Inside Santa Claus Golf Club, where the greens are ‘whites’ and reindeer roam the fairways

’Twas six days before Christmas

when all through the clubhouse,


Not a creature was stirring—

—well, that’s not entirely true. Creatures were, in fact, stirring when I called Santa Claus Golf Club on Thursday afternoon. Golfers weren’t, though. (Too dark, too cold.) Nary a sign of St. Nick, either. (Too busy.)

“Sometimes we do see his footprints in the snow,” Pia Lillberg, the club’s cheery managing director, told me by video conference.

She was joking. I think.

Santa Claus Golf Club — yes, it’s actually a thing — sits directly on the Arctic Circle, in Rovaniemi, Finland, about 500 miles north of Helsinki. There are no sleigh-carts or elf-caddies or gift-wrapped tee markers, and, no, you don’t get coal after a triple-bogey. But the club does have reindeer. About 30 of them. Lillberg says they’re “quite nice to play with,” if unschooled in the finer points of golf etiquette. Knock your tee shot into a flock, she said, and they’ll be in no rush to clear out. (Evidently the presence of reindeer sausage on the halfway-house menu has not put a scare into them.)

A flock of friendly, if stubborn, reindeer call Santa GC home.

When the club was founded in 1986, it had a far less recognizable name: the Golf Club of Rovaniemi. Its course was built not on grass but on ice and open only in the depths of winter: nine frigid holes set on the river that bisects the city. A few years later, a “summer course” emerged on terra firma with six fairways and a practice area, followed, in 1997, by a nine-hole layout. In 2011, the membership tacked on another nine — resulting in a par-71, 6,500-yard design that winds its way up and down a hillside lined with pine trees — but it wasn’t until a couple of years ago that the club acquired its current moniker.

“As we are in the Official Hometown of Santa Claus,” Lillberg said (yes, that’s a thing, too; Rovaniemi has it trademarked), “it’s only appropriate that we, too, carry the name. Somehow it seems more suitable to talk about Santa Claus golf than Arctic golf.” It’s also more marketable. The club is in the process of launching a shop on its website where visitors will be able to buy Santa Claus GC-logoed hats, shirts and balls — the perfect stocking stuffers for the golfer in your life.

Christmastime, ironically, is the club’s slow season.

“Sunrise was at 11:07 am today and sunset was 1:22 pm,” said Lillberg, who speaks excellent English with a heavy Nordic accent. “It’s not practical to go and play in the dark.”

It’s also not practical to play in the snow. But that doesn’t stop SCGC’s hardy membership from bundling up and playing the club’s “winter course,” a snowy nine-hole layout (complete with “whites” instead of greens) that the grounds crew spends a couple of months shaping. “We have to have 40 centimeters of snow before we start building it,” Lillberg said.

The course opens in early March, when the days are longer and the temperatures more tolerable. When the sun’s out, the “snow shines like crystals,” Lillberg says, turning the place into a magical golfing wonderland. “It’s perfect. I really can’t say enough good things about it.”

The course hasn’t drawn many American tourists, though one notable member of the golfing establishment did visit last March: USGA executive director Mike Davis. In his first foray in to snow golf, Davis competed in the Santa’s Snow Golf Classic. (“The whites putt beautifully,” he said at the time. “They’re actually not too different from a regular putting green.”) Papa Noel doesn’t visit the course much, either, what with all his duties down in Santa Claus Village. He has some other forces working against him, too, Lillberg says: “It’s a bit difficult for him to see the ball because of the stomach and the beard.”

The snow-golf season at Santa Claus GC lasts only about six weeks.

Still, whether the big man is on site or not, his spirit thrives at the club that bears his name, from Rudolph and Co. grazing in the rough, to the twinkly Christmas decorations in the restrooms, to the staff that runs the place.

“I have to make a confession,” Lillberg said at the end of our call. “I’m actually an elf in disguise.”

Come again?

Yep, for 10 years, Lillberg said, she moonlighted as one of Santa’s helpers, sorting letters for him at the post office in downtown Rovaniemi.

“Once an elf,” she said, “always an elf.”

