Aces

May 4, 2013 Bastrop State Park Golf Course, Hole 8

Pictured above are my brother John and me (in red). The very next day John would collect his first lifetime hole in one on his home course in Dallas Texas. This leaves me as the last of four brothers and our dad as not making an Ace.

I have seen two aces in my life, both from my other brother Eric. The first when he was about 10 years old and the other when he was 50. I believe he has a few others in between.

We as a family group celebrate all milestones such as holes in one. When I got word from John of his first I  gave him the congratulations he was due. He told me he regretted leaving me as the last without.

I have had close calls. In the past year on #13 of Roy Kizer GC here in Austin, my shot finished a mere inch away. On the day of the above picture I had a shot from about 170 yards out on the first hole, a par 4, stop about 2 inches out. So I still have game.

A fear I have is that I will ace a hole on a little 9 hole course I sometimes go to. It has 6 par 3's, all decent length but this significantly increases one's chances over a regular course. Or that I will score one without having a witness.

On the radio recently I heard talk of a golfer getting his first ace at the age of 75, and then seven holes later he had his second!

Gotta keep giving myself chances.

That had to sting

Ouch! Anthony Kim's drive on 18 gets a bad bounce. I saw this live and it made me laugh then as it does now.

Father's Day and Golf

A pretty good Father's Day this year. Bagels and coffee with friends after church. Back home for a light lunch, a 30 minute nap, a glass of iced tea, and out to Morris Williams GC for a round of golf.

I teed off at 3:15, and the club house thermometer showed 98 degrees. Whew. The heat was somewhat mitigated by light breezes, and I tried to walk a good bit in the shades of trees. Promptly double bogeyed first hole.

I played the first 11 holes as a single, and waited not once to hit. I caught the fellow in front of me at the 12th tee and we played the remaining 7 together waiting occasionally on the twosome in front of us, and they did not appear to be to serious about golf hitting 2 or 3 shots from nearly every place. The entire round was just over 3 hours, a land speed record for me at this course. Overall score was 82 going 42 - 40 on the nines.

The problem with playing solo is no one sees your greatness. My greatness this day was off the tee. I was hitting some of my best drives ever. Unfortunately this greatness was offset by poor play from the fairway and on the green. The main theme of the day seemed to be having the ball below my feet on a thin lie. Also many times I'd be a full to half wedge away from the green and fail to get the ball on the green, often missing badly. Putting is also very unreliable. I hit all four par 3's in regulation, and had 11 putts. I did finally get on the birdie quest on the 11th hole, a par 5 sinking a 2 footer.

After teeing off at #5, I saw very bright blue bluebird. The feral parrots appear to have been run off as I neither saw nor heard any all day.

Later that night a family game of Scrabble. Tory passed off "nuke", which scored him about 6 points. "Thugs" and "jail" were in the same line together, and "ozone" made everyone giddy. Sean won this tense competition.

Golf 2008 Underway

The ribbon was cut on calendar year 2008 golf season yesterday as I headed out to Morris Williams GC for a round. I went straight from the parking lot, to the pro shop, to the first tee, and promptly parred the first hole. Not a pretty par - missed green about 5 yards off the front but then chipped up to a foot of hole and tapped in for par. Promptly bogeyed the next hole missing a 3 footer for par, and double bogey on next also missing 4 footer after dumping tee shot in water. Putting was an adventure all day - since I had no warm up the club felt like a lead pipe in my hands. Lots of good shots along the way, plenty enough to inspire me to get back out. I closed with a par on 18 going 43 + 40 for an 83.

The birdie quest is still in the starting gait however and I really only had 1 good chance but missed a flat 8 footer at least 3 inches left.

At public courses, as a single golfer, I wonder about who I'll be paired with. Are they any good, or will it be a long day of looking for someone else's shot. Yesterday was good. Two guys in a cart played a scramble explaining neither of them were good enough to play alone. The other fellow was oriental, or as Hank Hill might ask "Chinese or Japanese?" He and I both walked. He tended to be extremely deliberate, ie before most every swing - feet together, club down, feet apart, practice swing, repeat each step, then move up to ball feet together, club down, feet apart, and take shot. What a time kill. I had to keep moving to prevent going unconscious at times. Thankfully he was a decent player.

Not Tiger

What could make me waste 2 spectacular weekend days in Austin, TX? The Masters golf tourney of course. I have wasted April days in years past and will again in the future. US Open dates too. The Masters, a tradition unlike any other.

Not Tiger. Not Tiger. That's what I've been saying like a mantra nearly this whole weekend - Not Tiger. Tiger Woods that is. I didn't want him to win. I am not a Tiger hater, and I'll explain what I like about Tiger before I am done. I will readily admit he's the best ever, and there will never be another as good as Tiger- ever, but I don't want him to just pile up a bunch of major titles all at once. I estimate Tiger will likely finish his career with 8 or 9 Masters alone.

