October Updates

Hello everyone. I know I've probably lost the few readers I had since I haven't posted anything in such a long time. As you have already probably assumed, I have not been playing much competitive golf at all lately. And trying to figure out what I'm going to do with my life as pretty much taken up all my time over the last couple of months.

I still manage to practice from time to time, but not nearly as much as I used to. I've started to turn my attention to working on the projects that seem to be the most likely going forward. A few ideas that came up never panned out, others have been put on the side for the time being, and a couple more have seemed to separate themselves from the pack. In particular, working with my dad and uncle in the trucking business seems like a very realistic option in the near future. My uncle has started to expand his business into Louisiana so there's a chance that I could play a part in helping grow the business in this area.

The other idea that is starting to get some steam is still in the dark for right now. It's a project that I got involved in with my friend Adam, and I can tell you that it involves "golf event management technology." So far, all our early meetings have been going extremely well. As things keep moving, I will disclose more information. Our projections as of right now are to have the software available by the end of the month, at which time, I will release all the latest information on this blog. However, this new product will also include a blog which will most likely replace this one.

But for now, I will try to keep posting shorter updates as to not make everyone read a novel once a month. Hope everyone is well. I'm happy to say that Erika is doing great so far with the baby and it looks like he/she might be arriving a little earlier than expected. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Scotland Recap.....and a few updates!

Well, we made it back across the pond safe and sound. That was by far the best trip I've ever been on in my entire life and absolutely a dream come true. Everything about it was 10 times better than I thought it would be. Scotland, to me, was a perfect example as to why golf is the greatest sport in the world. It was like a completely different game over there and in no other sport does the game change that drastically from one venue to the next. In fact, it was so different, it was almost like playing a whole new game.....golf 2.0.

We started our trip in Turnberry where we stayed at the hotel there for the first three nights. For our first round we played Turnberry (the Ailsa course) which is the one they use for the British Open. Talk about being thrown into the fire. This course had it all, from blind shots, to elevation changes, all the gorse and thick rough, plus a little rain and wind coming off the sea. It was incredible. The next day we played Royal Troon, which for me, felt like the hardest course of them all. Maybe it's because I wasn't hitting my driver all that straight which made it nearly impossible to score well. I think I shot 80, but unlike shooting 80 over here in the states, my 80 at Troon didn't really feel so bad. On Tuesday morning, we packed up our stuff and drove to Prestwick. For me, this was the most unique and intriguing golf course of them all. Everyone over in Scotland says you're either going to hate it or love it and I definitely fell in the "loved it" category. As one of the oldest courses in the world, it gives you a true idea of how golf was originally played. It gave me such a greater respect for the game, I could have played that course a million times and never gotten tired of it.

After finishing Prestwick, we drove 3 hours across Scotland to St. Andrews where we stayed for the remainder of our trip. On Wednesday, we played Carnoustie. We were fortunate to get our round in the week before they began playing the Women's British Open there so the course was in excellent condition. Holes 16, 17 & 18 might be the toughest three finishing holes on any golf course. It was another round for me where I shot 80 and felt like I played pretty well. It's just that there was such a greater penalty for missing a shot that it didn't take much to make bogey......or worse. Our next round, we opted to go a little off the traditional map of links golf, and played Rosemount (The Blairgowrie Course). It was set about an 1hr and a half inland and when we walked up to the first tee it no longer looked like we were in Scotland. Every hole was lined with trees and there was actually one hole that had a lake on it.....definitely something you'd never see along the coast. It was still a great course and I think everyone enjoyed switching things up for a day.

And finally, on our last day of golf, we played two incredible courses....St. Andrew's in the morning and Kingsbarns in the afternoon. Without a doubt, St. Andrew's was my favorite course out of the whole trip. And maybe that had a lot to do with the fact that St. Andrew's had all the history, but it was still just an amazing place. It was hard a lot of the time to focus on playing golf because the whole time I kept saying to myself, "am I really playing St. Andrew's right now?" I had to keep pinching myself just so I could focus on hitting a good shot. I'll never forget the birdie I made on the 18th hole to shoot 72, my best round of the trip. For our second round of the day, we drove about 5 miles north and played Kingsbarns. It was not apart of our original itinerary, but once we all saw the course, we knew we had to play it before we left. So, at 4:00pm, we teed off and didn't walk off the 18th green until 9:15pm. The locals call it the Pebble Beach of Scotland and let me tell you......it's probably better. I've never been to Pebble Beach, but I can't imagine it being better than this. It was easily the most scenic and had the most beauty out of all the courses we played and that alone made it as enjoyable as anything I've ever played in my life. I think I broke my camera I was taking so many pictures.

