On the subject of Old Money vs New Money
Old money members never wear wristwatches…they don’t have to be anywhere or do anything.
A New Money member’s bulging gold Rolex lost time momentarily the other day and caused a brownout in a major American city.
Dan Jenkins
Unplayable Lies (2015)
If you are on a golf trip to Orlando and playing the usual suspects, Bay Hill, Orange Country National, Grand Cypress to name a few, consider taking an afternoon and adding the Grande Lakes Course at the Ritz-Carlton to your vacation rota. Built on a typical piece of Florida marshland Greg Norman figured out a way to raise from the flood plain a very interesting set of holes that in many ways defies the typical central Florida formula of flat holes hemmed in by acres of sand and water.
The front nine wends through the oaks and cypress trees with some accent from the wetlands. The back nine serious soil was moved to raise topography from the flood plain and create compelling holes among the wetlands. This side is more exposed to the elements and any hint of wind brings the greater presence of the wetlands to front of mind.
The driving areas are generous throughout but having said that there are specific angles of approach to the greens that are advantageous. A yardage book is a great asset to understanding the proper lines of play. There is plenty of sand-some crushed sea shell waste areas as well-but the course is not overbunkered. Bunkers have clean edges which makes for a very tailored presentation.
The most thought was put into the green complexes which have very dramatic topographical interest. Many of the greens are more than 40 yards long and have serious contour so just being on a green is no guarantee of a two-putt. The green conditions were about as perfect as I have seen in Florida and the putting speed they can maintain as a result can be disarming.
The hole sequence on the front is user friendly with two par fives within three holes to allow build up of some par acorns. As you get into the last three on this side the water is closer at hand and the wind influence picks up increasing the challenge accordingly. Making a decent score on the outward nine is a matter of patience and line control.
The distinctive Par 4 11th is the gateway to a frenetic finish
Starting at the 11th the character of the course changes dramatically and your focus must heighten as well. Check the hole-by-hole attachment below for the details. The Par 4 11th is one of the most unique holes you play all day with a tree and sand feature in the center of the driving area that forces you to pick a favored line of play right off the tee box. To the chagrin of the Michelob Ultra crowd, a short Par 3 and a short Par 4 follow that favor brains over brawn and will punish overly aggressive play as the course works toward a strong finish down the last five.
The five finishing holes are a wild collection of very unusual holes that demand calculated patience to get to the house with your scorecard in tact. The common theme is adjacent disaster to the charmed line of play on each hole which makes the risk reward calculation on almost every shot of paramount concern. The green complexes down the stretch are some of the most imaginative you see all day so articulate approach shots are required or you can get into some very dicey up-and-down situations.
The finishing hole brings your home with a flourish
The finishing hole provides a grand view of the Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotel and play facilities. It seems like an appropriate back drop to what has undoubtedly been a stout and invigorating golf challenge.
Orlando, Florida
Designer: Greg Norman (2003)
Tees Par Yardage Rating Slope
Gold 72 6708 72.2 135
Blue 72 6324 70.3 127
White 72 5835 68 121
Green 72 5223 69.8 115
(Click to see complete hole-by-hole descriptions of the Ritz-Carlton Grande Lakes Club)
As Jerry Garcia once said to his devoted followers, “What a long strange trip it’s been”. Such is the trail that True Linkswear has followed from the early day’s of the comfy Clown Shoes through outdoorsy Chukkas to the overly zesty Millenals $99 collection and now back to something more refined for the True walking demographic.
For our review we focus on two next generation shoes in the 2015 True Linkswear line-the Game Changer Hybrid and Game Changer Pro.
True Game Changer Hybrid:
The Game Changer Hybrid is a very clean presentation of the spikeless walking shoe we have come to know and love from True Linkswear. Not a whole lot of external adornment gives a distinguished look to a shoe with all the functionality we expect in our Trues.
