Goodbye, Dear Tom

    Wow!  What a busy month.  I had the Club Championship (fail), and I had the training in Sedona (success).  I was also able to successfully move all of my parent-teacher conferences to this final week of October, the week of our Halloween party and our one community service field trip for this month to the Good Samaritan Center.  I have survived and thrived through most of it. 
    After playing so poorly (the bum knee did not help) in our championship, though, I wanted to get away from golf for a while, and so I did.  Now, I would love to get back out there again.  
     I have heard some sad news from my little golf world recently, however.  Our head pro at Hidden Valley has decided to take a new job in Florida.  I am happy for him, though.  He has more friends and family out there.  I am bummed for Hidden Valley.  Through his leadership and expertise, our little course has flourished and improved.  I know he had some input for the hiring of our new superintendent who has turned the greens from bumpy and unpredictable to smooth and readable.  I have been especially impressed with how well the girls on our golf team did with his coaching, and he was the major impetus for bringing the First Tee to Hidden Valley.  That culminated with the successful invitation of our very own Ray Torres to attend the First Tee Tournament at Pebble Beach recently.  Wow! 
     So, goodbye dear Tom.  I wish you well when you get to Florida, but I know they will appreciate you there as much as we have appreciated you here. 

New Title

Dear Golf,

I miss you.  Know that I will never forget you and that I will come back to you.

Sincerely,

Pat

P.S. (I have a new title that can be added to my long list of monikers, and that is a BIG reason why I have not been playing or writing about you lately.  After returning from a training in Sedona, Arizona, I can now say I am an official, certified, national Time to Teach Trainer.)

P.P.S. (For the record, I did give you an outside chance during my trip.  I brought my wedge and my putter and some golf balls along in our new Ford Escape.  I never had a chance to use them, but at least I got to see them every time I got something out of the back.)

More about this later...

The Round I Am Already Forgetting

    So, how bad can it get?  If I were to paint the worst scenario for how the Club Championship would pan out for me, what would that look like?  Before I write this, I would like to say that it’s not as bad as I thought it would be now that I am on the other side of it.  Writing about it helps.  Oh, it’s bad, but it’s not a tragedy.  Also, I know my tweaked knee played a part in this.
    It would include a great start, a drive right up the left side of the fairway on #1, a drive that went much farther than all of the competitors’ drives, a drive that used a bunch of adrenaline.  I know that each shot is separate from all of the others, but this drive would inspire hope and create an optimistic attitude that would later, of course, get dashed. 
    It would include some shanks and some high scores.  In all, I think it should have about nine shanks, six that come on two holes back to back (three each to be fair).  For the high scores, I would expect to see around six doubles, a few triples, and to round things out, a couple of quads.
    To be fair, it should include at least one topped shot, and it should also have a few shots that take out too much ground before the ball, the ones where the weight is not shifted properly and the contact is weak and “thuddy.”  When this happens, the ball should fly about halfway to the target.  
    How about a few out of bounds shots?  Sure.  The first will come on hole #5 right off the tee.  It will fly towards the cottonwoods near the fence, giving some hope that it might stay in, but it will never be found.  The second will come on hole #7, also directly off the tee, but this one will be in clear view.  There will be no doubt about it going over the fence, because everyone will watch it go over.  Nothing starts a hole off better than knowing that a double bogey or higher is the most likely outcome.  As is expected, the shots right after the out of bounds shots will be beautiful, or at least stay in play. 
    The third O.B. will rear its ugly head on an approach on hole #8 from the thick grass.  This third one will fly directly over some of the players getting ready to tee off on hole #13, of course, and it will hit the fence (but still go over it) to make that unmistakable “somebody just made a terrible swing” sound.  Thankfully, nobody will get hurt, though.
    Finally, the score should break 100, but not in the “good way.”  It will be over 100 by five strokes.  All of the previous rounds of the season will be below 100.  Most will be below 90, of course.  So, on the day when it counts the most, that will be the day to shoot the score higher than 100, a score that is rarely seen, if ever, anymore.

Who's the New Club Champion?

Written on 10-6-14

    I have about 20 minutes to write before “family chat night” begins.  It’s Sunday night, the Sunday of our Hidden Valley’s Club Championship.  I do not know who the club champ is, but I do know who it is not, and sadly, that is me.
    I didn’t even finish the thing, withdrawing from the tournament this morning with a quick phone call to Tom.  I have tweaked my right knee somehow, so playing another 18 holes could have wrecked it even more.  I have some theories about how it ended up this way, so I will defer to making a list.

Playing volleyball last weekend-I chased down errant passes as the setter, and sometimes I had to get really low to get under the ball.  I also did some jumping and blocking, so that put some strain down there.

Our new car-The new Escape has my knee in a different position for driving than the old Sienna did.  The angle is funny, so my knee feels bunchy when I have to switch from the gas to the brake.  I am sure I can adjust that, though.

My newer swing style-Dana taught me to point my toes out more than I ever have before in order to make a wider turn.  When I load my right leg now, my knee is in a different position, and that is also a strain. 

TRX workouts-With my feet suspended in straps, while lying on my back, with my bottom up in the air, my knees have some pressure on them, especially when I have to bend my knees to move my legs back and forth repeatedly. 

    All of these things contributed, in my opinion.  I hope it heals up as quickly as it came on.  It’s time for chat now.  I will pick this up where I left off after the chat is over.