So, that was our trip. It was a once in a lifetime experience and I'll never forget it. If anything, it makes me want to work even harder for the chance to go back again someday. Now that I've been back for a week, things have started to return to normal and I've pretty much come back down to earth. I've been trying to practice like usual and started to plan out my schedule the rest of this year. I do have some exciting news to pass along to those that haven't already heard......Erika and I are expecting our first child on Feb. 5th of next year. We've passed the first danger zone (the first trimester) so hopefully things will continue to go smoothly from here on out. Although I know that's rarely the case. Erika's feeling much better now that a lot of the sickness has passed, so we just keep praying for a healthy pregnancy.

Having a baby obviously changes things going forward. I don't really know how much more golf I will be playing since it becomes imperative now that we can support ourselves and a baby financially. I have signed up for one more Hooter's Tour event next week, but after that, I'm really not sure what will follow. There have been some new project developments on the side that I could be involved in, so we'll see if anything happens there. It looks like the month of August will be a good determining factor as to which direction my career heads going forward. All we can do is pray about it and see where the good Lord takes us. Hope everyone is doing and I'll have some updates next week from my tournament.

The Night Before Scotland....

Well, tomorrow I'll be heading to Scotland for 7 days of nothing but golf, golf and more golf. Our flight leaves New Orleans at 1:15pm and stops in Philadelphia before leaving for Glasgow at 9:00pm. We're scheduled to arrive at roughly 7:00am on Sunday morning and then head straight to Turnberry to play our first round. I can't explain how excited I am for this opportunity as this has always been a dream of mine since I was a little kid. The forecast over there is for rainy/cool conditions which I guess is to be expected this time of year. If anything, it will just add to the whole experience.

I'm going to try and take as many pictures as I can and share them through this blog when I get back. Wish me luck.....

Summer Update

Hello everyone. It's been a while since my last post and that's mainly because I haven't been playing in any tournaments. I was supposed to be leaving Monday for my next event, but I got a call Wednesday for the Tour Director letting me know they had postponed the tournament until October. I was pretty disappointed in the news because I had scheduled my plans around that event. There were other tournaments these last few weeks that I opted not to play in because I wanted to work on some things and prepare for what was supposed to be this tournament in Monroe, LA. I've looked at trying to find something else to play in, but there aren't any other options for that week.

And then the following week, I'm not able to play in anything because I'm going to Scotland on Saturday, July 16th. My father-in-law is taking me and my two brother-in-laws over for a week to play some of the best courses Scotland has to offer. It's a once in a lifetime trip, and I'm so thankful to have this opportunity. I think every golfers dream is to play one day at the place where it all began (St. Andrews) which is where we'll be playing our last round before flying back. I can't express how excited I am to go over there, and I'll be sure to take lots of pictures to post when I get back.

So, with all this going on, it looks like it'll be August before I play in another tournament. I know the time off will probably be a good thing, and I can tell already that there are areas of my game that seem to be improving. My putting, for one, has probably improved the most. I've adjusted my routine and my grip and it's already shown better results over the rounds I've played lately. Also, I got my new clubs in that I ordered and have spent a lot of time getting used to the changes there. I'm pleased so far with the way they've preformed and I look forward to working more and more with them going forward.

This weekend, I'll be in Grand Isle with my family celebrating the holiday. I hope everyone is doing well and have a Happy 4th of July.

Adam's Tour - Beaumont Open - First & Second Round

First Round Score: 78

The first round was a whole lot of the same thing I've been experiencing lately. I hit the ball pretty well throughout the round. My driver was working well for me off the tee, my irons weren't really helping or hurting, but my short game was horrific. Because I was hitting the ball well off the tee, I set myself up for a lot of wedges into the greens. Unfortunately, it was one of the worst displays of a wedge game you've ever seen. I repeatedly missed the green from 60, 70, 80 yards out. It's not that I wasn't hitting them solid, it was just my distance control. I felt like I was back in high-school when I couldn't hit the green with a wedge to save my life. It was extremely frustrating to say the least and consequently the reason why I scored so poorly. Instead of taking advantage of the short yardage situations by giving myself good chances for birdies, I was actually making bogies.......from 70 yards out!!! Then on top of that, my chipping and pitching as well as my putting were just as bad. You put all that together and a 78 is about what I deserved.

Second Round Score: 73

Today was so aggravating, I'm surprised I haven't thrown my putter in the lake by now. I hit the ball better again, my wedge game was more under control than the day before, but I continued to miss putt after putt after putt. If it wasn't a tap in, it wasn't going in. I was even par with two holes to play and I finished with a 3-putt bogey on #17 and a missed par putt from 4ft on #18. I bet everybody that reads this blog (all 5 of you) probably thinks by now that I enjoy putting bad. I mean, it's been a year and a half now and nothings changed. Trust me when I tell you, I practice my putting all the time and actually putt decently when I'm at home. But once I tee it up in a tournament, the ball just doesn't go in the hole. Period.

