80 Motivational Golf Quotes on Character, Money, and More

By Danielle Dahl

Writer, Ph.D Candidate and Inspirational quote curator

Published September 26, 2022

Is golf your favorite past time of choice?

If so, these golf quotes will gave you the motivation to keep playing and practice.

The book, Rules of Golf, reads: “The game of golf consists of playing a ball from the teeing ground into the hole by a stroke or successive strokes in accordance with the rules.”

Likely, you or someone you love spends countless hours attempting to do just that!

Personally, I am a fan of mini-golf.

I prefer the constant putting and being blocked by massive objects, over the skill required to actually play the game.

My husband has tried to show me, but I am beyond help.

There are too many little nuances: hold it this way, stand this way, bend here…

I just want to hit the ball.

Clearly, I lack the appreciation needed to play the game according to the following golf greats, but if it is your favorite past time of choice, then you will enjoy these golf quotes.

Also check out these sports quotes about mindset and becoming legendary.

Check out our most popular quote article, a list of short inspirational quotes for daily inspiration.

If you enjoy this collection, check out our inspirational quotes category page.

Golf quotes about money

1. “I regard golf as an expensive way of playing marbles.” – G.K. Chesterton

2. “Although golf was originally restricted to wealthy, overweight Protestants, today it’s open to anybody who owns hideous clothing.” – Dave Berry

3. “Putts get real difficult the day they hand out the money.” – Lee Trevino

4. “You don’t know what pressure is until you play for five bucks with only two bucks in your pocket.” – Lee Trevino

Religion and golf quotes

5. “Golf: A plague invented by the Calvinistic Scots as a punishment for man’s sins.” – James Barrett Reston

6. “Golf… is the infallible test. The man who can go into a patch of rough alone, with the knowledge that only God is watching him, and play his ball where it lies, is the man who will serve you faithfully and well.” – P.G. Wodehouse

7. “If you’re caught on a golf course during a storm and are afraid of lightning, hold up a 1-iron. Not even God can hit a 1-iron.” – Lee Trevino

Check out our collection of John Daly quotes if you enjoy this article.

Funny Golf Quotes

8. “Golf, like measles, should be caught young.” – P.G. Wodehouse

9. “The uglier a man’s legs are, the better he plays golf. It’s almost a law.” – H.G. Wells

10. “You know what they say about big hitters…the woods are full of them.” – Jimmy Demaret

11. “Golf is a good walk spoiled.” – Mark Twain

12. “Mulligan: invented by an Irishman who wanted to hit one more twenty yard grounder.” – Jim Bishop

13. “If profanity had an influence on the flight of the ball, the game of golf would be played far better than it is.” – Horace G. Hutchinson

14. “I don’t let birdies and pars get in the way of having a good time.” –Angelo Spagnolo

15. “Golf tips are like Aspirin: One may do you good, but if you swallow the whole bottle you’ll be lucky to survive.” – Harvey Penick

16. “Golf is the most fun you can have without taking your clothes off.” – Chi Chi Rodriguez

17. “They call it golf because all the other four-letter words were taken.” – Raymond Floyd

You might also like these Tiger Woods quotes for a successful future.

Golf quotes about character and ego on the course

18. “Golf is a compromise between what your ego wants you to do, what experience tells you to do, and what your nerves let you do.” – Bruce Crampton

19. “There are no shortcuts on the quest for perfection.” – Ben Hogan

20. “Forget your opponents; always play against par.” – Sam Snead

21. “Success in golf depends less on strength of body than upon strength of mind and character.” – Arnold Palmer

22. “Golf is a game you can never get too good at. You can improve, but you can never get to where you master the game.” – Gay Brewer

23. “Golf is the loneliest sport. You’re completely alone with every conceivable opportunity to defeat yourself. Golf brings out your assets and liabilities as a person. The longer you play, the more certain you are that a man’s performance is the outward manifestation of who, in his heart, he really thinks he is.” – Hale Irwin

24. “Nobody asked how you looked, just what you shot.” – Sam Snead

25. “If you wish to hide your character, do not play golf.” – Percy Boomer

If you’re enjoying these quotes, make sure to read our collection of character quotes about the power of integrity.

Golf Quotes about a person’s swing

26. “You swing your best when you have the fewest things to think about.” – Bobby Jones

27. “Golf is the only sport I know of where a player pays for every mistake. A man can muff a serve in tennis, miss a strike in baseball, or throw an incomplete pass in football and still have another chance to square himself. In golf, every swing counts against you.” – Lloyd Mangrum
If you’re enjoying these quotes, you’ll love our collection of Baseball quotes for the inner child.

28. “If a lot of people gripped a knife and fork the way they do a golf club, they’d starve to death.” – Sam Snead

29. “The golf swing is like a suitcase into which we are trying to pack one too many things.” – John Updike

30. “Every shot counts. The three-foot putt is as important as the 300-yard drive.” – Henry Cotton

31. “The golf swing is like a suitcase into which we are trying to pack one too many things.” – John Updike

32. “My swing is so bad, I look like a caveman killing his lunch.” – Lee Trevino

33. “Tempo is the glue that sticks all elements of the golf swing together.” – Nick Faldo

Golf quotes about skill and philosophy

34. “It took me seventeen years to get three thousand hits in baseball. It took one afternoon on the golf course.” – Hank Aaron

35. “A shot that goes in the cup is pure luck, but a shot to within two feet of the flag is skill.” – Ben Hogan

