How'd you play?

[tony@CIC]

Went out to play 18 yesterday in coudless, but humid weather. By the third hole the clouds appeared, by the fourth hole it's starting to rain. Wife and I decided to head back to the condo - no sooner than we started, the torrential downpour came. Rained all day! so much for weekend golf.  

[Mtbryant01]

I’m down at the beach with family at Seaside, FL. Got to play Windswept Dunes Golf Club yesterday morning. I really enjoyed the course. A lot of tee options and large greens with many tiers. Golf course was in great shape. The course let the natural area grow up all around the course which allowed for great scenery. 
 

I shot a 76 - 40/36. Drove the ball great and hit 14/18 greens which is a personal best for me. While the greens were large, I had to try and find the right tier. I ended up 3 putting on 3 of the holes. A storm came through on the last 3 holes making gripping the clubs challenging, but held on to go +1 in those holes. My golf game is starting to round into form as I’ve broken 80 in 3 of my last 8 rounds and going back to back in the 70s.

Now back to the beach.

[funkyjudge]

16 hours ago, Kenny B said:

The scrambles here are every Wednesday... $5 and pay the entire pot out to the top 3 teams.  The "rules" state that you play the tees that you usually play from.  It's a senior scramble age 60 and older, but at 74 I am one of the oldest.  Teams are picked at random with the low handicappers being captains.  Not sure what the formula is for assigning team handicap.  Since I normally play Blues, I can't compete with the guys off that tee.  I feel that I drag down any team I'm assigned to, so it's not that fun for me.  If I normally played from the Whites, it might be different.

Based on your comments, my first thought was "why do you ever play from the blue tees?"  The idea is to play golf from the set of tees which will allow you to enjoy yourself and allow you to reach the green in regulation (at least a majority of the time) when you hit well-struck shots.

At age 72, I have moved up to the White tees, or a mix of white and gold tees when available and when the course plays at 6,250 yards or more from all white tees.  I did this a couple of years ago when my average driver distance dropped below 240 yards and my average 7-iron distance dropped to about 140 yards.

[Rickp]

Monday morning 9.  Little humid, not awful but was getting hot quick.  Breeze didn’t pick up until we were on 7th hole. 
Driver was not great but irons we really good, greens were a bit slow but flat & true.  No birdies, was skimming edges for kick in pars +4.   

[funkyjudge]

By the way, I FINALLY shot a somewhat respectable score (82 on a par-70 track of about 6,000 - 6,100 yards) last Thursday, with a 38 on the back nine (one double-bogey where I lost my ball off the tee, even though I hit a 5 iron because there is a swampy "native area" about 200-215 yards from my tees and unless I hit a slight fade (my normal miss is a hook or pull-hook), I risk hitting it in the junk that continues up the left side from the native area to the green. My playing partner and I both saw that tee ball land in the fairway short of the swamp, but we couldn't find it and assumed that it hit something hard and went in the junk. That, plus a couple of bad bounces kept me from shooting par or better on the back nine, and breaking 80.

Considering the fact that I was so sick that I spent a month in the hospital and three months on heavy doses of IV antibiotics earlier in 2021, and just finished three months of physical therapy in mid-June, I'm not complaining about that 82, but a score in the 70s would look really nice after a bunch of scores between 87-92 since my return to golf the second week of May.

Edited June 30, 2021 by funkyjudge
Typos

[tony@CIC]

9 hours ago, tony@CIC said:

Went out to play 18 yesterday in coudless, but humid weather. By the third hole the clouds appeared, by the fourth hole it's starting to rain. Wife and I decided to head back to the condo - no sooner than we started, the torrential downpour came. Rained all day! so much for weekend golf.  

Or weekday golf - same hot - 90's+ humid weather interspersed with downpours. Almost feels like Florida August weather. 

[Chip Strokes]

41/41 82 today. ties my best round. 

9/13 fairways

9/18 greens

35 putts

driver stayed in the bag for all but 2 holes (and i missed the fairway both times). i’m playing around with different tee clubs, especially on shorter and tighter par 4s. used a lot of 3w and 5i today and saw a lot of success. man, is it nice knowing exactly where your ball is when you’re walking up!

short irons were really good today. great contact and ball flight. blocked a couple of long iron shots out to the right, but nothing that got me in too much trouble. 

