Summertime

Just read some great news.

Us Brits will be basking our pale skins in warm and dry summer this year. It's odds on for a barbecue summer.

Ewen McCallam chief meteorologist says 'we can expect times when temperatures will be above 30 C.

This may all seem a little euphoric to our friends overseas.

Summertime by Josh Rouse

'Here comes the summertime, the feeling's in the air.

I remember cigarettes, tube socks, sun burns and long blond hair.

Here comes the summertime, yeah its coming soon.

I remember living upstairs, drinking iced-tea and swimming pools.

And the feeling doesn't last that long.

Before you know, it's up and gone, oh yeah.

The things we do? In the summertime.'

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Polo envy

At Golf Refugees we can understand, almost appreciate, that you can feel proud wearing a polo shirt worn by one of your favourite professional golfers.

You watch Tiger, Phil, Sergio, Monty, maybe not, wearing this season's Nike, Adidas, Puma, Pringle colourful stripey creation and think heck, I'd like one of those. After all, it's a quality garment. It makes you feel good and look good whilst swinging on and off the course.

You don't spend much time thinking about how much the brands pay so and so to wear it, that's all just part of marketing and business. Fair enough. So how does an indie brand, without the coffers to pay say Tiger 100 million big ones over five years for parading around in their latest clobber, make you feel proud?

Here goes. Golf Refugees polos are 89% better, environmentally, then any polo shirt worn by any top golf professional.

89% better is a big margin. Independently audited by The Soil Association and The Carbon Trust.
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Black or white?

Visually white colour makes objects appear larger and black colour makes things look smaller. Hence lots of people wear black to make themselves look slimmer. Plus black colour is also regarded as being stylish and chic, white pure and clean.

What's this got to do with golf? Well, if you apply the same theory, a white golf ball will look bigger than a black golf ball. This gives a perceived advantage on the tee for a white ball, as it will seem a bigger golf ball to hit. However, when putting, the smaller appearance of a black ball will give the impression of a larger hole. Giving an advantage to a black ball on the greens.

There are other perceived advantages and disadvantages of colour. A white ball is more visible on the fairways to locate, while a black golf ball is easier to follow in the air. It can look as if you are tracking a piece of mud as it flies across the sky.

Then you have to consider thermal properties of colour. A white colour reflects most of the heat energy from the sun to remain cooler. Whilst black colour absorbs as much heat energy from the sun to obtain a higher temperature. Just go out on a hot summers day wearing a white t-shirt and then a black t-shirt to feel the difference.

When golf balls are tested in laboratories they are heated in ovens to temperatures of 23 degrees or more. Why? They are compressed during impact and designed to return to there initial form as quickly as possible. This compression and rapid expansion becomes more efficient at higher temperatures. Similar to a human muscle, where an athlete will warm-up before competing, to obtain optimum performance.

Hence a heat absorbing black golf ball on a hot summers day, will transfer energy more efficiently to gain extra distance than a colder traditional white golf ball.

Now what colour should I play with today. black or white?
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Just add sunshine

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Welcome aerosol style

Last night, I watched a BBC regional news programme about an aerosol artist from Birmingham UK, called Mohammed Ali. Who has developed his own unique graffiti style, with a universal message of 'peace', 'knowledge' and 'patience', using colours and shapes to reflect the energy of urban life. Mohammed's work has been exhibited throughout the UK, Dubai, Denmark and he has been asked by Sony to produce work to help promote their new PSP.

This got me wondering, instead of the usual boring 'welcome to so and so golf club' signs, why don't these golf clubs set aside a wall and commission a talented aerosol artist to paint a welcome sign.

Wouldn't that make a unique, colourful welcome to their golf club?

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NDC

Golf Refugees advocate no dress codes (NDC).

Golf courses need to be places where you can be free to express yourself. Collars or no collar. Socks or no socks. Who cares.

It's all subjective and individual fashion tastes change with time. Any golf club dress code rules need to be flexible enough to reflect upon the fashion tastes of golfers aged from teenagers to pensioners.

Lets just enjoy playing golf and wear what we like.
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Sergio & Phiten

In our mail today, we received a big picture of Sergio Garcia lookin thoughtful and manly. At first, we weren't exactly sure why we had received this, thinking it was highly unlikely Sergio is contemplating switching allegiance from Adidas to Golf Refugees. Though if he starts to play really really badly, we might be able to afford him.

After reading further, it was something to do with 'a well being product that uses titanium processed in a special, secretive way, which helps to maintain the body's natural state of balance to encourage optimum performance, which is easily disrupted by today's busy lifestyle'. Phiten products are suitable for anyone and everyone, even top-level International athletes and sports personalities such as Sergio Garcia have chosen to use products from the Phiten range. Included in the press pack, were five sample patches.

I can report that my body was starting to feel unbalanced.

It is easy to instantly dismiss such tosh, but not wanting to pass-up an opportunity to give my girlfriend the chance of reaching optimum performance. I decided to act.
Unfortunately she was out, so I placed one of the patches on the dog.