I laughed when she said this in spite of myself,

A wink of her eye and a twist of her head

Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.’

SOURCE:  golf.com

The post Inside Santa Claus Golf Club, where the greens are ‘whites’ and reindeer roam the fairways appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

29 TIPS FOR EVERY GOLFER

1) Don’t chase a score on the course, you have to stay patient and let it come to you.

2) Change your practice routine, and start focusing on your weaknesses. If you keep doing the same things over and over again, why would your scores improve?

3) Don’t pass the buck. It wasn’t the club’s fault, or the the wind, or the golf course. You are the captain of the ship. The sooner you take responsibility, and try to fix your mistakes, the better off your game will be.

4) Never assume you have it all figured out. Golf has a funny way of humbling you at the moments when you think you are invincible!

5) Enjoy the process. The one constant in golf is when you fix one thing in your game, another one will break. Accept it, and try to limit your frustrations. Golf is a beautiful mess.

6) Whatever scoring milestone you are looking to achieve, mastering your short game will probably be a huge part of it.

7) It’s OK to get upset with yourself when things don’t go your way during a round. It becomes a problem when you let it carry over to the next shot.

8) If you are obsessed with hitting the ball farther, you are likely ignoring parts of your game that will actually lower your score.

9) Your worst putt is usually better than your worst chip. Try using your putter more whenever you can if you are just off the green.

10) If you’re not having fun, you will never get better. Focus on enjoyment first, and the rest will follow.

11) Your round one big gambling experiment. Self control is rewarded, and blind aggressiveness usually ends in disaster.

12) The number one priority on any tee shot is hitting the fairway, choose the club that gets you there.

13) There is no one right way to swing a golf club. Look at all of the different swings in golfing history.

14) Mastering one shot is better than trying to be good at 5 or 6.

15) If it’s windy out, don’t swing harder.

16) What happens on the 5th hole will be a distant memory by the 13th. Try and save every shot you can even if you’re having a few bad holes. Things can turn around quickly!

17) Don’t play an expensive pro-level ball if your game isn’t suited for it. You’re wasting money, and the extra spin on the ball will do more harm than good.

18) Try playing a few rounds where you don’t keep score, and just focus on trying to hit good shots. You’ll probably be amazed at how much fun you will have, and how capable you are of hitting great shots.

19) Bad shots are inevitable. The better golfers move past them immediately, and shift their focus to limiting the damage rather than compounding their mistake.

20) You can only handle so much technical information before it does more harm than good. If you have several different thoughts before you approach a shot, it’s likely you won’t be confident. Try working on one thing at a time until your are comfortable with it on the course.

21) New equipment, and getting fitted for clubs can help your game. Don’t fall into the trap of giving it more importance than you should (See tip #3).

22) Be careful when someone makes a promise that’s too good to be true for your game. Their training aid, or learning course is likely fool’s gold.

23) If you are serious about becoming a better golfer you have to make a plan for yourself. Think long and hard about the parts of your game that need work, and make a practice schedule that focuses on those areas. If you just show up to the range, and start hitting balls without any purpose you will have wasted your time.

24) It’s probably a good idea to have your swing looked at by a professional from time to time. Choose one that you are comfortable with. The most important part is being able to understand what they are saying. If it doesn’t make sense, then they are not the right teacher for you.

25) What you see on TV is not reality for a golfer. Do not try and play the difficult shots that the pros can pull off. They’ve put in thousands of hours mastering them! That’s why they make it look so easy.

26) Figure out some creative ways to practice at home. It can sometimes be much more effective than your work on the range.

27) Read some books, here are a list of 10 that every golfer should have on their shelves.

28) Your goal is to limit your 3 putts, not make more one putts.

29) Sometimes your best rounds are right around the corner. If you’ve had a few bad weeks on the course don’t give up hope!

SOURCE:  practical_golf.com

The post 29 TIPS FOR EVERY GOLFER appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

It’s the most wonderful time of the year!

May you share joyful memories, laughter and good cheer this Christmas.

From our family to yours, we wish you peace, joy and all the best this wonderful holiday has to offer.  

