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My brother-in-law moved from Columbia, MO to Las Vegas about a week and a half ago. My wife and I had planned to go out there and help him unpack and get organized - he had plenty of friends to help him load, but none to help him unload. Our original intention was to fly out to Vegas and help unload and fly back. Then I had a crazy idea - I'll drive to Missouri and help him drive the U-haul towing his car. My wife would fly from Cleveland to Las Vegas a couple days later, then we would both fly from Las Vegas to Kansas City and drive back together, stopping at her mother's house in Paris, MO along the way. So I drove from Akron, OH to Columbia, MO on 4/10 in my car.... I love road trips in this car - I have to be careful and make sure I use cruise control because it likes to run. On 4/11, my brother-in-law and I dropped my car off at long term parking at the Kansas City airport and then I jumped in this hot rod.... My brother-in-law had decided to take the southern route to Las Vegas (through Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona) to avoid having to climb, or perhaps more importantly, having to descend the Rockies in a U-Haul with his car attached to it. It added a few hours to the trip, but I think it was a wise choice. Driving Day 1 - Akron, OH to Columbia, MO Driving Day 2 - Columbia, MO to Albuquerque, NM (via Kansas City Airport) Driving Day 3 - Albuquerque, NM to Las Vegas, NV Along the way, I took a few pics to document our/my journey.... Columbus, OH - not much to see from the I-270 loop except the A-B brewery. Ohio/Indiana border - I'm not sure why Ohio has an ugly, baby blue arch near the border, but it's there. Indianapolis - an oasis among corn and soy bean fields.... Indiana/Illinois border - nothing to see here.... St. Louis (I missed the Illinois/Missouri border due to traffic) Kauffman Stadium/Arrowhead Stadium - are you ready for some football (or baseball)? Kansas City - Mmmmm, BBQ! I did not get a picture of the Missouri/Kansas border because Kansas... Witchita - just about the only sign of life in the state of Kansas Kansas/Oklahoma border... Oklahoma/Texas border (which I almost missed) Texas/New Mexico border (you have to trust me that the yellow streak is the sign) New Mexico/Arizona border And finally, the Arizona/Nevada border. About the only "fun" thing we did (besides eat out at a lot of pretty good restaurants) was visit the Hoover Dam. Very impressive engineering challenge and the scenery was spectacular! When we left Las Vegas, we flew back to Kansas City and drove to my mother-in-law's house for the night. Driving Day 4 - Kansas City to Paris, MO Driving Day 5 - Paris, MO to Akron, OH In summary, I was in a car/truck for 3,020 miles over the 5 travel days. I actually found it kind of fun and got to see a lot of the country in the process. I joke about Kansas, but there is something appealing about the mostly flat landscape with rolling hills. As we were driving across Kansas, we were driving into about a 40 mph wind and when we cut southwest towards Oklahoma, it became a cross wind, which made the driving interesting - semi trucks around us had a noticeable list. One thing was apparent to me - Indiana needs to get their "stuff" together: I-70 though Indiana is the worst road I drove on - I needed an oil change when I got back and I had the alignment checked. It was a little off and I blame the potholes in Indiana. Some were quite jarring, especially in a sporty car without much tire sidewall to absorb the blow. A friend told me I was insane for planning this trip over Masters weekend, but when I wasn't driving, I had the Masters streaming on my phone and managed to catch almost all the final round. I thought it was a great tournament and I was actually very happy to see Tiger win. So there it is - my spring adventure and why I was not terribly active on here for a few days.

Happy Easter everyone!! It is also our 12th anniversary, so my wife and I headed to the course. My BIL said we wouldn't last 6 months!! lol For those that haven't heard the story... my wife and I were married on the 1st tee of our course, said our vows, turned around and teed off. Golf for everyone all day. Today we played with a couple that played with us 12 years ago. I made the turn at +1 with a birdie and 2 bogeys. Then I birdied #10. That's when I said "I could shoot my age, theoretically." hahahaha The golf gods got me. For some reason I couldn't hit the ball like I did on the front nine. Shot +7 on the back nine for a smooth 80. I did hit 12/13 fairways, but only 4 greens. Scrambling saved me on the front nine; didn't save me on the back nine. I missed an ace on the 144 yard #4, hitting my 9i 143.9 yards. It was a nice birdie, but my wife and the other woman in our group also birdied. Life is good!

Bam, and there ya have it! Only took 6 1/2 years...

