Opinion & Analysis
What’s your tee time?
I was always an early-morning man, a dew-sweeper. When I didn’t already have a tee time, I’d get to the course an hour before sunrise on a Saturday morning to see if I could get out as a single in one of the first groups.
Or I’d play the back nine with a few friends. We’d get to the 10th tee while it was still completely dark. We’d hit balls over the 18th green down the hill toward No. 13. When we could finally see the flight of a ball well enough to have an idea where it was going, we’d hit our tee shots on 10. By the time the sun rose, we’d be on 13 trying to find as many of the “warm-up balls” as we could.
Now that I’m older and my kids are out of the house, I no longer like to tee off with the sun barely breaking into the sky. I prefer a later time; a tee time that grants the opportunity for a full-night’s sleep, a leisurely cup of coffee, a chance to read the sports page, and to properly warm up.
I think an 8:30 tee time is just about ideal. And, not surprisingly, so do the people I play with at that hour. But golfers, this long-daylight time of the year, tee off anywhere from five in the morning until 6:30 in the evening.
I found Grady getting ready to play at 2:15 one recent Sunday afternoon.
[quote_box_center]“I like playing later,” he said. “The morning is for the early birds, I don’t usually get up before noon on the weekends.”[/quote_box_center]
“You’re single?” I asked.
“Now, yes. No kids either so my weekends are free. Tee times are no problem — if there’s not a big tournament. I got this time online an hour ago.”
It was a beautiful afternoon for golf and I wondered why it wasn’t more crowded.
[quote_box_center]“Seems like the regulars,” Grady said, “men’s club — and more serious golfers play really early. Then late morning you get guys who don’t play as much, or couples. In the afternoon though a lot of times, it’s wide open.”[/quote_box_center]
“You play by yourself?”
[quote_box_center]“Yeah, if no one else is here, I may play two balls. On some holes I may play three or four.”[/quote_box_center]
At a different course on a different day I met Blake and Austin. They were getting ready to play a higher-end daily-fee course.
“We wanted to play Pearl Dunes,” Blake said, “but they didn’t have anything open until later.” This was at 9:30 on a Sunday morning. “We pay more here” for the greens fee, he continued, “but we were able to get a time pretty easily.”
“What time do you think you’ll finish?” I asked with visions of the five-plus hour round they’d have to endure.
“Shouldn’t be too bad,” Austin answered, “it’s not that crowded. Depends on how we play, but I bet we’ll finish around 1:30.”
And who can complain about a four-hour round from a mid-morning tee time?
[quote_box_center]“I like to play in the afternoon when it’s warmer and the course has dried out. The beer tastes better then,” Denny told me at Shelter Grove as he and a couple of friends got ready to head to the first tee. “If it gets backed-up, we might skip around to an open hole and then come back around. Or we might play the front nine twice, we’ll just see how it goes.”[/quote_box_center]
“I love twilight golf,” Remy told me on a weekday afternoon in early June. “For one thing, it’s cheaper. For another, it usually isn’t packed. I got done working at 2, twilight starts at 3, and with any luck I’ll be done by 6:30.”
Not too long ago I played an afternoon round of golf with my youngest son. When we finished a little after 5 p.m. there was a couple on the first tee just heading out. I asked the man if he thought they’d finish the round before dark.
[quote_box_center]“I don’t know,” he answered. “But my girlfriend has only played a few times and we don’t want to bother anyone — or be bothered by anyone. We’ll play until it starts getting dark, or until the bugs start getting bad.”[/quote_box_center]
At dawn on Wednesday last week there were three foursomes waiting at the first tee at Spring Valley and another eight or 10 golfers on the practice green.
One of the guys, a heavy-set, deeply tanned man probably in his mid-60s, told me they played early every Wednesday. “We’re part of the senior men’s club,” he said. “We have tee times from 6 until 7:30, we get about 40 players most weeks. We’ll finish and have lunch, and I’ll be on my way home by 1.”
One guy was by himself in a cart on the 10th tee. “I’m just playing the back nine,” he said. “I’ll be done by 7:15, home and showered and in the office by 8:30.”
