Welcome to The Golf Scene — Golf, Explained Differently.

If this is your first issue, welcome.
If you’ve been following along, thanks — I appreciate it.

This week Dr. Bogie investigates an unexpected outbreak of winter, an astronaut comes face-to-face with a moose, and we explore one of golf’s less conventional learning methods: accidentally becoming competent.

And somewhere in there, we may even help you hit a few better shots.

Let’s get into it.

In This Issue:

A Dr. Bogie Detective Story: The Day of the Snowman

The Mapping Years: The Astronaut and the Moose

Swing Insight: Stumble Into Competence

The temperature was 27 degrees Celsius. About 82°F.

There wasn’t a cloud in the sky.

And yet, by the seventh hole, snowmen were appearing everywhere.

The first one showed up on the third hole, a short par four that had never previously been considered dangerous. There was no water. No out-of-bounds. No particularly deep rough. Just a fairway, a green, and several perfectly reasonable opportunities to complete the hole without involving mathematics normally reserved for amortization schedules.

The golfer hit his tee shot into the right trees.

His second shot struck a branch and travelled farther backward than forward.

His third escaped the forest but crossed the fairway and entered the rough on the opposite side.

His fourth found a bunker.

His fifth remained in the bunker.

His sixth left the bunker with considerably more enthusiasm than accuracy.

Two putts later, the first snowman had arrived.

An eight.

At first, nobody was concerned.

One snowman can happen to anyone.

It may appear without warning after a poor decision, an ambitious recovery shot, or the sudden belief that a golfer who cannot reliably hit a seven-iron from the fairway should attempt to curve one around a tree.

The score was recorded.

The group moved on.

But on the fifth hole, another one appeared.

This time, the golfer’s drive travelled only a short distance before disappearing into long grass. A provisional ball was struck, followed by another provisional ball when the first provisional began showing many of the same qualities as the original.

There was a search.

There was a debate.

There was an accounting process.

By the time the hole was completed, nobody was entirely certain which ball had been played, how many strokes had been taken, or whether the golfer had performed a séance on his nine iron.

Another eight was written on the card.

The weather remained warm.

The snowmen continued.

By the seventh hole, the playing partners realized they were no longer dealing with isolated incidents.

They contacted Dr. Bogie.

Dr. Bogie arrived at the scene carrying a notebook, a magnifying glass, and the calm expression of a man who had seen golf at its worst and still believed it capable of further decline.

He examined the scorecard.

“Where did the first one appear?” he asked.

“The third hole.”

“And the second?”

“The fifth.”

Dr. Bogie studied the numbers carefully.

“And this one on the seventh?”

“It may still be happening.”

In the distance, the golfer could be seen standing behind a tree, holding a five-iron and staring through a gap approximately three inches wide.

Dr. Bogie closed his notebook.

“We need to get over there immediately.”

They arrived just as the golfer began explaining the shot.

“If I keep it low, start it left of the trunk, cut it around the branches and get a little bounce off the cart path, it should run up near the green.”

Dr. Bogie looked toward the green.

It was 190 yards away.

Behind a pond.

“Have you ever played that shot before?” he asked.

“No.”

“Have you ever practised it?”

“No.”

“Can you normally curve a five-iron on command?”

“No.”

Dr. Bogie nodded.

“The snowman is already here.”

The golfer attempted the shot.

The ball struck the tree.

The tree remained unharmed.

The investigation continued.

Dr. Bogie interviewed the witnesses separately.

One playing partner reported that the golfer had announced on the first tee that he had recently discovered something important about his swing.

Another recalled hearing the words, “I watched a video last night.”

A third witness claimed the golfer had spent most of the round trying to keep his left arm straight, rotate his hips, shallow the club, hold the angle, release the clubhead and remain perfectly still.

All at the same time.

Dr. Bogie wrote this down.

“Was he doing any of those things before today?”

“No.”

“Did he hit the ball better before making the changes?”

“Yes.”

“Did anyone try to stop him?”

“We thought he knew what he was doing.”

Dr. Bogie looked up slowly.

“They always do.”

The evidence was becoming difficult to ignore.