Hey group! So I thought I'd stop in as it's been a good minute since my last post. So as the trend and comments continue regarding the durability.. or lack thereof.. I'm concluding that maybe Bridgestone is blazing a new trail for the "disposable" golf ball. I'm finding that I'm not too interested in playing this ball for more than 1 round due to the amount of ball damage showing at the end of the round. The only hope that a ball has to see another round, is if it was pulled at mid or end of the previous round due to a throw away or a shankering to the golf Gods. When used during a launch monitor session, it's an automatic throwaway because the face is just unrecognizable after a hundred+ smacks through my club lineup. In comparison to my Project (a) and higher priced balls such as the Bridgestone Tour B XS and ProV1, I've got balls that are going on their 3rd rounds with definite scuffing but nothing resembling the wear on the e12's.. The same goes with both the Callaway Super Soft and the Wilson Staff Duo. They just have much better wear stats. Hopefully I'm not being too harsh or critical but I feel this is why we're here. I really want to see Bridgstone continue to excel in the ball/equipment arena and stuff like this should only help them improve right? So throw out the lost ball factor.. throw out the performance factor (both appearing somewhat negligible). Quantifying cost per play at: (cost for 12) / (rounds per ball * 12) = Cost per play (welcome to my brain) .. I'm beginning to find it difficult to stomach paying $30/12 balls to get roughly 12 rounds of play at $2.50 per play per ball when I can pay about the same price for my Project (a)'s which will gladly give me 2-3 rounds each and amount to about $.83 - $1.25 per play/ball. To add to that, a box of Calaway Super Softs run roughly $20/12 which are also good for 2-3 or so rounds and equate to $.56 - $.83 per play. Even crazier is that a box of Tour B XS or ProV 1's at around $45/12 will definitely hold up to the 2-3 round challenge. Again.. $1.25 - $1.88 per play. Sorry if I just blew up anybody's brain with this.. but it's definitely an important factor to me as a budget-conscious golfer trying to get the most out of my equipment. The e12's just don't seem to be a budget-friendly option IMO. thoughts/comments/opinions are always welcome!

... My Phoenix winter vacation is sadly coming to an end. It has been a blast! Played Whirlwind Cattail today and really enjoyed the course. With winds 10-15mph but gusty not constant, I was playing the silver tees at 6300 and the two MD's I joined up with were playing the gold tees at 6725. I was 2 under on the front with 2 birdies and the rest pars, but made the turn and bogied 10/11 to get back to even. On 17, a 490yd par 5 with a little helping wind, I had 205 to the green. Both playing partners had no chance from 515 as my drive was a good 60yds past them. I hit my 4 iron into the lip of the bunker and barely got out and settled for par. They asked me why would I play the wrong tees when I was outdriving them both by 20-30 yds all day and a few even longer. I smiled and said "This is the first time I have played this course, I am 66 yrs old and have either of you considered that maybe you guys are playing the wrong tees?" I hit a 2 iron off the 18th tee so I was about 10 yds behind their drives and stuck a 6 iron to about 8 feet from 178yds and uphill. So much for a tee advantage. Rolled in the birdie putt to finish with a 71. After grinding out some mid 70 scores my last few rounds it was nice to be in sync and have a day where everything came easy. 9 more days in Paradise!

What has two thumbs, just had his Accra tz5 M5 delivered and is about to head to the range for a G410 session? This guy! Will have a writeup later tonight or tomorrow morning about my round from Friday and today's range session.

Some guy on Facebook posted a comment on the win. It said “his brother Peter is very proud of him”. I can’t stop laughing.

I saw this on Twitter.... Bridgestone says every Tour B XS has been spoken for... Anyone that thinks the game is better off without him is nuts.

Two weeks old and I love her to pieces. So happy to have her in our lives. [emoji3531] Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

Just me and the Eagles on the range today. Golf is such a stupid game. When I played last I couldn’t do a thing right and was ready to quit. I had no time to touch a club the rest of the week although I did a SuperSpeed workout on Saturday. I had a few too many cocktails last night. Slept in this morning and hit the range at 1230. Hit balls for two hours. My worst misshit during that time was better than my best shot last Tuesday. My driver was long, straight just a hint of draw. I was all over a flag that was 137 away with 9 iron. Averaged 161 on 10 7 irons, 190 with 4 hybrid and could adeptly alternate between a flag at 87 and another at 52 with either my 56 or 60 or switching between the two in the middle of the sequence. For yucks I went in the bunker and felt as if I could hole any shot I wanted (I didn’t but I was getting them inside of 10 feet). Golf is a stupid game. Best wishes to Carl and Rick on your recoveries! Sent from my iPhone using MyGolfSpy

