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Today was just about perfect for Michigan weather. Mid 80's, decent dew point, gentle breeze, lots of pillow clouds. Something just clicked today. My back was free, the new hip was working just outstanding. Not one SNAFU. Shot my best round ever. Shot 74 and for a 69-year-old I'm as giddy as a school kid. The key for me was being able to hit 13 greens in regulation and recover from missed fairways. Just a perfect day for me. Thanks for listening. Dweed.

One Sunday morning the pastor noticed little Alex standing in the foyer of the church starting at a large plaque. It was covered with names and small American flags mounted on either side of it. The six-year-old had been staring at the plaque for some time, so the pastor walked up, stood beside the little boy, and said quietly, “Good morning, Alex.” “Good morning, Pastor.” He replied, still focused on the plaque. “Pastor, what is this?” The pastor replied, “Well, son, it’s a memorial to all the young men and women who died in the service.” Soberly, they just stood together, staring at the large plaque. Finally, little Alex’s voice, barely audible and trembling with fear asked, “Which service, the 8:00 or the 10:30?”

76 (40/36) with two birdies, hit 12 greens, didn’t scare the hole much with the putter due to a pull, but chipped better than usual. It was a pretty good round once I got my driver on-track. Two additional notes: the small coaching-led swing changes worked as evidenced by higher than normal greens being hit, and the new Asics were awesome! So comfortable!!!

Not a real round today but I did play the little 18 hole par 3 near me. Instead of practice of practicing and hitting multiple balls I played straight up. Not bad. +10 on the day but my striking was just a tiny bit off today. A touch heavy on full swings so I shorted a lot or left myself with longish putts. My putting continues to be somewhat suspect which I guess should be expected since I'm installing/adjusting my stroke. Distance control was good, but I'm just a bit offline. I was Mr. 2 putt all day. All in all I think it was okay given how I was little off but I really need to do better at the 110-150 range (what this course offers) to improve my game. Will keep grinding. Planning for multiple rounds next week so we'll see.

WedgeAlicious!!!

With 2 penalty shots (both water hazards (#4 par 3 and #17 par 4, saving bogey on both holes), I shot a 78. 17 putts on the front 9 (40) and 12 putts on the back 9 (38). But, that's really deceiving information. Although there were only 29 putts for the round, it's more telling that I didn't make any birdies, so all those 1 putts (including 2 that were from off the green and I didn't count as a putt) were to save par. Still, I'm pleased with the round (no doubles!!!!). 6 bogeys, 12 pars.

77 today, 3 birdies on the back nune. A but of a horror show chipping and a stupid 3 putt put me with doubles. Lag putting continues to be solid and driving it into good spots, including driving the 14th hole today to 15 feet, eagle putt never moved an inch from the outside the hole I was trying.

More puttout training today. Still on the fence about actually buying a new putter. I have really come to like the StrokeLab and its feel, but others always are fun to look at. I average about 1 in 15 from 7 feet with the puttout which I think is great. However @GolfSpy MPR mentioned the other week that Kirke made a puttout perfect putt from 40 feet! I don't think I could ever do that. I'll just stick to my 6-10 foot practice.

... Every PGA Store is only as good as it's manager. That said, most managers I have dealt with are pretty cool and will bend over backwards, especially for a repeat customer. I had a custom Sim Max scheduled to be delivered to my home last spring, and 2 weeks after the delivery date I was in the store and asked about the progress and was told it had been delivered 3 weeks ago!?! I was living in a gated apartment and they had never heard of a theft at the complex. PGA manager and TM worked it out and they rushed me a new one. When it arrived it had the wrong shaft! The manager did something they never do and took a shaft from a Sim in stock and replaced mine with the Tensei Blue Raw I ordered and said he would deal with TM. Asked me what grip I use and then took a Lamkin ST+ out of stock and installed it "for all my troubles". I have been very loyal to that store ever since.

Looks nice. I am eager to get mince back from Jim; he is putting some graphite shafts in my Vokey's

My "last transaction for a while" was about 10 transactions ago.

I don't know about naming irons...here's a conversation I imagine would get me in trouble: Me (to a buddy on the phone): man, I put Jessica in my hands on the course yesterday and she hit my ball great! Wife: who did what?! Me: Jessica, she hit my ball great, although she could of gone a little longer but she helped me get it closer to the hole! Me (wakes up two days later in the hospital)

Well, evidently I misspoke. I was messing around with the head last night, and couldn't get it to rattle. What I found was that the little gold ring on the adapter, that basically keeps the lower piece of the adapter on the sleeve, came loose. So the downside is the bottom half of the adapter that has the letters on it, the "A" "B" "C" and "D" on it is loose and rattles when you shake it. I don't hear it when I swing the club, and that's the 2nd Titleist adapter this has happened to. I keep a little bag of weights in my bag for the driver, and occasionally move / change weights in it to try something with a different shaft. And the other adapter that this happened to has that bottom piece in that bag. Now there are 2 of them in that bag with the weights. So my bad, the head is fine. Just an adapter failure that doesn't remove it from use...