The snowmen were not appearing randomly.

They were being built.

One poor decision at a time.

A rushed tee shot formed the base.

An unnecessary swing thought created the middle.

A heroic recovery attempt completed the body.

Penalty strokes were used for the buttons.

Three-putts provided the hat.

By the eleventh hole, the scorecard resembled a winter carnival.

There were eights on par threes.

Eights on par fours.

Eights on holes where an eight should have required considerable planning.

Dr. Bogie gathered the group beside the twelfth tee.

“I believe we are dealing with a full outbreak,” he said.

“What can we do?”

“First, he must stop trying to fix his swing during the round.”

The golfer objected.

“But I’m very close.”

Dr. Bogie ignored him.

“Second, no more recovery shots that require the ball to pass through solid objects.”

The golfer lowered his five-iron.

“Third, when trouble appears, take the shortest route back to safety.”

“That could cost me a stroke.”

Dr. Bogie pointed toward the scorecard.

“You are currently losing them in groups.”

The treatment began immediately.

The golfer returned to using one simple swing thought.

He aimed away from trouble.

When his ball entered the trees, he chipped sideways into the fairway instead of attempting to recreate a shot last seen during a televised tournament by a golfer whose name was embroidered on his golf bag.

Progress was slow.

But by the fifteenth hole, the snowmen had stopped appearing.

A seven was recorded.

It was not celebrated publicly, but several members of the group exchanged relieved glances.

On the sixteenth, the golfer made six.

On the seventeenth, five.

Then came the eighteenth.

A straightforward par four.

The golfer found the fairway.

His second shot reached the front of the green.

His first putt stopped three feet from the hole.

Dr. Bogie watched from beside the scorecard.

The golfer stood over the putt, made a quality stroke, and watched as the ball dropped into the hole.

A par.

Dr. Bogie smiled.

His intervention had been a success.

The snowmen began to melt.

Sanity prevailed.

Decent golf shots returned.

No miracle recoveries were attempted.

The exorcism equipment was quietly packed away.

The temperature was still 27 degrees.

There wasn’t a cloud in the sky.

And winter had finally left the property.

The investigation, however, remains ongoing.

A new snowman had just appeared three holes behind them.

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I mapped more than 1,000 golf courses across Canada for GPS over a six-year period.

During that time, I had a tremendous number of unusual experiences.

This was one of them.

I looked out the window of my hotel room in Moncton, New Brunswick, at five o’clock in the morning.

It was pouring rain.

And not just ordinary rain.

This was the kind of rain that makes you wonder whether Noah might have been onto something.

No matter.

The golf course had to be mapped that morning because, when I was finished, I needed to leave Moncton and drive another two hours to the next one.

So I had some coffee and a quick breakfast, gathered my mapping equipment, computers, charging systems and suitcase, and headed for the car.

I drove out of Moncton, crossed to the west side of the Petitcodiac River and headed south toward the Hopewell Rocks. The golf course was located roughly ten kilometres before the famous Flowerpot Rocks.

I arrived at about seven o’clock.

There was one other car in the parking lot.

That was not encouraging.

Fortunately, I was already wearing my rain suit because it was still absolutely teeming down, and I managed to get inside the clubhouse without becoming completely amphibious.

There was one staff member there.

I explained who I was and that I had arrived to map the golf course for GPS.

He explained that the forecast called for this kind of rain all day, so the golf course would remain closed.

There were no other staff members on the property.

He would be leaving in about an hour.

Which meant that, once he left, I would be the only person on the entire golf course.

If anything went sideways, I was on my own.

Fair enough.

It wouldn’t have been the first time.

He gave me some scorecards, a course layout, the key to a power cart and a brief explanation of what to expect once I got out there.

The rain eventually eased enough that you probably only needed a small rowboat, so I prepared to head out.

Before leaving, I put on waterproof boots, my waterproof rain suit, pulled the hood tightly around my face and put a baseball cap over everything to keep some of the rain out of my eyes.

Then came the GPS backpack.

It had wires running in various directions and a pole sticking roughly two feet above my head with a round GPS antenna on top.

Add a scuba tank and a tinted visor and I could easily have been mistaken for an astronaut.

