The Grand Champion

I have proven once and for all that I am the superior golfer with a solid all around performance in the final round. Strub is inconsolable.

It's over

I won, but I lost.

Damn.

Driver status

Driver doesn't appear to be on the table at this point. I've had some success hitting 3- and 4-iron off the tee.

Plan is to visit the driving range tonight (once I get my car back from the shop). I'll try hitting driver about a hundred times, see if I can get this thing straightened out.

I don't think I have a shot to win tomorrow if I can't hit the Sumo Sq2. But that's not to say I'm going to go in and hit it if it's not going to show up for me. I'd rather play even and lose the season by 8 than make an ass of myself and lose tomorrow by 20 feebly attempting to hit driver every hole.

Alex has been playing better than me lately, but he's still the same Alex. Meltdown definitely not off the table. And if his lead shrinks to about 3 by the turn, look out.

Hit the driver?

Strub refused to hit his driver again last weekend with only one exception. He almost made it to the ladies tees. I have a slight length advantage over him, and he makes the problem 100x worse by hitting 5 iron off the tee. His thinking was that he would put it in the fairway every time, and I would lose enough drives to make it worthwhile. Unfortunately, neither of those things is true. In fact, he is still losing more drives than me. He said the only way he could win this week was to be able to pull the driver out of the bag with confidence. Whether he put in the time at the range this week is yet to be seen.

This is the week

Strub hasn't beat me in golf in 3 weeks. He has to win by 8 to take home the Libous title. Not a chance.

Last week

Strub claimed to be too sick to wake up early and play golf, so we did a light day at Chenango Commons. I beat the everloving piss out of him, but it was pretty easy to see that coming after he put his first three shots into a pond literally 6 feet in front of where he was teeing off. All told, he barely broke 100 on a course which is par 60.

This week is his chance to break 100 on a real course- the one we were supposed to play last week. I still don't give him very good odds, but we'll see I guess. Stranger things have happened.

Now it is a sprint

I beat Strub by a solid 7 strokes at Traditions, and now he is in a deep hole with only one course left. He'll try to put on a brave front and say that he is confident he can make up 7 strokes in one day, but the statistics are clear that rarely does anybody win by 8 or more in a single day. He really needs a little help here.

The thing working most against him is the fact that when one of us plays bad, the other one invariably plays almost (but no quite) as bad. At Hiawatha last week, I had one of the worst outings of the year, and he managed to have an awful round of his own. If I have another bad day at Conklin, expect him to have a bad day of his own. His best chance is if I have an average day, and he comes up with the round of his life.

The final round at Conklin is at least 2 weeks away, and we have a tune-up at Genegantslet tentatively scheduled for this week. Strub is still chasing 100, despite the fact that he has shown marked improvement throughout the summer in everything except his driving game. In fact, a common refrain last week at our shockingly bad outing was that for two guys that played so much this summer, we still scored (and played) awful. Genny is forgiving, and gives some opportunities to make up strokes if you start slow.

At the end of the day, this tune-up is about being ready for Conklin, whenever we get there. Strub has experimented with taking his long clubs off the table (presumably because I guaranteed I would beat him if I took that route), with hitting driver at every opportunity, with hitting other woods off the tee, and all manner of other bold strategies. Now he has a very limited amount of time to figure out what actually works and stick with it. No matter how you slice it, the constant loser's refrain of "it's a marathon, not a sprint" is no longer true- it's a close to a sprint to the finish as you could imagine.

Nah

Nah

Traditions

If yesterday's tournament was any indication, me and Strub are gonna have a rough day next Saturday when we go back to traditions. We both played absolutely awful, but alcohol may have been a factor. I am going to go out on a limb and say that in addition to being the youngest, we were also the drinkinest team out there. The team behind us was shocked that we finished even par. So was I.

Traditions preview

Unsure if this posted successfully the first time, I will repost

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Conklin Players Club will be the final event of the invitational, but one course I've looked forward to all summer is Traditions at the Glen.

When I started playing a few summers ago, Traditions was where I began (in fact, I wasn't cognizant of Ely). It's one of the classiest courses in the area, built around a resort and spa that's considered one of the premier places to stay for travelers.

Whereas most courses we've played this year will be one and done, Traditions will be the exception. Today is the BU Alumni Golf Classic, a tournament I played in last year with Jay Boulia, Nick Nunziato and Mike Boykin. For varied reasons, Boykin and Jay dropped out this year, so we'll field a foursome of me, Nunz, Alex and Mike Waffle.

This tournament was the highlight of my 2009, and I expect it will be the highlight of my 2010. Plenty of food and drinks, with a BBQ dinner to cap the night: this tournament is built for 24-year-old alpha males like us. Dan Polhamus does a great job organizing this tournament, and I technically was on the organizing committee this year (although my responsibilities have been minimal).

At the least, today gives me and Alex an opportunity to see the course and get a sense of how to take on one of the tier's nicest 18, which we will play again next Saturday afternoon. Having played here many times, I have to feel at least a little confident.

As for our chances today, they're about zero. I don't remember what number we posted last year; I only remember that we lost by 18 strokes. The winning team includes Jeff "Frosh" Wolniewicz, one of the best golfers in school history. His team must be the favorite going in again today. We'll see.

A Traditions preview

Conklin Players Club will be the final event of the invitational, but one course I've looked forward to all summer is Traditions at the Glen.

When I started playing a few summers ago, Traditions was where I began (in fact, I wasn't cognizant of Ely). It's one of the classiest courses in the area, built around a resort and spa that's considered one of the premier places to stay for travelers.