And he has been acting very strangely. Still, if it's good enough for Sergio.
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eco clothing

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black ball

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Sock club cover

Recycling is all the rage now.

So at Golf Refugees, we were wondering what to do with our smelly old socks. Just chuck'em out, wash and save them for charity or create a new product.

Being a thrifty lot, it seemed obvious to us to use them as golf clubhead covers.

Job done.
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Presidential Golf

US presidents have always managed to find time for a round of golf.

First up William Howard Tait, insisted on playing as often as possible. He was once due to meet with a Chilean diplomat but said, ''I'll be dammed if I'm going to give up my golf game to meet see this fellow, '' and went off to play 18 holes instead.

Woodrow Wilson was obsessed with Golf, he played every day but Sundays. Extreme weather conditions like snow were no deterrent to Wilson's routine. He simply got the Secret Service men to paint the golf balls red.

Dwight 'Ike' Eisenhower was an extremely good golfer who played who played a staggering 800 rounds during his eight years in office.

JFK was secretly a keen golfer who occasionally used the game as an alibi for his extramarital activities.

As for Bill Clinton, he followed the rules for about a hole and a half. Then he let his guard down and started taking these do-over shots and gimme putts, and at the end of the 18 holes, it took him about 200 swings to score 82.

The Bushes tend to race around the golf course in record time. They want to get off the course as quickly as possible. The score doesn't matter. It's the time elapsed that matters the most to the Bushes.
* extracts from First Off the Tee by Don Van Natta
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Killer Golf

Let's be careful out there, should be the call on the first tee at Augusta.

Golfer Michael Utley struck by lightening on a Cape Cod course, his shoes were blown off and his heart stopped. Utley now walks with a cane.

One golfer mauled to death by a bear in Wyoming, while in Rhode Island a women on a putting green was run over by a deer.

Fifteen year old Nils Beeman became sick and died following a junior golf tournament at an Arizona course. Tests revealed he had contracted the intestinal Norwalk Virus from water containers.

Golf lawyer, Michael Kraker claims 47,000 people are injured playing golf each year and that four die in the USA alone from accidents on the course, excluding heart attacks and lightening strikes.

In Virginia 42 year old James Tobin was playing a round of golf when a ball hit him on the neck.
Doctors concluded the golf ball strike had caused a major trauma to an artery in his neck and had led to a stroke. Today, Tobin is trying to relearn the game. He's got a pro teaching him how to hit from a chair.

Green Keeper Alan Cutler was killed when a lawnmower he was driving fell into a bunker and crushed him. Health and Safety officers concluded for some unknown reason the highly experienced grass cutter drove too close to the edge.

Larry Lapekas, an employee of Wolf Creek Golf Course, died when he fell off the back of a golf cart. And in Illinois, a 71 year old women drowned when her cart veered off a steep slope and into a pond.

Britain is perhaps home to the most dangerous golf course of all, where eighteen bombs from World War 11 were discovered on the putting green.
* extracts from Driven to Death by Charlie Koolhaas
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A Gentleman's Game

Stirling Golf Club (SGC) boasts a British Amateur Ladies Champion amongst its members. The club was offered a £24,000 Lottery Grant to improve and extend its clubhouse, on the condition that its 150 lady members were given the same access to the new facility as the men. At its annual general meeting SGC voted 92 to 62, to turn down the cash. It could not be bribed into giving women equal treatment.

At Little Aston Golf Club in Staffordshire, where a women whose husband had a heart attack on the links. She rushed to his side, leaving her car in the main car park.
After her husbands recovery, she was sent a letter from the golf club reminding her that as a women, under club rules, she is not allowed to use the main car park.

Here's another. There were some women on the balcony of the clubhouse having a drink, watching the golf, you know. The eighteenth hole was right outside the clubhouse. The women were watching the men play, and one of the men swears when he's playing his last shot. The women complained about his audible foul language. So the club banned all women from drinking on the balcony.
* extracts from Park and Ride by Miranda Sawyer
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Uroclub

Most players have been caught a little short on the golf course. If we could carry 15 clubs instead of the regulation 14, perhaps golfers could all walk a little easier down the fairways. This is where the Uroclub excels.

Instead of hunting for that handily placed tree, you can discreetly pee into the Uroclub.

Technically speaking, after use, you are altering the swing-weight of the club. No need to bother with those fiddly little adjustable metal weights you find on other clubs. This additional weight will move naturally around as you swing due to centrifugal forces. Just make sure you've secured the cap, otherwise you could be in for a golden shower.

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Polo pride

What would you feel better wearing;

1) a polo shirt worn by one of the best golfers from a leading sports brand.

2) a polo shirt from an unknown brand ethically made from carbon neutral organic cotton.

I guess it's a question about whether you're happy to contribute towards the high marketing costs of paying one of the best professional golfers to wear your polo shirt. Or, the cost of ethical manufacture and production using less polluting pesticides and reducing harmful emissions which contribute towards global warming.

Do you have pride in your polo?
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