Rough day on the range today. No real excuse for it, I just didn't feel good about my swing. It was ugly with lots of shots off the hosel, the exact opposite of my usual slightly toey contact miss. By the end I could tell that I wasn't staying down at all, moving towards the ball and lifting up. I didn't feel that I was able to make any real corrections, which is annoying because I had been doing well recently. Will probably take a day or two off and then go back to working out the kinks. Hopefully it was just a bad day and not the destruction of all of the work I've been doing for the past few weeks. Left probably half a large bucket out there. It reminded me too much of something my college advisor told me. "If everything is going badly in the first 30 minutes of your day, just go home. It won't get any better and you will be miserable trying to fix everything." The few times I've used that advise, he wasn't wrong.

I get that you can - it’s name then becomes a joke - I should have been clear earlier - of course you are correct. But excluding former Major winners in their prime, guys who would ordinarily exempt into the field? It dies cast a pall over the tournament IMO.

I don't know how the Titleist rep survived that day. It was a sweltering 95*+ at the time of the fitting and he was wearing a vest!

A distraught senior citizen phoned her doctor's office. "Is it true," she wanted to know, "that the medication you prescribed me has to be taken for the rest of my life?" "'Yes, I'm afraid so,"' the doctor told her. There was a moment of silence before the senior lady replied, "I'm wondering, then, just how serious is my condition because this prescription is marked 'NO REFILLS'.."

As posted in the Putter thread... this is my latest acquisition (probably last for a while... at least that is what I told my wife).

Order placed from Cleveland... now we wait.

Today's shot of the day came on a par 3. My tee shot found the bank and bounced back into the water. Dropping my ball in the designated drop area, my 3rd shot (after the penalty) wedge flew true and bounced around the cup/pin and came to rest an inch from holing out, leaving a tap in bogey.

Grabbed a box of Maxfli Tour X to compare to the Tours..was taking my daughter to Old Navy, so a stop at GG was on order.

53 on front nine round. Putting was a disaster. More in depth on my breaking 90 thread.

Recently in a local club tournament, temps in the 102 range, which I'm used to. I was playing horribly throughout the round. On 18, of course. I hit the ball into a greenside bunker then popped it out and in the hole for a score of 7 on a par 4. I just keep playing...

Pic of Titleist rep with the vest...

Hope had a fresh bath today. She’s been heavy into the grass rolling around and pollen is Definitly getting to her. Going to be a more often thing over the next few weeks

You sir are dead to me. Seriously, congrats on the new irons whatever they may be! I'm thinking the Cobras...

I believe the goal is 72 iirc. That’s one’s foursome on every hole in a shotgun start.

The view from the first tee: A view looking across from another teebox (5?) down towards the feature 14th hole: Teeing off on 14: And putting out to finish the 14th hole: Overall it was a beautiful course and facility, but I don't think I would play there again. Part of the reason why I love golf so much is the creativity it affords you when you get out of position, and the decision making process. The design of this course essentially took that away and forced you into a rather mundane game of target golf. Aim at a portion of the narrow fairway - if you hit it (or the 15 feet of rough on either side of it), proceed to that spot and do the same thing for your next shot. If you miss it, proceed to the spot anyways and take a drop there because your ball is lost in the thick underbrush and probably still rolling down the hill somewhere. On a par 5 you could score par and your partner could score triple bogey, and you would both be taking the exact same shot every time.

9-holes at the nicest public course I've ever been to where I played with my H4 and the new armlock putter for the first time. It's definitely going to take some time to ingrain tagging clubs into my preshot routine but the H4 was an surprisingly pleasant experience. I had several three putts with the armlock but I felt confident over the ball and expect the stats to improve once I have owned it for more than 24 hours . Hit 51 overall, with a par on the 4 handicap 392 yard 9th. On the 9th, I hit my driver well, pitched extremely well from behind a tree with my 9 iron, and two putted with the new armlock putter. Unfortunately, the 9 iron pitch was the result of leaving my pitching wedge on the 8th. By the time I returned to look for it, it was gone. I'll check in with the clubhouse later today or tomorrow to see if anyone turned it in. I think I'd be more upset over losing the ShotScope tag than the club itself if it's gone for good.

2 birdies and two double bogeys to card an 80. Other than a lateral hosel rocket 7 iron, ball striking wasn't too bad. Not a lot of GIR on the front side (42) which improved on the back (38). The correlation of GIR to scoring was once again proven to me.