2 birdies on the card today, which is always nice.  feels really good knowing i was a couple of burned edges away from breaking 80

 

[Ben_Howell34]

10 hours ago, Mtbryant01 said:

I’m down at the beach with family at Seaside, FL. Got to play Windswept Dunes Golf Club yesterday morning. I really enjoyed the course. A lot of tee options and large greens with many tiers. Golf course was in great shape. The course let the natural area grow up all around the course which allowed for great scenery. 
 

I shot a 76 - 40/36. Drove the ball great and hit 14/18 greens which is a personal best for me. While the greens were large, I had to try and find the right tier. I ended up 3 putting on 3 of the holes. A storm came through on the last 3 holes making gripping the clubs challenging, but held on to go +1 in those holes. My golf game is starting to round into form as I’ve broken 80 in 3 of my last 8 rounds and going back to back in the 70s.

Now back to the beach.

You like back 9’s at the beach apparently. Great round. 

[Ben_Howell34]

Walked 9 this afternoon at the Graveyard course at Bent Brook in Birmingham. Was going to just hit range balls but decided to walk 9 instead, so zero warmup. Shot 41. Had 1 birdie on 7 which is a shorter par 5, was able to take advantage of a monster drive. Still had an issue hitting a few iron shots thin for some reason, as I did the round before. No blowup holes though which is a plus. 

[Kenny B]

7 hours ago, funkyjudge said:

Based on your comments, my first thought was "why do you ever play from the blue tees?"  The idea is to play golf from the set of tees which will allow you to enjoy yourself and allow you to reach the green in regulation (at least a majority of the time) when you hit well-struck shots.

At age 72, I have moved up to the White tees, or a mix of white and gold tees when available and when the course plays at 6,250 yards or more from all white tees.  I did this a couple of years ago when my average driver distance dropped below 240 yards and my average 7-iron distance dropped to about 140 yards.

I understand and I do play from the White tees occasionally.  The Whites are our senior tees at 5400y.  Our Blues are 6100y.  However, 700y difference is not evenly spaced out throughout the course.  It's a course designer issue IMO.  As an example... our par 5 #5 holes plays 550y from the Blues and 540y from the Whites.  Into the typical prevailing 15-20mph headwind, it doesn't matter which tee I use!  Much of the yardage is made up on par 3's, which isn't considered for the scramble as one of the 3 required tee shots for each person.  

Moving up 700 yards does not mean I shoot lower scores.  In fact, I typically shoot the same scores which means my index would go up a couple of points playing from the Whites.  Most of the guys I normally play with play from the Blues, so I that's where I play.  I actually enjoy playing from the Blues, and to do so requires I keep a sharp short game!!

My issue with playing in the senior scramble is that most of the seniors playing from the Blue tees hit 240-250 yards (most are in their 60's).  I'm lucky to get 210y.  On short holes they are much closer to the green; on long holes they have a mid or short iron into the green or can reach par 5's in two shots.  Using 3 of my tee shots only hurts the team, which is why I don't play in the scrambles anymore.

The guys from the scramble league have very similar handicaps as I do.  If we played head to head, I could beat any of them from the Blues on a good day.  Because I play from the Blues, I am not allowed to play from the Whites in the scramble; it would make the par 3's easier for me!!

Of course, 5400y is typical for the Forward or Red tees at many courses and my wife plays from there occasionally.  When we play together (which is most of the time), I don't consider it fair for me to play from the same tees since she is much shorter off the tee and is an 18 handicap.

 

[Tom the Golf Nut]

11 minutes ago, Kenny B said:

I understand and I do play from the White tees occasionally.  The Whites are our senior tees at 5400y.  Our Blues are 6100y. 

That makes more sense. Here I am thinking your playing from the tips. Blue is my courses tips at 6700, then, white at 6300, and gold 5700 senior tees, then red at 5000 womens. 

[Kenny B]

30 minutes ago, Tom the Golf Nut said:

That makes more sense. Here I am thinking your playing from the tips. Blue is my courses tips at 6700, then, white at 6300, and gold 5700 senior tees, then red at 5000 womens. 