Full Two-Year Waterproof Warranty on a shoe with True Barefoot Spikeless Performanace Tread, Zero-Drop sole and roomy toe chamber keeping you connected to the ground , sock-fit elastic cuff for snug fit, and integrated P-Motion for max comfort and flexibility. More than enough room inside to accommodate orthotics or other foot issue support aids.
At a retail of $150, the color offerings of Black/Charcoal, White/Grey, Cool Grey/Charcoal, and White/Burnt Orange give you plenty of options to accessorize smartly your collection of Dockers.
True Game Changer Pro:
For a firm that from the beginning had sworn off soft spikes for nubbed bottoms the Pro is a pretty bold introduction from the True lab coat crew. Trying to address what some people consider a trade-off in traction with a spikeless shoe True have used very clever innovation to add a replaceable Champ Zarma soft spike to the same platform as the Hybrid described above.
The key is that they have recessed the back two spikes to maintain the integrity of the Zero-Drop signature feature of all their True Linkswear shoes. Whether walking on pavement or the turf you still get that comfortable heel to toe transition that walkers and runners have found so endearing.
This shoe has all the goodies of it’s Hybrid cousin described above. The leather upper is distinctly more sporty so the color combinations of Black/White, White/Grey, Grey/Gold, and White/Red may not fit all tastes. But Ryan Moore has brandished these effectively against his wardrobe of grey-on-grey on the overseeded Bermuda during this year’s Florida swing.
In our testing on the wet and soggy spring turf left behind in the East now that the winter glacier’s have receded we found that the soft spikes do provide a distinct improvement in traction in these kinds of conditions. On heavy dew mornings or when there is harrowing low pressure system in the forecast the Pro’s are a go-to alternative to have at your disposal.
You are paying a little more for the integrated soft spike design but at $170 they still represent a solid value for a full featured walking shoe.
As with last year’s True Lyt’s and the True Stealth’s before them, these two models move seamlessly from practice tee mats to the course to the bragging bar after the round, but as Jerry has warned the faithful just watch your speed.
March, 2015
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Your relationship with James Finegan probably started like mine. Back from a first trip to Ireland, talking with friends about the experience and chomping at the bit to get back for more, someone who had been to the British Isles a second time says, “Then you got to read Finegan”.
What ensued was typical…off to Barnes and Noble, fingering through a copy of “Emerald Fairways and Foam Flecked Seas-A Golfer’s Pilgrimage to the Courses of Ireland” I am drawn in by personal accounts of places I had played-Ballybunion, Rosses Point, and Royal County Down. Finegan’s visual of RCD is typical, “What strikes us-in truth, assaults us-are the massive sand hills, the profusion of gorse (overpoweringly golden in spring, impenetrable at any time) and the heady views”.
Once owned the romance with his writing accelerated as he described courses large and small, quaint hotels and B & B’s, town histories and antiquities, and his experiences with the locals. He captured the lure of Ireland through this descriptive of a chance encounter with an Irish immigrant-that is to say a Philadelphian who had moved to Dublin.
“This free spirit fascinated us. The very notion of simply picking up and going to Ireland to live because the golf was ideal-well, this was so preposterously at variance with such things as discipline and roots….it was dizzying to contemplate….Think of it: a golf expatriate, an expatriate not because of taxes or career or love but for golf. I had to concede that it was not a noble rationale for self-exile. Nor was it ignoble.”
Whether it was this one or “Blasted Heaths and Blessed Greens” about Scotland or a third about England and Wales, or his seminal collection “Scotland-Where Golf Is Great” becoming a James Finegan fan just happens. The rapture of his prose, his unique voice on links golf, makes recalling your last trip or planning your next one a vibrant and exhilarating experience.
James W. Finegan passed away this week in his hometown of Philadelphia at the age of 85. You can read Michael Bamberger’s stirring tribute to “another member of golf’s greatest generation…an extraordinary voice in the game, both as a speaker and writer”. Bamberger says, “Alongside Herbert Warren Wind, no other American writer captured the windblown, rugged beauty of golf in the British Isles with such wild enthusiasm”.
