Why You Should Walk The Golf Course
The benefits go beyond playing better
Before we begin, just wanted to say thanks for all who are newly subscribed. The Scoring Letter has risen to #85 in the sports category on Substack. Pretty cool.
I guess people enjoy learning to score more than they enjoy hearing about another club shallowing drill…
Today’s post is going to be about why I think all golfers should be WALKING the course - if they’re able…
Before I make the case for walking, let me be clear: I’m not saying you should never ride. Some courses genuinely aren’t designed to be walked. There are layouts with massive gaps between holes, or brutal elevation changes, or just weird routing that would turn a normal round into an exhausting slog. And obviously, if you’re dealing with an injury or you’re older and walking 18 just isn’t realistic anymore, then none of this applies to you.
But for most golfers, on most days, at most courses? Walking is by far the better choice. And I don’t just mean in some romantic “this is how the game was meant to be played” kind of way. I mean it actually helps you play better golf.
You See the Course Differently
When you walk, you pick up on things you’d never notice from a cart.
You feel the ground beneath your feet. You start to sense whether the fairway is sloping left or right before you even get to your ball. You notice firmness or softness in the turf. You notice elevation changes that don’t show up on your GPS. And maybe most importantly, you develop this intuitive sense of distance because your brain connects how far you just hit a shot with how long it actually took you to walk there.
All of that feeds into better decision-making. You start making smarter choices about club selection, about where to aim, about what the hole is actually asking you to do. It’s not dramatic. It’s subtle. But it adds up.
When you ride, you miss most of that. You drive straight to your ball, hop out, and immediately start thinking about the next shot. There’s no time to absorb the information the course is giving you. And so you miss little details that could’ve helped you make a better decision.
And if you’re an amateur trying to score lower, every little detail can be used to your advantage.
Walking Gives You Time to Think
Golf requires thought. That’s just part of the game, whether we like it or not.
And walking naturally creates the space you need to think clearly between shots. That 2-3 minute walk to your ball gives you time to process what just happened and plan what comes next. It allows you to ask yourself the correct questions. Such as “Where’s the smart miss?” “Am I in a position to be aggressive?” Or “Why am I even playing this sport? I suck at it”.
Instead of reacting on autopilot, you’re making actual decisions.
Riding compresses everything. You’re moving quickly from shot to shot, and there’s less natural buffer between one swing and the next. It’s not that you can’t think in a cart, but the rhythm is quicker. It’s easy to get rushy, and that leads to dumb decisions.