If there is anything positive that I can take away from this event, it's that I drove the ball well for both rounds. I put myself in scoring position many times, but my short game really let me down. I'm not surprised that my putting was as bad as it was, I'm just fed up with the fact that all the practice that I'm doing isn't paying off. It's all lead to a point in my career where it's time to start thinking about a plan B. Sometimes, things just aren't meant to be.

I've ordered a new set of clubs to help correct the problems I'm having with my old ones. I think I made a post about how far off my clubs are now for my swing so hopefully these new ones will give me a better chance at hitting the ball with the center of the club face. I plan on working with them for the rest of the month, as well as trying any and every last thing I can think of to improve my putting, before playing in what could be my last tournament for......I don't know how long. There's another Adam's Tour event in Monroe, LA at the beginning of July that I will prepare for and if I'm still writing posts like this one after that tournaments over, it might be the last post overall. Erika and I will be heading back to New Orleans tomorrow, so I'll have some updates throughout the rest of the month and let yall know how things are going. Thanks to everyone who's kept up with me through this site for all this time now. I know I sound like a broken record, but I really do hope this is the last blog with bad news and nothing but positive news from here on out.

Adam's Tour - Beaumont Open - Preview

This week I'm back in Texas again for another Adam's Tour event. This time I'm in Beaumont playing the Beaumont Country Club. I played in this tournament last year, so I'm pretty familiar with the course. We drove back over from Baton Rouge on Monday and I was able to get in 9 holes of a practice round. There was a really bad storm which came through about mid-afternoon that basically wiped out the rest of the day. Today, I was back out there finishing up my practice round by playing the back nine.

After two days and a year under my belt, I feel like I've got a good idea about how to play this golf course. I've changed my game plan from last year a little bit by hitting driver on a few holes where I hit 3-wood before and deciding to lay up on one of the par-5's I would of attacked in the past. This is one of those old style golf courses where the holes run parallel to each other, so there are many instances where it's better to take driver and get it as close to the green as possible. I'd say every hole has it's trouble spots, but it's usually just on one side of the hole. If I can make my mistakes on the right sides where there's room to miss, then I should be able to set myself up for a lot of wedges.

The rough is up in spots (like last week) which will make it tougher to control distances on approach shots and spin the ball around the greens. Let's just say I'm going to try and avoid those areas as much as possible. Overall, I feel better than I did at this time last week the night before the first round, so I'm hoping with a little fortune I'll be able to put together a solid performance. Then again, putting is always a major factor in how I score, so hopefully we'll see some improvement this week.

My tee time tomorrow is 9:10 off #10.

Adam's Tour - Bay Oaks Championship - Rounds 1 & 2

Scores: 82-78

The first round began like a nightmare. I had gone through a good warm-up session before the round started, and proceeded to hit my first tee shot off #1 in the woods. It was basically like hitting it out-of-bounds because we never found that ball and eventually lead to a triple-bogey (7). I don't care who you are, you can not start rounds with triple bogey's and play well. It seems like some of these last few rounds I've played, I've started out just shooting myself in both feet on the first hole. It makes it nearly impossible to get anything going after that happens. I followed that up with a double-bogey on the second hole and a bogey on the third, so I was +6 over par through 3 holes.

There were some solid shots periodically throughout the rest of the day, but I never felt like I had control of the round. On days like that, it seems like nothing ever goes your way. Even when I felt like I hit a good shot, it didn't end up that way. I finished with a double-bogey on #18, after hitting a good second into the green, which pretty much summed up how the day went.

During round two, I had one goal in mind. I wanted to execute every shot with as little thought as possible. Meaning, after I had calculated my yardage and planned my shot, I was going to just walk up to the ball and hit it. And that was exactly what I did on every shot from tee to green...even my putts. On the front nine, I actually played pretty well. I had one 3-putt that lead to a bogey and one poor iron shot that lead to a triple-bogey. I know that's still unacceptable, but overall I felt better than I did during round one.

The second nine holes were much of the same. I executed a lot of shots like I wanted, gave myself multiple good looks at birdie, but nothing seemed to be falling. I did make a couple good putts to save par, but I missed three putts inside of 3ft. So, I don't really know what to think about my new strategy on the greens. I can't afford to miss any putts that close, let alone three in one round. Again, on my final hole of the day, it was another bad break that lead to a double-bogey. Just wasn't meant to be.

Erika and I came back to Baton Rouge last night to save some money on hotels and give me a place to practice over the weekend. I've got another Adam's Tour event next week in Beaumont, TX so we'll probably head over that way on Monday to get ready. Hopefully, I'll have a little better luck on this next one.