What bothers me most is the nauseating gush the media, mainly the TV coverage lays on Tiger. The commentators can't help themselves fawning over his greatness. Whenever there's an opportunity to show Tiger on the scoreboard, he will be as high as possible. Usually the number of holes played determines where on the board a player is placed when he is tied with others, but Tiger will always be on top of a list of players he's tied with. After the fourth rounds on Sunday, how many golfers were interviewed on air? Two. Who? Tiger, somewhere near the scorer's tent, and Trevor Immelman the winner right before he got his jacket.

Its also very irritating to watch everyone else in the field self-destruct. After Saturday's round this year there were 5 golfers ahead of Tiger, by as many as 5 shots - and all but 1 failed to keep himself together. Four golfers, and more crumbled out on the slopes of Augusta ( which this year looked especially frightening, and the wind was unsolvable as well ). Can't any of these guys hang with Tiger? Mickelson was horrible, as was Flesch, my brothers in left-handedness. You can count on the field to be painfully undependable when it comes to battling Tiger.

What do I like about Tiger? I will keep this short. He is all business out on the golf course, every shot gets 100% effort and he doesn't like or accept a poor performance - while he is on the course. Is there any shot of his you don't expect to see go in - miracles from him are routine. When Tiger "self-destructs", he finished second.

After his round on Sunday he is being interviewed by CBS reporter Bill McAtee about his "terribly frustrating day." At the time Immelman had double bogeyed 16 and was only 3 shots in front. McAtee's last question for Tiger was, " What do you plan to do now?", of course meaning Immelman is real shakey right now and might falter on 17 and 18 and Tiger you might end up in a playoff. Tiger's answer - "I plan to go get something to eat. I am really hungry"; Tiger knew what the question wanted, an answer saying something like " well I plan to go hit some balls and stay fresh because Trevor might fail and I could still win this thing." No, Tiger paused for effect and finished by saying ' Trevor had a bad hole, but he's solid and will bring this into the clubhouse. ' Tiger knew he did all he could do and was bested - and like the rest of us wanted to eat something and let Immelman enjoy his win. I liked that - Tiger has class - especially the way he toyed with TV.

Good work Trevor Immelman. Thanks for not falling totally to pieces down the stretch, tho you tried to give a lot of it back. And thanks Tiger - you're great, the greatest. Please pardon me if I enjoy seeing the TV guys have a bad day at your expense.

Sunday Golf

I went back to Morris Williams this past Sunday and got in a round. A pleasant 80 for the day. I got out of my car at ten till three and walked straight to the first tee. Unfortunately a double bogey waited for me at the end of the first hole. A pretty hot day, temps near 100. For the first time though, I had a brand new bagboy cart for my clubs. I felt a little awkward pushing that thing at first since the only people I'd seen using on are my dad, my father in law, and my dad's golfing buddies. By the end of the front nine tho I was appreciating not having to carry my clubs.

I was part of a fivesome this time. Again I was the only walker. I have found that riders don't have a lot of traits that walkers have. For example, they are less apt to watch where their ball goes probably thinking that being in a cart will afford them loads of time to look for their shot. Riders also tend to think they've hit their ball much further than they actually do often driving past their ball. Since I am walking I will usually find others' shots as I approach.

Golf usually tells you something about the people you're playing with. On Sunday, one guy was a tremendous overcusser, a term borrowed from The Ticket radio station. Nearly every sentence, exclamation, or utterance was laced with profanity. I don't think I am prudish, and I hear much of this language everyday at work, but geeesh, give it a rest. Plain offensive. One of the other players was talking much of the round. He was a very good player probably shooting around par, but always seemed to be going on about something. And not all of it was bad or uninteresting, but a constant flow, and at times he made an effort to outdo the overcusser. The other two players had the same first name, Brett I think, and at the time I considered this a good thing because it was one less name to remember. Both were 90's golfers, sometimes hitting good shots, but hacking away on others, a pretty common trait of myself most of the time. They were good company though. They had a couple of bets going and I goaded both of them off and on to double or press the bet because the other guy was failing.

I really like my clubs now. Probably playing my best golf ever. Uncle Eric picked out some good ones for me. It seems also that somewhere between dog-tired and total exhaustion I hit the most optimum groove. Everything works, but it only lasts for a hole or three. Today it kicked in on 15 tee - and 16 was total golf consciousness as driver (out drove everyone drilling tee shot perfectly in the middle, and nearly too far as it almost went through the dogleg) wedge to 6 feet, drain putt dead in the heart for birdie. On the day though chipping and putting was an adventure.

A good day on the whole.