Spending More Time in the Sand Than David Hasselhoff

Geoff Ogilivy blew up the field in the Mercedes Championship at Kapalua. In spite of it not being very dramatic, I still love to watch the tournament. It is a place unlike any other the Tour goes to (the Sony next week looks more like Florida than Hawaii for my taste), the views are dramatic (did you see the Humpback whales behind the 17th tee one day? Ernie did – he just stood there and watched them. Doesn’t happen in Milwaukee, I can tell you that), and the elevation changes are clearly evident, even on TV.

But the tour is apparently thinking of moving the tournament to another venue, as Doug Ferguson reports in Golfworld online. And not because Kapalua doesn’t want them there. And not because the players want to leave. (Davis Love – “We all want it to stay here.” Ogilvy – “This is a perfect place to start [the season].” Ogilvy goes on – “”After Florida, you probably play the same golf course 20 times in a row. But to play such an extremely different setup, it’s a cool place to start.” Rory Sabattini even went there this week for vacation – even though he wasn’t playing in the tournament).

So who wants it changed? If it isn’t the players, and it isn’t the resort itself, then it is either sponsors or the PGA Tour administration. Tim Finchem wasn’t real clear in Ferguson’s article – “we are looking at some options in terms of what is the best future for this tournament.” Sounds vague enough to mean “we are getting out of Dodge asap, amigo!”

Maybe they want travel to be easier. Move it to the mainland, so Tiger will show – well, no he won’t, at least according to Justin Leonard, who may know a bit more than me. (”If you’re trying to get one or two players, you’re going to have to move it to San Diego or Orlando,” said Justin Leonard, referring to Mickelson and Woods. “And even then, I don’t think those guys would play. It’s nice to start here.”)

If the tour would just come out and say that they’re doing it for economic reasons – easier for sponsors, easier to get better players – I’d be a little better with it. But to hem and haw and obfuscate, well, Finchem just looks like he learned how to do PR from Enron or WAMU.

Tags: PGA, PGA Tour, Places to Play by
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Friday was my birthday – don’t worry, I’m not upset that all of you didn’t call or send me cards. Well, I retract that – my sister, Kerry, has blown off my birthday once again. But that’s OK – she’s visiting for Thanksgiving so I’ll extract revenge then.

I had a great time, even though the nasty rain prevented playing golf with my older two sons. But Erik, my 19 year old son at UNC – Wilmington, and Kirsten, my 21 year old daughter at UNC – Chapel Hill, both came in town and we all went to dinner, so it was nice. And I got some cool gifts – UNCW hat and shirt, the new Bob Rotella book (always a great read), the Josh Hamilton book (inspirational!).

Erik gave me a very, very cool present. He doesn’t have a lot of money, so I was a bit surprised when he brought in a large, flat package “wrapped” in a sheet – a clean one, he insisted. It was this:

4 summers ago, Erik, my father, and I had taken a “once in a lifetime trip”, in our case, to Scotland to play golf. My dad is a golf nut and, as I’ve mentioned before, taught me how to golf. And I, in turn, taught Erik. My dad had been to Europe many times, but always with my mom, who doesn’t golf. He had never visited the great golf courses of Scotland. We played at Turnberry, Prestwick (the original home of the British Open in the mid-1800’s), Kingsbarnes, Carnoustie, and at St. Andrews. It was a great 3 generational trip. And Erik took the yardage book from the Old Course at St. Andrews and cut it up to make this poster, including our scorecard, which you see on the bottom right of the poster, and below in close-up.

I would like to point out a few things. Yes, I did indeed shoot an 89 while Erik shot 77. And, in fact, I did have a 10 on 14. I could say that I wanted to give the “Hell Bunker” a try and failed. But in reality, I got into this version of golf Hell and, 4 swats later, found out how it got its name.

But I’d rather you focus on #18, the Home Hole. We had teed off at 6:40 in the morning (a bit brisk in St. Andrews at that time, even in July). We were finishing at around 10:30 on what was turning into a beautiful summer morning. This area of St. Andrews is very popular and bunches of people are typically walking around the 18th green and 1st teebox, which are adjacent, on their way to the beach or just for walks.

So there were probably 50-60 people standing in back of the green just watching the golfers on 18. Erik and I both hit good drives and hit our approaches to about 20 feet. In front of the crowd, I drained my putt for birdie, hence the “3″ you see on the card. My caddie then incited the crowd to cheer for me, so I am proud to say I got a standing ovation on the 18th at the Old Course. Probably my greatest golf memory ever.

Tags: Golf vacations, Places to Play by
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Just wanted to share some pics from our weekend at the IJGT Junior Tournament in Williamsburg, VA at the Golden Horseshoe Golf Club this last weekend. Leaves turning, beautiful course – great weekend. And young Master Ehlert took 4th – not bad, though he felt like he should have won.

Tags: Junior Golf, Places to Play by
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