Whereas most courses we've played this year will be one and done, Traditions will be the exception. Today is the BU Alumni Golf Classic, a tournament I played in last year with Jay Boulia, Nick Nunziato and Mike Boykin. For varied reasons, Boykin and Jay dropped out this year, so we'll field a foursome of me, Nunz, Alex and Mike Waffle.

This tournament was the highlight of my 2009, and I expect it will be the highlight of my 2010. Plenty of food and drinks, with a BBQ dinner to cap the night: this tournament is built for 24-year-old alpha males like us. Dan Polhamus does a great job organizing this tournament, and I technically was on the organizing committee this year (although my responsibilities have been minimal).

At the least, today gives me and Alex an opportunity to see the course and get a sense of how to take on one of the tier's nicest 18, which we will play again next Saturday afternoon. Having played here many times, I have to feel at least a little confident.

As for our chances today, they're about zero. I don't remember what number we posted last year; I only remember that we lost by 18 strokes. The winning team includes Jeff "Frosh" Wolniewicz, one of the best golfers in school history. His team must be the favorite going in again today. We'll see.

Stonehedges

I played like garbage yesterday, plain and simple. I'm done making excuses about preparation and all that jazz: For the first six holes of the round, and on No. 9, I just could not strike the ball. Period.

I liked playing a course that required a bit of thinking. The course is tougher than most, not necessarily because of the terrain or hazards (no sand at all), but because the configuration requires creativity and ingenuity when planning shots.

I just couldn't execute what I wanted to do, plain and simple.

Honestly, I probably should've lost by even more than I did. As has become tradition, I played much better on the back nine, and Alex handed me a four-shot gift after hitting into a hazard, taking a drop in a tough spot, and then immediately hitting back into the hazard.

I also made some good putts, which I think bodes nicely for the stretch run here. Of course, neither of us have played Conklin -- which I hear is difficult -- but at Traditions, I am very familiar with the greens, which, for the most part, are not the most difficult we've seen.

What it comes down to is this: I need to take advantage of my knowledge of Traditions -- having played there dozens of times -- and regain a lead heading into the final course. When Alex can take his driver out of his hand and hit long iron off the tee, he's able to play pretty consistent golf. I need to have him taking chances with the driver for me to have a chance, and if he goes into Conklin with a lead, despite his nature as a choke artist, I'll be worried.

As he noted, technically, we are now tied for the entire season. However, when we started the competition, I proposed the idea of dropping our lowest scores. When that is taken into account, he is winning by five shots.

It'll be unfortunate if one of us wins with all scores accounted for, and the other wins with the lowest score dropped. At this point, it's a definite possibility.

Re: Throwing away a summer of golf

Strub managed to blow an entire summer's worth of lead in one day. We are now tied on the season, with 2 left to play.

A nice win

Full update later, but I gained another two strokes on the season with a two-shot win (108 to 110) at Pheasant Hill this morning.

The deficit is going to be difficult to close at this point. I didn't play my best today, but I did a really great job recovering from trouble.

I like my chances.

Libous

If Libous will pose for this picture at the Deposit Lumberjack Festival Parade ...



... he's gotta find 30 seconds for us.

Saturday plan

10 a.m., Pheasant Hill in Owego.

I am feeling supremely confident.

Agreed on all counts

That course was miserable. We kept trying to give it a chance, and it just kept getting worse. I mean seriously, I thought the paint on the garbage cans at Dimmock Hill was bad until I saw this:



Behind the chicken wire with 'H G C' scratched into it is the cart path heading to the No. 8 tee, but it might as well be a sample of many of the fairways.

Today wasn't an accurate representation of our golf skills, that's for sure. Add the dry conditions to an already dreadful course and this is one round I won't fondly remember.

Quickly, though, the employees of this golf course were really great, one of the nicest staffs we've seen. The woman tending bar was extremely friendly and kind, and when we stopped for hot dogs at the turn, a gentleman was waiting with a gas can to check to make sure we'd make it all the way around the course again. Classy employees.

And as for how we played, well, a tie at this point is, in my eyes, a victory. I was up 3 heading to No. 18, and threw the individual win away with a triple-bogey 6, but I drove the ball the best I have in months, and had the first eagle putt of my life after an exceptional (and ballsy) hybrid over a water hazard.

My lead stays at 7, which I am comfortable with. I think I can outplay Alex at Traditions, because I've played there at least a dozen times. His window to make up the difference here is quickly closing.

I'm this much closer to proving, definitively, that I am the better golfer.

Hancock

Whereas some of the courses we played were cow pastures, Hancock was instead an abandoned logging project. Fairways were basically just dead grass, and you essentially were hitting off berber. Easily the crappiest course we played, but home to maybe the best moment of the year. Some guy in a stained polo shirt (later determined to be brother of the club pro) walks behind the bar, mumbles something about 5 o'clock somewhere, takes out a styrofoam cup, fills it with ice, and then fills that with just vodka, and walks out. It was almost, but not quite, noon.

Two words

Score board.

HA

Chris Strub is the only guy I know that complains when he doesn't get 11 hours of sleep. Guess what buddy: we all know you work late, but that doesn't mean we are all gonna feel sorry for you because you have to have short nights like a regular person. You can get out of work at midnight and wind down for 2 hours and be in bed by 2. That gives you 6 hours before you have to get up at 8, and if you're gonna complain about only getting 6 hours of sleep, screw you. Maybe the real problem here is that you choose not to get up until 3 pm on Fridays and you have only been up for 9 hours when you try to go to bed. You make the choice about being awake before work or after work, and you have chosen after. Everyone take note of what time he wakes up and sees this post as evidence.

Also, don't try and lay down that bs about not being prepared last weekend. I was in much worse shape than you and I still whooped you up and down the fairways. Get better at golf if you want to win.