To Rent Or Not To Rent?
While I was working as Director of Golf in Grand Cayman and the Bahamas, both courses were affiliated with resorts and one of the most frequent questions I would receive before guests would arrive was "Should I bring my own clubs or are your rentals any good?". The answer to this question has a lot to do with you as an individual golfer, but here is what I can share.
As far as the quality of rentals goes, if you are travelling to a top or well known golf course or resort, they will have new updated equipment from a top of the line club company. Most good quaility courses now days have a rental agreement with a top manufacturer where they will only rent that companies clubs and advertise the brand on their website, in turn the manufacturer will replace the equipment for the latest technology every year or at the most every two years. So yes, the equipment is the top of the line but it is still used and a duffer may have been the first to use that driver and on his first swing roofed his drive causing a sky mark, so expect the odd blemish.
I stated that this decision is based a lot on you. If you are going for pure pleasure to just enjoy the course and will not become irate if the clubs go a slightly further distance, or the putter is not face balanced like yours, or the driver doesn't have the same weight and tipped shaft as yours, go ahead and leave your clubs behind, travel light, don't stress about whether your clubs are on the plane and use the rentals. Besides, this gives you an excuse for the odd arrant shot or missed putt and we all want to blame something other than ourselves, don't we?
If you are going to lose control for every shot that doesn't come off perfect and the mere fact of putting with anything other than your beloved custom fit "Scotty" causes you to lose sleep, bring your clubs. Rentals are not yours and will play a little different. If you are the type of person who after every imperfect shot states that you would have done better with your own clubs or if the fact of a loss of your near perfect game will turn you into a volcano irrupting on a beautiful course taking away from the serene calmness of the ocean lapping up against the fairway's edge and the picture perfect sunset over the eighteenth hole, then bring your own clubs.
Oh, and rentals are revenue for the club, so please don't call and state that the airline now charges you to bring your own clubs and ask for a cheaper rate because $60 USD is too much for rentals.
I personally have left my blades at home and am renting graphite shafted cavity backs and enjoying the beauty of the courses and the pleasure of playing abroad.
See you in the fairway.
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