Category: 2017

  • Season 9, Tournament 7 : Let Them Just Do It

    Season 9, Tournament 7 : Let Them Just Do It

    That’s a great swing! OK, you tried to hit that a little hard.  Try it again. Stay up on the follow through, you’re falling off! You don’t have many balls left, you need to get that driver out so you’re confident off the tee! Rob : OK mom.  I’ve got it.  Stop! Yet next to us…

  • Season 9, Tournament 6 : No One on the Bag

    Season 9, Tournament 6 : No One on the Bag

    Today was a day designed to take Rob and I completely out of our comfort zone.  The tournament director was out of the country so I was in charge of running the 150 player US Kids tournament field.  Max and Bear were out of the state at the Optimist Tournament of Champions at PGA National,…

  • Season 9, Tournament 5 : Cold and Wet

    Season 9, Tournament 5 : Cold and Wet

    I put clothes out on his bed like I always do. Stuff that actually matches (but the shirt and pants match – they’re both red ….. and the green socks – no one looks at socks anyway) and factors in the weather forecast – relevant especially today with a massive front threatening to blast winter…

  • Season 9, Tournament 4 : Less Complicated

    Season 9, Tournament 4 : Less Complicated

    I am behind the scorer’s desk again this week and Rob’s brother, Bear, is on the bag.  It is an experiment that could either go very badly or, …… not too badly.  My instructions to Bear were along the lines of : You are being paid to do a job. Sometimes we don’t like what…

  • Season 9, Tournament 3 : Golf Rules and Fire in the belly, or brain

    Season 9, Tournament 3 : Golf Rules and Fire in the belly, or brain

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      Bear asked where Rob was playing this weekend.  I told him. Oh no.  That course is horrible!  Probably the worst they play on! Oh no you don’t!  Don’t say its horrible and put preconceived notions in his head! It’s a funky course. Not horrible.  Just interesting.  I corrected.  Or I could have used Gary…

  • Season 9, Tournament 2 : An Aside, A Blowhard, and One That Got Away

    Season 9, Tournament 2 : An Aside, A Blowhard, and One That Got Away

    Rob : My goal today was to shoot in the 70s.  Oh yes, and have fun.  It was all going good and I was on track to shoot in the 70s.  My driver and putting were going very well.  Chips and irons mostly going well.  Hybrids and 3 woods iffy.  But on the last 5 holes…

  • Season 9, Tournament 1: Golf Scores and Goals : More than a Number

    Season 9, Tournament 1: Golf Scores and Goals : More than a Number

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    Bear started playing US Kids golf tournaments in 2010.  We’ve  played hundreds of tournaments with the organization but today I found myself for the first time on the other side of the scoring table.  I was the Director’s assistant and helped with collecting scores and putting them on the leader board.  First tournament of the…

  • Season 8, Season Championship : Personal Best (whew !!)

    Season 8, Season Championship : Personal Best (whew !!)

    It’s helpful when drives go straight and you can get on (or at least close to) the green in regulation.  It is not helpful when you are waiting on almost every shot.  The player in front of us on the second tee box is not recognizable.  He has not played on this tour before –…

  • Season 8, Tournament 6 : Engaged.

    Season 8, Tournament 6 : Engaged.

    When you’re 7 over after the first 3 holes you’ve got to wonder what the hell you are doing playing this game and when you have to put up with tears and fragile daddy caddy egos taking a beating you got to wonder why the hell you put up with it at all.  At this…

  • Season 8 Tournament 5 : Home Course Advantage

    Season 8 Tournament 5 : Home Course Advantage

    Home course advantage.  Technically it is a thing. Our first 2 holes went like this : Unplayable.  Tree.  Rough.  2 putt from 3 feet.  Quadruple. Hazard.  Hazard.  Double. You would have sworn we had never seen this course in our lives ! And so it went.  He could not sink a putt for the life…

  • Season 8, Tournament 4 : Moms

    Season 8, Tournament 4 : Moms

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    I imagine if you put 3 Republican women senators and 3 Democrat women senators together in a room you could have a totally acceptable health care bill on the table within a few hours. Today we were 3 moms on the bag and it was peaceful, practical and perspicacious. Women will generally work well together…

  • Regional Tournament at Pinehurst Day 2 : Parent caddies, or not.

    Regional Tournament at Pinehurst Day 2 : Parent caddies, or not.

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    It’s not often that parents do not caddy for their kids in US Kids tournaments.  If they are not on the bag it is mostly because they cannot handle the pressure, or the kids cannot handle the burden of the pressure placed on them.  Sometimes parents are simply lazy and sometimes they get fired. Should…

  • Regional Tournament Day 1 at Pinehurst : Breakthrough

    Regional Tournament Day 1 at Pinehurst : Breakthrough

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    We had – Some very good luck.  The only bad drive of the day went hard and low and skipped wildly over the lip of a particularly bad fairway bunker sending it safely over the adjacent fairway bunker and on to the fairway. A ball ricocheted off a tree and on to the fairway.  A…

  • Season 8, Tournament 3 : Some Thoughts and Observations

    Season 8, Tournament 3 : Some Thoughts and Observations

    Have a little First Aid kit in the golf bag. Leave extra time to get to a tournament (like a whole hour if its a long way away and you have to negotiate big city traffic.) Know the hole you tee off on and how long it takes to get there. Don’t leave the coolers…

  • Season 8, Tournament 2 : New Personal Best

    Season 8, Tournament 2 : New Personal Best

    It’s dangerous to start off perfectly.  Par. Par. Past a pollinator garden – such an excellent idea on a golf course ! Expectations rise way too high and the fall is prolonged and difficult to roll out of. Tee box on hole 3 – he is lining up too left, aiming at a sneaky watery…