Luke Reese - One for the Memory Banks

Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. Today's episode I am joined by Luke Reese. Luke is the author of a new book, One for the Memory Banks. It's a story about traveling around Scotland and learning to play golf and kind of the culture of Scottish golf and golf in the UK. Really, Luke I have known for a long time. I caddied at a club he's

Luke wrote this book.

He sent me an advance copy and we've been planning to do this podcast for a while. But really interesting book for any golf lover. It's got a little bit of everything for everybody. And one of the neat things that he's doing is that he is doing a large

A green, for example, I'm already upset when I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. And when I find my ball in a bright egg Friday egg, the dreaded Frida egg, Frida Egg egg bride egg Lie, I'm about ready to run.

Off of the hump.

Being somebody that's been in the golf business for Is there anything that compares to this in terms of the demand for playing.

No, nothing, nothing's even remotely close.

I mean, this has been I think right now we're experiencing in golf is just a people have gotten back to the love of the game and they're playing, and they realize it's outdoor, it's activity, you can do stuff, you can be with people, you can be socially just, and you can also be sort of close to each other.

I think rounds of play are going to stay up. I would expect them.

I think you're going to get a lot of people who have suddenly realized this is a good game and this is fun and it's a fun place to play, and you know, I think rounds of play are going to stay up. I think the only question that we'll have is as over time, as people start to get back towards having to work in an office, are they going to be able to slip out and play nine or slip out and practice chipping and putting or that sort of thing.

And that's that's the big question to me.

But I'm I think that people have realized that golf is a really good thing to do.

I think I think you hit on one of the things. It's like, it's a great safe way to spend time, spend time with people and your friends, and that kind of ties into your book that just came out One for the Memory Banks. A uh Rivet agreed. I think it's neat because you've got you've got golf and architecture mixed in with human interest in a story of a great friendship, and ihip golf friendship as an adult is way. It's like underrated because of how much time you spend when you golf with somebody.

I've thought about this a lot.

It's like, you know, even my best friends say, I see him once a month now, and I you know, I spend a couple hours with them. If I play golf with the same person every weekend, I'm gonna spend way more time over the course of the year with that person than even your best friend.

Well hopefully they become your best friend.

Okay, hopefully hopefully your best friend is the person with whom you're golf. I mean, I sort of I got just incredibly lucky, and I guess you know, first of all, you know, I came late to the game. I didn't start playing it's till my mid thirties, and I was a tennis player before that. Tennis is not a place where you play for fun with people. You're hitting the ball at somebody, they're hitting it at you. It's you against them. By definition.

Golf is sort of a combination of you against the course.

And it's and if it's match play, it can have a whole competitive element to it that can have a fun element to it, and you can celebrate their good shot and at the same time try to beat it. And I think that you know what where I got lucky was learning to play with some Scottish guys who were just amazing people and then who cared massively about architecture and who at the same time wanted to play

And you know, it's a great way.

It's a great way to get to get to know the game. And so you know, back your comment about your best friends, my best friends, the people with whom I'm texting until ten o'clock last night about whether you know they want to buy the new T three hundred irons or whether they want the TSI two driver or three. I mean, these are the kind of things that you sit back and look and go, that's the kind of

No one has ever called me and said, let's.

Go play a tennis course at a new place, you know, a tennis court. It's just like they're all the same. They all have the same measurements, all the same dimensions, and it's just who am I going to play with? And we might be wearing different outfits, but that's it. And so it's just to meet. Golf is just this infinite variety. And then you have the history and then you have the architecture and it's all there. It's just a it's a cool thing to do.

Yeah, Golf the course obviously, I mean this podcast covers courses. We think courses are infinitely interesting because of that variety. I something I really appreciated from your book was reading about how you got into the game late in life, but then you got a different upbringing than all of US Americans. You know, I always say that I want to denounce my American golf citizenship, that I want to be like A I want to be either an Australian

You can.

You have a legitimate claim. So you were take us there, you know. I don't want to spoil the book too much.

It take us.

You're working for Wilson's Sporting Goods at this point and you you're working in their European office, and uh, that's how you get into the game.

Yeah, it's so it's.

Very funny talking about renouncing your American golf citizenship. Don't do that yet, but I will say, we are so fixated on what did you shoot today? And we are so fixated on the pro game. We talk about the pro game so often as opposed to where are we going to play? And the benefit of the UK is manyfold.

You know.

Number one, you can play almost every single one of their courses as a regular person. You just have to write a letter, you have to show up, you have to be respectful, and it doesn't cost that much. So the great courses are open, they're members, they're frequently members clubs, but they're also open to us. The second thing is these golfing societies. Crewis around and they play there on different days and they're always playing the great places.

