Werepuppie wrote:

Played the best round of my life.Shot 81 which itself is unbelievable for me.The sad part is that if I do not blowup the last hole I would have broken 80,which is something I never imagined doing.

Awesome round. Congrats.

jfurr wrote:

Hit ZERO fairways! Off the tee the swing is all screwed up right now. Either miss slightly on the rough, or just pull or push it dead into a tree. Putting was pretty good though.

... and today the complete opposite. Hitting well off the tee and missing putts everywhere. Golf is crazy. The game of the devil.

Today I shot 5-over par 77, yesterday I made bogey at the 1st 4 holes, but fought back and shot 1-over 71.

44/40 84

3 lost balls on the front...

12 beers

83 - golfweek am tour stroke play tournament. Won my flight! (C flight). Scrambled like mad. Only one disaster hole, tried to play safe and went wild took a triple.

Real happy about the play though, very encouraging.

guzzlingil wrote:

44/40 84 3 lost balls on the front... 12 beers

Beers before or after the three lost balls?

77 yesterday at Douglaston Park in Queens. Before we get all excited its a +10 on a par 67. Most fun had playing golf in a while. One bad hole but I controlled the ball pretty good and short gamed it nice. Good to see my game hold up okay on a new course, especially one that gets narrow at times like this. Plus I won a few bucks off a guy who plays here all the time.

91 yesterday at Split Rock in the Bronx. Great weather but miserable day out there. Finished 18 in just under 6:00.

I was nudged into playing a round with a BF of my girlfriend's assistant. Regrettable, but I don't think I could've politely gotten out of it. At least it gave me a closer perspective on the once a month golfer douchebag type that I see all the time. I knew as soon as I saw his dusty bag filled with super game improvement clubs that it was going to be a long day.

We started the day off by getting lost in a rough part of the Bronx. Once off the train we needed a cab to the course, but there were none to be found in this dodgy area. There were plenty of unsavory, unlicensed gypsy cab drivers offering us rides in their regular cars. Normally I am not a paranoid type but a voice inside insisted that I don't get in one of these cars. Had a feeling if we did we would end up on the news. So we stand around trying to figure out what to do, looking and feeling absolutely like pale skinned golf-bag toting easy targets. We hop on the first city bus we see (headed in the wrong direction of course) and ask the driver for help. After 15 minutes he lets us off in a slightly less scary part of the Bronx where we managed to hail a sketchy cab, albeit one that appeared to have an actual taxi license.

After nearly two hours in transit we make it to the course and get on the first tee with not much wait. No matter-ahead of us is a long train of weekend d-bags that snaked all around the course. The group in front was four guys playing with three golf bags, one of them dressed in jeans, button down shirt and sneakers. No fewer than four times someone in a group ahead drove back towards asking if we had found: a sandwedge, a phone, a sandwedge (same guy), a carton of cigarettes. At one point I let them know that we were going to play thru since they were busy driving backwards searching for lost stuff, to which one dick-faced guy huffed at me: "WHATEVER".

Split Rock is a tough unforgiving course to begin with and yesterday it was in awful condition. Aerated neglected greens, surface of the moon terrain, etc. Add it all up and I was miserable and wanted to go home mid-round. I bought a coors light from the bev cart in a vain attempt to blunt the pain, something I rarely ever do. I shot a 91 while feeling like I hit it around okay. I hit plenty of nice shots, I just couldn't muster up any desire to score. Just wanted it to be over with. During a 6-hr round you don't really feel like you are playing a hole, its just a series of disinterested disjointed shots, there's so much waiting that your shots do not flow into one another like they would in a normal round.

Back to my playing partner, he was terrible, he hadn't played since September. He mentioned the word "mulligan" a few times during the round and kept trying to give everybody putts.* He got stuck in a bunker at one point and needed seven shots just to get out. But he didn't care too much, he just blithely flailed his way around the course looking more like a guy terrified of snakes than a golfer. But it reminded me how most people on a busy muni course don't care a lick about playing good. I don't understand it but that is the reality. They are probably just into the idea of playing golf as a conversation piece, something to tell other people about what they did last weekend to make themselves sound interesting.

