Skip to main content

Par for the Course

The 2018 Golf season has officially begun, Tiger Woods is back in the field!

I know the 2017/2018 professional tour schedule technically began in October with the Safeway Open. But talk to any Golf aficionado and you will quickly see the “Tiger” effect on professional golf at Torrey Pines in San Diego. 

Google queries for Tiger Woods, specifically “Did Tiger make the Cut,” (at the Farmers Insurance Open) is in the top 10 trending searches on Google.

The Golf Channel, golf promoters, golf courses, driving ranges, golf merchandise sales, and television ratings are way up. Attendance this weekend (Jan. 27 & 28th) at Torrey Pines will soar. Try it, do a Google search for Tiger Woods and see what turns up. Profits. 

Yesterday, after months of procrastination, I got off my duff and made the trip to the Carlsbad Golf Center to have a new grip installed on my TaylorMade three wood.

While shopping I eves dropped on the conversations in the golf shop. And yes . . . it was all about Tiger Woods.

“You think Tiger will make the cut?” 

“He looks pretty good, we’ll have to wait and see.”

“I will say this, since Tiger announced he would be playing again in 2018 our business has been up.” 

Admittedly, I’m a fan of professional golf. My interest in golf was sparked one day unexpectedly when Lori said to me, “I used to love to play golf with my Dad growing up.” The radiant smile and twinkle in her eye said it all. To my utter astonishment, golf was something she truly enjoyed!

“So - let’s play some golf.”

 For her 40 birthday, with the help of my friend Chuck, we purchased Lori a complete set of Lady La Jolla clubs. I happened to be working in New York that week so Chuck’s mission was to deliver the clubs and surprise her on her special day. Alas, it appears that company has gone by the way side. But she still enjoys playing her clubs. You should see her antique Wilson set we have in our garage. 

Now, it’s important to understand, this idea of playing golf, I had never really played golf, didn’t own a set of clubs, and no clue how to get into this sport reasonably.

“Are you kidding me, look at the price of this stuff.”

My participation in sports has always been cycling, softball, running, swimming, and walking, for exercise. Golf, to me, was not a sport. Really, how can you consider golf exercise when you’re riding around in a cart, chasing a little white ball, then back to the clubhouse for a beer?

So, my next step was to get my own set of decent, reasonably priced clubs.

This Golf thing can’t be that difficult. I thought.

Lessons, hah, who needs lessons, look at Bubba Watson he never took lessons. He can drive the ball a mile. When you watch the professionals on TV they make it look so easy.

“The short game, that’s where it’s at. Very few can drive the ball like Bubba.”

It’s obviously all about style, look at Rickie Fowler. 

Boy was I wrong. These guys are good.

So for a number of years Lori and I would treat (frustrate) ourselves and play golf together on the weekends. Lori as my coach, I quickly learned that swinging hard did not work.

Lori would step up to the tee and with a silky smooth stroke, straight down the fairway. 

Me, I would step up and bust it - Pow! Out of bounds.

“Why does that stupid ball keep shanking to the right,” I grumbled.

“You’re hitting it off the toe of the club.”

“Ok, now it’s curving to the left.”

“You’re swinging the club like a baseball bat.”

“We need to spend some time at the driving range.”

“That’s boring, let’s just play the game.” So we did.

For practice, we play a Par three executive course, 1822 yards. Lori keeps score. Turns out I was able to shoot par within the first six holes.

“That’s good, right?”

“No - not really.”

“Ok, what’s Par?”

“This pitch-n-putt is a Par 54 course. That means a good golfer should be able to take 54 strokes to complete 18 holes. Three strokes per hole, not 10.”

“You’re kidding me, right?”

We were consistently shooting 90 strokes or higher.

“Think geezer swing,” she would say. “That’s why you practice at the driving range.”

Yes, I’m stubborn.

Well, to make a long story short, as they say, Listen to the wife. She was right all along.

So this year we’re going to spend some time on the driving range. Practicing my swing and learning which iron to use for different distances.

