04:30 can't be reading putts from both sides.
04:33 It's brilliant, I am loving this.
04:35 It's hard work, hamstrings are feeling really tight.
04:38 But I'm buzzing, it's great.
04:41 Final push, last three and a half holes.
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05:14 - Yes, come on, go on, Luke.
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05:25 - 70 minutes, 31 seconds.
05:39 So we just missed our target time of 70 minutes.
05:44 Gonna catch my breath, gonna catch up with Luke
05:47 and try and work out what we've learned
05:50 from playing speed golf this morning at the Springs.
05:53 But that was a lot of fun.
05:56 So we have finished our round of speed golf.
06:00 We've had a chance to have a bit of a rest,
06:02 a little bit of a lie down, had a full English breakfast,
06:05 which I think I thoroughly deserved.
06:08 Luke just had a cup of coffee and a water.
06:11 He is an athlete, unlike me, but that was a lot of fun.
06:14 We've had a chance to reflect on it.
06:16 Didn't quite break that 70 minute target.
06:19 We were 70 minutes and 31 seconds,
06:22 but still that is an awful lot shorter
06:26 than a regular three ball to play 18 holes of golf.
06:30 I'm just looking at the scorecard.
06:31 Luke shot one under par.
06:34 He was five under at the turn, turned in 31,
06:39 then made a birdie, chipped in for a birdie at the 10th.
06:43 But yeah, incredible.
06:47 I shot 87, but with a quadruple and a treble.
06:51 So could have been all right without that.
06:54 And Alex, third member of our group,
06:57 got it in under a hundred, which was great.
07:00 Wheels came off a little bit for him,
07:01 but then it was interesting, Luke,
07:02 you helped Alex get the wheels back on really.
07:06 And that was like, you told him to put the driver away
07:09 and start playing.
07:10 Tell us, how do you think we got on in our,
07:12 I mean, obviously for you, we slowed you down a lot.
07:15 You would normally get round in, what,
07:16 sort of about 35, 40 minutes?
07:18 - Fingers crossed.
07:19 Yeah, yeah, fingers crossed.
07:21 Look, you guys were great.
07:22 You embraced the unknown.
07:23 You tried something new.
07:26 Golf is one of the oldest sports around.
07:27 That's what's beautiful about it.
07:29 And guess what?
07:31 You can always experience a new version of golf,
07:33 and that's what you guys did.
07:34 Golf is for anyone.
07:35 And these guys rocked that today.
07:37 (both laugh)
07:38 - Yeah, it was really interesting.
07:39 I think one of the things that I probably,
07:41 I love my technology.
07:42 I've got a laser, I've got a GPS.
07:45 I'm forever looking at the yardages.
07:47 And a couple of times, I think you laughed at me
07:49 when I go, "What's the yardage here?"
07:50 And it's like, "Just hit it, just hit it."
07:53 How often do you go through the back of a green,
07:56 certainly missing a green, shorten at the front,
07:59 just bump it up, have a putt?
08:01 Sam and I wouldn't have been that far off my handicap.
08:05 Take out the quadruple and the treble,
08:08 and I'd have been okay.
08:10 What do you think next time, Luke?
08:12 Is there anything else?
08:13 Because I know you said at the start,
08:15 you wouldn't hit a driver
08:16 'cause you didn't want to peg it up.
08:17 That would take a bit.
08:18 But I felt I drove it quite well today.
08:21 I had that little cut going on,
08:23 just almost like a little chippy one,
08:24 180, 200 yards, found the fairway.
08:27 Anything that I could do,
08:28 or Alex could do differently next time?
08:30 - Yeah, going forwards, speed golf is all about
08:34 trying the unknown, like we just said there.
08:36 And it's about exploring.
08:38 Have a little experiment, try stuff out.
08:41 Never stop trying stuff out.
08:42 And that's why, look, today was a great round for me.
08:44 One under par, I feel great.
08:46 We had a good time, that's world record stuff.
08:49 Where did I get to, how did I get to that?
08:52 Well, it was by exploring.
08:54 So all I would actually say is,
08:56 I would just say embrace that, explore.
08:58 I will come around with anyone.
09:01 I will leave that open to you guys.
09:03 Pick up the phone, ask me, and I'll take you around.
09:06 But the point is, just explore.
09:08 It might not always be, I want to have a fast round.
09:13 But that's kind of cool.
09:14 It might be, I want to improve my golf.
09:16 You can do that.
09:17 You can do whatever you want, but explore,
09:18 and then you'll find stuff out.
09:20 I go around this great place here,
09:22 there's red kites flying around.
09:23 Your course might be armadillos, who knows?
09:25 You know, explore.
09:27 - It was brilliant.
09:28 It was a really fantastic experience, a really great buzz.
09:32 I was just chatting to Luke afterwards over breakfast,
09:34 and sort of said, how does that compare to other rounds?
09:37 What did I feel like at the end?
09:38 And I reckon the only time that I felt more of a buzz is,
09:42 I played the old course once in a competition,
09:45 finished par birdie to break 80.
09:48 But today, the elation I felt, finishing on the 18th hole.
09:53 And it was interesting chatting to Alex as well.
09:55 Alex has done a lot of really intense cycling,
09:58 cycled up a place like Alpe d'Huez.
10:00 He was saying, similar sort of buzz
10:02 once you finish that round of golf.
10:04 The elation you got.
10:05 Really good workout.
10:07 Good, it's, what's the time now?
10:11 It's sort of half nine.
10:12 I'm going to head home, going to go and do a day's work.
10:15 But it's been absolutely brilliant.
10:16 Luke, thank you for having us.
10:18 - Thank you.
10:18 - Been a brilliant morning at the Springs Speed Golf.
10:22 I don't know, give it a go.
10:23 It's a bit of fun.
10:24 It's a bit of something different, but a lot of fun.
10:28 Definitely going to try it again.
10:30 But from the Springs Golf Course, it's goodbye.
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