The true fans of the game have lost a chronicler, a scribe of all that is good and great about links golf. Thankfully Finegan’s links voice will continue to influence the itineraries of golfing pilgrims for generations to come through the cherished impressions he has left with us.
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(Click to read Michael Bamberger’s tribute to James Finegan on Golf.com)
March, 2015
A reminder from the guys @College_Golfers….whether you are grinding away with your mid-irons on the range or refining your finesse pitching at the short game area you want to minimize your divot footprint by following the straight line practice protocol on the left.
For each subsequent shot place your ball one inch behind your previous divot. It will eliminate divot scatter and make a huge difference to the long term maintenance of your practice grounds.
College Golf@College_Golfers
March, 2015
In case you missed it on Friday Rory McIlroy, the current #1 in the World Golf Rankings, let his temper get the best of him on the 8th at Doral after hitting his 3-iron approach into the drink and flung the disobedient implement a good 75 yards into the water next to him.
Rory wasn’t entirely enamored with his play on Friday at Doral
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To his own admission, it wasn’t his proudest moment, but it felt good at the time. Henrik Stenson, his playing pard and a man known to display a personal anger tempest from time-to-time said, “Well, if you can’t get on ‘SportsCenter with your play, at least you can do it with something else”.
As far as being a bad role model with this show of temper, let the record show it did not take very long. Marcel Siem, a fellow European Tour stand out, replicated the act on Saturday after stuffing his long iron in a green side bunker on the same hole. Rory may have to anchor a public relations campaign against helicoptering long irons to tamp down a brush fire among young Rory-ites..
Take a look at Bob Harig’s ESPN.com article on the affair which includes full video of the fling as well as Rory’s version of contrition in his post game press conference on Friday.
BTW, as Bobby Knight, a man who knows from where this comes, said in his interview with David Feherty a while back when asked about the proper form for flinging metal objects, it is all about getting to your left side on the follow through. You will note that the true athlete in Rory came through in his fling form, there is not a hint of a duck hook in the flight of the iron.
Good news is a diver was back in the pond yesterday to retrieve the club and it seems to have survived the swim with it’s dignity in tact. Only question is whether this 3-iron now shows up on EBay or in a glass case at Doral for the sake of recollection.
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(Click to read Bob Harig’s article about Rory’s Frustrated Fling)
March, 2015
The USGA publications tend to be dry, button-down, corporate presentations that are about as much fun to read as the obituary columns in your local paper. But they stepped out of their blue blazer mode in the publication of Golf Rules Illustrated 2012-2015-The Official Illustrated Guide To the Rules of Golf.
Every one who plays the game is confronted with rules conundrums whether it is from their Saturday group, an outing they are playing, or the live action they are watching during the Sunday tournament broadcast. The first person they are likely to ask is the head pro at their place and the second person is probably a single digit guy they barely know walking through the locker room. More often than not they come away more confused about the rules then when they posed the question.
Sure there are on-line sources like Barry Rhodes Rules School who is probably the reigning authority outside of the USGA/R & A tandem when it comes to answering rules questions. You could check resources like our Keepers Rules Education Initiative which explains frequently asked rules incidents with on course scenarios to clarify the nuances of rules in your day-to-day game.
But for coherent answers to all golf rule questions you need only have a copy of the Golf Rules Illustrated book at your disposal to get meat of the matter in a hurry. The book is organized with color-coded index for each chapter that covers one the 34 rules in the game. For each rule and it includes an explanation of the rule and it’s related sub-cases with a combination of easy to understand text, simple illustrations, relevant photos, and real incidents and frequently asked questions.
A simple visual explains what you are prohibited from doing in a bunker
The table of contents makes it easy to find what you are looking for and once there you will find yourself perusing the related sub-cases as well as real incidents from the tour that will bring the rules to life for you. The FAQs help to fill in the gaps so you reconcile the obvious questions that come to mind as you start to understand the rule at hand.