Some 12 hours later I was back at Spring Valley, waiting as a twosome made the turn to the homeward nine.
“We teed off at 5 and played through one foursome,” Graham said, “and there’s a two a couple of holes in front of us but they’re playing as fast as we are.”
“What time do you think you’ll finish?” I asked.
“Before dark. Everyone plays a little faster when the sun starts to set.”
“The carts have to be in by 8, we’ll make that no problem,” said Graham’s friend Kelly.
In the pro shop, Dustin behind the counter told me that the last tee time they’ll sell today is at 7 p.m. “You can play nine in 45 minutes if you hustle,” he said. “But usually no one starts much after 6:30. I doubt we’ll have anyone more.”
Just then, two guys walked in.
“You still get us out for a quick nine?” one asked.
And I realized as the two hurriedly paid and headed to the first tee, from dawn to dusk golfers have to take the opportunity to play whenever time, and daylight, permit.
What time of the day do you like to play? Let us know in the comments section below. And check out the inspirational story of one golfer trying to shoot the round of his life at 7-ironpress.com. The book is called A Perfect Lie – The Hole Truth and you can get free shipping on the paperback with the code GOLFWRX, or $4 off the e-book when you enter the code GOLFWRX1 at check-out. Pre-Father’s Day delivery in the US if ordered by June 17.
As the editor-in-chief of this website and an observer of the GolfWRX forums and other online golf equipment discourse for over a decade, I’m pretty well attuned to the grunts and grumbles of a significant portion of the golf equipment purchasing spectrum. And before you accuse me of lording above all in some digital ivory tower, I’d like to offer that I worked at golf courses (public and private) for years prior to picking up my pen, so I’m well-versed in the non-degenerate golf equipment consumers out there. I touched (green)grass (retail)!
Complaints about the ills of and related to the OEMs usually follow some version of: Product cycles are too short for real innovation, tour equipment isn’t the same as retail (which is largely not true, by the way), too much is invested in marketing and not enough in R&D, top staffer X hasn’t even put the new driver in play, so it’s obviously not superior to the previous generation, prices are too high, and on and on.
Without digging into the merits of any of these claims, which I believe are mostly red herrings, I’d like to bring into view of our rangefinder what I believe to be the two primary difficulties golf equipment companies face.
One: As Terry Koehler, back when he was the CEO of Ben Hogan, told me at the time of the Ft Worth irons launch, if you can’t regularly hit the golf ball in a coin-sized area in the middle of the face, there’s not a ton that iron technology can do for you. Now, this is less true now with respect to irons than when he said it, and is less and less true by degrees as the clubs get larger (utilities, fairways, hybrids, drivers), but there remains a great deal of golf equipment truth in that statement. Think about it — which is to say, in TL;DR fashion, get lessons from a qualified instructor who will teach you about the fundamentals of repeatable impact and how the golf swing works, not just offer band-aid fixes. If you can’t repeatably deliver the golf club to the golf ball in something resembling the manner it was designed for, how can you expect to be getting the most out of the club — put another way, the maximum value from your investment?
Similarly, game improvement equipment can only improve your game if you game it. In other words, get fit for the clubs you ought to be playing rather than filling the bag with the ones you wish you could hit or used to be able to hit. Of course, don’t do this if you don’t care about performance and just want to hit a forged blade while playing off an 18 handicap. That’s absolutely fine. There were plenty of members in clubs back in the day playing Hogan Apex or Mizuno MP-32 irons who had no business doing so from a ballstriking standpoint, but they enjoyed their look, feel, and complementary qualities to their Gatsby hats and cashmere sweaters. Do what brings you a measure of joy in this maddening game.
Now, the second issue. This is not a plea for non-conforming equipment; rather, it is a statement of fact. USGA/R&A limits on every facet of golf equipment are detrimental to golf equipment manufacturers. Sure, you know this, but do you think about it as it applies to almost every element of equipment? A 500cc driver would be inherently more forgiving than a 460cc, as one with a COR measurement in excess of 0.83. 50-inch shafts. Box grooves. And on and on.