Merry Christmas from all of us at Down River Golf Course

 

The post It’s the most wonderful time of the year! appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

A look at the 10 best golfers without a major championship ahead of the 2019 PGA Tour season

“The best golfers without a major championship” is always a fascinating discussion and maybe never more so in the world of golf as we enter 2019. The sport is absolutely loaded with stars and superstars at the highest level, and you could argue that with Tiger Woods back to winning, the PGA Tour hasn’t been healthier in a long, long time.

Because of this and because a healthy PGA Tour leads to massive purses, golf is becoming more and more competitive. The rise of social media has engendered an era when even three-win or four-win golfers without majors are well-known personalities. All of this is a great thing of course, but it also means that the major-less crew is more recognizable than ever. That’s good for golf (so many stars can win in any given week!) but tough for the players on this list to continually field questions about why they haven’t won the big one.

With that, let’s get to our top 10. Remember, this isn’t a list of the 10 most accomplished but rather the 10 best players in the world who have yet to win a major championship.

1. Jon Rahm: He doubles as the most decorated on this list as well. For the second consecutive year, he won at least three times worldwide and solidified his spot as one of the handful of guys most likely to win the most majors from this point going forward.

2. Bryson DeChambeau: Only Rory McIlroy got to five wins more quickly in recent years. I don’t think DeChambeau is “somewhere between McIlroy and Spieth” good, but he’s certainly being undervalued.

3. Rickie Fowler: He’s the lightning rod for this conversation. I won’t belabor the point — I’ve done that plenty elsewhere — but he remains one of the most underrated big tournament players in the world.

4. Tommy Fleetwood: I struggled with these next two. Hideki Matsuyama is more accomplished, and neither is a tremendous putter, but Fleetwood has displayed a flair for the big stage. That gives him the nod over Matsuyama.

5. Hideki Matsuyama: One of my low-key favorite predictions to make is that Matsuyama won’t ever win a major. Not that he’s not good enough — he is — but at some point it just becomes a numbers game. There aren’t enough of them to go around.

6. Tony Finau: Embarrassment of riches when it comes to talent, but as Justin Ray of Golf Channel recently pointed out, Finau is also probably the most dominant player in the world who doesn’t win (or at least hasn’t won recently).

Yet, Finau finds himself with just one PGA Tour win so far. Over the last three seasons, Finau has 20 top-10 finishes — twice as many as any player without a victory in that span. Tony can find solace in his bank account — his $5.62 million in official earning last season are the second-most in PGA Tour history by a player without a victory.

7. Xander Schauffele: If you value winning, this is your guy. He’s maybe done more of it compared to his brand value in the general public than anyone else on the PGA Tour. Definitely has the goods to win a major or two.

8. Paul Casey: I wanted to go with Thomas Pieters right here, but Casey, even at his age, is still astoundingly good. To go with his Valspar win last season, he had five top 10s and 13 top 25s. It would be pretty awesome to see him win an Open Championship at this stage like Henrik Stenson did.

9. Patrick Cantlay: He’s become mildly overrated in deep golf circles if only because he became somebody sexy to hitch your hipster wagon to, but the talent is there. He’s made four of his last five cuts at majors, and I think he’ll give himself a chance to win at least one in 2019.

10. Gary Woodland: Seems to be having a later-in-his-career resurgence. At the age of 34 he won, had 11 top 25s and made it all the way to the Tour Championship in September. He was one of 17 players without a major to do so. I could have gone with Aaron Wise, Billy Horschel or Cameron Smith right here, but for my money right now, Woodland tops all of those guys.

SOURCE:  msn.com

The post A look at the 10 best golfers without a major championship ahead of the 2019 PGA Tour season appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

Iowa man gets really creative with golf balls

From the world of weird n’ wacky in Golf, we found this…

Ever wonder what people who live on golf courses do with all the balls that get hit into their backyards? Well, you probably wouldn’t guess what one Iowa man did.