Another solid (42/41) 83 today! Started off pretty hot with birdies on #2 & #3 at Mansfield National in Mansfield, TX. Unfortunately, I'd have one triple per side to keep me firmly out of the 70's. Putting was really solid for the most part despite greens that were constantly building in speed as temps went up and the humidity lifted. I had a total of 8 one-putts with 6 of those coming on the front 9. Of course, I countered that with 3 three-putts which stinks. I did grab one more birdie on the back after reaching the Par 5 13th in two. This is the third time in as many rounds that I've managed to actually reach the green in two on a par 5! I'm usually within range on most par 5's, but always struggle to get there. One last highlight was my bunker shots on #8 & #9. The bunkers at Mansfield National are terrible and today was no exception as they were wet and compacted to boot. One of our playing partners offered to let pull my ball out of the first bunker, but other than the conditions stated above, I didn't think the lie was bad and decided to take a swing. The ball came out perfect and with enough spin to keep it just a few feet past the hole despite going down a slope. #9 was the same deal except I had a much higher lip and less green to work with. I opened my 58 and choked down a bit so I could make a full swing. The ball landed next to the hole and stopped maybe 3 or 4 feet on the other side of it! Playing Waterchase with a good buddy next week. I'd like to get some revenge for my previous outing there when I simply could not get off the tee well. Absolutely loving some return to form. If I can just push it over the edge so I'm scoring in the 70's I'll be ecstatic!

Friday Bacon Boyz early this morning. Only 12guys, we have injuries, Covid and some out of town. I’m of course still being careful not hitting anything over an 8 iron. Definitely starting to feel the swing coming back and realizing I haven’t had a full swing in years! So after knee heals up need to work on that. Anyway hitting the ball well staying within myself and working on the follow thru. Played the Par4’s (2) from 150yard marker so I don’t count them, par 3’s were 1birdie, 4pars and 2bogies. Putting was decent, currently using a LH Tad Moore anser style but with more toe hang than normal. Taking 2 days off and playing Monday.

Got the shipping notification which got me even more excited. Being they are coming from out of country I expect/hope later next week. Another cool thing was just before they shipped and such was in talks with the builder and he offered to laser etch the irons for me so each iron now has its own name 5 - Fender (Our dalmation, I love her but she can be fickle and a real pain at times just like my 5 iron) 6 - Sampson (Our first family dog, super reliable and a mutt, but was a best friend for so long. Much like my 6 iron which is often a go to reliable club) 7 - Oliver (Our Chihuahua, probably should have made his the gap, but oh well!) 8 - Apollo (The genesis of my forum name, my best little pup and most reliable club in the bag. 8 iron was perfect) 9 - Ivan (My son, another go to club and a club my game revolves around much like my life now he makes up such a huge part of it) PW - Gus (Our old family cat, the only cat we ever owned. I'm not a cat person... nor do a love my wedge usually, but he was awesome) GW - Derby (This one is funny because allyssa and I both agreed to name our next dog Derby so got him in on the ground floor) Can't wait to see how they turned out!

How many Circle T's did you buy?

You have to spill. Do you now own Ben Hogan golf or something?

LIV management has stated that their model is Formula One. They eventually want to sell the teams and have Worldwide team competition as F1. They supposedly want to play three events in Australia next season. You don’t think a team of Cam Smith, Jason Day, Mark Leishman and Adam Scott would draw fans there and in other spots worldwide? Not that they can draw all four, but I think that is the idea for the ultimate 12, 14 or 18 teams. If they realize they have to go 72 holes to gain OWGR points, I’ll bet they’ll move that direction as well.

Had one of those days where the putter just didn’t work. First round left hand low. I’m not even mad. What happened was my putts hit the center so solid my distances were all long. Even with hitting the putting green earlier. I just had no feel for distance control. So I just choke that up to learning a new stroke and needing an adjustment period. I also hit some drives of my life today. On one drove the green and had an uphill 15 ft for eagle but missed it short by 2 ft. One bad hole where I did shank a driver ob. Otherwise Driver was very solid. Iron play also not too bad. One bad hole with short game due to steep drop offs and everything playing fast. I see so much potential even with my poor SG putting today. It felt awesome.

I'm going to have to check out one of these Monte clinics when we get settled in AZ. I simply cannot believe he hasn't offered any here in SW MT.

My favorite grip. Whenever I see them on sale I stock up on midsize. I disagree with his comments about glove wear. I've never seen an issue.

As a long time REDSKIN fan, I have no team thinking of maybe becoming a Ram Fan,,,, no way would I be a “Commanders” fan,,,, HTTR ! By the way, I moved 5 miles from a Apache reservation, one of the first gentlemen I became friends with is a die hard ‘Skins fan AND full blooded Apache,,,,,, he’s in the same boat!