So here's where I got lucky.

I was a tennis player, played college tennis, blah blah blah, and I joined Wilson, which is the powerhouse tennis company. And you know, those of us from the golf industry don't think of Wilson in quite the same esteem as those from the tennis side. The tennis side, we're, you know, we're essentially the titleist of tennis, and we had this kind of power there and I came from it from that side, and all the top managers were all tennis guys.

It was just a disaster.

And it's you know, I feel like that's the scenario that so many Americans get dropped into, minus the leather, but it's at a golf course with water. Really it's really challenging for beginner and it's like, why do we do this?

People should play from teas that are way further forward. They should play easier golf courses until they can handle them. And none of us can hit the heroic shots we watch on the TV. And so to me this is just sort of the funny part. But I'm in a meeting one day in my offices in Munich and I'm basically.

A young sales rep. And I asked some guy to critique my.

Swing, and he, in his Scottish brogue, goes, you know, as a and he sort of pulled the whole crowd in.

This guy had that like presence.

He's sort of like the you know, a combination Winston Churchill Arnie Palmer type personality. Everybody listened to everything he said, and he pulls me and goes, young, mister Reese, as a golfer, you'd make a fine salesman.

Now here's my tip.

And then he gave me a tip which was basically, never touched the grip of a club in front of a golf pro. Just basically, you will lose all credibility the moment you try to address try to waggle, he said, they'll know you don't know anything about golf. Okay, and the whole crew crowd just cracked up, and everybody thought it was funny. And I was sort of like slightly humiliated as a young.

Salesman trying to sell.

You're trying to go sell the self clubs, so you can't even grab yeah, and.

I'm bribing self clubs and I could speak languages and I could tell people like how wonderful this club was and why the off center hits went straight and everything else, but I sure couldn't actually do it. And so I was like, oh my god, this guy's humiliating, but it was sort of it was funny at the same time. And the next week, sitting you know, showing up in a little package. This is before FedEx and all these

And I was like, oh my god.

And there's a picture of Turnberry on the front, on the front, and you know, just and he just he told me what pays to turn It was his home course, which is basically western Gales, and he's like, you know, come learn about golf and learn this is where golf is really played.

And I was like, okay, I could figure this out. I'll get it. And then I just became fascinated. And over the winter I just started reading more and more about this thing.

And then James Dodson's book Final Rounds came out, and about that same time and To the Links Land with Michael Bamberger came out, and I was like reading these books and I'm like, this is authentic, this is real, and it's like and it appealed to me. It struck this chord that was so much deeper than anything tennis had ever done. In tennis, we'd sit back and talk about how Labor used to beat Rosewall but that was it okay, and you might beat him on a different surface or something.

But in golf, it was like, wow, Bobby Jones played here, specifically at this course and this is where he shot the perfect round. I'm like, well, let's go play there, let's go truck it, let's go see what happened.

So it was a chance to actually do what the pros do, what's happened in history, and for me, Links and UK golf just appeal to every.

Aspect of that.

And obviously I was lucky because we had a factory in Urban Scotland and Urban is right next to Western Gales, Glasgow Gals, Royal Troon, Prestwick, you know, just down the road from Turnbury, you could play a lot of good links golf and there are ten courses I didn't name that are phenomenal. And so we would just sneak out after work every day six o'clock at night and we'd get eighteen in and then go to dinner. And I just that's how I learned how to play. And so

So I think the match play is so critical to that because like the the concept of you're out of the hole, you just pick up and you're get to move to the next one and it only costs you one is so valuable to a beginner, Like it's the penalty.

Of a bad hole is so much less.

If you play match play as a beginner, then as as a stroke play it is.

And if you take stroke play, you ruin around with two bad holes. If you take match play, it's ten percent of the round, okay, or roughly, you know, it's a little more than ten percent, but not much more.

So it's just like two bad holes. It's just two. It's two points against you.

And that to me allowed me to get to move along and start focusing on trying to make pars as.

Opposed to worrying about making a quad.

Okay, and you know, a bad score just didn't matter because literally you just pick it up. It Also, it's funny, and it's what it's one probably a problem that I have in golf.

I don't put nearly as well for a birdie as I do for a par lots.

You know, it's just because it's it's exactly right, because so you know, if I'll sit down, I've got a ten footer for par I guarantee you the ball is going to go slightly past that hole and it's going to have a little more direct line. If it's for Bertie, I'm like, whatever you do, don't make bogie in this hole, okay,

So that's sort of the and I also played the guy who was a world class taunter.