*My new way of dealing with the offer of gimme putts is to completely ignore it, act like I don't even hear it and then go about putting the ball in the hole. After a few holes the guy got a clue and cut it out.

legitimatebeef wrote:

91 yesterday at Split Rock in the Bronx. Great weather but miserable day out there. Finished 18 in just under 6:00. I was nudged into playing a round with a BF of my girlfriend's assistant. Regrettable, but I don't think I could've politely gotten out of it. At least it gave me a closer perspective on the once a month golfer douchebag type that I see all the time. I knew as soon as I saw his dusty bag filled with super game improvement clubs that it was going to be a long day. We started the day off by getting lost in a rough part of the Bronx. Once off the train we needed a cab to the course, but there were none to be found in this dodgy area. There were plenty of unsavory, unlicensed gypsy cab drivers offering us rides in their regular cars. Normally I am not a paranoid type but a voice inside insisted that I don't get in one of these cars. Had a feeling if we did we would end up on the news. So we stand around trying to figure out what to do, looking and feeling absolutely like pale skinned golf-bag toting easy targets. We hop on the first city bus we see (headed in the wrong direction of course) and ask the driver for help. After 15 minutes he lets us off in a slightly less scary part of the Bronx where we managed to hail a sketchy cab, albeit one that appeared to have an actual taxi license. After nearly two hours in transit we make it to the course and get on the first tee with not much wait. No matter-ahead of us is a long train of weekend d-bags that snaked all around the course. The group in front was four guys playing with three golf bags, one of them dressed in jeans, button down shirt and sneakers. No fewer than four times someone in a group ahead drove back towards asking if we had found: a sandwedge, a phone, a sandwedge (same guy), a carton of cigarettes. At one point I let them know that we were going to play thru since they were busy driving backwards searching for lost stuff, to which one dick-faced guy huffed at me: "WHATEVER". Split Rock is a tough unforgiving course to begin with and yesterday it was in awful condition. Aerated neglected greens, surface of the moon terrain, etc. Add it all up and I was miserable and wanted to go home mid-round. I bought a coors light from the bev cart in a vain attempt to blunt the pain, something I rarely ever do. I shot a 91 while feeling like I hit it around okay. I hit plenty of nice shots, I just couldn't muster up any desire to score. Just wanted it to be over with. During a 6-hr round you don't really feel like you are playing a hole, its just a series of disinterested disjointed shots, there's so much waiting that your shots do not flow into one another like they would in a normal round. Back to my playing partner, he was terrible, he hadn't played since September. He mentioned the word "mulligan" a few times during the round and kept trying to give everybody putts.* He got stuck in a bunker at one point and needed seven shots just to get out. But he didn't care too much, he just blithely flailed his way around the course looking more like a guy terrified of snakes than a golfer. But it reminded me how most people on a busy muni course don't care a lick about playing good. I don't understand it but that is the reality. They are probably just into the idea of playing golf as a conversation piece, something to tell other people about what they did last weekend to make themselves sound interesting. *My new way of dealing with the offer of gimme putts is to completely ignore it, act like I don't even hear it and then go about putting the ball in the hole. After a few holes the guy got a clue and cut it out.

Beef: If you are willing to spend that kind of time and energy finally leaving Dyker Beach, to go all the way out to some junk course in the Bronx, then you should seriously rethink your options. You can get out here to beautiful Fairfield County or New Haven County, CT on MetroNorth in an hour or two, where we have real, good quality, well-maintained, challenging courses to test your game and most without too many 'd-bags,' as you call them, and play a round on weekends in under 4.5 hours. I play often late in the afternoons and can get in 18 in under 3 hours usually. It sounds from the description of your game in your postings, that you need something better than Dyker Beach every now and then.

I know how expensive it is to get around and live in NYC, though my guess is it isn't too expensive to play at Dyker. Out here, general pricing for everything is cheaper than New York except maybe our quality courses where you may pay between $45 and $75, depending on course, for a weekend round. That added cost of a few bucks for a tee time at a top shelf public course here, will be offset by the reasonable prices for everything else, like cabs, food, alcohol, etc. And at the better courses, we take our games pretty seriously. Right now, before we get into regular season rates, you can really test your game at my course, Oxford Greens, voted one of the 3 best public tracks in CT, for $45 on the weekend. It is beautiful, pristinely maintained, very challenging (131 from the whites)and scares off most of the 'd-bag' golfers you so despise. Or, something a little closer, just a $7 cab ride from the Milford train station is Great River Golf Club. Normally about $125 for a round, but again, in the pre-season, cheaper I think. It too is one of the top three in CT and will challenge your game as much, if not more than Oxford Greens.