Most people think that when they come to our course.  White tees at every other full size course in town is 6100-6300 yards.  Many people that come here for the first time automatically head to the Whites    Probably where many should be playing from anyway.   Our Black tees or tips play 6700y.  I wish they would make combo tees both Blue/White and Black/Blue.  There are about 4-5 holes where I'm only playing the Blues that are maybe 5-10 yards from the Black tees.  Other holes there is 40-50 yards difference.

[chisag]

... Played on one of my favorite courses today and after several rounds of mediocre play, I finally shot under par. 6 birdies and 3 bogies in 111* heat. I knew it was gonna be my day on the first hole when I had 175 to the pin with some wind into me, I hit a 5 iron almost over the green. The back of this green has about an 8 foot rise and my ball almost stopped on top and then rolled back down 35 feet to about 6 inches. Yea, I meant to do that  

... Then on #11 a 175yd par 3 with the pin tucked on the right side with a deep bunker on that side I tried to hit a cut 5 iron to the left side and move it back to the pin but I came up/out of the shot and hit it very thin, carrying maybe 100yds then running and rolling up on the green, taking the slope and leaving me about 1' for birdie. For fun I hit a 2nd shot as good as I can hit it starting middle of the green and fading back right at the pin hitting just to the right and then trickling off into the bunker for what would have been an impossible up and down. Ain't that golf? Hitting a really sh!tty shot and have a tap in birdie, then hit an almost perfect shot that missed my target by inches and would have resulted in a bogie at least. 

... CamelBack Resort Ambiente is a links style course that goes away from the club house for 9 holes then turns and comes back for 9 holes just like a seaside course. It has that natural rustic look I really love with native grass and plants and runs $175-225 in the winter but in the summer heat it is silly cheap and I played it for $29 today. (3rd photo upside down ... again) 

 

 

 

[Kenny B]

1 hour ago, chisag said:

... Played on of my favorite courses today and after several rounds of mediocre play, I finally shot under par. 6 birdies and 3 bogies in 111* heat. I knew it was gonna be my day on the first hole when I had 175 to the pin with some wind into me, I hit a 5 iron almost over the green. The back of this green has about an 8 foot rise and my ball almost stopped on top and then rolled back down 35 feet to about 6 inches. Yea, I meant to do that  

... Then on #11 a 175yd par 3 with the pin tucked on the right side with a deep bunker on that side I tried to hit a cut 5 iron to the left side and move it back to the pin but I came up/out of the shot and hit it very thin, carrying maybe 100yds then running and rolling up on the green, taking the slope and leaving me about 1' for birdie. For fun I hit a 2nd shot as good as I can hit it starting middle of the green and fading back right at the pin hitting just to the right and then trickling off into the bunker for what would have been an impossible up and down. Ain't that golf? Hitting a really sh!tty shot and have a tap in birdie, then hit an almost perfect shot that missed my target by inches and would have resulted in a bogie at least. 

... CamelBack Resort Ambiente is a links style course that goes away from the club house for 9 holes then turns and comes back for 9 holes just like a seaside course. It has that natural rustic look I really love with native grass and plants and runs $175-225 in the winter but in the summer heat it is silly cheap and I played it for $29 today. (3rd photo upside down ... again) 

 

 

 

Nice round!  

I played Ambiente the year after it was added to the Camelback Resort.  It wasn't that great then.  Probably a lot better now that it's matured.  Padre got all the play.  Yes, it was cheap in July 25 years ago too!!

[chisag]

1 hour ago, Kenny B said:

Nice round!  

I played Ambiente the year after it was added to the Camelback Resort.  It wasn't that great then.  Probably a lot better now that it's matured.  Padre got all the play.  Yes, it was cheap in July 25 years ago too!!

 

... I have heard that from several that played Ambiente when it first opened and yea they say it is quite different now. I am not a big fan of Padre. OK course and no real complaints but no real compliments ether. Just kinda meh plus it is a 45 minute drive and there are so many more courses closer I would rather play. But for me, Ambiente is well worth the drive. 