Would fewer regulations be objectively bad for the game? Would this erode its soul? Fortunately, that’s beside the point of this exercise, which is merely to point out the facts. The fact, in this case, is that equipment restrictions and regulations are the slaughterbench of an abundance of innovation in the golf equipment space. Is this for the best? Well, now I’ve asked the question twice and might as well give a partial response, I guess my answer to that would be, “It depends on what type of golf you’re playing and who you’re playing it with.”
For my part, I don’t mind embarrassing myself with vintage blades and persimmons chasing after the quasi-spiritual elevation of a well-struck shot, but that’s just me. Plenty of folks don’t give a damn if their grooves are conforming. Plenty of folks think the folks in Liberty Corner ought to add a prison to the museum for such offences. And those are just a few of the considerations for the amateur game — which doesn’t get inside the gallery ropes of the pro game…
Different strokes in the game of golf, in my humble opinion.
Anyway, I believe equipment company engineers are genuinely trying to build better equipment year over year. The marketing departments are trying to find ways to make this equipment appeal to the broadest segment of the golf market possible. All of this against (1) the backdrop of — at least for now — firm product cycles. And golfers who, with their ~15 average handicap (men), for the most part, are not striping the golf ball like Tiger in his prime and seem to have less and less time year over year to practice and improve. (2) Regulations that massively restrict what they’re able to do…
That’s the landscape as I see it and the real headwinds for golf equipment companies. No doubt, there’s more I haven’t considered, but I think the previous is a better — and better faith — point of departure when formulating any serious commentary on the golf equipment world than some of the more cynical and conspiratorial takes I hear.
Agree? Disagree? Think I’m worthy of an Adam Hadwin-esque security guard tackle? Let me know in the comments.
@golfoncbs The infamous Adam Hadwin tackle ? #golf #fyp #canada #pgatour #adamhadwin ? Ghibli-style nostalgic waltz – MaSssuguMusic
Episode #16 brings us Cliff McKinney. Cliff is the founder of Old Charlie Golf Club, a new club, and concept, to be built in the Florida panhandle. The model is quite interesting and aims to make great, private golf more affordable. We hope you enjoy the show!
Last week, I came across a reel from BBC Sport on Instagram featuring Scottie Scheffler speaking to the media ahead of The Open at Royal Portrush. In it, he shared that he often wonders what the point is of wanting to win tournaments so badly — especially when he knows, deep down, that it doesn’t lead to a truly fulfilling life.
View this post on Instagram
“Is it great to be able to win tournaments and to accomplish the things I have in the game of golf? Yeah, it brings tears to my eyes just to think about it because I’ve literally worked my entire life to be good at this sport,” Scheffler said. “To have that kind of sense of accomplishment, I think, is a pretty cool feeling. To get to live out your dreams is very special, but at the end of the day, I’m not out here to inspire the next generation of golfers. I’m not out here to inspire someone to be the best player in the world, because what’s the point?”
Ironically — or perhaps perfectly — he went on to win the claret jug.
That question — what’s the point of winning? — cuts straight to the heart of the human journey.
As someone who’s spent over two decades in the trenches of professional golf, and in deep study of the mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of the game, I see Scottie’s inner conflict as a sign of soul evolution in motion.
I came to golf late. I wasn’t a junior standout or college All-American. At 27, I left a steady corporate job to see if I could be on the PGA Tour starting as a 14-handicap, average-length hitter. Over the years, my journey has been defined less by trophies and more by the relentless effort to navigate the deeply inequitable and gated system of professional golf — an effort that ultimately turned inward and helped me evolve as both a golfer and a person.
One perspective that helped me make sense of this inner dissonance around competition and our culture’s tendency to overvalue winning is the idea of soul evolution.
The University of Virginia’s Division of Perceptual Studies has done extensive research on reincarnation, and Netflix’s Surviving Death (Episode 6) explores the topic, too. Whether you take it literally or metaphorically, the idea that we’re on a long arc of growth — from beginner to sage elder — offers a profound perspective.
If you accept the premise literally, then terms like “young soul” and “old soul” start to hold meaning. However, even if we set the word “soul” aside, it’s easy to see that different levels of life experience produce different worldviews.
