00:00Hello everyone, Mike Harris from Golf Monthly and you join me at the Springs Golf Club in
00:06Oxfordshire. It is a fairly ungodly 6.30 in the morning, set my alarm for 4.45 to get up to get
00:15here. This is not just a general easy Friday morning knock though. I'm playing 18 holes of
00:24speed golf with PGA Pro Luke Willett aka the Iron Golfer. Luke is an incredible athlete along with
00:33being a PGA Pro. He's able to play 18 holes. I think his record time is 44 minutes and having
00:41only 78 shots. I don't think I'm going to get anywhere near that today but I'm out here to
00:47find out what it's like to play speed golf. I'm playing with Alex Neri, one of my colleagues from
00:52Golf Monthly. We're not athletes, we're not runners. We do a bit of fitness and we play quite a lot of
00:58golf but how are we going to get on? What are we going to learn today? Luke says he loves speed golf
01:04because it disconnects him to make him feel connected. It's all about being stripped down,
01:09really eyeballing shots, not overthinking golf. Certainly something that I probably struggle
01:14with. So today, really light pencil bag, just got a half set of clubs. Interestingly to see,
01:21Luke has only got four clubs. He told me not to take a driver because not to waste time pegging it up
01:27but I'm afraid the driver is my straightest club in the bag. I'm worried about spraying it around.
01:32We'll see how I get on out there but just a minimal half set of clubs. It is literally hit it,
01:39find it, hit it again, keep on going for the 18 holes. It's about four and a half miles around the
01:4518 holes. Luke reckons we might be able to do it in about 70 minutes which is an awful lot quicker.
01:50than I normally play 18 holes. Let's get to the first tee and see what happens.
02:20We will be able to do it. If you know when we are up there to get away from scratch and your
02:30paragched crown at a bottom I think it's better. Call me a little tiny electronics. This is a
02:38big part of the big park in California. And you can see these sharps due to some
02:42of the close there. But finally, we will show someogyny assistant. If you kırk your
02:47we are halfway round in 31 minutes so
02:55and that was for a five a par we're actually playing quite well short and straight
03:06off the tee definitely the play doesn't matter if you duff it it's much harder if you are
03:12running offline looking for balls although a couple of times alex has hit it offline
03:17has allowed me a chance for a breather so uh just about to go on the 10th hole
03:23this is unbelievable i am loving it uh par three how far
03:29oh great swing yeah i love your shot 180 i guess okay
03:42hole 15 um 55 minutes
04:11i think we might break that 70 minute target that luke set
04:15um definitely nudge it down the middle is the play
04:21every time i'm actually playing all right i overthink my golf and
04:26in this format you just can't overthink it can't be looking at yardages can't be
04:30reading putts from both sides it's brilliant i am
04:34loving this it's hard work hamstrings are feeling really
04:37tight uh buzzing it's great final push last three and a half holes
04:43all right
04:49like
04:59Yes! Come on, go to the next!
05:2970 minutes, 31 seconds, so we just missed our target time of 70 minutes, going to catch
05:44my breath, going to catch up with Luke and try and work out what we've learned from playing
05:51speed golf this morning at the springs, but that was a lot of fun.
05:57So we have finished our round of speed golf, we've had a chance to have a bit of a rest,
06:02a little bit of a lie down, had a full English breakfast, which I think I thoroughly deserved.
06:08Luke just had a cup of coffee and water, he is an athlete unlike me, but that was a lot
06:14of fun. We've had a chance to reflect on it, didn't quite break that 70 minute target,
06:19we were 70 minutes and 31 seconds, but still that is an awful lot shorter than a regular
06:27three ball to play 18 holes of golf. I'm just looking at the scorecard, Luke shot one under
06:34par, he was five under at the turn, turned in 31, then made a birdie, chipped in for a birdie
06:43at the 10th. But yeah, incredible. I shot 87, but with a quadruple and a treble, so it could
06:52have been all right without that. And Alex, third member of our group, got it in under
06:57100, which was great. Wheels came off a little bit for him, but then it was interesting, Luke,
07:02you helped Alex get the wheels back on really, and that was like you told him to put the driver
07:08away and start playing on. Tell us, how do you think we got on in our, I mean, obviously for you,
07:14we slowed you down a lot. You would normally get around in, what, sort of about 35, 40 minutes?
07:19Fingers crossed. Yeah, yeah, fingers crossed. Look, you guys were great. You embraced the unknown,
07:24you tried something new. Golf is one of the oldest sports around. That's what's beautiful about it.
07:29And guess what? You can always experience a new version of golf, and that's what you guys did.
07:34Golf is for anyone, and these guys rocked that today. Yeah, it was really interesting. I think
07:39one of the things that I probably, I love my technology. I've got a laser, I've got a GPS.
07:45I'm forever looking at the yardages, and a couple of times I think you laughed at me when I go,
07:49what's the yardage here? And it's like, just hit it, just hit it. You know, how often do you go
07:54through the back of a green? Certainly missing a green, shorten at the front, just bump it up,
08:00have a putt. So, I mean, I wouldn't have been that far off my handicap. Take out the quadruple
08:07and the treble, and I'd have been okay. What do you think next time, Luke? Is there anything else?
08:13Because I know you said at the start, you wouldn't hit a driver because you didn't want to peg it up.
08:18That would take a bit, but I was sort of, I felt I drove it quite well today. I had that little cut
08:22going on, just almost like a little chippy one, 180, 200 yards, found the fairway. Anything that I could do,
08:28or Alex could do differently next time? Yeah, going forward, speed golf is all about trying the unknown,
08:35like we just said there. And it's about exploring. You know, have a little experiment. Try stuff out.
08:41Never stop trying stuff out. And that's why, look, today was a great round for me. One under par.
08:45I feel great. It was a good time. That's world record stuff. Where did I get to? How did I get to that?
08:52Well, it was by exploring. So all I would actually say is, I'll just say embrace that. Explore. You
08:58know, I will come around with anyone. You know, I'll leave that open to you guys. You know, pick up
09:04the phone, ask me and I'll take you around. But the point is, just explore. And you're, it might not
09:11always be, I want to have a fast round, but that's kind of cool. It might be, I want to improve my golf.
09:16You can do that. You can do whatever you want, but explore and then you'll find stuff out.
09:20I go around this great place here. There's red kites flying around. Your course might be
09:24armadillo's. Who knows? You know, explore. It was, it was brilliant. It was a really
09:30fantastic experience. A really great buzz. I was just chatting to Luke afterwards over breakfast and
09:35sort of said, how does that compare to other rounds? What did I feel like at the end? And I reckon
09:39the only time that I felt more of a buzz is I played the old course once in a competition,
09:45finished par birdie to break 80. But today the elation I felt finishing on the 18th hole.
09:54And it was interesting chatting to Alex as well. Alex has done a lot of really intense cycling,
09:58cycled up a place like Alpe d'Huez. He was saying similar sort of buzz once you finish that round
10:04of golf. The elation you've got, really good workout. It's what's the time now? It's sort of half nine.
10:12I'm going to head home. I'm going to go and do a day's work, but it has been absolutely brilliant.
10:16Luke, thank you for having us. Thank you. It's been a brilliant morning at the Springs.
10:21Speed golf. I don't know. Give it a go. It's a bit of fun. It's a bit of something different,
10:26but a lot of fun. Definitely going to try it again. But from the Springs golf course, it's goodbye.
10:33Bye.
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