Every time I travel with my clubs on an airline I’m always a bit anxious when I place them on the luggage conveyor belt. Quite honestly, I never know if they’ll end up damaged, temporarily delayed or even get to my destination at all. Most of the time it works out, but I still get a queasy feeling when I turn them over to airline employees who don’t give a rat’s ass about handling my clubs with care. That said, I travel with my clubs less and less these days on international trips. Frankly, I don’t want to pay for substandard service and care anymore. I’ve also had some fairly good rounds of golf with rental clubs, too. Here are my 5 reasons why I choose to rent:
1. Hassle-Free and Time Saving
You don’t have to waste time meticulously packing your clubs and lugging them through airports. Better still, you won’t have to search endlessly for the oversize luggage carousel to retrieve your clubs or worry about customs rummaging through your bag.
2. Avoid Costly Baggage Fees and Damage To Your Clubs
Some of the airline fees for golf clubs are obscene. Don’t these airlines make enough money by saving on their lousy food, measly bags of peanuts and cramped seats. Ever since they discovered how extra fees are an amazingly easy way to gouge their passengers, airlines have no problem charging for just about anything. They practically want you to get a home equity loan just so they’ll take your clubs on a flight.
3. Rental Clubs Are Generally Excellent, Quality Clubs
Years ago, rental clubs were typically some dusty set the golf pro brought from his garage for the odd golfer that didn’t bring his own clubs. Not anymore. Many of today’s golf club rentals are high-quality, premium brands. For instance, Sweet Spot Club Hire in Australia, has premium men’s and women’s Callaway and TaylorMade sets for all skill levels–from scratch players to newbies.
4. Great Chance to Try Out a Different Set of Clubs
I’m a huge blame-it-on-my-clubs guy, so I’m always open to different sticks. With rentals you can take them for a test drive on 18 holes instead of hitting them into a net off synthetic turf at a golf store. Worse still, is the demo day at your golf course where the sales guy puts on the hard sell like an annoying car salesman.
5. You Actually Might Play Better
Who knows, your own clubs might be holding you back. Renting clubs is a great way to find out if maybe it’s time to shelve the old sticks that have consistently produced double and triple bogeys and lots of heartache.