Kevin Pingel took nearly 600 balls and turned them into a six-foot, 100-pound statue of a golfer, according to Siouxlandmatters.com. Here’s a photo of the structure:

Pingel said he modeled the statue — which is becoming somewhat of a tourist attraction in Alta, Iowa — after the current swing of his favorite golfer, Tiger Woods. Somewhere, Sean Foley just did a fist pump.

SOURCE:  Golfdigest.com

The post Iowa man gets really creative with golf balls appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

HOW TO MAKE THE BALL CURVE

Don’t make hitting a draw or a fade complicated

Modern launch monitors have taught us exactly what makes the ball go where it goes, but most golfers would be smart not to get too caught up in technicalities. Decades ago, Jack Nicklaus described a simple way to shape shots, and it’s every bit as valid today.

Jack said to hit a fade—his preferred shot—aim the clubface where you want the ball to come down, and align your body to the left (for right-handers). To hit a draw, do the opposite: Aim the face where you want the ball to finish and align your body to the right. For both ball flights, swing the club where your body is aimed.

Here’s the procedure, starting with the fade (above). After sighting your target from behind the ball, step in and aim the face at the target. Next, set your feet, making sure your stance line is well to the left. (Remember, a square stance is parallel-left of the target line, so you have to be farther left than that.) Your body lines—knees, hips and shoulders—should point where your feet point. Then swing where your body is aimed. The ball will start left and curve right.

“TO SHAPE A SHOT, BETTER TO CHANGE YOUR SETUP THAN YOUR SWING.”

Now, take the draw. Aim the clubface at the target, then arrange your stance and your other body lines to the right. Swing where your body is aimed, and the ball will start right and curve to the left.

What I really like about this method is, you get most of it done at address. I see golfers trying to roll the face closed for a draw or hold it open for a fade. Jack’s way is better.

GOLF’S NO. 1 MISTAKE
People ask me all the time, What’s the biggest fault you see with amateur golfers? My answer: They don’t take enough club. They take the club that requires a career shot to get to the target.

Optimistic? No, more like unrealistic. You should base your club selections on the average distance you get out of your clubs. Take one more than you think you need, and then swing within yourself. Trust me, you’ll make better contact and hit your target a lot more often.

SOURCE:  GolfDigest

The post HOW TO MAKE THE BALL CURVE appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

Plane makes emergency landing on golf course, golfers can thank frost delay for still being alive

Golf Basics: Understand the difference between chipping vs. pitching to add versatility to your short game

To the non-golfer or golfers just beginning, chipping and pitching might seem like very similar shots. Both are basic short game shots and can be achieved with a wide range of clubs.

However, many golfers don’t know the difference between two, and their one-size-fits-all approach often adds strokes to the scorecard.

When looking a professional golfers who exhibit superior proficiency and consistency with their short games, it’s key to understand their consistent quality of contact and variety of shot choices are accomplished successfully by understanding basic setup and technique differences between chipping and pitching.

 

---

Chipping vs. Pitching

The most common definition of a chip shot is that it has more ground time than air, with very little carry and more time bouncing and rolling on the green. This shot often occurs very close (within a few yards) from the green and requires a smaller swing than a pitch shot.

A pitch shot is contrarily one that spends more time in the air than on the ground, with more carry, a has a higher trajectory and more spin that helps it stop faster after it lands on the green. Pitch shots often occur farther away from the green than chip shots, and thus require a slightly longer swing.

Chipping Setup

It’s key to first understand setup changes needed with chipping compared a full swing to ensure a clean strike and the low, predictable trajectory we’re looking for.

To accomplish this, start with a narrowed stance, about 80 percent of your weight on the lead foot and ball positioned back in the stance. A good measure for ball position is to place it just forward (toward the target) of the big toe of your trail foot. The handle of the club should be about even with your lead thigh (not much more forward than a normal setup position), and you will also need to stand closer to the ball and raise the handle, so the shaft is at a more vertical angle.

Also, while using a wedge is often the right club for these shots, it’s also often wise to pick an 8- or 9-iron because it can be more predictable than a higher-lofted wedge.

Pitching Setup

The setup for a pitch shot is very similar to a chip shot, but your weight remains more centered, with only about 55 to 60 percent favoring the lead foot.