“It’s muscle memory, repeating the same swing using a different club for distance.”

“Ok, I get it - let’s go to the driving range."

On Friday, Tiger did make the cut at Torrey Pines, Par 72, over 7600 yards, he shot -1, (one under par). How they do it I’m still trying to figure out. 

I wonder? If I practice enough, could I shoot Par for the course?

What do you think?
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Most Popular of All Time

Morning Coffee

In this episode, Morning Coffee . . . Now, I’m not saying everyone needs coffee. Some folks get by just fine on, I don’t know, sunlight and positive thinking. Me? I’m pretty sure I started drinking the stuff sometime around the Reagan administration. Reading John Gierach’s "Ode to Campfire Coffee" in Trout Bum (a book that should be required reading for anyone who sees sleeping on the ground as recreation) got me thinking about how we’ve managed to complicate something as fundamentally simple as boiling water and adding grounds. Taste, you say? Look, black coffee is an acquired taste, like tequila or cilantro. I just don’t get it. Gierach, bless his heart, mostly drinks his java streamside, probably while wearing wool socks and waders and contemplating the mysteries of the universe. As for me? My outdoor coffee experience is a bit different. Picture this: the High Sierra, where campfires are banned (to avoid agitating Smoky Bear), and I’m huddled over a Whisperlite , coax...
1 comment
Read more

A B+ Kind of Life

Welcome back to this week's On the Fly . Retirement has taught me something unexpected: life gets a lot more enjoyable when you stop chasing perfection. Lately, I've been having an absolute blast playing executive par-3 courses like Rancho Carlsbad . A short iron, a sunny morning, and nowhere to be except the next tee—that's my kind of day. This Thursday, though, I'm raising the stakes. I'm heading to The Links at Lakehouse in San Marcos, a full-size par-71 course with enough water hazards to keep the local fish well-stocked with my golf balls. After shooting a 64 on a par-3 course, I've set myself a new goal: shoot an 89 before my birthday next August. Why 89? Because on a par-71 course, that's bogey golf—one extra stroke per hole. For non-golfers, think of it this way: par is like earning 100% on a final exam. Bogey golf is a solid B+. You got the job done, learned something, and probably had a lot more fun getting there. The older I get, the more I appre...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Endless Work of Wisdom

It always makes me smile. The moment people learn I've officially entered what I like to call the Great Un-Working (retirement), they almost immediately ask the same question: “So . . . What do you do now?" I think they're expecting me to say I'm restoring a vintage sports car, hiking the John Muir Trail, or finally becoming fluent in French.   Instead, I tell them: "I live life deliberately." That's usually the point when I get a polite nod, followed by the unmistakable look of someone wondering whether I've simply found a more sophisticated way to say, “I’m becoming a bum.” Apparently, "living deliberately" sounds suspiciously like unemployment, just better branding. The truth is, what living deliberately looks like for me right now is taking time to synthesize a lifetime of experiences into these weekly reflections. It's slowing down long enough to ask what those experiences have taught me, while keeping the door wide open to the poss...
Post a Comment
Read more

A Tucson Typewriter Tale

One of the great joys of wandering without much of a plan is that the universe occasionally rewards your lack of organization. During my recent visit to Tucson, AZ, Robert and I were strolling through the Annex this afternoon, doing what tourists and newly minted retirees like me have elevated to an Olympic sport: meandering. The Annex is one of those places where every few steps there's another handmade candle, artisan coffee, or vintage object someone rescued from a garage sale and convinced the rest of us was always destined to become art. Then I saw something that genuinely stopped me. A young woman standing quietly behind a manual typewriter. Not a laptop designed to look like a typewriter. Not a quirky Bluetooth keyboard. An honest-to-goodness mechanical typewriter—the sort of machine that once announced every sentence to the entire office with a satisfying clack and enough force to wake nearby pigeons. With an iPhone 16 sitting in my pocket in an age when people write novels...
Post a Comment
Read more