It’s easy to start planning a golf trip with the golf.
Which courses? How many rounds? What tee times can we get?
Obviously, that matters. But after enough group trips, we’ve learned that a great lineup of courses doesn’t automatically make a great trip.
The trip needs a rhythm.
A tee time affects dinner the night before. A late night affects tomorrow morning. A long drive changes what time everyone needs to be moving. Where you stay affects how much time gets spent in the car. Cost can change which rounds deserve a bigger part of the budget.
Everything starts connecting pretty quickly.
The goal isn’t to schedule every minute.
It’s to make the pieces work together so the group can enjoy the trip.
The earliest tee time isn’t always the best tee time
There’s something great about being one of the first groups out.
There’s also something not-so-great about trying to get a house full of golfers moving before sunrise after everyone decided to stay up the night before.
Sometimes an early round is exactly right. Other times, a later tee time gives everyone a chance to sleep a little longer, grab breakfast and show up ready to play.
The right answer depends on the trip.
If there’s a longer drive to the course, that matters. If the group has dinner or plans that evening, that matters. If yesterday was a long day, that matters too.
We’re not just looking at an available tee time.
We’re looking at what happens around it.
Drive time counts
A course can look perfect until you realize it’s farther from the house than you thought.
Then a 9:00 tee time isn’t really a 9:00 tee time.
It’s wake up, get everyone moving, load the vehicles, account for the drive, leave some margin and get to the course early enough that nobody is sprinting to the first tee with one shoe untied.
Do that several days in a row and those drive times start becoming a real part of the trip.
That doesn’t mean every course needs to be close.
Some rounds are worth the drive.
It just means the drive belongs in the plan.
The house matters, too
Where the group stays isn’t just where everybody sleeps.
It can be where you have breakfast before a round, cook dinner one night, watch a game, have a few drinks, settle a debate from the course or spend a couple of hours doing absolutely nothing.
There’s planning behind that, too.
How many beds actually work for the group? Who is sharing rooms? What does everyone want to spend? Are you eating at the house? Do you need groceries? How does the location work with the courses you want to play?
Those decisions aren’t as exciting as picking a golf course.
They can have just as much impact on the trip.
Don’t forget the fun between the fun
We like golf trips loaded with fun.
But golf isn’t the only fun.
Dinner out. Hanging around the house. A good drive through somewhere you’ve never been. An evening with no real agenda. Telling the same story for the fifth time because somehow it keeps getting better.
That’s the fun between the fun.
If every hour of the trip is packed, there isn’t much room left for it.
Downtime isn’t necessarily wasted time.
Sometimes it’s part of the plan.
Every group has a different pace
Some groups want 36 holes and another round tomorrow morning.
Some don’t.
Some want great golf followed by a great dinner and a later start the next day. Some care more about the house. Some want nightlife. Some want to spend more on a couple of memorable rounds and save somewhere else.
There isn’t one correct formula.
That’s why we don’t think a group trip should be built from a cookie-cutter itinerary.
You start with the people going.
Then you figure out what kind of trip works for them.
Leave a little room for the curveballs
Even a well-planned trip changes.
Weather happens. Availability changes. Someone needs something. A round takes longer than expected. Plans that sounded great three months ago might not sound as great once everyone is actually there.
A good plan gives the trip structure.
A great plan also leaves enough room to adjust.
After years of organizing and taking these trips ourselves, we’ve learned to anticipate a lot of what can get in the way. That doesn’t mean every trip goes exactly according to plan.
It means we’re usually better prepared when it doesn’t.
Plan. Organize. Execute. Enjoy.
That’s the routine.
Not because the trip should feel organized while you’re on it.
Quite the opposite.
The planning should do its job early enough that, once you’re there, the trip mostly feels like the reason everyone came in the first place:
a good time with the group.