Just got back from watching the Steelers thrash the Jets 27 to 10 and since I am on this high, thought I would get the blog done tonight rather than wait until tomorrow. Played course number 85 this week, Stoughton Acres in Butler Pa. which is a 65 minute drive. This course is one of the best bargains of all the courses we play. We only had a threesome when we played and even though they do not charge half cart fees, we played 18 holes and had lunch for 23.50 apiece. We could have had a bowl of soup, hot dog , chips, and a can of pop. We did not have the soup but the hot dog was very good and you could not beat the price. This was the course we tried to play a few weeks ago but the greens were top dressed but they healed up real well were running a 6 on the stimp and were in great shape. The course was 62oo yards and played to a par of 72. The clubhouse is more like an antique store than a pro shop but does have some cool golf stuff. The course is hilly but very playable and was in good condition with the fairways full and the rough was grown in nicely. This course we tandomed up with Lake Arthur for a very nice day. The course is worth the trip for a 36 hole day. The group played ok as I had a 79, Pete had 84 and David 89. I had a real good round out of the blue on Thursday at Indian Run, shooting a one over 72. I shot 77 at Lake Arthur and today at Scenic Valley a very non-describt 79. I have been doing this swing thing now for almost a year and overall my game has come back from the ashes. Since I started this my index has gone down from 5.7 to its current 3.0. At one time this year I was down to 2.1. The last month or so has been a little frustrating. I seemed to have lost something with the swing the last 6 weeks or so. Its been a bit of a mystery. Every time I think I am back in the groove I have a setback. The good news is this is the longest I have ever swung the club basically the same way. When I made the slight change in the swing the middle of this summer and then went back to the way I was doing it before, I just can’t seem to keep contol of the swing like I did before. We will see what the next 2 months bring. That is just about what is left of this golf season. The search will contiue as I have fifteen courses to go.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
Played course number 84 today as we went to the Phoenix at Buffalo Valley. I had thought that I had never played this course before but when we pulled into the parking lot, I was beginning to recognize some things and sure enough I had played it once before about 5 or 6 years ago. Another senior moment had occured. I did remember the holes as we played them, but I still don’t remember driving there. This course is located in Freeport, Pa., about a 60 minute drive. The course played about 6400 yards from the tees we played from and can be stretched to amost 6800 yards and plays to a par of 71. This course is pretty narrow and has a good variey of holes with water and lots of trees. The course is very hilly with some blind tee shots. Unfortunately the course was in just fair shape to say the least. The fairways were really bad and the rough was ok but had many bare spots and weird grass growing in some spots. The greens were slow barely make a 4.75 on the stimp. They putted smooth enough but at times they seemed that they needed rolled because a lot of putts really seemed to wiggle back and forth. The hot dog at the turn was pretty good but overpriced. This course was the 84th course we played and that is pretty close to where it will be ranked at the end of the trek in the bottom 20. Obviously this course is not worth the trip. The group had a so so day as Tony and I shot 79, and Pete and David had 87 and 88 respectively. On Monday and Wednesday I shot 79 and 81 and did not have a lot of confidence going into the South Park Senior Championship. But some conservative thinking and a white hot putter (25 putts ) helped me stagger in with a one over 73 and a top 6 finish. This is why I call this game goofy. Needless to say I have not fixed what is ailing my game lately. Other than the tournament I have not broken 79 for about 6 or 7 straight rounds. I will be adding some more courses this week and hopefully can start to play better. Eighty four courses down and sixteen to go.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
Played two new courses this week as we had a very nice 36 hole day on Wednesday. First we played Pittsburgh National in Gibsonia, Pa., about a 45 minute drive. We played from tees that played about 6400 yards and the greens were running a nice 6.5 on the stimp, and were very smooth. There are tees that will stretch the course to 6900 yards. The course was in very good condition over all and was very challenging. It had a great variety of holes and played to a par of 72. The course was tight in some places and was hilly. Lots of trees and some water that came into play. This course was worth the trip. The hot dog at the turn was just fair and it took awhile to get it, and this was around 1:30pm. The group played ok but none of us scoredvery well. I shot 83, Pete 85, David 93, and Tom 90. Then three of us went up the road to play Saxon in Sarver, Pa. This course is what I call the perfect community course. First of all it is very flat which makes walking a breeze. The two nines have quite a contrast with the front being wide open and the back tightening things up just a bit with some tree lined fairways. The course played about 6600 yards from the blues to a par of 72. The greens were not quite as good as Pittsburgh Nat. as they ran about a 5 on stimp and had some bad spots. The fairways were a little long but were fine to play the ball without getting any bad lies. This course is not worth the trip but if you live within 20 to 25 minutes of the course, this should be your go to course when you don’t want to make a trip. The hot dog at the turn was superior to the one at Pittsburgh National, with a great taste and some fine condiments. I really enjoyed this course despite some of it short comings, and again I did not score very well. I shot 82, Pete 77, and David 87. My scoring problems continued the rest of the week. I shot a 79 at Indian Run of Thursday and an 80 at Pittsburgh North today. Putting and some poor club selections on iron shots has been the main culprit for the high scores. This week with weather permitting I am playing tomorrow, Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday. I am hitting the ball reasonalbly well but even that took a bit of decline this past week. Will see what happens this week, as on Thursday is the South Park Seniors. Eighty three courses down and seventeen to go.