Too much Dyker Beach is making you stale and crabby. C'mon out to CT every now and then, where we have clean air, smiling faces, friendly people, serious golfers, tough courses, and fewer 'd-bags'! You might enjoy it. Just don't accidentally get off the train at the Bridgeport stop. You may think you never got out of the Bronx.

Thank you Dougie. Yesterday was kind of an obligation, because usually I know better than to hit up a NYC course on a nice Saturday. I have started to branch out though and it is nice, Friday was a real enjoyable round.

I had never really considered CT but now that I have been invited I'm going to take you up on it. Maybe finally try some of that New Haven pizza. Getting on the metro-north for an hour makes so much more sense than riding a subway through south Bronx. Besides I live not far from Grand Central terminal. And GCT is such a nice place, going through there you feel like a human, that maybe you deserve good things in life or that NYC could maybe be a worthwhile place after all. They sell all kinds of fancy sandwiches there. Penn Station is all stale popcorn smell and Rangers fans and loudmouth chicks from Ronkonkoma, you feel more like a cattle waiting in line to get electrocuted.

Today was just miserable. Every shot I hit today just stunk. Don`t even feel like posting my score, I`m so embarassed.

Well I played a 6 hr round today too, at Man-O-War in Myrtle Beach. The course was full and busy and slow, but the fairways and the grass everywhere was in such since great shape I enjoyed it. I was playing at the back of with a group of 12 guys so even if I wanted to go faster it wouldn't have mattered, so I just stuck with it.

The course was very nice and playable I thought. I'm not used to the "resort" style courses - it was pretty wide open. I'm used to more tight, tree and woods lined holes. Think there was OB on only maybe two holes, but there was plenty of water, island greens, etc. For about the first 12 holes the wind was kicking hard, two or three clubs.

What killed my scoring today was I never could get comfortable with the greens. Downhill putts were slow, flat looking putts would take off fast. Chips and approaches would bounce off or long. Shot a 90 with SEVEN 3 putts and one 4 putt, plus making a mess in one of the green side bunkers took three shots to get out. Ouch.

Played Sunday, 9 from the blue, 9 from the whites, unofficial 84 as we are still without greens to putt on. Only stat I'm tracking right now is FW's hit and whether the drive is playable. I'm encouraged there, 8 of 14 hit and only 2 others that put me in jail. ballstriking is pretty steady right now too (just jinxed myself). I pulled my putter out the bag for the first time in about 3 weeks, it felt weird in my hands, I'm screwed when I get on a real green.

Shot a personal best 41 on the front nine of my home course today in the sub-40 degree 30 mph wind.

It was a really special round all around considering the miserable playing conditions. I had the biggest fluke ever occur on the back nine. On hole 10 and again on hole 12....I hit my second shot on each of those holes, and it hit one of those iron sapling support rods that are about 1/4 of an inch thick and about three feet high. Both times, the ball ricoccheted past my head and into the hazard behind me. That's two stroke and distance penalties on what were, all things considered, pretty decent strokes. All told, I shot a 50 on the back nine, but my ESC was 48.

On two holes, I just had the wind kick my ass. But on every other hole, my driver was absolutely awesome, and my wedges were saving pars and bogeys. If my driver and wedges are that good all year long, my handicap is on its way down.

Oh..I almost forgot my hole 18 finish. The wind had died down a bit by that point, as it was only about 15-20 mph (started with 40 mph gusts). The tees were playing way, way, way back making this hole the longest I've ever played it. I absolutely schmucked my driver. I didn't measure, but it put me at about 220 for my second shot, and that's 5w territory. I went for it, and I biffed it bad. I hit it off the toe, and I sent it screaming into the grove of trees off to the right. So I found my ball, and I actually have enough room to make a swing. There really is no escape shot anywhere to be found, but I have this little tiny window right at the flagstick. I'm about 100 yards out, and I absolutely could not believe that I was able to get my wedge shot through that window. Unfortunately, though, I ended up about 20 yards short of the green with an evil short side pin. My wedges had been saving my butt all day long, but I just didn't see any way to stick that pin. I tried as hard as I could, and even though I landed the shot about a foot past the fringe, it rolled about 20 feet past the hole. So I"m looking at an evil sidewinding 20' putt to save par. I got the read right. It rolled...rolled...and it stopped on the lip for just a moment before it dropped.