Your knees should be also be slightly more flexed than with a chip shot, feet slightly farther apart, and a ball position more forward (in the middle of your stance) with the handle location remaining neutral.

Impact Points

The strike of a chip shot is slightly different than a pitch shot. Most chip shots are struck ball first, compared to pitch shots that see the ball and ground contacted at about the same time.

Simply stated, this difference occurs because the ball-back, weight-forward setup of a chip shot creates a steeper attack angle and contact occurring earlier in the downswing in relation to where the swing arc bottoms out.

The chip shot setup also keeps the clubhead’s loft reduced to create lower trajectory shots in comparison to pitch shots, which yield higher, softer shots with more spin from a setup encouraging a shallower attack angle, more use of the club’s bounce and an impact point closer to the bottom of the swing arc.

SOURCE:  golftec.com

The post Golf Basics: Understand the difference between chipping vs. pitching to add versatility to your short game appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

Tiger Woods accomplished a world-ranking feat that nobody else could in 2018

There are many worthwhile ways to gauge Tiger Woods’ comeback in 2018. Tiger’s memorable Tour Championship victory highlighted his campaign, with his near misses at the PGA Championship and the Open Championship not too far behind.

Another indication of Tiger’s return to elite play around the world in 2018 is his world ranking, which made some really impressive increases over the year. Of course, the below stat might not be surprising when you consider the 14-time major champion was ranked as low as 656th in the world in January.

Now Tiger’s in the top 15 in the world—which is obviously impressive, but even more so when you consider this stat:

We’re pretty sure most golf fans wouldn’t have expected such a rapid return to becoming one of the world’s best players in less than 12 months. But that’s what we saw with Tiger’s return in 2018. And when you consider Tiger’s world-ranking position to end 2018 is higher than Jordan Spieth’s, Patrick Reed’s and Bubba Watson’s—especially considering Bubba won three PGA Tour events in 2018—the stat become more impressive.

Perhaps no world-ranking stat will ever compare with Woods spending 683 weeks (more than 13 years) at No. 1, which is 352 more than No. 2 on the list, Greg Norman. But this one is one more cherry on top of this season for Tiger—what a year it was.

SOURCE:  GolfDigest

The post Tiger Woods accomplished a world-ranking feat that nobody else could in 2018 appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

You’ve heard of Big Bertha but have you heard of Big Beertha???

From the world of weird n’ wacky in Golf, we found this…

 

THE BIG BEERTHA

Inside many an outwardly mature golfer lurks a glazed-eyed frat boy opposed to growing up. For those arrested fellows—and yes, they’re mostly fellows—there’s the Big Beertha, which looks like a driver but works like a beer bong. You pour a 12-ounce brew into the hollowed-out club head, then flip the club over and shotgun your beverage through the grip end. The liquid flows through a clear acrylic shaft, creating a viewing spectacle for those around you, who are likely to be either appalled or impressed.

SOURCE:  Golf.com

The post You’ve heard of Big Bertha but have you heard of Big Beertha??? appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

Let’s Get Ready to Party • This Saturday!

The Down River Annual Christmas Party is right around the corner!

Are your ready to have some fun and maybe WIN some great items?

Saturday, Dec. 8th at 6 pm

FREE ADMISSION

• bring a covered dish •

RAFFLE PRIZES • $40 per person entry free for a chance to WIN

PRIZES will include Memberships, Cart Pass for a Year, Dozens of Pro V1 and Pro V1x Golf Balls, Cart Cards and many other great gifts!

Buy your Raffle Entry Here

HOLIDAY GIFT CARDS ARE NOW ON SALE

• SAVE 15% off regular prices •

BUY NOW

 

The post Let’s Get Ready to Party • This Saturday! appeared first on Down River Golf Course.

Nine changes in the new Rules of Golf you absolutely need to know for 2019

As Jan. 1 approaches, it’s time to consider what New Year’s resolutions you’ll be making to help your golf game in 2019. For those who haven’t come up with any, here’s a suggestion: Learn the Rules of Golf. (No, really learn them this time.) Perhaps you’ve tried, only to find that by February, the copy of the rules book you picked up is covered with as much dust as that Peloton you bought to get into shape. Yet here’s the thing: There’s no better time than now to give it another shot because a new, modernized version of the rules goes into effect on New Year’s Day.