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
After a great night’s sleep I am ready to write about the so called “mental game” of golf. Any one, who has played the game for any length of time, knows the drill. Stay in the moment, breathe, take enough club, avoid trouble, stick to your routine and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,blah. All this vast knowledge of the mental game did not help Adam Scott, Jim Furyk and many others. There have been 3 times in the last 15 years that a player only needed to double bogey the last hole and win a golf tournament. One of those was a major championship. All 3 players made triple bogey to go into a playoff and lose. What is even more amazing about this, is 2 players made 7 foot putts to make the triple bogey. Here is another interesting phenomenon. In 2005 Peter Lonard won the 2005 MCI Heritage Classic for his only PGA tournament win. His scores for that week were 62, 74, 66, and 75. How is that for consistancy. His scores varied from 12 to 8 to 9 shots each day, and this on the best week of his PGA career. So why do we get so upset when our scores vary from one time to next when we play. Is there really a mental side to this game. Do mistakes on the physical side lead to brain confusion. Are we making too big a deal of the mental game saying the game is 90% mental and 10% physical. The only golfer that I ever saw that never really gave a tournament away was Jack Nicklaus. I just refreshed my memory by reading the chapter The Mind Game in Nicklaus’s book My Golden Lessons. It is not too enlightening on why this man was so mentally tough. Nicklaus has always been big on visualization. I don’t care how great your visuals are, if your grip sucks you are going hit a bad shot. This is my 55th season of playing this damn game and I have battled yips, choking and hitting bad shots when it mattered the most. Most of these things I have conquered and have played well in the heat as I like to call it. Lets clear up another thing here. Hitting a golf ball 50 yards off line or more, missing 2 foot putts, never getting the ball airborn, 3 putting, losing 4 dollar golf balls in woods and bodies of water and leaving the ball in the sand trap after you taken a mighty cut at it is not FUN. Golf is only enjoyable if you can play the game to the best of your abilities. I do know that for now I don’t have the answer to the so called mental side of this game. I also know that I am not alone.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
Did add a new course this week with some odd things happening. We went to Dubbs Dred in Butler, Pa., about a 65 minute drive. The course played about 6800 yards from the tees we played from and I will expain the “about” a little later. The course was in very good shape and the greens were running a solid 6.5 and very smooth. The front nine was fairly straight forward with the holes pretty wide open and right in front of you. Then after the 11th hole on the back the course became much tighter with many blind shots. This affected me into some bad scoring and worst decision making. This course was a good course to play and I would say worth the trip but I have some very specific criticisms. First of all some of the hole yardages were off. One hole was supposed to be a 460 yard par 4 and after our drives we were 180 from the hole and I let you do the math. There were other holes like this as well. The other bigger problem when you played from the blue tees,was there are about 5 tee boxes that come out from a shoot of trees. These trees however are also over hanging the driving area. You have to keep your drive low, not only straight. This place needs to get into some tree trimming. The hot dog at the turn was ok, made better by having some banana pepper rings for condiments. I thought we were going to play another new course near by, Stoughton Acres, but when we got there, we found out they had plugged the front nine greens and so we only played the back nine and those greens were really nice and ran 6.5. I will blog this course at a later time. For the week the scores were pretty good until today. At Dubs Dred I shot a 77 and Pete a 78. It was the back nine that really did me in. I was even after 11 holes and then fell apart. I had 76 on Thursday and 74 yesterday. Today I went to North Park and laid a big 80 egg. Very poor thinking and bad luck on the greens with some average ball striking led to the 80. In the next day or two I am going to do a blog on the mental game but I am mentally and physically exhausted from a very busy playing week. Eighty one down with ninteen to go.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
