Thanks, Golf Digest (but great athletes don't always make great golfers)

I wish I had a dollar for every student of mine who told me at the beginning of their golf lesson that they were great baseball players, tennis players or athletes in general and wondered why they weren’t better at golf. A good golf swing requires an athletic move, but you don’t have to be athletic to do it. I have seen plenty of over-weight, out of shape people play really good golf and I have seen plenty of great athletes in top shape play really bad golf.

This month Golf Digest ranks 220 top athletes that play golf and of some those athletes weighed in on the debate of golf as a sport. Ivan Lendl, eight-time Grand Slam winner used to think that there was not much to the game of golf, just a bunch of over-weigh people walking around, but now, Lendl, an avid golfer, says that he appreciates the difficulty of the game.

Brett Hull, NHL superstar, considers golf a sport, but my husband Dan, Olympic Gold Medalist in Speedskating, doesn’t think golf is a sport. He doesn’t think that a game where you can eat, drink and smoke at the same time should be considered a sport.

“But it is the hardest game I have ever played,” says Jansen.

In a study conducted by ESPN, 60 sports were ranked in order of difficulty. Golf ranked 51st on the list, with boxing and hockey ranking the highest and golf ranking just above cheerleading and roller-skating. So if golf is not a difficult sport, what makes the game so hard? And why hasn’t a retired athlete crossed over successfully to the professional golf ranks.

That is because golf requires much more than just athletic ability or hand-eye coordination. Golf requires a lot of time and effort, not to mention a great deal of skill, mental fortitude and perseverance to excel at it. To play consistently, you must spend countless hours hitting balls, practicing, putting, chipping and playing practice rounds. You could spend a lifetime studying the game and still not master the skills necessary to play professionally.

At one time Michael Jordan, arguably the greatest basketball player considered playing professionally against the players on the PGA Tour, but now has settled playing against his buddies and anyone who can afford a $1000 Nassau. He just doesn’t have what it takes to make a living playing golf.

I don’t think people realize what it takes to make a living playing golf. You need to have phenomenal talent and then hone your skills on a daily basis. Shooting par golf is just not enough to make it out on tour. Rick Roden, former major-league baseball pitcher and No. 1 ranked athlete-golfer on Golf Digest’s ranking says that he knows a lot of scratch golfers but that could not make a living playing golf.

“After 10 years I’d seen and been through everything in baseball,” says Rhoden. “Every golf course in America has scratch players, but that doesn’t mean they can make a dime playing professional golf. Those guys are very good at not wasting shots, at shooting par or better when everything’s not clicking. On the celebrity tour, if I shot around par, very few players would pass me. On tour, 50 guys would.”

It is frustrating for athletes who were at the top of their sport not to master the game of golf, especially when they see players with bodies like Tim Herron and John Daly boom 300-yard drives easily down the fairway. So just because you are a great athlete doesn’t mean you will be a great golfer.