Grays On Trays

… the more I enjoy snowboarding!

Finding success in golf can, for the lousy player (like me!) be a hit or miss activity: that is, you don’t know if you’re going to hit the ball, is miss it entirely.

Actually, I don’t miss the ball as much as I hit it badly: chunk it, top it, toe it, or send it into the water, trees, or sand.

Is there an analog in snowboarding? I’m not sure.

You usually don’t fall down while golfing–and if you do, you probably have more serious problems than a bad golf game. But falling down while snowboarding? That’s easily possible, especially if you are pushing up against your limit, whatever that is.

The lack of scorekeeping is one bonus for snowboarding. Fall down on one run down the piste? Take a line that leads you into some unpleasant work, trying to keep control over unfavorable snow? Lose your momentum while avoiding an inattentive rider or skier?

Not a problem. Get on the chair lift, or hike back up, and start all over. It’s a new game.

Think of the following activities: golf, hockey, baseball, basketball, football, bowling, and the Tour de France bicycle race. What do they have in common? They have distinct time periods of effort during which performance is scored, and then carried forward into the future. Hit the tee shot into the water or throw the bowling ball into the gutter after two strikes, and you’ve got actions that have repurcussions for the duration of the activity.

With snowboarding, you shake off a bad run, and start over again. That’s even the spirit of the competitive events in snowboarding. Whether you’re talking about halfpipe, or slopestyle events, it’s the best out of two or three–not the cumulative score. Snowboard crosss, reflecting its similarities with skiing, does have a cumulative aspect to it.

After playing a fine outing on the golf course, my companion for the round waxed eloquently on the virtues of golf. Not the physical aspects of it, but the social environment, the rituals of etiquette, and so forth.

His point? There’s a tradition in golf the demands treating other people with respect, accepting adversity with grace, and in general being an all-around decent person. He also pointed out the widely viewed image of snowboarding as a devil-may-care, break-the-rules, and out-of-my-way activity.

So is “snowboarding etiquette” a contradiction in terms? Is there any grace in the sport, any social element to an activity that is fundamentally you and the board?

Thanks for the conversation, “Dude.” You’ve given me something to add to my list of things to think about during the off season.

After a tough round at a scrappy course, I was quite interested in the following from the New York Times:

New and technologically advanced golf balls fly farther than ever. Oversize golf drivers hit the ball straighter. Space-age materials make irons easier to swing. Ergonomically engineered putters roll the ball more precisely. Golf courses are more plentiful and maintained better. Instruction is more accessible, at public and private clubs, not to mention every night on a cable television channel devoted entirely to golf.

So what good has this done for golf scores? Nothing that we can see. The score of an average golfer is still 100, where it has been “for decades.”

Even with $500 drivers and $200 putters, the pursuit of a better game is elusive to many.

After four years of golf, I’m still a lousy player. After two seasons of snowboarding, I’m not great. But I’m not lousy.

It’s easier to do the fundamental task of golf–swing a club and hit the ball–than it is to do the fundamental task of snowboarding, which is to stand up on a slippery board and maintain your balance.

But progressing in golf is a lot harder.

I’ve taken some time to compare snowboarding with golf, and concluded that snowboarding is better.

Here’s one reason: snowboarding is an easier mental game.

True, a very good golfer can have a “blow-up” on one hole, and then proceed to have many good shots after that. But if your a mediocre or worse golfer–and to say that I am a “hack” would be to overstate my skills on the course–one bad hole can lead to many others. After all, scorekeeping is cumulative.

With riding, on the other hand, each trip down the mountain, each entry to the halfpipe, each unloading from the lift presents a new opportunity. Sure, you may have skidded out of some turns and barely kept your board under control, but that was last time; with each new buckling of the binding, you’re free to start with a clean slate.

In short, trouble on the snowboard comes in small packages, and hope springs anew. That’s a large advantage to riding.

We are now approaching my least-favorite time of year: Spring. Yes, there’s all that lovely birds-and-bees stuff, with birds returning from the South, and bees pollinating flowers. But gardening has never been my thing, so Spring is just another word for “too warm to ski, too cold to golf.” Or more succinctly, “mud.”

Last year my last day of skiing was St. Patrick’s Day, March 17. No green snow, just a whitish-grayish slop that barely covered the ground. In all, I skied five times last March, and none of those times was memorable for any good reason.

SNOWBOARDING VERSUS GOLF
All this brings me to golf. Yesterday I was shoveling a patch of the driveway that has been untouched for a while, when a young man came through the neighborhood selling discount coupons for a nearby golf course. It’s a fairly scrappy course, and it’s not at all an attractive one. Little tree coverage, barely one pond, and hardly any change in elevation. It’s good for my super-high-handicap game, of course, but not for the visual and aesthetic stimulation that occurs on a fine course.

But then again, Old Scrapper doesn’t have the $75 greens fees that would make playing there a waste of money and time. So, despite my general rule against buying from solicitors, I bought the coupons. I should recoup my purchase price and actually save some money on my third or fourth outing of the year. Since O.S. generally opens in April, I can start working towards “saving money” soon.

Generally, golf is more expensive than skiing or snowboarding. You can buy a cheap set of gear for either sport at roughly the same price, and if you match quality-for-quality, a daily lift ticket is roughly the same price as the fees for an 18-hole round of golf. It’s harder to make a comparison based on season passes, but it’s fair to say that if you make the appropriate adjustments (length and quality of golf course, size of ski area), a season pass for either sport is roughly the same price.

Still, it’s probably time to remember the Top 10 Reasons Why Snowboarding is Better Than Golf.