I mean his if you've read the book, you know BONDI was able to get in your head on every single putting stroke, every single time, and he could do it in the most subtle, you know, classic British way.

But he'd say things and you'd sort of go, is this uphill? Sit downhill?

Is it left or right? Is it right to left? What happens if it goes too far past? So it was it was nothing but fun.

You're making me miss I haven't played a good match in a while, and I missed being those subtle lays, the sneaky subtle aays to just kind of rattle some face cage. They're the vest where they don't even they think you're room for them, but you're just you're just getting a little bit in their kitchen.

I mean it's just sometimes like some of the things that that guy would do and I just still laugh. It's like he'd give you a gimme, but make you wait for a second. It's like icing your kicker in football, but everybody knows you're going to ice the kicker. The kicker's like, okay, are they going to actually use this timeout or am I gonna have to kick this one?

A little more?

You know, and it's just you're like, oh, crap, I hope I don't miss this one, you know.

So that's yeah, it's that's like a perfect example of of GoF is you know, playing playing in stroke play stuff, I always I didn't like having a five footer early in a round, but I always liked if I had one and I made it, I felt like it was going to be a great day because it like you feel like you just you get you're you're in the

You're standing back in match play and the Scots are world class with this. They're really good at giving generous gimmeis early on. They just don't make you put early things early on, and then they slowly tighten device.

It's like playing against the python.

You know, they're just they just wrapped themselves around you, and all of a sudden you're like, I actually could win this thing. And now you're like, god, I hope I don't give myself a four foot of a testy four footer, and certainly not a left or right with a little downhill.

You know those are those are you know the Oh god, I don't want to do it.

I don't want to go past, you know, for a victory and then something you have to have a comebacker for a half.

So psychological aspects of putting are just unbelievable. So I'm curious as somebody who who writes occasionally a moonlight as a as a writer on my website, I don't I wouldn't say I'm regular on it anymore. But uh, you're not a writer by trade, You've never been one. How do you just sit down and write a book like what did what did you do? What preempted it? And uh and how did how did the whole process of actually writing a book go for you?

First of all, hang on, shame on you. You are a writer.

I enjoy your headlines and your wise ass stuff.

I enjoy it.

I don't even write. I don't even write that anymore.

Though. Whoever wrote nobody beats Cockrock two d and thirty three times in a row? That's really okay. I that was a belly laugh for me. I I've opened up, I have my cup of coffee. I look over and I'm like, okay, that's just okay. So so don't tell me you're not a writer.

That was well nice, Okay, I'm like a month contributor at this point.

Then guess what, You're a great editor.

At a minimum, you're a great I don't even edit either yet. I've taken myself completely out of the writing. That's why it's improved.

Then you're a world class manager. Okay, something.

You're doing something right because if it were wrong, it's your responsibility. Okay, you are mister Friday. So if it comes out under your tagline, guess what, it's it's great. So back back to writing. Here's the funny thing. If if you look, we all know ten people at any given any given club that are just funny people.

We just know. We all we've all played with them, we all have a good time.

Everybody's like, Oh, that's the kind of guy you want to go play with, or that's the kind of woman you want to play with.

And so everybody has that group of people.

And if you're paying attention and listening to all the funny things that are being said, you realize that in a course of a lifetime you have a bunch of people who a bunch of funny events and a bunch of funny things that will could take place. I got lucky, and I mean just incredibly lucky to have like this Arnie Palmer type figure.

I mean, you know, that's what Bondy was.

He was just this otherworldly, larger than life and funny, funny guy with a really classic, wry Scottish humor. He was that funny Scott and there could be very serious Scotts, and he was both determined and serious, but always funny.

Golf's not going to happen.

So I basically started writing these stories down twenty years ago, and every time he and I would leave, of course, you know, I would turn and I go, you know, Bonnie, listen, you're a lot older than I am.

You're not gonna remember this stuff. So I'm going to write these things down.

And so i'd write down where we played, what was the match result, was any great holes, any funny things.

That happened, any funny things he said?

And it was usually funny things he said, not I and I just sat down and sort of wrote them down one time, just on a piece of paper, and i'd write them down as you know, as i'd fly home.

After matches or after you know wherever.

And I had them all and then obviously, you know, I left. You know, I spent some time sort of

That's that's what I learned. I was a terrible writer when I started. I learned if I make it short, brevity is an unbelievable skill that more people that give wedding speeches need to follow. Brevity greatest greatest trait in writing and in speeches.

I think you're right, you.

Know, as so, you know, as I looked at it, the writing was just fun and I wanted to have a blast writing this thing and just having a good time, and it was so I wrote the stories and I try to make them sort of fun and amusing stories, but also stories that would tell on several levels.

