TEEING OFF: Handling bad breaks key to growth in golf

Just play your ball out of that divot.

That ugly lie in the rough? Don’t fluff your ball up, accept the situation and club down to get it back to the short grass.

Up against a tree? Unlucky, but chip it away or take a penalty stroke if you’d like to drop it elsewhere.

While we’re at it, putt the three-footer. I mean read it, line it up and make a real stroke.

If golf is merely a fun pastime to play a few times a year, then disregard everything I just said and take all the liberties you want.

But if you’re keeping a real score, playing for money or in a tournament, or even just trying to beat your personal best, these small acts of grace golfers bestow upon themselves add up.

After 18 holes of foot wedges, fluffing and half-hearted “I would have made it if I tried” putts, you’re left with a hypothetical score you could have shot if a sport filled with luck handed you nothing but good breaks.

There’s a chance that number may not have been much different if shot to the letter of the law, but the only way to truly find out is to do it.

For some, they learn in their first true competition, when they card a score five or six shots higher than normal and blame it on tournament nerves and a challenging course setup.

Those factors are real, but not as significant as the challenge of finally being forced to chop the ball out of deep rough, make all the short putts and hit it out of divots when you never practise.

I learned the hard way growing up, shooting ugly scores and becoming increasingly frustrated with how “unlucky” I was in competition.

I’ve been on both sides of the debate on whether golfers should get relief from divots in their own fairway, but I’ve settled on the less popular side.

Why? Because if you allow leniency here, it becomes a slippery slope.

If one golfer doesn’t have to hit it out of a divot in the fairway, why should another have to play from a steep slope in the fairway?

Sure, only one was part of the design, but both are part of the game.

At first, it’s humbling that your personal best round might feel out of reach. It’s another gut punch when you realize that score probably isn’t real.

But committing to a 100 per cent honest score not only teaches you how to handle imperfect lies, but puts a greater emphasis on avoiding the treed areas that weren’t a concern when you let yourself move to a spot where you could aim between two of them.

Saving par is cool, but doing so after the course handed you a horrible break is awesome.

When you shift your mindset, your mental toughness improves. Then one day when your swing feels good and you get a little bit of luck, you’ll beat that career-low score without an asterisk.