Let’s say you need to know if the pile of rabbit poop your ball landed in can be removed without penalty as Loose Impediments (Rule 23).
This illustration defines Loose Impediments vs Movable Obstructions
You recall that crazy situation when Tiger got to move a boulder in Arizona, a loose impediment in his way that took an army of people to remove. Check the incident section of Rule 23 for an account of that crazy affair and the logic that supported the ruling.
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It then occurs to you, can you remove sand on the putting even though your ball lies off the putting surface….check the Frequently Asked Questions at the end of the chapter.
Maybe you were playing with your buddies the other day and one of them hit a ball off a steep upslope that came straight up and deflected off this body. Any penalty for that?
Happened to Jeff Maggert at the 2003 Masters and cost him a one-stroke penalty
But this leads you to wonder about other incidents where a ball is stopped or deflected by hitting your opponents bag or another ball in motion.
Dropping the ball whether for free relief or in implementing a penalty can lead to all kinds of variations of events. In the chapter on Rule 20-Lifting, Dropping and Placing-it clearly explains a litany of scenarios including cases when you must re-drop.
Under the FAQ they address whether a player is required to mark the position of a ball he is going to drop before lifting it.
Remember Van de Velde’s choosing this option from the water hazard at the Open
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This book is an invaluable reference for getting the rules right because it cuts through all the legal language to present an intelligible understanding of the rules and related issues as well as providing simple visuals to reinforce the logic of how the rules must be implemented.
For about 15 bucks you can get this from any number of the on-line book purveyors. Golf Rules Illustrated should have a front row spot on your golf library shelf. The pages will become dog-eared in no time.
(Illustrations and photos from Golf Rules Illustrated 2012-2015)
February, 2015
Lydia Ko at 17 years old became the youngest player to reach the #1 ranking on the LPGA Tour a few weeks ago with a second place finish in the Coates Golf Championship. If anyone had doubts about her credentials at such a young age they were put to bed with an impressive win today of ISPS Handa Australian Open at Royal Melbourne.
Lydia’s Aimpoint putting technique emphasizes her ranking
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Royal Melbourne is a true championship test that has befuddled professionals of both genders with it’s Alister MacKenzie green complexes. This week was no exception as the hot Australian summer presented parched hard and fast fairways and greens stimping a major championship speeds. Lydia played with metronomic patience on the composite par 73 layout with scores of 70-70-72-71 to win at 9-under par.
This was Lydia’s 8th professional win on the LPGA and European Ladies and caps off a 14 month period where she has won 4 times with 18 top 10 finishes in 29 events. She has not missed a cut and won $2,400,00 over that span.
The stretch began with a gripping toe-to-toe 1 shot victory over Stacey Lewis in the Swinging Skirts LPGA Classic at Lake Merced last April. Lydia then added the Marathon Classic in July with a 1 stroke win over So Yeon Ryu. Then she put herself seriously in the #1 ranking mix with a playoff win at the CME Group Tour Championship in November. The only thing missing from her trophy case is a piece of major championship hardware and that cannot be far away.
Since she splashed on the scene with her first LPGA Tour victory as an amateur at age 14 in the CN Canadian Women’s Open Lydia has shown a mature approach to playing that belies her years. Her game resembles the consistency of Annika Sorenstam in her peak years. Lydia has hit 85% of the fairways this year and this week on a Royal Melbourne course with serious fire in it’s belly she has consistently hit 89% of the greens each day.
Ko’s proficiency with hybrids reminds us of Annika’s Callaway Metal Wood Game
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The final day began with Lydia tied for the lead at 7-under with Ariya Jutanugarn and Amy Yang one back at 6-under. It pretty much became a head-to-head competition between Ko and Yang as the rest of the field faded fairly early in the front nine.