I wanted to tell the story of Bondie.

I wanted to tell the story of Angus Moyer, but most of all Bondie, because body is was that seminal character.

In my life.

He's the guy who made me the golfer I am. And I would say several people who've read the book now say, so that where you picked up all those tricks, like that's that's how you became the match player player you are, And so that's sort of the fun part. And I think that if I look at you know, how I wrote it.

It was for that. Then my second aspect was I wanted to give most of all American golfers a sense of what UK golf is all about and how they play what they do. And then I thought, look, there's a travelog aspect to it, and that's I don't want this to take place where he and I go play the same course over and over over again and I just tell those stories. I thought, let me go take you around the UK to a bunch of courses that a bunch of us haven't heard of and haven't played.

Topic, I gotta I got questions for that later.

Well, yeah, we're gonna remedy that one. But so I thought, okay, let me do that. And then as I was in there. I thought, Okay, how do I make sure that I actually show the difference of a links course, because they look from pictures the same, an Irish course, an English you know, Irish golf, English golf, and Scottish golf. And that's why I used Hemmy Mcinaley, Laddie Lucas and Joe Carr as my three sort of examples of what prototypical Irish, English and Scottish golf would be.

Yeah, let's drill into that a little bit. How would you, in short short, you know, classify each of them for the lay person that say, somebody that's ever been.

Okay, if you've never been, never been, if you're gonna go to any one of the three, So first and foremost, if you're gonna go to to any English club, take your coat and tie. Okay, make sure that you do not make the mistake of walking into the clubhouse in your golf shoes, with your baseball cap on and a pair of sunglasses on top of your by you know, fact,

Then, so there's a lot of there's a lot of extracurriculars involved before and.

After, and then they go out and they beat the crap out of each other in match play, and they either play you know as two balls in match plays, sometimes four balls and or all they play all red shots. And you go play, and you come in, you might have lunch, You shower, you put your coat and tie on, you have lunch, then you go back and put your golf clothes back on, and then go back out. And so you're sitting in a fancy dining room usually having

The Scottish clubs are a little more the Scottish, you.

Know, people are just a little more rough and tumble than the average English people.

And the character that I.

Talk about, Hammy mcinally is a guy who basically is, you know, he just wants to beat.

You, and he wants to have fun and he wants to wire as crack as he does it.

And Scotland, and I'd say Scotland golf would be it's still the same aspects.

It's still much more civilized.

It's still much more coat and tie, but at the same time it's very very open and very.

Public Friday, it's Friday, but still in an office atmosphere. Then Ireland is just flat out fun.

And in Ireland if you stop ten, you know, ten minutes before the course and ask where is Port martok golf club.

You will you you'll be late for your tea time.

If you have to get there within a half an hour, because they'll stop and go where are you from? And the next thing you know, you're just like, whoa, well, so would you know the Killarney so and so from there? Well they're from Killarney, but they originally came here. And the next thing you know, you're stopped. I mean I've stopped where people have said what do you think.

Of my horse? And I'm like, are you serious? And the next you know you're on their horse taking pictures.

And it's just Ireland is they just love life. And you know, I describe it one time in the golf.

They play golf fast, but it's definitely an hour slower than the Scottish golf because the Irish just can't stop talking in the middle of the rounds. They just talk.

They talk during before, after the swings, they just have fun and uh and it's just a good much more convivial atmosphere. I would say, course wise, the biggest difference. Ireland tends to have higher rough because he got more rain and it tends to get a little unruly. So I tend to like to play there in the spring or in the late fall once they've cut it back a little bit, because it's just the balls are you know, taking your with an angles andy, you can get a little tight sometimes.

I've read that they've kind of fallen victim to the of what happened in America with thick rough and narrow fairways a little bit and a lot of courses could stand to widen things out a little bit. This is just from what I've read, and you know, talk with people about let's Pusswell.

I'm a member. I'm lucky enough to be a member of Port Marnock and it's just the most amazing golf course.

I just love playing it.

But having said that, I went and played it before they held the broge M last year and I'm like, I've had enough of this course. You know. It's just like you know, and I consider myself a reasonable golfer, you know, four lost balls in I'm like, I've never i haven't lost four balls in a round and in a long time, and balls were just going into the rough and they're gone.

So it just all depends, you know, when they get a lot of rain.

If they don't cut things back, it can It can get pretty tough.

So that's that's sort of the fundamental difference of the three places.

Would you say that the the golf courses, the aesthetic style kind of mirrors the people too, Like where you on the you know, Iril, Irish side, you've got definitely the most rugged golf and kind of that would probably be a good way to you know, kind of bucket the the on the scale of the people. And then when you get to England, it's the neatest golf and the most formal. Would would would.