Not me, but my buddy is in Scotland this week and texting me pics:

PIF is all about diversifying Saudi investments and generating a good return, it’s not just sportswashing at all costs. What we don’t know is how patient, or not, they may be - PIF has been characterized as among the least transparent sovereign wealth funds in the world. PIF has been in existence since 1971 so it’s not some new Saudi experiment, though MBS took control in 2015. The $2B investment in golf is less than 0.3% of the fund, almost trivial to PIF overall. It is possible LIV will reduce the PGA to a shell of itself, and then the Saudis will stop supporting LIV if it doesn’t meet their (return and PR) objectives - that would leave professional golf in a mess…

A buddy I golf with regularly started taking lessons. At first, he went to some guy who charges an exorbitant amount and is apparently on the Golf Digest Top 100 list or something but the first thing he wanted to do with my friend is change his grip. I thought it was kind of odd given how much swaying and extraneous movement he has in his swing that the guy would just jump to grip right off the bat. The grip he had worked with what he was doing. It's not ideal, but he can keep it in play and get the ball moving. Next round out, my buddy can't keep it in the fairway and doesn't know if it'll go straight or snap hook due to the new grip. I told him to go back to his old grip and he started playing golf like normal again. I asked if the guy was a "one swing" teacher and my buddy said "yep". Without dragging this out much further, today my buddy told me about a lesson he had with a different instructor. This guy (much to my agreement) told him he could get to the 70's without much help - just clean up a few things. He's working with what my friend brings to the table based on his goals and my buddy is playing some spectacular golf. He clipped me by 1 stroke on the front 9 last week and had me beat by 3 or 4 strokes on the front this week! If I can just get him to stay in it on the back and not take on too much, I'm sure he'll beat me through a full round sometime in the near future.

Picture doesn't do it justice, but the garden provided a good chunk of tonight dinner. Cast iron cheeseburgers and sauteed yellow squash. Cheeseburgers were topped with huitlacoche ("corn smut") sauteed with garlic and an excellent corn salsa. Everything but the meat and cheese came from the garden this week. Huitlacoche is the result of a fungus that infects the corn kernels. The kernels swell up huge and turn gray/black. Mushroom consistency when sauteed and very earthy in flavor. It was excellent paired with the brighter acidity of the corn salsa.

I have my first weekend game round in like 5 weeks tomorrow, and my first 18 hole round since the MGS trip... but man is 730 and 740 going to come early tomorrow

Hit the range today to work on my setup/alignment issues. As I'm figuring things out I hit a couple of really awful fat shots, and then about a third of the way through the bucket the head of my 7 iron snapped off. Seemed like a good time to switch it up and work on my longer clubs. Was able to get my 3 wood, 7 wood and hybrid straightened out. I was overly closed in my setup and opening up and shuffling back slightly brought it all together. Pulled out a wedge and putter to work on the chipping green. I put everything else in the trunk and realized I'd just locked myself out. While I waited for Owen to come with the spare key I worked on chipping to a slightly elevated green from about fifteen yards away. Needs more work. Came up short of the green far too often and if I tried to put a little more on it I wound up hitting liners off the back of the green. Have an outing next weekend, gotta figure out whether I should go back to my Cobra Amps or pull out the old Wilson Staff blades.

I'm re posting from another thread because you just can't get enough forum validation right? Not new but in really good condition. The entire process of this purchase and build I can't help but have the song "reunited" playing over and over in my head. I played these for all of last year and most of 2020 and loved everything about them. A few months back I traded them for a set of Callaway RAZR X MB blades just to see if I could handle that transition. The Callaways also had shafts that I've been trying to get my hands on (Royal Precision Rifle 6.5's). Well I found a guy selling this set for $250 on offer up including Aldila graphite shafts. I was able to pull the shafts and install my Royals from the Callaway blades and now I've got my "perfect irons" built and ready for action tomorrow at Golf Canyon (Dinosaur Mountain). I stripped the red triangle on the "M" and think the look with the ferrules is pretty killer.

My name must be on the 4 iron I guess? Seriously though that's a pretty cool option!

Better! 40/38 -> 78 (+6) Finally got some better swings on the ball after finding a backswing key at the range yesterday. Still had some bad swings in there today, mostly with the driver, but I did hit some really, really solid ones for the first time in a few weeks. Two flukey double bogies, both of which were mental mistakes. I came oh so close to birdieing No. 11 for the first time ever. It's the only hole I've not birdied this year, or in the four-plus years of playing here. I hit a perfect utility from the tee, put my 7 iron just off the back edge of the green from like 185 out and my chip shot just slid off the left side of the hole. Easy tap in par but I wanted that birdie soooo bad.

Today was all over the map scoring wise. I played 9 holes. I parred the 1st and the 9th. Only had 2 drives that cost me strokes because I was forced to chip out. And according to Shot Scope I had a several drives over 220 yards and one of 253 yards. Chipping was my absolute downfall today. I was around the green in 2 for the most part on par 4s but kept on hitting my chips thin and sending low lasers over the green.