Ko asserted herself with an amazing pitch in on the third hole for eagle to take the lead outright at 8-under. She was on cruise control with four straight pars until she hit an approach pitch into the 8th green two steps past the flag only to see the hand of Alister shuttle it off the back of this devious green complex and end up 30 yards over the green in a thatchy lie with an impossible elevator pitch back up to the flag. The unforced error cost her a bogie and a two-shot swing tied them at the top when Yang buried a 50-footer on the 9th hole in front of her.
The momentum further shifted in Yang’s direction when she laced her second shot on the par 5 10th to inside 15 feet for a good eagle opportunity. But the golf goddesses interceded as the storm alarm sounded before she could putt forcing an interruption in play that stifled her charge. After play resumed she missed the eagle putt settling for a birdie which Lydia matched on the 10th to bring them both to 8-under.
Lydia asserted herself again with a good birdie opportunity on the 11th but left the putt in the jaws and settle for par. On the par 4 12th she hit it to 25 feet and calmly rolled in a curling birdie putt to regain the lead alone at 9-under.
When the birdie putt found bottom on the 12th the Fat Lady was humming
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Yang, just one back on the par 5 14th, hit her second into the green side bunker and made a gutsy up and down for birdie to once again tie the lead at 9-under. But her putter was to be her undoing as she missed a short one on 15 to make bogey failing to get up and down from in front of the green. A miscue on 17 led to another bogey and her final second place position at 7-under par.
From the 13th tee to the trophy presentation it was fairway and greens for Lydia without a dropped shot on the card as she proved once again to be a stoic front runner once she has the lead. This performance was hauntingly similar to her win over Stacy Lewis at Lake Merced.
These victory speeches are becoming old hat for Lydia
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At 17 this young woman is maturing quickly shedding the Annie Hall spectacles for contact lenses, embracing make-up, and wearing more stylish attire. The new look still has a ways to go to catch up with the maturity of her golf game which has gotten her to #1 and will make it a formidable task for anyone to dislodge Lydia from that perch.
February, 2015
I don’t think so. Nor do a number of other folks with serious golf smarts including Tour Putting Guru Marius Filmalter.
Of late these short pitches have spawned more frowns than smiles
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Check out Marius’s recent article on golf.com where he clearly believe’s Tiger’s short game problems are not neurological but a matter of proper technique confidently applied. He should know since his client list includes a who’s who of top global players from the PGA, European, L.P.G.A and Champion’s tours.
I for one think Marius has it right. In spite of his pathetic short game performances at the Hero’s Challenge In December and the Waste Management and Farmer’s more recently there is really nothing in his short game that resembles the yips to me. Tiger has simply lost his way on short swing technique. But the question is why?
For me the answer lies in Tiger’s unrealistic quest for golf perfection. He not only wants be the best player the game has ever seen but he wants to have the perfect golf swing as well. Throughout the early part of his career he repeatedly said he wanted to “own his swing” in a Hogan-like sense. For a guy who pretty much had the perfect swing back in 2000 under the tutelage of B.H. he has repeatedly wandered from expert to expert in search of something more perfect. The bad news is that the more he has tried to refine his swing the further from the truth he has found himself.
I buy the fact that as he says, his current short game performance problems are because he cannot synchronize his new little swing pattern to bottom out properly. But the question is why try? It may be inherent that a player’s big swing and little swing tend to look alike but it does not have to be that way.
As Phil said in comments about Tiger’s pitching woes, “There’s only one way to chip effectively. So regardless of how you swing the club, regardless of how you putt, there’s only one way to chip, because the leading edge on a 60-degree wedge is coming into the ball first. And everything you do chipping is to get, keep the leading edge down. So there’s three or four fundamentals on chipping that everybody has to do to chip well. No matter who you are. And it has nothing to do with your swing.”
He needs to forget about synchronizing methods of his long and short swings and focus on the fundamentals of quality short game shots that are the same for all players, regardless of swing principles.
