Forethoughts: Is This How We Roll?

Time was, whenever I traveled out of state and mentioned I was from Colorado, people would ask if I skied. Now they ask if I smoke marijuana.

I do ski. I don’t smoke, but I am guardedly optimistic that Colorado has pioneered a tightly regulated budding industry that’s spawning jobs, new tax revenue and tourism.

In my world, pot describes a bunker, not a substance you light up once out of view of the clubhouse. Smoking pot is technically still illegal on public courses, but privately owned facilities can make their own rules—or just let people go on doing what they’ve always done.

There’s no denying golf has long had a stoner subculture. We’ve all known someone who likes the occasional toke between shots and have even read news reports about professional golfers who partake. My partner in a recent pro-am told me some of his former Canadian Tour colleagues often hid joints in the shafts of their clubs—that is, until one hit a bad shot and snapped his driver over his knee, spilling its contents across the fairway.

You’d think a course filled with stoned golfers would make the game even slower. But as many of you probably saw in the current issue of Golf Digest, on-course pot-smoking “does not generally make it onto the list of things people complain about” according to a spokesman from Denver’s Parks & Recreation. City Park, one of Denver’s seven courses, annually hosts The Clinic Charity Classic, a tournament staged by a dispensary that last August raised $40,000 for Multiple Sclerosis research.

The conservative part of me believes golf courses, like the best fairways and greens, should remain weed-free. But then I wonder, is the “wakeand- bake” guy any different than the “double-Bloody-Mary-for-breakfast” guy? To the golf course that sells the Bloody Marys, he is. But would we ever really see cannabis-infused candies sold in golf shops alongside energy bars, mixed drinks and Macanudos? And what about second-hand smoke? Breathing in your cart-mate’s boozy belches may be nauseating, but it’s not potentially intoxicating.

I’ve said before that the only change I like in golf is the coin marking my ball. But change is part of the game. You see it in distance-seeking smartphone apps that have replaced the rangefinders that replaced the sprinkler heads. You see it in players cranking tunes in the golf carts that replaced the caddies. You see it in grow-the-game experiments like the 15- inch cups advocated by TaylorMade CEO Mark King. You see it on private club members now wearing denim—and caps!—inside clubhouses.

Will we see change in the widespread acceptance of marijuana on golf courses? Probably not. But does it really matter? When it comes to pot, tobacco, liquor or any other controlled legal substance, golfers need to exercise moderation and discretion, particularly when in the presence of the next generation of players.

Who knows, maybe when those kids grow up and say they’re from Colorado, people won’t ask if they’re skiers or smokers. They’ll ask if they’re golfers. Now that would be a change I’d embrace.

Colorado AvidGolfer is the state’s leading resource for golf and the lifestyle that surrounds it. It publishes eight issues annually and proudly delivers daily content via www.coloradoavidgolfer.com.

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