That kind of fit on a sliding scale?

You say that's I hadn't thought of it that way, but I think the courses would be you'd be more manicured, you'd have more of a of a manicured look in England on balance, and especially with the heathland courses west of London, you know, the whole, that whole, you know, London Heathland area, you know with Sunnydale, Saint George's Hill, Swinley Forests, they just have their beautifully manicured but they look very very natural. I mean, Harry Colt did an

And you know, they don't have a lot of mowing. They don't have a lot.

It's just very natural and you're out there playing and you know they've gotten the little wires around the greens. It's just it's it's just a little bit more of a natural get out there, go play and then get back and you know, go go find some respite from the elements.

In a way, it seems, you know, just from a casual onlooker, it seems like, you know, in this ties to your book and how you got involved, you know, into the game of golf. Was the Scotland just offers a much more informal version of the game than we.

See in America. Well it's from a variety of ways, but well, part.

Of its cost, part of it just the cost of playing the sport, you know, if you want to play, you know, I mean I follow the Friday you know, routinely, and you know, you if you look at the courses that you've described in the last let's call it fifteen days, how many of them are places that wouldn't cost somewhere around one hundred thousand dollars to join. You know, they might be sixty, they might be eighty, but it's real money. And then you have other ones that are a little

It's just it's just not much money to play. It's designed.

It's sort of like being a member of the public park, and so Scotland has that much more natural open and the person you're going to play with could be anybody.

It just so you're united.

By a love of golf, not by a commonality of what your profession is. Then happen to have a love of golf, and that's sort of a different aspect to it.

I'm curious this is just a question. I didn't think we'd approached.

But when you were working for Wilson, how did club sales compare in Scotland per say, per capita golfer of equipment spend there versus the US? Was it significantly less or about the same or do you know that?

Well? No, no, no, I know it quite well. Scotland's never been the kind of play if you want to go make money, Scotland's not your place to God's not the way to get it.

There's still people will still send me a nineteen fifty eight Dina power wedge and say, you know, can I get this thing regrips, you know, And I'm like, it doesn't make.

Grooves on it anymore. That's no longer a wedge. That could be a putter if you just straight it out.

So you know, at some point, you know, my biggest fear about my book is if one copy will make its way all the way around Scotland.

Everybody will read the same book and it'll be one book, and so I'll sell one.

So it's just you know, I had a friend who called me and goes, oh, yeah, I love the book.

I gave it to a friend and he gave it to a friend like no, no, no, no, no, no no, you're not supposed to do that.

I'm like, you're going to keep it tell him about it, and he's like, but then I wouldn't be letting the book, and.

I'm like, Okay, my publisher's not going to be terribly happy with this process.

You're supposed to tell people buy the book and take it with you on your next trip, so that way you can read.

It while you're there. Okay. So that was my little plug for buying more books.

Hopefully some people will be interested to buy it out. I've read it. I really enjoyed it. It was a you know, for me not going I haven't been there.

Well, okay, so if you touched on like three or four funny items there that are that are shocking and amazing. Number one, you know, as Bondie would say, we got we got our first set of clubs before we got our bike, Like you know, we and Americans sort of get a bike, you get a bike, you got trade bills.

Of just having fun doing it and playing it. That's that's number one. I think. The second aspect is, you know, we all grow up.

You know, one of the problems we have is a lack of time, and a lot of people will say, okay, if I only have a certain amount of time, I'm going to get over to Scotland. I might get two or three trips in my life over there, or over to the UK, over to Ireland. And if you look at it, they say, okay, well then if I'm gonna be there, I have to play the old course, I have to play you know, CARDUSSI, and they've got to

And now what you've got is there's a thing where people like playing golf that they then see on TV like it is. It enhances your viewing experience no matter what. If you're familiar with the golf course. But you know there's also drawbacks right.

Well, and and to me that's the wonderful aspect.

I think the biggest key is if you're going to Royal Dordic and you don't play Brora, you've just made a mistake. You've missed a real job. It's sort of like, you know, Andy, you do an amazing job of just talking about things like Cedar Rapids Country Club or you know something, Davenport Country Club. I wouldn't have gone there if you hadn't talked about it, Okay, And we're talking.

About world class golf courses.

And Brora is one of those world class golf courses that happens to be twenty seven minutes from the you know.

The first tea at Dorric.

To get up that close and that way and not play it, it's just crazy.

And when I had to.