36. “A perfectly straight shot with a big club is a fluke.” – Jack Nicklaus

37. “Golf is about how well you accept, respond to, and score with your misses much more so than it is a game of your perfect shots.” – Dr. Bob Rotella

38. “Never concede the putt that beats you.” – Harry Vardon

39. “The mind messes up more shots than the body.” –Tommy Bolt

40. “One of the most fascinating things about golf is how it reflects the cycle of life. No matter what you shoot – the next day you have to go back to the first tee and begin all over again and make yourself into something.” – Peter Jacobsen

41. “For this game you need, above all things, to be in a tranquil frame of mind.” – Harry Vardon

42. “The secret of golf is to turn three shots into two.” – Bobby Jones

43. “What other people may find in poetry or art museums, I find in the flight of a good drive.” – Arnold Palmer

44. “When you lip out several putts in a row, you should never think that means that you’re putting well. When you’re putting well, the only question is what part of the hole it’s going to fall in, not if it’s going in.” – Jack Nicklaus

45. “A leading difficulty with the average player is that he totally misunderstands what is meant by concentration. He may think he is concentrating hard when he is merely worrying.” – Bobby Jones

46. “Concentration comes out of a combination of confidence and hunger.” – Arnold Palmer

47. “What other people may find in poetry or art museums, I find in the flight of a good drive.” – Arnold Palmer

48. “I never learned anything from a match that I won.” – Bobby Jones

49. “The most important shot in golf is the next one.” – Ben Hogan

50. “Golf is deceptively simple and endlessly complicated.” – Arnold Palmer

More golf quotes

51. “Golf is a sport for white men dressed like black pimps.” – Tiger Woods

52. “Golf’s ultimate moral instruction directs us to find within ourselves a pivotal center of enjoyment: relax into a rhythm that fits the hills and swales, and play the shot at hand – not the last one, or the next one, but the one at your feet, in the poison ivy, where you put it.” – John Updike

53. The only time my prayers are never answered is on the golf course.” – Billy Graham

54. “Art is not predictable. Art is not golf, as great as that may be. There are 360 degrees of choice to make.” – Tina Weymouth

55. “Do your best, one shot at a time and then move on. Remember that golf is just a game.” – Nancy Lopez

56. “Achievements on the golf course are not what matters, decency and honesty are what matter.” – Tiger Woods

57. “There is no such thing as natural touch. Touch is something you create by hitting millions of golf balls.” – Lee Trevino

58. “Golf is played between the ears and if you are not 100 percent focused on what you are trying to do, then people will go past you no matter who you are.” – Lee Westwood

59. “To be consistently effective, you must put a certain distance between yourself and what happens to you on the golf course. This is not indifference, it’s detachment.” – Sam Snead

60. “Competitive golf is played mainly on a five-and-a-half-inch course… the space between your ears.” – Bobby Jones

Golf quotes for when you love swinging clubs

61. “To find a man’s true character, play golf with him.” — P. G. Wodehouse

62. “Don’t play too much golf. Two rounds a day are plenty.” — Harry Vardon

63. “If you watch a game, it’s fun. If you play it, it’s recreation. If you work at it, it’s golf.” — Bob Hope

64. “I guess there is nothing that will get your mind off everything like golf. I have never been depressed enough to take up the game, but they say you get so sore at yourself you forget to hate your enemies.” — Will Rogers

65. “Reverse every natural instinct and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having a perfect golf swing.” — Ben Hogan

66. “The game of golf would lose a great deal if croquet mallets and billiard cues were allowed on the putting green.” — Ernest Hemingway

67. “I know I am getting better at golf because I am hitting fewer spectators.” — Gerald R. Ford

68. “If there’s a golf course in heaven, I hope it’s like Augusta National. I just don’t want an early tee time.” — Gary Player

69. “Golf is a day spent in a round of strenuous idleness.” — William Wordsworth

70. “Go out and have fun. Golf is a game for everyone, not just for the talented few.” — Harvey Penick

Golf Quotes To Make You Have Fun

71. “It is more satisfying to be a bad player at golf. The worse you play, the better you remember the occasional good shot.” ― Nubar Gulbenkian

72. “The only thing a golfer needs is more daylight.” ― Ben Hogan

73. “Golf is the only game I know of that actually becomes harder the longer you play it.” ― Bobby Jones

74. “I play golf with friends sometimes, but there are never friendly games.” ― Ben Hogan

75. “The object of golf is not just to win. It is to play like a gentleman, and win.” ― Phil Mickelson

76. “Golf is not a game of great shots. It’s a game of most accurate misses. The people who win make the smallest mistakes.” ― Gene Littler

77. “Golf isn’t like other sports where you can take a player out if he’s having a bad day. You have to play the whole game.” ― Phil Blackmar

78. “Exercise? I get it on the golf course. When I see my friends collapse, I run for the paramedics.” ― Red Skelton

79. “Like most professional golfers, I have a tendency to remember my poor shots a shade more vividly than the good ones.” ― Ben Hogan

80. “I had a wonderful experience on the golf course today. I had a hole in nothing. Missed the ball and sank the divot.” ― Don Adams

What did you learn from these golf quotes?

One of my favorite drinks is an Arnold Palmer, so I like that he talked about hunger and lunch in his golf quotes!

I won’t lie, the only other person I recognized was Tiger Woods.

I am sure if you have read this far, then you know who all these people are and can relate.

I hope this gave you some motivation to keep playing and practice!

Or at least made you laugh!

I don’t really agree that golf is the most fun you can have without taking your clothes off…but to each their own!

Go pull on a pair of plaid socks, grab a cart and your clubs and play a round for me!