Tiger’s never ending quest to reinvent his big swing to meet his latest sense of perfection has leaked into what was the best short game on tour and wreaked havoc. Marius is correct when he says Tiger needs to get back to fundamental sound technique around the greens and harmonize it with the self awareness that he is doing it properly.
It is time for Tiger to stop soliciting the advice of any tour player within earshot and listen to the familiar voice of a short game expert he knows. If he brings this short game to Augusta, the most demanding tight lie short game shot course in the world, he will not break 80.
(Click to read the Marius Filmalter article “Tiger Woods Does Not Have The Yips”)
February, 2015
PGA Tour caddies filed a class-action lawsuit claiming they are sick of being unpaid sandwich sign board shills for the corporate sponsors of PGA Tour events. The caddies at tour events are required to wear the logo-covered bibs which bear the tournament sponsor’s moniker and are paid nothing in endorsement fees for this powerful marketing effort each week.
For months the caddies have been attempting to negotiate a deal with the PGA Tour that in lieu of being paid for this the tour would contribute money to a retirement and health insurance fund for the benefit of the caddies. Those talks broke down hence the filing of this lawsuit followed.
The tour sucks gazillions of bucks out of big corporate sponsors like Waste Management, Farmer’s Insurance, and A T & T for sponsoring PGA Tour stops. The signage for the sponsoring corporation is everywhere-in ads, on tickets, programs, placard signs around the course, and on the bibs of the 125 to 140 caddies that walk across TV screens with the players each week.
The only one seeing green from this each week is the PGA Tour
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Considering that these events are covered for nationwide broadcast audience on the Golf Channel on Thursday and Friday and then the networks on Saturday and Sunday that is a lot of eyeball time for selling product. Every time the leading players commiserate with their caddies over club selection or putting line it is another 20 to 30 seconds of uninterrupted exposure of the sponsor’s corporate logo. What do the caddies get remunerated for their invaluable role in this marketing exposure ….bupkis ….nada …zilch….apparently not even a thank you.
In our area retail merchants are often prohibited by local governments from putting temporary advertising signs on the curbs in front of their stores. So they resort to hiring people with sandwich board signs across their shoulders to walk the highway median strips to do their marketing bidding instead. Apparently this kind of expression tied to a person has first amendment free speech protection along with monetary compensation.
Tim Finchem’s reaction to the suggestion that the tour should share the spoils of this marketing arrangement with the caddies, “Most people don’t understand the way a caddie/player relationship works…it goes back a long way. The player makes an arrangement with somebody to carry their bag …..and they work out a financial arrangement …..the historical process is the player handles that.”
He did explain that in spite of the fact that the Tour’s policy has been to never negotiate compensation with caddies, the tour does currently give caddies a $2,000 annual stipend for health insurance. Sounds like he is talking out of both sides of his mouth to me.
Tim has a seven figure salary, a Bentley of a benefits package, and a golden parachute to boot so he is probably not aware that $2,000 a year does not buy very much in the Affordable Health Care Market today. $166.67 a month is not buying a PPO Insurance Plan with major medical coverage for your dependents. Given how much time these guys spend out in the sun they probably need a melanoma rider that would cost that much.
Displeasure with this free marketing labor arrangement on the tour is not recent. Steve Williams, the caddie for a decade plus for Eldrick Woods, used to pull off his bib and ball it up in his fist as soon as Tiger’s putt crossed the lip of the final hole. For all the winning that Tiger did on Steve’s watch Williams became one of the most highly paid sports figures in his home country of New Zealand. But even he sensed he was not getting his fair share of the weekly entertainment take and was adamant about expressing that displeasure.
Most of the caddies on tour barely make enough to make ends meet, not many are going into early retirement to live off of their stock portfolios. It seems only fair that since they are such an ever present element of the presentation of golf on TV they too should get some benefit from being an accessory to marketing the product.
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February, 2015
moegolf 