September 19, 2005

Caffeine vs. De-Caf -- How Does It Impact Your Golf Score?

I had a venti, one-pump, non-fat, no-whip, extra-hot mocha from Starbucks on the way to the golf course yesterday as a part of the caff/decaf experiment. The 40-minute drive to the course allowed the caffeine to work.

Did the caffeine affect the way I played? The answer is an unequivocal fuck yes. It like totally fucked up my game for the first 8 holes. I sucked like big time. If this wasn’t a scientific experiment, I would’ve quit. In fact, on the 6th hole, I nearly walked off; but being a good scientist, I felt like some responsibility to the scientific community and the golf world to continue. That has been the problem, though; I have walked off the course several times, so it was hard to blame my troubles caffeine intake. That was like just, what we scientists refer to as, anecdotal evidence, so to speak, not grounded totally in science or in intelligent fucking design.

Laugh. Go ahead. But how can something as complex, intricate, and demanding as golf have evolved by natural forces without the hand of some intelligent designer? It's just ridiculous to think that something as elegant as golf could arise from nothing, like evolving from a big fucking bang. After all, philosopher Lee Trevino, after being struck by lightning, said like whenever a thunderstorm rolled through in the future, he’d hold a 1-iron aloft because "even God can’t hit a 1-iron." Dude. There you have it.

Getting back to my experiment in biochemistry, after struggling on like the first eight holes, shooting a fucked-up eight over par, I think the effect of the caffeine was wearing off and I drained a 15-foot, downhill, sidehill putt for par, after a duck hook drive into a drainage culvert, penalty stroke rather than hit it out of the culvert, a long, big, sweeping, running 3-wood to about 75 yards, and a sand wedge flipped in. I did bogey the 10th, but I fucking struck the ball well, finding a green-side bunker with my second shot, failing to get the sand save.

I lipped out a par putt on 13, birdied 15 and 16, missed a birdie putt on 17 and finished with a fucking bogey, ending the back nine in one over par for 79.

Final assessment: Avoid caffeine before playing golf.

Posted by Bill at September 19, 2005 11:57 PM
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