Go to hit a moment like that last week I was in I was driving to Prairie Dunes from the New King Collins Course land Man, and I drove through On the way down, I had to drive through Lincoln and at that point was I drove through Lincoln, I realized I'm as close to the sand Hills of Nebraska as I can get.

Oh.

So, so then I went to Prairie Dude.

So in the back of my head, I said, I'm pretty close to Wildhorse and I really want to go see that place.

Now, granted it was five hours, but well, I can't get closer.

Well, and once once you're in Lincoln, Nebraska, Okay, first of all, you've just driven by Omaha Country Club, missed a great one. And then you say, okay, now four and a half miles from there, I could actually get to the turnoff where I turn right and I get up to Sand Hills and and Dismal River. So you've got like amazing courses. The problem is that's a long way away, and you're right, it is close. I look at these courses in Scotland and say, if you're going to.

Be at these places.

Bonnie and I were always like, let's go play all the fun places that we want to play, and you know, we were lucky enough to also work there so we were able to go play them after work. So I think that, you know, one of the crucial aspects for people is if you have enough time in your life and you have an opportunity to go play over in the UK play a whole bunch of these hidden gems. That's part of what the book has is I didn't just write it about the you know, the courses where

All right, So you give us a couple other off the beaten path ones.

You've got obviously, uh Brora, you've got Macrohonnish, McCree. What you know, if we if I was if I was going on you know my I was supposed to go to the UK this year, but that that obviously got derailed. But say I'm going where where should I be going, you know, my first trip over there? And what are some some courses that might not be road of courses that you absolutely cannot miss.

I know that's a massive question, is.

That that question is so massive, and all I'm going to do is screw up by not including a whole bunch of things.

Yeah exactly.

So, any I'm designed to get in trouble, I'm probably gonna bet kicked out of a whole bunch of accounts was I don't mention them, which is a real problem. So if we think about links golf, I think you first and foremost. It's an obligation if you're really gonna be serious about understanding links golf, to play some of the classics, you gotta go play the old course. You have to have played like a court Carnoustie, I think

It's not little.

It's a world class golf course that's right near Royal Truon and you can play it. You're there, you're in the course, you know people. Now North Barrick is no longer a hidden gem. It's it probably was a hidden gem twenty years ago. There's nobody out there who cares about architecture, who hasn't seen it or fantasized about playing the pit or you know some of those holes, and who talks about the radan.

So I can't call that a hidden gem.

But I'd say if you're going to go to that area, you play Mirfield, which is just a top fifteen course in the world without question. Then you play North Barrack, which is another top course in the world. Then you probably should play Gullen number one, number two, you probably should play number three, then you play Dunbar and then if you can get on I'm joking Luffnut's new and obviously you know chapter twelve discusses playing leftist do or

You know you got to play those. To be this is a you sort of almost had to view it in chunks.

Yeah, it's a you know what you're talking about, mirrors a lot what happens in America with the lists. You know where this of course on the list. And to be you know, I'm lucky. I get to play a

Even if it's not an alysty, you go, if it stinks whatever, you know.

Well you've invested thirteen thirteen bucks.

In America you invested four, you know, four hours, and in Scotland you've invested three.

So it's just it's just.

Not that much I mean, you know, you Andy, you have talked about Lost Sonia, Lynx or you know, places like this.

I wouldn't have gone to Los.

Sonia Links, you know, other than you know, golf magazine and panel. I'm being a golf magazine paylist, but it's I would have naturally just gravitated there. I start reading about it, I'm like, I gotta go try it. I go out and play it, and I'm like, holy crap, this back nine is world class. You know, there's some amazing golf holes there, and.

So well, the more the more time you spend there, you start to you start to think that the front nine might be better than the back nine.

And that's the crazy thing.

I I think. I probably I can certainly say, you know holes.

You know, we we're not going to get into a specific debate on the poles two, three, four, five, but I think that, you know, the approach shot on number two is like one of those I fantasized about hitting it right now, and and so I'm like, gosh, I like hitting it down, and I know it's got a left right and the back to front slant, you know, slant, et cetera.

And I think I three putted.

But it's just, you know, as we think about these great golf courses, I look at Scotland and say, the amazing thing is there are a hundred courses in Scotland. You could drop me on right now and say go play for the next three hours in a mash fan Andy and go have a blast, and we'd have a blast, and we'd find great parts of them because a whole bunch of these courses were built so naturally and they use the land and they're just different and names we

Are you?

And I said, and Sultan, and he's like, how about Row West, you know, Devon And I'm like yes, And so we would go play three or four of these courses and just and you walk away and go. If that course were twenty five miles from New York City, you wouldn't be able to get on it.

It would be a.