No new courses this week but a very busy week where I was able to play on 5 consecutive days. The scores for the week were 79, 77, 74, and 75. The fifth round was a 2 man scramble where Pete and I did not do all that great with a 0ne over 73 at North Park. Our putting was not that good and with only fair ball striking it added up to the above score. However, I feel like I am back on track, as I had a really good ball striking week especially toward the end of the week where my 75 was more due to some poor putting on the always tough greens of Scenic Valley. The method is doing well and even the less than full swing game seems to be perking up. The trek is exactly 80% of the way through. I have 20 courses to go to find the answer. I feel how I control the golf swing now to be full proof. I got side tracked a little by trying to isolate on too small of a group of muscles. The arms are the enemy of the golf swing. But over these last 10 months I have learned that the legs are also the enemy of the golf swing. I have 20 courses to go and they will be coming fast and furious over the next 6 weeks. It will be over that time frame that I will have to come up with the mental answer to the game. It took over 2 years to come up with the physical side. Hopefully a lobotemy is not the answer. Although I would do it if I thought if would make me scratch. I don’t know for sure if I will be able to get in all 20 courses before the end of the golf season. If I don’t, then I will have all winter to figure it out. If the physical side holds up I will reveal what I now consider a superior way to go about the golf swing. I have even given it a name. Coming soon hopefully “The No Try Golf Swing”.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
A very busy week as two new courses were added this week. It was a 36 hole day on Wednesday as we traveled to Spring Valley in Mercer, Pa. an hour and fifteen drive and to Green Meadow in Volant, Pa. which is about 15 minutes closer. Spring Valley is a very unique course to say the least. It plays only to about 5800 yards from the back tees to a par of 72. The course rating is only 66.6 with a slope of 112. I can guarentee you, that if I played this course all the time I would never have a chance of being a scratch golfer. There are a lot of goofy holes, with the best example, the second hole, a 28o yard par 4, that has no fairway. They put a tee box and a green, and the rest is trees everywhere, that you either go over or around but you are not going to avoid them. The greens were smooth but slow running barely a 4.5 on the stimp. The fairways were ok but there were some burned out places and the rough had bare spots. The hot dog at turn was good with some really nice minced onions. The people that ran the place were friendly but this course was not worth the trip. I shot a 79 and Pete had the same. I had lots of strange stuff happen to me all day. The best of the lot was on the 12th hole and downhill short but narrow par 5 of 451 yards. On the tee box there are woods all down the right side and it appears there are trees all down the left side. I hit a big high hook heading into what I thought were trees on the left. I stood there waiting for the sound of my ball hitting trees and then all of a sudden we heard this KABOOM. Here, I hit the roof of a golf cart on the hole coming back with two women in it. They were ok and they graciously pointed out my ball in the middle of their fairway. We happily went down the road to Green Meadow. Green Meadow turned out to be a solid golf course in very good shape. The greens were smooth and ran a nice 6.5 on the stimp. The fairways were lush and the roughs had no barespots. The course played 6500 yards from the blues to a par of 72. There was a great variety of holes and the course was very flat and fair. The hot dog at the turn was good but the minced onions at Spring Valley were better. This course was worth the trip. Even though this was a much more enjoyable course to play, after an opening birdie, I pretty much stunk out the joint and came in with another 79. Pete got better results than I did and came in with a nice smooth 75. My ball striking was pretty much mediocre all day. I had a good practice session on Thursday and was pretty confident on Saturday but could only muster an 80 at South Park from the blues. I did strike the ball much better. Today at Rolling Acre I shot a very nice even par 73. The ball striking was good as I hit the first 13 greens in regulation. I faltered a little bit down the stretch but overall a very good end to the week. The week coming up will be a very busy one with playing golf everyday but Tuesday. No new courses will be added because of events but I feel with all the play, this should be one of those weeks that will really determine if I am on to something. I think I finally untweaked the tweak and I am back where I was about 2 months ago. Eighty down and twenty to go to find the answer.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
A rain out today so only played 2 and half rounds this week. Did add a new course this week as we went to Pittsburgh North in Bakerstown Pa. about a 40 minute drive. Pittsburgh North is an older challenging course with lots of interesting holes, trees and water. The tees we played from were about 6700 yards and course played to a par of 72. The course was in excellent shape and the greens were smooth, but a little slow at 4.5 on the stimp. I really liked this course and would have liked it even more with a little quicker greens. There is a great variety of holes and the course has a nice flow to it and is not too hilly. The hot dog at the turn was one of those fatter dogs which is not my favorite but the dog was cooked very well and the condiments were good. The young lady who served it was also very nice, so that didn’t hurt my taste buds either. This course was worth the trip and will probably be in the top 20. This week, I also got some of my mojo back. Thank goodness for notes, especially if your an old person like me. After reviewing my notes from earlier this summer I played 9 holes at Mt Lebanon and I got back into some solid ball striking.The biggest plus was that I got my distance back with all the clubs. We had a three some at Pittsburgh North and we all did pretty good on this tough lay out. I shot 77, Pete had 80 and David 85. Played Scenic Valley on Thursday and managed a 78. The scores were not great but I finally untweaked the tweak and now can get into solving the mental game puzzle. I even think I made some progress on that this past Thursday. I was really looking forward to today but mother nature would not co-operate. This week is looking very good weather wise. With a well rested game and the physical side back in business I am hoping to get in about 5 and half rounds this week. I think the next 4 to 5 weeks will be critical to the possible success in finding the answer to this goofy game. Seventy eight down with twenty two to go.