An astronaut whose mission was apparently to measure golf greens in New Brunswick during a flood.

I climbed into the power cart.

And when I say climbed in, there was a technique involved.

Because of the backpack, I couldn't actually sit behind the steering wheel.

So I drove from the passenger seat.

My left hand steered. My left foot operated the gas and brake. And sitting on the right side kept the antenna outside the cart roof where it could communicate with the satellites.

It was not covered in the power-cart owner's manual.

Believe it or not, I drove more than 18,000 golf holes that way.

The front nine went surprisingly smoothly.

Wet.

Cold.

Dark.

But smooth.

Then came the back nine.

On the tenth hole I had to cross a small river that was moving considerably faster than usual, thanks to the rain.

No problem, even though the water had risen to the level of the bridge.

I crossed it, parked the cart near the green, got out, mapped the perimeter and returned to the cart to draw the shape of the hole and green in my notebook.

Then I headed toward the eleventh tee.

The clubhouse attendant had warned me that it was a fairly long trip from the tenth green to the eleventh tee.

He was right.

I would guess it was about 150 yards through dense forest, with steep hills, sharp turns and a gravel cart path made somewhat more entertaining by the fact that the brakes caused the cart to slide.

Up one hill.

Down another.

Hard turn.

More trees.

Another hill.

And then, as I crested one particularly steep rise, there it was.

Standing directly in the middle of the cart path.

Facing me.

Maybe forty feet away.

A moose.

A very large moose.

Now, I don’t know whether you have ever seen a moose up close.

They are enormous.

And I don’t mean enormous in a Shaquille O’Neal sort of way.

I mean enormous in a front-of-a-bus sort of way.

I hit the brakes.

The cart slid slightly on the gravel and stopped.

The moose didn’t move.

Neither did I.

I quickly looked to both sides of the cart path for some kind of escape route.

There wasn’t one.

The forest was too thick.

Going sideways was impossible.

Behind me was the steep hill I had just climbed, which I had absolutely no interest in attempting backwards while being pursued by something the size of municipal transit.

So my choices were relatively simple.

Forward.

Backward.

Or sit there dressed like an astronaut and hope the moose had somewhere else to be.

What struck me was that the moose and I appeared to be the only two beings on the entire golf course.

Both of us were standing in the rain.

Both of us were a long way from home.

And both of us appeared to be wondering what the other one was doing there.

It became a genuine Moncton standoff.

I stared at the moose.

The moose stared at me.

Neither of us moved.

This probably went on for two minutes, although when you are sitting forty feet from a moose with no escape route, two minutes has a tendency to feel considerably longer.

Eventually I decided that one of us was going to have to do something.

The advantage I had was that the power cart was gas powered.

It made noise.

Quite a bit of noise if you encouraged it.

So I revved the engine slightly and began creeping forward.

The moose stayed exactly where it was.

I moved a little closer.

Still nothing.

Closer.

Nothing.

At about twenty feet, the moose finally began to move.

Backward.

Slowly.

At almost exactly the same speed I was moving forward.

For a while, we travelled down the cart path maintaining a very polite twenty-foot buffer zone between us.

This gave me more time than I really needed to study a moose at close range.

And I came to another conclusion.

They may be among the homeliest creatures on Earth.

Eventually the moose turned around and began walking in the same direction I was driving.

Then it picked up speed.

Then it started running.

That was an enormous relief.

The moose disappeared up the cart path.

I arrived at the eleventh tee.

And then I remembered something.

I still had to map the golf course.

Which meant getting out of the cart.

I walked the perimeter of the tee deck, got back in, drove toward the green and realized I had completely lost sight of the moose.

I had no idea where it had gone.

This became slightly more concerning when I reached the green and once again had to leave the relative security of the power cart and walk around the perimeter of the green wearing my GPS backpack.

For the first ten holes, my primary concern had been collecting accurate GPS data.

That priority had now changed.

I mapped the green with one eye looking forward, one looking left, one looking right and another checking somewhere behind me.

Apparently fear had temporarily provided me with additional eyesight.

My concern was simple.

The moose might be standing somewhere in the trees watching me.

