Joey's Golf Bag

On Sunday, I played 18 on the Championship and Masters courses at Firewheel. We were scheduled to go off at 1:30PM, but there was heavy fog that morning and we ended up going off at 2PM. We finished up in near darkness just after 6PM. The weather was quite sunny and pleasant, even though the temperature was in the mid-50’s, as there almost no breeze.

My score:

* Hit green in regulation.

Themes:

• Tee shots. I hit 6 fairways, not good, but in reality, it was even worse, as two of the shots were in the fairway by virtue of hitting trees and getting lucky bounces back into the fairway. With the driver, I was either hitting low hooks or high pushes. I did hit two of the par-3 holes in regulation, though, which is pretty good for me. My first two tee shots resulted in two penalties into hazards. Yeech!
• Approach shots. In general, my short iron or wedge approach shots were pretty good, as I hit five greens in regulation (two being off the tee on par-3 holes). My long irons tended to hook and my fairway shots on the par-5 holes were, to put it bluntly, pathetic. I had one penalty when I pushed a 4-hybrid shot into a creek.
• Chipping. My chipping was mixed, as I only got up and down twice all day.
• Sand shots. I hit only one greenside bunker, and I caught too much ball and hit just over the green. I hit one fairway bunker, which I promptly chunked into the next fairway bunker. The shot out of the second bunker was respectable, though.
• Putting. On, boy, did I suck! 43 putts, nine 3-putts. It was if I hadn’t practiced putting for a year. I hit exactly one putt that was over three feet. Mostly, I left putts well short. Truly my worst putting day ever.

OK, my practice time was very limited during January due to travel and bad weather, but I didn’t think my putting would be the part of my game that would let me down. I knew my driving would be bad as I’ve really only been working on irons and wedges lately. Thankfully, January tends to be the worst weather month in Texas, so I expect I will soon be back on the range.

Yes, it was bad, but I did have fun. Yes, I am crazy, thanks for asking. 😉

I’ve been unable to practice since Jan. 13 due to a week of travel and a week of bad January weather. Finally, today, the cold, cloudy weather cleared out of here and I was able to go to Golden Bear Golf Center to practice. Though the temperature was in the mid-40’s, it was quite comfortable since there was virtually no wind.

I started out in the bunker, running the sand drill, then hitting a dozen balls out of the sand, getting every one of them out, but without good distance control. I then hit a variety of pitches and chips. My touch was pretty poor today, that’s what goes first when I can’t practice. My main issue was hitting fat. I wasn’t pleased.

Next, I went to hit some balls. On mats. I hate mats. I hit poorly off mats and they tend to cause me to sweep the ball instead of taking a divot. Even so, I hit the short irons and wedges pretty solidly, but my long irons were pretty shaky, and the driver, well, just bad.

Did I mention that I hate mats? Well, I hate that rubber tee even worse.

I finished off my practice with a good speed drill followed by some lag putting. Surprisingly, my putting had barely suffered at all from my two week layoff.

OK, my game is pretty shaky after two weeks off. We’ll see what happens on the course tomorrow.