[Getoffmylawn]

Put together a couple solid rounds recently.  First, a 78 on Sunday that I'm particularly proud of...after a rough start I was able to stay focused and grind out a sub-80 score...

Then, shot a new personal best 74 last night!  Same course.  Left some out there for sure; I had very good speed control and never 3-putted but for as well as I know this course I still overread a few.

I can finally go edit my handicap to show some progress in the right direction!  On the down side, that was the last round for about 2 weeks...going to see family in PA and won't touch a club, and that's probably a good thing.  Golfer's elbow is still very much a problem, so rest, ice, and massage gun for a while now.

[edingc]

- 39/43 = 82 (+10)
- 5/15 FIR
- 9/18 GIR (2 birdies)
- 35 Putts (1 3-putt, 15 2-putts, 2 1-putts)

Soggy and sloppy round after 6.25" of rain since Thursday afternoon. Short game let me down a bit, but not as much as my driver. Just a bunch of terrible swings and playing from adjacent holes. 

I did birdie No. 4 for the first time in the past two years after sticking my 58 degree wedge from 108 out to about five feet!

Hoping the rain holds off and Thursday's round will be more dry!

[MrBandit]

Played US Am Tour tournament yesterday, the score doesn't reflect how I played. I drove the ball exceptionally well , i missed 3 fairways, and one of those was my only bad swing of the day on the 6th hole, (as it started to down pour) as I started on the 10th hole. and Number 10th first hole just getting adjusted to the speed of the greens.

I had a couple of loose irons shots, but felt good about how I was playing . Chipping was good, putting was also good, the issue was not because of bad putts, I putted exactly where I was looking, burn a lot of edges all day, really fast greens.

[Rickp]

13 hours ago, Kenny B said:

I understand and I do play from the White tees occasionally.  The Whites are our senior tees at 5400y.  Our Blues are 6100y.  However, 700y difference is not evenly spaced out throughout the course.  It's a course designer issue IMO.  As an example... our par 5 #5 holes plays 550y from the Blues and 540y from the Whites.  Into the typical prevailing 15-20mph headwind, it doesn't matter which tee I use!  Much of the yardage is made up on par 3's, which isn't considered for the scramble as one of the 3 required tee shots for each person.  

Moving up 700 yards does not mean I shoot lower scores.  In fact, I typically shoot the same scores which means my index would go up a couple of points playing from the Whites.  Most of the guys I normally play with play from the Blues, so I that's where I play.  I actually enjoy playing from the Blues, and to do so requires I keep a sharp short game!!

My issue with playing in the senior scramble is that most of the seniors playing from the Blue tees hit 240-250 yards (most are in their 60's).  I'm lucky to get 210y.  On short holes they are much closer to the green; on long holes they have a mid or short iron into the green or can reach par 5's in two shots.  Using 3 of my tee shots only hurts the team, which is why I don't play in the scrambles anymore.

The guys from the scramble league have very similar handicaps as I do.  If we played head to head, I could beat any of them from the Blues on a good day.  Because I play from the Blues, I am not allowed to play from the Whites in the scramble; it would make the par 3's easier for me!!

Of course, 5400y is typical for the Forward or Red tees at many courses and my wife plays from there occasionally.  When we play together (which is most of the time), I don't consider it fair for me to play from the same tees since she is much shorter off the tee and is an 18 handicap.

 

I understand your dilemma completely, going thru same situation.

Recently moved to the Senior Tees on 18 hole courses, approximately 5,500 yards and moved to middle Tees on Execs.  I’m much happier playing I guess where I belong.  Although the 60 year olds are also playing same tees and it definitely is an advantage for them.

[juspoole]

Walked a local par 3 course today.  My buddy wanted to work on his short game so I tagged along.

We ended up playing two balls off the tee for more practice and taking the better score of the two.  With that in mind, i shot a 2 under 25.  Played really pretty well regardless of the extra ball.  Likely would have been close to even with my own ball.  

3 birdies and one bogey due to a diabolical pin position on the back side slope of a green.  Also, have went back full time to my trusty Scotty Pro Platinum after a couple rounds.  I just give myself more chances at making birdies when it's in the bag.

Unsure if I should change out my stability shaft and put it in the Scotty?