Newer souls — or people in earlier stages of their development — may be curious and kind but still lack discernment or depth. There is a naivety, and they don’t yet question as deeply, tending to see things in black and white, partly because certainty feels safer than confronting the unknown.
As we gain more experience, we begin to experiment. We test limits. We chase extreme external goals — sometimes at the expense of health, relationships, or inner peace — still operating from hunger, ambition, and the fragility of the ego.
It’s a necessary stage, but often a turbulent and unfulfilling one.
David Duval fell off the map after reaching World No. 1. Bubba Watson had his own “Is this it?” moment with his caddie, Ted Scott, after winning the Masters.
In Aaron Rodgers: Enigma, reflecting on his 2011 Super Bowl win, Rodgers said:
“Now I’ve accomplished the only thing that I really, really wanted to do in my life. Now what? I was like, ‘Did I aim at the wrong thing? Did I spend too much time thinking about stuff that ultimately doesn’t give you true happiness?’”
Jim Carrey once said, “I think everybody should get rich and famous and do everything they ever dreamed of so they can see that it’s not the answer.”
Eventually, though, something shifts.
We begin to see in shades of gray. Winning, dominating, accumulating—these pursuits lose their shine. The rewards feel more fleeting. Living in a constant state of fight-or-flight makes us feel alive, yes, but not happy and joyful.
Compassion begins to replace ambition. Love, presence, and gratitude become more fulfilling than status, profits, or trophies. We crave balance over burnout. Collaboration over competition. Meaning over metrics.
Interestingly, if we zoom out, we can apply this same model to nations and cultures. Countries, like people, have a collective “soul stage” made up of the individuals within them.
Take the United States, for example. I’d place it as a mid-level soul: highly competitive and deeply driven, but still learning emotional maturity. Still uncomfortable with nuance. Still believing that more is always better. Despite its global wins, the U.S. currently ranks just 23rd in happiness (as of 2025). You might liken it to a gifted teenager—bold, eager, and ambitious, but angsty and still figuring out how to live well and in balance. As much as a parent wants to protect their child, sometimes the child has to make their own mistakes to truly grow.
So when Scottie Scheffler wonders what the point of winning is, I don’t see someone losing strength.
I see someone evolving.
He’s beginning to look beyond the leaderboard. Beyond metrics of success that carry a lower vibration. And yet, in a poetic twist, Scheffler did go on to win The Open. But that only reinforces the point: even at the pinnacle, the question remains. And if more of us in the golf and sports world — and in U.S. culture at large — started asking similar questions, we might discover that the more meaningful trophy isn’t about accumulating or beating others at all costs.
It’s about awakening and evolving to something more than winning could ever promise.
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dr bloor
Jun 14, 2015 at 9:09 pm
Grady’s my soulmate. I love sneaking out after the morning rush but before the afternoon leagues tee off, solo. One to four balls depending on my mood. On one occasion I had about 45 minutes to myself on the 18th green to chip and putt. It’s heaven.
C. Weber
Jun 13, 2015 at 6:54 am
I play in a group on the weekends that will tee off anytime between 7 and 8:30. Our course hosts a lot of tournaments but our Pro takes care of us letting us know what times are ahead of the tournament. During the week I get out 2 or 3 times usually Tues and Thurs at 3:30. Can get in 18 by 7pm then.
Timbleking
Jun 12, 2015 at 1:58 pm
Being a father for now 7 weeks, I discovered the very early tee-times and I must say I like it. With my best friend, playing right after the greenkeepers is priceless. We play fast and good golf, and we do the same for the competitions.
Jim
Jun 12, 2015 at 2:06 am
I hate mornings in general. I don’t even feel awake before about 1pm, and when my 65 year old father comes into town and wants to tee off at 7am and we compromise at 8:30, I am terrible. Joints feel unused, I’m sore, unfocused, 10 strokes over my usual, etc. By myself or with my wife, I start around 5pm and play 27 holes or so by 9pm, when it gets dark here. I love it, and can honestly say if I had to play golf before 10am any time I wanted to play golf, I simply would not play golf. A bonus that super twilight is 1/3rd the cost of a 6am rate, which is baffling to me.