You ever have one of those days.... ...that's starts out good on the first couple holes with 2 birdie chances: And then you get to the green and it looks like this: You can't see it but there are earthworms all over the place also... I assume those little brown dots are from the worms pushing up the earth...and it looks like they aerated a couple days ago. It was nearly impossible to putt.... We had about 1-2 inches of rain in a 30 hour period and it meant a lot of this on the fairway: Hard to see but the ball is 3/4 buried - in the middle of the fairway. It was like standing on a wet sponge and trying to hit the ball... I was actually happy to get in the rough on some holes. Somehow managed an 83 but the course did not help me one little bit.... not one. but hey - I was playing golf!

Then I'll add this one....

... As far back as I can remember there have always been high and low bounce wedges. It is the bounce that makes the D grind useless here. Phoenix has bunkers with high lips and virtually no sand at all. The only way to get it over the lip is open the face and the 12* bounces into the ball. I have played all over the country and have never seen bunkers like these, especially on nicer courses. They say winds blow all the sand out of the bunkers so they just don't replace it. Additionally some of these desert courses have hard pan around the greens and if you have enough green to work with you can put the ball back and lean the shaft for a chip, but it is gonna come in low and run.

Played another full league round with the e12 Speeds on Saturday. My results are similar to what I quoted from DannyDips here. Once again, I was painting within the lines (mostly) but the wayward shots were more swing/contact induced than anything I could attribute to Bridegstone claiming these fly straighter. I will say I did not have any big hook/big slice results, and my number of penalty strokes was down from earlier rounds with the other gamers. Distance off the driver was not significantly different. Off the irons and other clubs it seems like I'm seeing about a 1/2 club gain with these. That's the good side. Even the flush hit irons aren't grabbing the greens like I would like. I tend to prefer a hop and stop or maybe a slight pull-back on full iron shots into the green. With the e12 it's definitely an adjustment to account for the hit and roll performance. Especially on intermediate wedges and chip shots. I've had to account for a lot more roll out than with other gamers. But that is an adjustment I can make. Durability is the only real down side to the e12 Speed that I have noticed so far. Flush iron shots and bunkers were what gave me the results in these photos. I didn't hit any cart paths or trees or any of the other usual suspects for marring of the golf ball cover. Nothing more here than a flush 3/4 gap wedge

Long time struggle with trying to find a 3 wood I like. I had basically gone to a strong 5 wood that was doing well but at times made it difficult to reach the par 5's in two. I used the Most Wanted section here and picked up two 3 woods from the older list. A Callaway Rogue 3+ and a Cobra f7 3/4 adjustable. I cranked the f7 down to 13.5* and now I have another problem. I have two 3 woods that are absolute bombers !! I keep alternating rounds with them trying to decide which to keep. Both are great clubs, thanks for the reviews MGS.

Like others, my definition of good continues to change. For the purpose of your question, and where you are in your golf journey, I'll share my first definition of good. Don't lose too many balls Don't hold up the players behind me Play a full round without mulligans Know most of the rules Know my distances (roughly) Notice how none of those had to do with score. Of course score mattered, but not as much as getting the basics right. If you stack those on each other, they'll add up to reasonable scores and you can move onto your next definition of good. Now that that's out of the way, it took me until my second season to break that first layer of good (now on my 9th). I practiced a lot, read a lot, and tried to play with purposes in mind. I was never really the type to get hammered with the bros on the course and screw around. Still not. Good luck in your journey! Hope we get to hear more as you progress.

I went to a cool golf center today to get my clubs all dialed in and gapped. While I was there, the guy casually snuck a fitting in on me, and the Srixon 585 on a 80 gram kbs graphite shaft tied with the kgb tour head on the same shaft. im a digger and he felt that the v-sole on the 585 was perfect for my swing. It seemed like a pretty big V compared to the kgb sole. The 585’s seemed like a fairly traditional loft as they were 10 yards shorter than my p790’s, which we all know are a strong hot club. I only hit on the mat, so I can’t tell you much, but it was interesting how the mat particles were left on top of the V, and not the leading edge

MGS, GIVE US OUR FREE DATA!!! NOW!! In all seriousness, if this golf ball report helps your game out and you enjoy these types of test/research, give these guys a donation. It doesn't have to be a lot, but we are all eagerly anticipating a test that will probably cause us to spend more money on golf balls...either on ones that will help our game or the ones we currently have and we'll want to buy more of that particular ball. With the information we'll obtain for free, maybe throw an Andrew Jackson at MGS as you know, a little something for the effort.