Private course, and it would be one of the most coveted courses anywhere, and yet it's sitting out there in the middle of nowhere.

I think about that all the time whenever I play in a golf course. I'm like, God, imagine if this was around Chicago, because like Chicago is like the great desert of public golf. Like, you know, we have a few courses, but for the most part, like you put something in Chicago that's like, you know, a really great public course or something from scott it's just like God that that place would charge two hundred and.

Fifty dollars and you'd never be able to get a tea time, and you would able.

To get a tea time.

It would just be the place that everybody talks about and I look at it and say, okay, or from another less, if it were a private course on the north shore of Chicago, you wouldn't be able to get in. Yeah, you'd now be looking at it going that course is that good? It's just sitting in a remote location or somewhere else. And I think that in the UK. You know, I received an email today from somebody from Warpleston Golf Club and it was.

Old Willie Park.

It's an old Willie Park course and it's where Joyce weather Ed won like strings of Mitch mixed porcels, you know, where you're playing all reight shot male female and you know she's obviously the best female player, and she won it with her husband and a bunch of other players like seven or eight times in a row.

But I was like, it's just like one of these amazing courses.

And yet we only talk about five or six courses west of London, but there are probably sixty that would be considered shockingly great if they were sitting right near New York City.

Yeah.

One I fancy is a broadcaster.

Brancaster.

So Bonnie and I played a match in Brancaster and the moat the actual we played it, and we were a little bit slow, and the water came in and the moat was broken, so we got stuck on the wrong side of the gate, which is actually the right side of the gate, so we had to miss our meetings and we just said, okay, we're here, let's go

So so with uh, you got one trip left, So you have one trip left?

Where are you going where that region?

That is flat out not fair. I don't think I can answer it. There's no chance, there's no way. I refuse to acknowledge that I got one trip left. I'm not going to do it.

I well, let's just say where it's. It's your last trip.

You you've done, You've hit everything up in the last five years.

What's the place you're going back to?

Is?

Do you want me to go to Links Golf for you?

I mean it's up to you. You're you're you're a pecond Oh well, okay, I'm.

First of all, I haven't been in New Zealand for a while, so I'm going back to play Tara eighty Golf Club.

Okay, that's that's basically heaven or.

So if I'm going to get stuck on one last trip and get me stuck there for the rest of my life or for eternity, I'm taking Tara Edie. If you haven't played it, it's it's a dope masterpiece, just built. Everything is natural andy in the world of It's a Lynx course with just.

More hospitable climate. So it's sort of like the winter.

Weather is like maybe Sea Island or something, and the summer weather is like Maine, and it's a Lynx course and it plays like a Las course one hundred percent. You're bumping and running and everything else. So that would be my place if I heard.

New Zealand described as basically California with the tenth of the population.

So it's just wonderful.

Uh it's I think it's bigger than California, and it's it's yeah, that's exactly right. And it's just a it's a combination of mountains and vineyards and beautiful English countryside and volcanic rocks off the side, and then insanely nice people. I mean, these people are they're so nice. You think they're you know, coming a big city, you think they're actually out to fleece you. At first you're like, ye't be that nice, okay, and then they are, Okay, they're actually that nice.

So to me, New Zealand is the place where you want to be.

By the way, when you're in New Zealand, there are no poisonous snakes, there are no big animals, there's nothing. It's not like Australia where no coronavirus either. They well they got rid of it. They were they're they're they're actually able to follow rules. Like when the government says everybody shut up and go sit in your room for you know, for three weeks, they just do it.

And three weeks later they all come out and they're like, is it gone?

Yeah, it's gone, okay, and you know, and so they just behave differently. And so they're all out playing golf and they're with each other. They don't have masks on anymore because they don't need masks.

But it's because they don't.

They don't have snakes either.

They don't have snakes either because they don't let them in.

Now, yeah, they were a bunch of rule abiding people who when the ships went from England, you know, all the hard chargers said we're going to America.

Okay. You know, everybody was like, I want to go make my way. I want to go to America. They went and did it.

Then a bunch of ships said, okay, you're a bunch of detainees. You know, you're you're in prisons of some sort. You're going to Australia. And so it's a rough and tumble place, it's a prison colony. And then there was this little group that went off to New Zealand and said, don't tell anybody about it. It's just this wonderful place. Let's be quiet and let's just be really really nice. So that's that's that's where my trip is but back to one for the memory Banks and UH and Scotland

One else there and you could just you could just go around and around.

You can just keep auto looping and you know, we were playing somewhere between forty five and fifty four a day. And as you know, I I tried to par whole number one at Macrohanash, which is probably one of the best holes in the world. Then to me after that, I'd love to go back to Wales and play Southerness. It was just a dream trip where my ancestors are from.

