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My playing year usually starts in Orlando at the end of January when I play in the Isleworth Invitational, an individual pro and pro-am team event at Tiger’s club. My expectations are fairly low as we are coming from snow and cold and I am competing against mostly Florida guys, with the added attraction of playing the difficult Isleworth course at 7000 yards in spotty weather. I would consider shooting even par to be excellent, breaking 150 to be modestly successful, and anything else to be a poor result. In 2011 I shot 82-73, with at least the second round being decent.
In April we start the Middle Atlantic PGA season with our Match Play Championship, which qualifies 32 for match play, then whittles down to the quarterfinals which are held later in the year. I made it into match play with a 76, then won my first two matches to advance to the quarters, which as a bonus were to be held in September at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club, site of many previous President’s Cups.
The next major event on the schedule is the PGA Professional National Championship, previously known as the CPC, which I won 10 years ago in Oregon. This year the tournament was to be held at Hershey Country Club in Pennsylvania, where my website partner Rick Buonincontri signed on to carry the bag. I had been having off and on problems with stiffness and pain in my back and hips most of the year, and I had been forced to withdraw from at least one event in early June because of it, also managing to fail to qualify for the Maryland State Open, making a quad on the 17th hole to miss by 2 just to play in a tournament I had previously won 3 times. The National is an all walking tournament on two courses, so I knew I would have to walk at least 4 rounds, six if I made the cut. I have not made the cut here since 2007, and I always question how my body is going to hold up for the week. This year was no exception. I played decent in the practice rounds, but the first round was a struggle as I hit some weak shots and putted fairly poorly on the shorter of the two courses. With a 4 over par round I knew I would have to get it under the second day to have a chance at the weekend. A fire alarm woke us at 5am the morning before round two and to my chagrin I found that I could not bend over to put on my shoes. My back had gone into spasm, and while I had a late time it appeared that I would not be able to play. As it turned out, I warmed up through the bag and was able to make it to the first tee, and I promptly holed out from a greenside bunker for eagle. Alas, there would be no miracles and I shot a decent round of 74 to miss the cut by more than a few.
I had compiled a pretty good record in the CPC, having won once, finished fifth once, and been inside the top 20 three other times, which qualified me to play in 5 PGA Championships, the last being 2003 at Oakland Hills. My struggles since then are a good indication of the deterioration of my game, although I had a great year in 2007 when I turned 50, and continued to play fairly well until the end of 2008. I won my Section Championship in 2007 with a birdie putt on the final hole, and shot 63 in the final round of the Senior Section Championship to become the first person to win both in the same year. I capped off 2007 by finishing 3rd in the National Senior Championship, which qualified me for the 2008 Senior PGA Championship at Oak Hill. I also qualified for the Senior US Open in 2008 and finished runner-up in the Section Player of the Year standings, which isn’t too bad considering my competition includes two other CPC winners and a national PGA Player of the Year. That was about it for my usual level of play, and the last 3 years have been substandard to say the least.
In August we always play our Section Championship, and this year I opened up with a 69, my best round in a while, but followed that up with 75 and 73 to finish T-15 and miss out on a spot in the National in a playoff (I’m done with my 10 year exemption for winning, although there is talk of going back to a lifetime exemption for past champions), and will have to rely on getting in as an alternate. About a week later we played our Senior Section Championship and I managed to scrape in a 6th place finish, which qualified me for the National PGA Senior Championship which was scheduled to be held locally at a new Nicklaus course in Leesburg, VA called Creighton Farms. You wouldn’t think much of my score (1 over for 27 holes) unless you saw me play. It was an amazing assortment of recovery shots, up and downs, scrambling, and grinding that took me to the final hole needing a par to make it, whereupon I proceeded to hit a snap hook, punch out, and then hit a 230 yard hybrid on the green to save the day.
I find golf with bad ball striking to be especially exhausting. My driving has been particularly erratic, and when you are all over the place off the tee everything after that is just grinding. If the course you are playing is somewhat forgiving you can get away with it, but as the courses get tougher it becomes more difficult to post decent scores. I was always able to play the tough courses well due to my solid ball striking and good short game (although the courses at the major championship level were a bit too tough for me to manage even when I was hitting it OK), but posting decent scores on more challenging venues has been difficult. My ball striking issues cost me in the continuation of the Match Play Championship, as I managed to win my quarterfinal match but lost on 18 in the semis in a match where a few timely good shots might have changed the outcome.
The problem I have with my back and my hips does two things to me: it keeps me from making the movements that I know I need to make during the swing, and it keeps me from practicing enough to eventually be able to make those moves. Every now and then I think I might just stop playing, but that only lasts a day or two and then I’m back at it. Hopefully some new stuff my therapist is doing will help and with the new revelations I am having while studying all the Tour swings (especially Hogan) I am still angling toward a comeback.
The last significant tournament of the year for me was the National Senior Championship, and I actually didn’t feel too badly going into the event. Alas, the course was really hard, and I started with a horrendous 79, which didn’t really set me up for a good week. The second round was played at a different course (not as hard), and somehow I revisited past glory and came up with a no-bogey 67, which brought me in well under the cut line. My third round, back on the hard course, started well with an even par front 9, but then the wheels came off. I bogeyed 10, 12 and 13, and then hit my tee shot to the right on the short 14th. My ball came to rest in a hole next to an electrical box, so I asked an official for a ruling. He wasn’t sure, so he summoned another one, who told me there would be no relief. For some inexplicable reason I chose, instead of taking an unplayable and punching it up on the green, to try to hit the ball out of the hole, an attempt that failed to move the ball at all. I then even more stupidly tried to hit it again, at which point the ball hit the front of the hole, bounced way up into the air, backwards, and to the right, and landed on top of my golf cart, which I had, in another moronic move, parked quite close to where the ball lay. The ball ended up in the fairway trap, from which I knocked it on and 2-putted for 8. I finished with a 44 for the nine and 80 for the round, and my closing 74 missed qualifying for the Senior PGA Championship by a mere 2 strokes.
That tournament pretty much toasted me for the rest of the year, and I skipped the last batch of section events. It took me almost 6 weeks to get my desire back, but I did play in a 2-man event in December and played fairly well, finishing 3rd among 16 teams. I have been feeling a bit better lately and have made some new, significant observations/discoveries just recently and am again hopeful that I can start the New Year with some better golf. And as I said, from now on I’m going to report in on my efforts with the thought in mind to share my past and present experiences in competition in order to help guide the website members in your attempt to achieve that next level.
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