Exhausting weekend

I’m beat. This weekend was a perfect storm of sorts. I played in a two-day tournament at Eastmoreland Golf Course and had one solid round and one upsettingly rough start.

Day one went well. My tee time was 10:47 so I had plenty of time to stop by Columbia Edgewater and warm up with all of the sticks and still make it down to Eastmoreland in time to test the greens and get my head mentally suited for the game. I started off with a couple of bogeys, a par and then two more bogeys to be at 4 over after 5 holes. I birdied the par 5 sixth hole and then made the turn at a 5 over 41. The back was pretty consistent. I had my biggest issues of the day getting off the tee and was punching out or hitting knock-down shots a lot, but managed to make some solid pars and a few bogey saves to end with a back 9 40 for an 81 on the day.

I was really proud of that 81. There were a lot of good sticks in the field and at least 7 of which were scratch or plus handicaps, and the low round on Saturday was a pair of 72s. I talked with one of the guys who shot 72 after his round and he said he felt like he played the course really well and was a plus handicap who shoots upper 60s on a regular basis. So, 81 was a pretty solid score and something to be proud of. I didn’t double bogey any holes and had the one birdie. Also, when I turned in my card at the end of the round the weather app on my phone said it was 100 degrees in Portland, which is about 20 degrees warmer than the day before. It was a full-sun hot 5.5 hour round in the middle of the day. I was pretty happy to shoot 19 strokes under the temperature

On Saturday evening, my girlfriend, her two kids and I went to a little barbecue and then got back to the house around 8 to put the kids to bed (3 and 6) and try to get some rest ourselves. I was really beat from the long round and heat of the day and wanted to get to bed early for an 8:30 tee time on Sunday. All was well at first, we went to sleep around 11 and despite the heat in the house everyone fell asleep well. (on a side note, not many people, including us, have air conditioning in Portland as it rarely gets hot enough to use it, usually just one weekend a year.) But, around midnight, Mary woke up feeling nauseous. I’m a pretty light sleeper, so woke up when she got out of bed and after she didn’t come back to bed for a while I got up to check on her. She felt like she had food poisoning and couldn’t get to sleep between feeling sick and being in such a hot house. I stayed up with her for a bit and then around 2 she started feeling better so we went back to sleep. At 3, her son woke us up needing some water, he couldn’t sleep in the heat either. At 4 the kids got up again due to heat and then her daughter woke up for good at 6. By the time I got out of bed at 6:30 I think I had gotten a combined total of about 3.5 hours of broken sleep. That stacked on top of a really long hot Saturday didn’t make for good energies heading into the round Sunday. When I got into my truck to head to the tournament it took me a few moments to remember whether it was a stick or automatic. I dropped my water bottle three times between waking up and getting to the course. Definitely not a good sign for coordination.

Now that that is all written out, I want to say that I’m not using this as an excuse for today’s round. Things happen and you need to perform when the time comes no matter what your previous night was like. Rather, I just wanted to shed a little light into my general energy level and mental focus for the day.

The round started off just like yesterday’s. For the first hole, that is. I bogeyed 1 after hitting it in two by three putting due to not having the speed of the greens down. The second hole was a total blow-up. I pushed the drive on the 440 yard par 4 left. I tried to punch out back into the fairway but my punch hit a branch and there I was punching out again. I got the third shot into the fairway but pulled too much club on my 150 yard approach shot and the ball bounced pin high but didn’t check up and ended up rolling off behind a tree. I had to chip up to the opposite side of the green because the tree blocked my line and then two-putt for a triple. On the third hole I pulled a 3-hybrid way right and it ended up stuck behind a tree. I had to punch out and then hit the green and two-putted from 10 feet for a bogey. Fourth hole I pushed the same club I had just pulled and again was stuck behind a tree. After punching out I took too little of a club for the approach and ended up with a 60 foot putt which took me three to get in the hole for a double. The fifth is a 220 yard downhill par 3. I tried to hit a little faded 3-hybrid but ended up hooking it right OB. I hit it again and the ball landed pin high but just off the green. I chipped on and had a 6 foot putt in front of me. The guy I was playing with had the same line and was out so I got to see the line before putting and his turned right just before the cup. I hit it towards the left edge, but it made a turn for the left and lipped out. Another triple.