And if it decided to charge while I was walking around the green wearing twenty pounds of electronics and a two-foot antenna, that would be bad.

Considerably worse than a triple bogey.

As it turned out, I never saw the moose again.

I have no idea where it went.

I hope it eventually found whatever it had been looking for, or at least shelter from the rain.

For the remainder of the round, however, I became considerably more interested in my surroundings.

The golf course was empty.

But I no longer assumed I was alone.

Eventually I finished the eighteenth hole, drove back to the clubhouse and packed all my equipment into the car.

Only then did I notice something I hadn’t paid much attention to when I arrived.

There was a For Sale sign on the building.

The golf course was on the market.

And here is the truly ridiculous part of the story.

Sometime later, I put in an offer to buy it.

The offer was accepted.

But that is a story for another day.

Most issues contain at least one thing intended to help your golf game.

Below is this week’s version, which discusses the way many people stumble around in the dark yet somehow find some competence, or not.

There are many ways to build a golf swing.

You can understand what you are trying to do.

You can work on it systematically.

You can practise with purpose.

Or you can close your eyes, dump several hundred LEGO pieces onto the floor, wave your hands around for a while and hope that when you open them there is a castle.

This is approximately how many golfers now build a swing.

A little YouTube.

Two scoops of TikTok.

A generous helping of Instagram.

Add one slow-motion Tour swing, three conflicting grip tips, something about shallowing, a reminder to rotate harder, another reminder not to rotate too hard, and one man filming himself beside a driving range basket who appears extremely confident.

Blend thoroughly.

And occasionally, something magical happens.

The golfer hits it beautifully.

Not once.

Several times.

There is a moment of stunned silence.

Could this be it?

Have years of searching finally paid off?

Has the perfect combination of ingredients somehow been discovered?

Quite possibly.

Until Tuesday.

Tuesday is when Chaos arrives.

The little draw disappears.

The driver begins travelling to parts of the golf course previously accessible only by maintenance vehicles.

The seven-iron now has two distances.

And the swing thought that produced absolute enlightenment on Saturday appears to have no recollection of ever meeting you.

Never mind.

Back to the laboratory.

The chemistry set comes out again.

Perhaps the problem was the quantity of shallowing.

Maybe we need slightly less hip turn and considerably more ground force.

Perhaps the wrists need to do something they were specifically told not to do last Thursday.

Another video is found.

Another ingredient added.

Another breakthrough appears.

And for approximately 48 hours, competence has once again been stumbled into.

This is the great dream of internet golf instruction:

That if you collect enough parts from enough places, eventually probability will take over.

Give a thousand monkeys a thousand typewriters and, eventually, one of them may produce Shakespeare.

Give a golfer enough TikTok swing tips and, eventually, one of them may produce a seven-iron that flies straight.

Unfortunately, neither monkey nor golfer necessarily knows how it happened.

And that is the problem.

A good golf swing is not a collection of interesting parts.

It is a system.

The pieces have to belong together.

Know what you're trying to change.

Know why you're changing it.

And know how you'll tell whether it actually worked.

Because accidentally finding something that works is not the same as understanding why it works.

And if you don't know why it worked...

Tuesday is coming.

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How to make a snowman when the temperature is 27 degrees celsius.

That astronauts and moose apparently have right-of-way negotiations.

And that competence can occasionally be achieved without anyone understanding how it happened.

And please...

If you've ever seen a moose up close and personal, you already know they weren't assembled by the same design team responsible for kittens and bunnies.

If you found this useful, or at least mildly entertaining, feel free to share it with:

a friend

a playing partner

or someone who loves a good Dr. Bogie detective story.

And if you're looking to take your game a step further...

👉 I'd be happy to help — in person or online.

David Govan
PGA of Canada Professional

Golf Excellence Academy
Modern Golf Instruction

Creator of the 5C Golf Performance System
👉 GolfExcellence.ca

P.S. Issue #21 is currently somewhere between careful editorial planning and three ideas we haven't thought of yet.

Beyond that, the editorial strategy remains remarkably similar to my golf game:

We have a general direction, but the exact landing area is still unknown.