I'd say that it depends on what you do from there. For me, that's too upright, but it works quite well for Jim Furyk.

I snuck out for an early morning range session yesterday before the family festivities started. I wanted to test the sliding weight and how much difference I saw in ball flight. No LM so don't have the hard numbers but what I can tell you, for my swing, the weight REALLY moves the ball around. Even subtle adjustments on the track are a visible difference. This gives everyone the ability to manage ball flight for their swing. Really impressed by the differences. P.S. Sorry to the range boys having to pick up balls 60 yards left of the range.

The wife got me a like new SC200 launch monitor for a Birthday/Fathers day gift. Not sure how much I'll use it over the summer, but will get a lot of use over the winter months.

45/40 on a nice Willamette Valley Easter Sunday. 69% fairways, 30% GIR, 35 putts, a 3 putt, and a 3 doubles. Short game and putting generally steady, but currently a real struggle.

... I had to buy a SM5 58* M grind to play in Phoenix this winter. So many tight lies on basically hardpan and bunkers with little or no sand in them made the D grind useless. The M grind certainly has it's advantages but I miss my SM7 D grind and 12* of bounce that is very versatile in soft conditions or actual rough and of course bunkers that have sand in them. At least it was only $59 and it will go back in the basement til next winter.

Ko’Olina #1

This is a par 3 over an old silver mine and is where all bad shots go to die... I've played here before so I knew what to do... The mine shaft is on the left...next to the group of trees...that's the tee box in the back. Slicers beware! hahaha Course built on a 300 year old farm in Mass.; still no leaves on the trees but the flowering trees are in bloom and the grass just started to green up.

Keeping with the impact mark trend, today's range session saw me hitting the lower half of the driver: Consistently around 96-100 MPH, 225-240 carry according to my Swing Caddie. I did play with the sliding weight today, moving it about halfway between center and draw positions. I do not draw the driver typically, but on a few of my better swings after moving the weight I managed a nice baby draw. Something to continue to play with as I also work on the swing. Since sound has been a huge focal point in this thread, I attempted to capture it on video as best as I can. I brought all of the drivers in my house along to the range today to hopefully give a better illustration of the sound. The Epic Flash is definitely more of a muted crack than a metallic sound. Both Cobra drivers in my video above are definitely more metallic, and the Ti Bubble 2 from the late 90s sounds like I'm hitting metal on metal! I didn't take many swings with the other drivers, but all indications show several more yards carry distance with the Epic Flash as well. What else would everyone like to see? What questions can I answer or help out with?

I agree. This isn't me trying to rag on the TV Producers. They HAVE to show Tiger. You are shooting yourself in the foot if you don't. He matters that much.

NOPE.

Golf Town's website nearly crashed from demand for the red mock shirt he wore on that fateful Sunday. Sold out insanely quick. I've been saying it for a few years now, regardless of whether Tiger beats Nicklaus and Snead's records (much more likely now than when I first said this), no other player has had the level of impact that he has on the game of golf. That's enough for me, with his win totals, to crown him the GOAT by a significant margin. Jack was a hell of a player and great for the game, but his impact pales in comparison to Tiger's, imo. Sent from my Pixel 2 using MyGolfSpy mobile app

This video will tell you everything you need to know about why lie boards are not the answer. I deliver my irons slightly toe down. A lie board would say I should go about 2 degrees upright. The problem is, I already hit a draw, so that would turn my draw into a hook. Through a proper fitting I learned I actually need my irons 1.5 degrees flat and I play my wedges at 2 degrees flat

Thanks! At first I thought it was over-priced, and am not too keen on the continuing subscription model, but I'm lucky to have a few $$ to indulge in my hobby and .. via MPR's and others' posts .. saw the very real utility it can provide! Ha ha.. I wish... But "me" will always be in my head, impeding .. "our" .. progress..! Thanks! ..that's also one of my primary goals with it, working on wedge distances for varying shots.

From that pic I would say yes. But without seeing what happens as you complete the swing it is impossible to say for sure. It all depends on what your goals are. Changing swing plane is a major undertaking and will require some work and some bad scores will probably follow. As always try to get a lesson, but if not feasible from the one still pic you posted, it looks like changing your right elbow position may accomplish what you are looking for.

