Gimme? No thanks – they should be banned
6. The quick rake
You’ve missed your 12-footer for par and you then scoop your ball up as you don’t fancy what you’ve left yourself coming back. No eye contact is ever made, the ball and putter departing into the sunset in one well-oiled motion and the next time anyone speaks might be the next tee.
It’s all part of the plan. There will be a lot of huffing and puffing in the charade and some affected face pulling as the seeming injustice of the first putt slipping by is seemingly enough for you to play god and just decide for yourself that you’re done here.
Sorry, not good enough, you’re a cheat.
7. The master tacticians
Ever since time began we’ve all been fed this nonsense that someone might give an early three-footer but then “have a look at one” towards the business end of things.
This, we’re told, is the epitome of brilliant mind games. They won’t have had a single putt from this range and then you strike, swooping like Mike Brearley in his heyday, with your masterstroke.
An alternative view is that gimmes in golf just make everyone feel awkward so you just give an early one so you carry on nicely with your conversation about schools, Holly Willoughby, and Brexit.
Then there are no hard feelings until you look the other way at the 16th when you quickly transform into the devil incarnate.
8. ‘Did I say that was good?’
We’re only six weeks into the new season and we’ve already had our fill of silly rules infringements. Think gimme and your mind might switch to the 2015 Solheim Cup where Alison Lee picked her ball up thinking that her 18-inch putt had been conceded and Suzann Pettersen claimed the hole.
Never has so much been written about the Solheim Cup and none of it any good for the game. And we would have won the cup for the third time running.
Even worse was the semi-final of the US Girls’ Junior when Elizabeth Moon had a three-footer to reach the final but was then shaking hands a loser.
Her short putt missed and she raked up her par putt of 10 inches. Erica Shepherd claimed the hole, the match and, a day later, the title.
9. It’s not proper
When you’re all done and you’re sat there bragging about your possible 39 points in your 4&3 victory you’re papering over the cracks.
Among it all there will have been at least three putts that you might have missed or you conceded to yourself having already won or lost the hole. Don’t confuse a match involving gimmes with anything resembling proper golf.
10. Gimmes in golf don’t save that much time
I personally couldn’t care less if a round takes five minutes longer if I’ve just spent the previous three and a half hours wondering if I’ve been generous enough with my concessions.
Even when something is given most of us feel the need to hole out anyway, generally making a mess of the back-handed tap-in and raising the awkward levels another notch or two.
By all means speed things up without going through your marking and pre-putt process but do it right. And when you’re in with a chance in the Spring Meeting you’ll be thankful that the task of holing out isn’t something you’ve never done before.
If you could play one hole over and over for the rest of your life
‘Crazy golf just got epic!’ – unlike my behaviour
The never-ending problem of slow play at club level? Solved
The one rule that should never be changed
Mark Townsend
Been watching and playing golf since the early 80s and generally still stuck in this period. Huge fan of all things Robert Rock, less so white belts. Handicap of 8, fragile mind and short game
