Pictured: With the HoneyStick, golfers may be able to hit the ball straighter and farther than ever before. Photo courtesy of HoneyGolf.

Patrick Warren and Blake Brannan had a problem. The Sarasota-area natives and lifelong golfers loved the game. They also loved playing with a burgeoning group of golfers that included their friends and family members. The only issue? Golf didn’t love their friends and family back.

The barrier to begin playing golf, which exploded in popularity during the pandemic, isn't what most people think it is. It’s not a stuffy, ‘old school’ culture or some country club environment of toxicity. It’s not even the price point–a round at a public course can cost less than the price to fill up a gas tank. The barrier to entry is one of skill: hitting a golf ball, in the air, in the general direction of the desired target is hard. As in, even the Dalai Lama would likely snap a club in frustration over a bad shot hard.

Patrick and Blake, who both played for Cardinal Mooney High School and have continued to play into their professional careers, realized that. Where their swings had been perfected over a lifetime of practice, those of the novice golfer had not–but that didn’t mean that the novice golfer shouldn’t be able to enjoy the game.

Golf is largely a game of tricks and gimmicks, one of which being the chapstick trick: applying chapstick to the clubface is said to drastically reduce the spin of the ball when hit, thus eliminating or at least greatly lessening the slicing or hooking of a shot. From there, the HoneyStick was born. “The HoneyStick is a spin reducing device. People have horrible swings when they start and that’s totally fine. What HoneyStick does is reduce the amount of spin that comes off the face of the club by an insane amount and in some cases, depending on the person’s swing, it completely eliminates any spin,” says Warren. “Applying HoneyStick to the club face basically allows you to hit a knuckleball. You not only hit it substantially straighter, you actually hit it farther too.”

The HoneyStick golf product can be found online and is preparing for a larger drop later this month.

Pictured: With the HoneyStick, golfers may be able to hit the ball straighter and farther than ever before. Photo courtesy of HoneyGolf.

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