*having panic attack*

Three hours of seat time through the mountains today in the Hellcat. Best therapy I have had in a long time. Sent from my iPhone using MyGolfSpy

As a manager, I like weeks like this where I only had 4 players playing. That way, I can't blame myself for playing the wrong people.

Went out and shot an 88 today. I broke 90, which is a good sign I’m trusting what I have. 43-45 with just bogeys as my worst and nothing higher. I’m just swinging my swing(which produces a in play slice 240 with roll down the middle) . I know my swing is over the top and divots point left. But so what , i keep the ball in play this way and know where it is going. Trying to clear my head from all the instructions I got on changing everything. Not saying it was.a negative. Just didn’t seem to click for me .

shot a 76 in the comp on Saturday- do you think they'll be a BROKE 75 badge soon?

Yeah. I don’t want to mess around with ball position too much because I get crisp strikes with the rest of the clubs. Might go back to having the 56° be the highest lofted club. I can make it a 64° if needed. If Seve could do it, I can at least try. [emoji854]

Congratulations! Quality over quantity.

I really haven't noticed a significant difference between it and my Callaway Razr-Fit. I agree it's a bit more "tinny", but not an issue for me. I really don't pay much attention to club sound - particularly if the club is hitting long and straight.

The only places that I have seen demo wedges for outside trial is Titleist Thursdays, Titleist demo locations, and Cleveland scoring clinics. Of course, I haven't been to any of these events recently but i keep checking hoping that I can find a convenient one. I really want to try a bunch of wedges with different bounces and grinds to learn how they work with my swing.

I haven’t been to a store yet that has demos that I could take to a course or range. I’ve been at numerous demo days where demos were available, and Club Champion does wedge fittings indoor... It’s funny to hear guys like Crossfield, Shiels, and this designer talk about taking clubs to a course and try them first. I can see a single club off a fitting cart, but I haven’t seen wedges available yet. My Edel fitting was done outside, and inside both, and I’d love to try other options out there. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

Today will be a day I don't ever want to remember except for one hole. My drives were short, irons didn't cooperate and chipping and putting stank to high heaven. Our course was soaked - water on the fairways and the rough was impossibly high. We had to walk it which is almost 8 miles - guess that didn't help my game - plowing a cart through wet fairways. On the other hand my nemesis hole #8, I pared today. In all the years playing this course the best I've done is a bogie. Sent from my iPad using MyGolfSpy

Happy Easter Avid golfers of golf spy.Went out and played 9 holes today. Shot a 46 with one double and 8 bogeys. Just one of those rounds where my approaches or drives were off just slightly. But slightly enough to put me in spots that made a great recovery very difficult. On top of that, the pins were placed up on knobs. The greens crew is off today and tomorrow. So they placed the pins in spots where excess traffic wouldn’t harm the ‘main’ green area that much. When I look back. There is such a fine line between a par and a bogey. It’s really just a matter of a few yards left or right of your intended target. And those slight misses can really put you in some tough predicaments

50 (5A) PV1’s for $45 on eBay. Funny thing is the guy asks if I want red or black, so I said, well red would be cool. The the box shows up with 49 black and one red..

When it's close to 70° outside, what could be better than sledding?

Happy Good Thursday Spies. (My own invented holiday since my 4 day work week gets cut to 3 this week.) So I bit the bullet today(quite literally) and decided to put the e12 into play from swing 1 of my round this morning. To be honest it wasn’t pretty, now to be completely fair my home course is fairly difficult and we had winds 15-20 mph this morning. I made a few notes on my scorecard of unexpected shots. Hole 1- Hit 9I 10 yards over the green then chipped through the green (two things I rarely do) Hole 2- Hit SW 15 yards long over green. Hole 3- Hit 5 shots inside 125. Hole 5- Hit 9I pin high to 155. (Typical yardage 145) Hole 8- Hit 52 degree 134 pin high. (Typical yardage 115) Hole 11- Flew PW 150 over green. (Typical yardage 125) I found today that the ball seemed to fly 10+ yards further off almost all my iron shots. This made club selection increasingly difficult, especially in a 15 mph wind. I’ve always found chipping with the e12 difficult due to the amount of roll out on anything inside 40 yards. I’m starting to think this may be a very poor ball for my game and style of play. Also to keep up with the durability issues check out this gem... Sent from my iPhone using MyGolfSpy

I picked up a blue chip tonight! One year sober and feeling and looking better than a coon pup on his first treeing