Tim
Jun 11, 2015 at 5:09 am
The British summer is great – once finished playing a match on the 22 hole at 10pm, the light really was fading by then. I think we teed of at 5 or 5:30. The Steward had kept the lights on in the clubhouse for us.
trbgolfer
Jun 10, 2015 at 11:12 pm
I usually play late-morning/early-afternoon weekdays and I can usually play in 2 hours or so if I can play thru folks but usually it’s pretty clear by then. I live in OK and it is usually getting hot and humid then and most golfers are gone. Most people here like the early morning or late evening rounds so I try to get in the middle. I’m self-employed and have the ability to play twice a week like this. I’m blessed.
FEV
Jun 10, 2015 at 6:03 pm
1st or 2nd tee time of the day. Some courses that can be 5:30 am
RobG
Jun 10, 2015 at 4:59 pm
I prefer to play in the evenings when it’s a bit cooler and the course isn’t so busy. I rarely get a full 18 holes finished before dark but I am usually able to play 2 or 3 balls and hit a lot of practice shots around the greens and work on my short game so it doesn’t matter.
Golfraven
Jun 10, 2015 at 2:42 pm
almost morning on weekends before the booking time – usually 7.45 ish. Late evening from 7.30 is also ok but hard if you have little ones and need to finish work.
Christosterone
Jun 10, 2015 at 1:09 pm
I am in Texas and will only play at sunup(6:30-7:30 depending on time of year)…my goal is to be home showering by 10:30 to 11:30…anything over a 3 hours is out of the ordinary for these times
Jacob
Jun 10, 2015 at 12:56 pm
Any time of the day is great..but I prefer real late rounds..at the end of the day ending at or right before dark..the course is never busy and you can really take your time and still finish 18 in 3.15 hrs..or I do really early..my wife sleeps in on the weekends. I’m generally up as soon as it gets light Our..so half my round is done before she wakes.
Chad Rechlo
Jun 10, 2015 at 12:56 pm
100% a morning pegger, love the feeling of an 8:00 am tee time on the weekend.
Tom Wishon
Jun 10, 2015 at 12:34 pm
After work and even after dinner when far fewer people are on the course. I always have liked practicing on course more than the range – play two balls on a hole and play “worst ball” against yourself, hit 2-3 extra shots here and there, try different putts from different places on the greens, take 30 mins to play a hole, etc. I’m fortunate that we live on a course so I can just watch for when the holes near the house are empty to jump out there.
Moses
Jun 10, 2015 at 12:30 pm
I prefer to play in the afternoon and I usually play better because I’m looser. Plus it’s much cheaper. But since I live in LA I typically only play in the morning because you can easily see 5 1/2+ hr rounds anywhere after 1030am.
ibroke90
Jun 10, 2015 at 12:02 pm
down here in south texas, i like playing early, as early as possible! temps start to rise by 10 and with the humidity it gets uncomfortable.
Jeez Utz
Jun 10, 2015 at 11:38 am
First off at 8
So no one is in front of me
Double Mocha Man
Jun 10, 2015 at 11:21 am
I’m up at 6:30AM to make breakfast and get my teen off to school. Then I shower, sip a coffee, make my own breakfast and stretch… on the course by 9:15. Usually finish in under 4 hours so making happy hour is no problem. If I play in the afternoon then I take happy hour with me in the form of my infamous Italian Sports Drink in a canister… Pinot Grigio. It nicely lubricates the swing. Shot a 72 a couple weeks ago with ample lubrication.
Chisag
Jun 10, 2015 at 11:04 am
I hate morning golf. My brain doesn’t work for a few hours after waking and my body doesn’t cooperate either. The few times I have been on golf trips the morning rounds are in the mid 80s and afternoon rounds in the low 70s. And for me, there is nothing quite like watching the sky change color and the sun start to set coming up the last few holes.
Rich
Jun 11, 2015 at 6:37 pm
Couldn’t agree more.
ca1879
Jun 10, 2015 at 10:36 am
The very best time to play is just as soon as I can after my last round. We have a short season up here, and I like any time, anywhere.