I did a bunch of research on it Ian Wusom and I'm enthralled the people of Wales. They seem like the best.

They're they're they're just very natural, very call it, you know, just just call it as it is. They're very straightforward. The golf courses of Wales are phenomenal. And if you if you only can play one course in Wales, go to Pinard.

Hm, it's now, I I know.

They pour crawl, people are going to be all over you.

No, no, no, no, no role fourth call is is just the class of Wales in terms of the best golf course. I'm just saying, if you can only play one time, if you go to Pinard, You're just gonna be shocked at just how natural it is.

Great advice, go go play Pinard rather than you know potential open course.

Well, okay, and I don't mean to say don't play Fourth Call.

No, but if you have one, see, but that's a good this good piece of advice.

You forced me into one course.

And but I would go play Tend, I'd go play Fourth Call, I'd go.

Play Southern Down.

They're all amazing, amazing golf courses, and so I just love being there. And you know, to me that whole tip and then then you just slip right around the coast. You've got a bunch of great ones on on the West coast. There are one hundred great golf courses to play. And obviously Bondie and Angus and I had a great match at Royal County Down, and you know, Port Marnick is another one that I want to go play again.

Port Rush was amazing. So to me, I can't make one final trip.

I know. That's an incredibly long answer and I was absolutely evasive there.

Sorry, that's that's uh, that's good. That's so.

We've talked a lot about your book. Where can people purchase your book?

The book is available on Amazon. It's called One for the Memory Banks, and it's not about me. It's essentially about the people who taught me how to play, and.

It's it's I don't know how you describe it, Andy, would.

You say sort of a part travelogue, part human interest.

I think I think there's a it's a it's like a you've got the the friendship story and and golf like. It's gonna pull on numerous bones in your golf body. It's gonna pull on your interest in discovering courses and learning about courses. But then it also has the story to go with it. That's gonna keep your interest. And really, uh, you know, even it pulls, it pull up some emotions, maybe, I hope Well.

If if, if it doesn't pull your emotions to the end, you're human being.

Okay, that's uh, you know, I'm sorry.

Uh hey, I just didn't want people to feel bad if it didn't.

No, no, no, no.

But I think you're gonna laugh. You're gonna laugh for eighteen chapters and then you're gonna cry. And you know, one of my one of my good friends called me back, and he's a surgeon, and uh, he said, I laughed out loud chapter after chapter after chapter, and I said, and did you cry it all?

And he goes, no, I'm a doctor. And I said what and he said, I get sad about dogs or horses or things like that. I was like, oh my god, I don't want you handling me.

He goes, no, you want me handling you because I can be you know there, So I think, you know, this is it's a human interest story. But it's it's absolutely something that I think will be a book that you hopefully will read a couple of times and make you want to go play these courses and that that to me was one of my big missions and play these courses in the kind of style and realize that we just had a lot of fun and.

Frankly, we're lucky.

You know.

It's just a and I think it's a it's a wise ass book.

So it's definitely I don't think I think there's at least one course when I'm not getting in if I don't think they'll want me as a member after I described way.

But that's okay, Hey you know their loss.

Uh well I can say that. But so it's available at either the Memory banks dot Com or on Amazon. Either ones available, and uh, frankly, you know, I'm just uh, I'm thrilled to have gotten out. I'm thrilled at the early response to it so far that the publisher has just gone to a second printing.

Oh wow, so he had a congratulation.

Thank you.

We've had a whole bunch of people who've bought like one and then bought five more and said, I'm setting it out to my friends. I want them to to get this one or I want to start planning a golf trip with them. So that's it's been. It's been sort of fun there. And uh, you know, I'm I'm just I'm enjoying this journey, in this ride, and I've had had I've been blessed in my my career, so I had a chance to write this all.

Right, Well, thanks so much for coming on, Luke, and uh, I look forward to everybody reading your book. And you know, baby, we'll have a part two when I finally get over there.

Andy, you are more than welcome, and uh, you will you know where to go, you know how to reach out to me, and I will gladly take you around a bunch of these places and actually experience play some matches. Well we can, we can play some matches. I'm not sure I could play against you. I think you're a little better golfer.

That's what handicaps this for. I stink. Now, Okay, I'm the worst I fed in a lot of time.

I'm I'm sort of that, like, you know, I think in the u K probably be a five. In the US, I'm like a three, And I'm like, I don't know how if somebody is calling me a three, it's it's it's not right. So I I'll go with my UK five handicap and play.

But then they only go three quarters difference to the handicap, so it's done. All right.

Thanks, I've got new technology.

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