- 4 hours of golf practice every day after school sold out
Established a personal relationship with the owner of the golf driving range
Extreme training was hard, but I got through it with my stamina.
If only golf wasn’t viewed negatively…
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I played for 4 hours from 8pm to midnight without stopping. The only light was a faint fluorescent light, so the ball was not even visible. I just relied on feeling. As four months passed, my golf skills improved significantly.
Golf was not a sport where you hit the ball far. The teacher dug a small hole on one side of the school’s tennis court, buried a bucket full of tennis balls, and called it a ‘hole.’ He then had us practice ‘putting’, rolling the ball into the hole. Golf was a sport where people competed to see who could put the ball into the hole first. Looking back, it was the full-fledged beginning of Choi Kyung-ju’s life. This is God’s amazing guidance. I fell in love with golf as if I was possessed by something. I devoted myself to practice without missing a single day.
After practicing putting at the tennis court, I went to the golf driving range on the hill. At the time, it was unthinkable to receive guidance from a professional golfer. Kang-rae Chu, the owner of the practice range, provided guidance, but he was also a beginner. The owner, who was as passionate about golf as any other professional golfer, invited a golfer with whom he was a personal friend and gave a special lecture. When even that was difficult, I practiced by looking at a textbook that explained Jack Nicklaus’ golf lessons with pictures.
As time passed, the president and the golf club students became ‘master and student.’ I followed the boss and called him master. The training given by the master was not easy. Every day, after second period class, I ran straight to the practice field. The training routine was like this. I did golf gymnastics, practiced swing and putting, and did physical training.
I practiced swinging by burying a waste tire in the ground with only the head slightly sticking out and hitting it with a metal pipe. A practice club was made by attaching an iron ball to the end of an iron water pipe. Since the shampipe was so heavy, I had no choice but to naturally use the rotation of my waist to hit it. Compared to this, golf clubs were no different from plastic toys. Thanks to this, I was able to learn a flexible yet strong swing.
After swing practice, I did physical training by crawling down from the practice range on the hill to the mill intersection 200 meters down and duck walking up. The slope was gentle at 30 to 50 degrees and then steeper, but I had extraordinary lower body strength, so I climbed up while pushing my friends who were having a hard time behind me.
Putting was practiced using a machine specially made by the teacher. I made a long metal exercise machine that was about 1cm wider than the putter head and practiced rolling the ball inside it. If you didn’t hit the putter straight, the head would hit the metal frame and make a sound. If I didn’t concentrate on practice and made a sound, I would often get scolded by the teacher. It was the training the golf club hated the most because each person had to roll the ball 200 times before they could rest.
At this time, I would like to talk about my thoughts on golf. The sport of golf has many contributions to society. Personally, I think golf is the best among individual sports to promote Korea, excluding the World Cup and Olympics. In Korean society, there is a strong perception that golf is a luxury sport, but I hope it is not viewed only negatively. You should never think like that. I would like to praise sports diplomacy through golf at least once.
Summary = Reporter Yoo Kyung-jin ykj@kmib.co.kr
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2024-12-08 18:10:00