Budget Beater: Plan Your Winter Rounds Using The Extended Forecast

The only thing worse than playing a wet course during the winter is playing a wet round during the winter, and paying for it. To make it worse, most courses are booking out their prime tee times a week or two in advanced, which means you either call early or you miss out on being done before dark. Fortunately, the internet can help you to some degree in this mess as you can access the extended forecast on weather.com to help you along the way. By hitting up the extended forecast for the area in the course you want to play, you can stretch that golfing dollar a bit further – or at least have a decent time playing when you do spend the money – and possibly get away with sneaking in a round when the weather should be great.

Above is the two week forecast for my area. Even though 10/8 only shows a “bit of rain”, this is the type of day we try to skip out on here. First off, when there is a bit of rain in the Seattle area, it can mean 10 minutes of downpours or 6 hours of cold, wet drizzle. It’s the sort of forecast you just plan on cleaning out your garage with, not hitting the golf course. The following Saturday would be the opportune time to play a round if you were looking to land a weekend round during this stretch. Mostly cloudy after a nice dry week is about as good as you can hope for this time of year. That is, unless you can sneak away from work for those sunny Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday times that would be even better. Weekday rates and sun can’t be beat this time of year.

The bonuses don’t stop with better rates and a round that is more fun. Checking out the extended forecast also helps you plan your round a bit better. If you see rain for the 4 days leading up to your round, you may want to bump the loft on your driver a 1/2 degree to get a bit extra carry out of it. If it shows cold, you might want to pack an extra layer or possibly make some room in the bag to take a layer off when the sun does break through and start to warm things up. Most of all, just having the weather information for the week surrounding your round will let you plan out your round even better. With rain soaked courses, you can’t expect to shoot a three under round, but if it’s been dry all week, you might have a go of it. If you plan out when to play based on the best weather conditions, you’ll save yourself the frustration of paying for rounds in bad weather, as well as stretching your golfing dollar to the max during the off season.

PS – If you live somewhere warm and sunny, this may not apply to you quite as much, but you can still keep track of that extended forecast to help you plan better.