In the most sweeping revision in more than 60 years, officials from the USGA and R&A, golf’s governing bodies, have reorganized the rules to make them easier to understand and apply. The number has been cut to 24 from 34, and the language simplified to make it more practical. Roughly 2 million copies of the Player’s Edition of the Rules of Golf were published and circulated this fall. If you haven’t gotten one, you can find it online at usgapublications.com, as well as with explanatory videos at usga.org/rules. The free USGA Rules of Golf app has been updated, too.

To help you keep this resolution, here are nine changes to the new rules you should know.

I. Accidents happen
The controversy over Dustin Johnson’s ball moving on the green during the final round of the 2016 U.S. Open exposed the old rules for being too harsh when it came to what many considered tickytack infractions. New language, first adopted through Local Rules since 2017, states there is no penalty if you accidentally move your ball (or ball marker) on the green. Put the ball back, and you’re good to go. The same applies if you’re searching for a lost ball and mistakenly move it.

II. The fix is in
Golfers often complained about the silliness of letting players fix a ball mark on the green, but not a spike mark. What’s the difference? With no good answer, officials now will let you fix everything without a penalty. You can also touch the line of your putt with your hand or club so long as you’re not improving it.

III. A lost cause
To improve pace of play, golfers now have just three minutes to search for a missing ball rather than five. Admit it, if you hadn’t found it in three minutes, you weren’t finding it anyway.

IV. Knee is the new shoulder
The process for dropping a ball back in play is revamped in the new rules. Instead of letting go from shoulder height, players will drop from around their knee. This is a compromise from an original proposal that would have let golfers drop from just inches above the ground. To preserve some randomness with the drop, officials went with knee height instead. Why change at all? Primarily to speed up play by increasing the chances your ball stays within the two-club-length drop area on the first try.

V. No longer at touchy subject
Hitting a ball into a water hazard (now defined as “penalty area”) should come with consequences. But golfers don’t have to be nervous about incurring an additional penalty for a minor rules breach while playing their next shot. You’re free to touch/move loose impediments and ground your club, eliminating any unnecessary worry. The only caveat: You still can’t put your club down and use it to improve the conditions for the stroke. You can remove loose impediments in bunkers, too, although touching the sand in a bunker in front of or behind the ball is still prohibited.

VI. Damaged goods
We all get mad on the course, and sometimes that anger is taken out on an unsuspecting driver or putter. Previously, the rules were confusing on when or if you could play a club you damaged during a round, and it led to instances where some players were disqualified for playing clubs with a shaft slightly bent or some other damage they didn’t realize the club had. Now you can play a club that has become damaged in any fashion. If you caused the damage, however, you can’t replace the club with a new one.

VII. Twice is … OK
A double hit is almost always accidental, and the outcome so random as to hardly be beneficial. So golfers are now spared the ignominy of adding a penalty for hitting a ball twice with one swing. It counts as only one stroke. Somewhere T.C. Chen is smiling.

VIII. The end of flagstick folly
Another nod to common sense eliminates a penalty for hitting a flagstick left in the hole while putting on a green. Taking out and then placing back in flagsticks can often cause undo delay in the round, and the flagstick is as likely to keep your ball out of the cup as it would help it fall in.

IX. O.B. option
Courses may implement a Local Rule (not for competition) that offers an alternative to the stroke-and-distance penalty for lost balls or shots hit out-of-bounds. A player may drop a ball anywhere between where the original ball was believed to come to rest (or went out-of-bounds) and just into the edge of the fairway, but no nearer the hole. The golfer takes a two-stroke penalty and plays on instead of returning to the tee. This way, the Local Rule mimics your score if you had played a decent provisional ball.

SOURCE:  Golf Digest

The post Nine changes in the new Rules of Golf you absolutely need to know for 2019 appeared first on Down River Golf Course.