I was pretty heart broken at this point. I had played 18 holes just yesterday at 9 over and here I was at 10 over after 5. Golf is such a cruel game sometimes. I felt shellshocked. I started the round in about 20th place for gross and 5th for net and had just thrown it all away in five holes. I had a moment on the fifth green of anguish and despair but it was fleeting and I realized that I just had to adjust my goals to fit for my current position. When I began my goal was first and foremost to take it shot by shot and play some good golf, but also I wanted to see if I could improve on the previous day’s round. At this point, I needed to reevaluate and set a new goal. I decided that I wanted to start by getting back to bogey golf, which means that I would need to be 10 over after 10, or 11 over after 11, etc. That was the new goal.

The rest of the front got better, but wasn’t too great. I ended up turning at 12 over for a 48 on the front. I started the back with three pars to meet my goal of getting to bogey golf, as I was now 12 over after 12. From there my goal was to finish under bogey golf for the day. I hit some good and some bad shots over the next few holes, but by the time I entered the tee box for 17 I was 14 over par. I started 5 over after ten, but then played 4 over for the next 11 holes. I ended up lipping out my 5 foot putt on 17 for a bogey and then missing an approach on 18 to score another bogey for a 16 over 88 on the day.

Ten over after 5 and then 6 over on the final 13 holes. That’s golf. The positive from this experience is that I mentally didn’t crack and stuck to it and actually managed to improve through the round. I’d take this type of round over 6 over after 13 and then 10 over on the final 5 holes any day. Also, I was able to adjust my goals during the round and make those goals. All in all a positive experience and a learning experience.

I would have loved to card another 81 or anything lower, but sometimes things just don’t go your way. When that happens you can’t give up, just adjust your target and stay the course.

Here’s to a good night sleep before my next tourney If nothing else, I’m going to sleep like a baby tonight.

16 Responses to "Exhausting weekend"

David says:

August 5, 2012 at 5:28 pm

Don’t feel bad Dan, it was brutal out there. I shot 72, 73 to win but I was grinding so much the second day. Some of the pins were borderline ridiculous and that wind was swirling all day, it was the complete opposite wind from yesterday. And on top of it the heat can wear you down, especially on the back nine when you get near the water, the humidity definitely increases. I’m usually scoring in the high 60s on portland golf courses but I played great to shoot 145. It’s well known that the folks at Eastmoreland don’t particularly like players going low on their course.

Keep grinding it out and play in as many tournaments as you can, you’ll learn a lot.
dan says:

August 5, 2012 at 5:45 pm

Thanks David,

Glad you got the win! It was a tough one out there with the conditions as they were and I learned a lot from the experience. Can’t wait for the next one!

See you out there soon,

Dan
williamevanl says:

August 5, 2012 at 7:56 pm

Well it sounds like the first day went pretty well. You’ve kind of set the bar pretty high for yourself with a handicap of 5.9.

What tees were you playing from? It looks like you would have needed to throw up a couple of 75′s to shoot your handicap with the course rating from the whites and a couple of 77′s if you had played from the tips. Either way, as your instructor says, “golf is famously frustrating”
Ian says:

August 5, 2012 at 10:21 pm

Bad luck about your second round….hardly ideal preparation! Here’s one thing to consider though. I don’t know if they still do this, but when the Australian cricket team used to tour India and Pakistan, where the mid summer heat and humidity are fierce to say the least, anyone who even mentioned the heat copped a team fine. No doubt this helped to keep the players minds on the cricket and off the weather!
Barry says:

August 6, 2012 at 8:46 am

Hi
Go to some amateur tournaments in porland and watch the 21 somethings hit the ball.
Now that is a lesson!
You need more than luck my friend. You need to be practical.
Look at the web site for the itour leaderboards as well as the hooters tour.
Thousnads of aspiring golfers both amateur and pro that can really play. They miss the cut and move on to the next event.
You are in a different league Dan. It’s apples and oranges.
I caddy for a young 22 yr old amateur that started taking lessons and playing at 11. He was tied for 13th at the Ontario amateur. The winner was -9 and then played in the Canadian Open and made the cut……-9… ever been near that number?
Good luck is not enough!
Jay says:

August 6, 2012 at 6:08 pm

Don’t listen to the negative nancy’s.