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
Finally a new course was added this week as we went to Totteridge in Greensburg Pa. about a 55 minute drive. This course started as a country club but ran into financial difficulties and went public about 5 years ago. The course played about 6600 yards from the tees we played from but has tees that will make the course play over 7000 yards long. We had a beautiful day to play golf and the course was in very good shape. This course is again one of these courses that I call a fake links course. They cut down all the trees, let weeds grow up that they call heather and hope the ocean moves in real quick. Despite this, the course does have many interesting holes. The fairways were very good, with the greens running a nice 6 on the stimp and were very smooth. The roughs were grown in nicely with very few bare spots. The course was fair and enjoyable to play. The green fees are a little stiff, but over all this course was worth the trip. If they get more competitive with the fees I am sure this course would get more play. The hot dog at the turn was ok but nothing special. We had a threesome and course got its way with most of us. I shot a ho hum 80 with no birdies and one double bogey. David had an 84 and Pete had a tough day with a 90. Earlier in the day I shot a 37 on the second 9 to go with my 34 of last week at Mt. Lebanon, but I do not know if that was good enough for a win. I played South Park on Saturday shot 37 on the front from the blue tees, but then storms came in and I went home. Today we went to Village Green and I shot a miserable 84. Before we get into that debacle, I have to mention one of the strangest shots I have ever hit in my life, the last time I played Village Green, about 10 days ago. It was on the 17th hole which is a very tight 400 yard par 4 with OB on the right and a creek on the left. The right side of the hole has a bank which will kick everything to the left. I hit a good solid drive along the right side just about 5 yards into the rough. The ball hit the top of the white 150 yard post, at the point that is angled at about 45 degrees toward the hole, and can not be more than an inch wide. It caromed off the post way up in the air and backwards some 55 yards. The most accurate drive I have ever hit in my life. The odds of hitting that post exactly at that point some 250 yards away would be far higher than getting a hole in one. Needless to say untweaking the tweak has been a much tougher endeavor than I would have ever thought. I will have some work to do this week and hopefully I can back to where I was about 5 weeks ago. At least a new course was added this week so I am one course closer to possibly being put out of my misery. Seventy seven courses down and twenty three to go.
The Goofy Game of Golf Searching for the Answer
No new courses again this week as competition and some threatening weather came into play. This was a very up and down week with some changes made. By the end of the week I had untweaked the tweak. The week started off well enough with a good 9 hole practice session at Mt. Lebanon. On Wednesday I got off to a solid start to the Mt Lebanon Men’s league championship by shooting a nice 1 under 34. I followed that up later in the day at Village Green with a 74. I was feeling pretty good going into the 36 hole North Park mens championship on Thursday. There I laid an enormous egg by shooting a very smooth 85. Nothing specatacular, 13 bogies and 5 pars. The second 18 was not much better but I finished up on the last 4 holes I played with 3 pars and birdie but then the rains came and I was ready to pack it in. Even though I had shot the 1 under par 34 on Wednesday, I made some very nice par saves and was quite fortunate to shoot the score. After giving the tweak a solid 3 to 4 weeks, I decided to go back to the original way I was doing the new swing. Over the weekend this gave me just so so results with a 74 at South Park and a 78 today at Riverview. I did feel more comfortable with the swing but poor thinking was the culprit for not scoring any better. I have to say this was one of the most disappointing weeks I have had in a long time. I still feel this is the answer to the physical side of the game. Not much work done on the mental side this week due to the fact that I made the swing change. Even though I thought this was a minor change and I was really narrowing down the controlling factor of the golf swing it seemed to me that these muscles just do not seem to do the job. Next week I feel certain that I will be adding a new course to the list. I also found some new reading material that may help with a muscle explanation on what I am doing. I don’t think there has been anything written for what my brain is doing. Obviously this game can jump right up and tear your heart out. Just ask Adam Scott. Does anybody dispute that this game is just plain goofy.
The Goofy Game of Golf/Life Searching for the Answer 