Sometimes things just don’t click and come together as we hope but ultimately work is the only thing that can keep you moving forward. I know you’ve inspired me to keep working hard and really go after the things I want and as a college student, I think thats probably the best inspiration I can hope for!
Richard says:

August 6, 2012 at 9:02 pm

I agree with Jay. Forget what Barry (and others like him) have said. Even if you never make it to the tour, you’re still doing something that’s ground-breaking and inspirational to many like myself. I try to employ some of your mental strategies on and off the course in hopes that they will lead to lower scores and a happier life. Some people are just jealous of your opportunity or bitter because they missed theirs, and others just like to tear people down so they can walk around with big puffy chests lol.
Craig says:

August 6, 2012 at 11:37 pm

Dan,

Thankfully it matters not whether you are an apple or an orange. World Golf Hall of Famer Walter Travis never struck a golf ball til he was 35 years of age.

Craig
williamevanl says:

August 7, 2012 at 12:17 am

Craig,
Way to make an argument for talented people being able to get really good at golf in no time.

“Within a month of hitting his first golf shot, Travis earned his first trophy by winning the Oakland Golf Club”

Yep, talent… Which side of the argument were you on exactly? I agree with Barry, like a virtuoso instrument player, the greatest golfers possess an ability that is unfamiliar to the rest of us.
Craig says:

August 7, 2012 at 3:17 am

William,

I guess I was just pointing out that there are multiple routes one can take to achieve success.

Craig
dan says:

August 7, 2012 at 8:08 am

Hi Craig, Jay and Richard,

Thank you. I appreciate the comment and the encouragement and appreciate that you understand the project.

Keep following along and thank you for chiming in

Dan
dan says:

August 7, 2012 at 8:09 am

Hi Ian,

That’s a great idea and plan. Out of mind out of sight, eh? I’ll give it a go next time the heat is on and it’s tourney play time.

Cheers,

Dan
Q says:

August 7, 2012 at 2:01 pm

Unless you are Barry Bonds, I never heard of you but I have heard of Gary Player.

“The more I practice, the luckier I get” – Gary Player

Dan, I think you should be listening to someone like Gary Player than someone who caddies for young boys.
Richard Chen says:

August 7, 2012 at 10:19 pm

Can be tough playing in really hot weather, but high temperatures make balls hotter to fly further for more distance.

One time went out to play in the winter, while there were still large patches of fairly thick snow on the ground. When the ball landed in one these snow patches, it was no use to fix the eyes on the spot where the ball landed. When walked up to the landing spot, there was no trace of the ball, and there was no trace of any hole made by the ball as it burrow under the snow. Lost everyone of a whole bunch of balls that landed in the snow patches. Maybe orange color ball would had helped.

Read in a golfing magazine long ago of one of these half page “tips” from contributors. This magazine tip is to imaging sharply compressing the back of the ball with the driver face. This tip seems to work for me to help ensure the release is fully completed, and sharply made as the hands get to the back of the ball during the final release to prevent late hits. The image of “compressing” also keeps the left wrist firm going a bit of distance into the ball. This helps in preventing pushing too.
Dan Persoff says:

August 13, 2012 at 2:38 pm

Hi Dan, you are only about a third of the way through, you should not let ANY bad round discourage you. Bad rounds are what you will be overcoming as you continue with getting instruction and practicing. You have already achieved great things and if you stopped playing tomorrow, you would have already proven your point because you have improved so much. Thinking and worrying so much about your score, can take the joy out of hitting each shot, as well as rob you of the joy of your potential for improvement with additional coaching and practicing. You may not be able to control how far your game will go, but you can control how much fun you have finding out.
Eddy says:

August 13, 2012 at 8:32 pm

Hi from Malaysia.
I was googling.. would it be possible to turn pro if I start at 30 and it lead me to your blog..

Great stuff.. admire and envy your guts!
Keep it up.. Cheers

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