Hooter's Tour - Albany, GA - Second Round

Score: 72

Since I didn't walk off the last hole yesterday until 8:10pm, I wasn't able to get anything posted about the round. In two days, it took almost exactly 12 hours to play 36 holes of golf. Easily the longest two rounds of golf I've ever played in my entire life. I honestly didn't think there was any way we were going to finish yesterday's round, but I'm glad we did.

Here's the recap:

It was a lot more windy the second round than it was the first, so overall the course played a little tougher. For me, it was still do or die because the cut was going to be under par and I needed birdies.....lots of them. On the front nine, I let a few good opportunities slip away but was still able to turn in -2 under par.

On #1 (my tenth hole), I had about a 12 footer for eagle that just missed on the high side. I tapped in for birdie and was -3 under for the day (even for the tournament). At this point, I was comfortable with where I was at but I knew I needed to make as many birdies as possible coming in. In the back of my mind, I was thinking the cut would be -4 under so that meant I had 8 holes left to find at least four birdies.

On #2, I hit a very poor wedge shot into the green and squandered a good birdie opportunity. Then, the next hole was where I really hurt my chances by three putting for bogey. The first putt was a pretty long, but I still should of made the 3 footer coming back for par. From then on in, I just wasn't able to get anything going. I was still hitting good shots, but the putts weren't falling. Finally, on the second to last hole, I lost focus on the tee and hit the one bad shot of the day that turned into a lost ball and lead to a double bogey (6). By the time we got to our final hole, it was nearly dark and I just missed from about 6ft for birdie. Not that it would of mattered, but it would of made me feel better had it gone in.

So, what was actually a very solid round of golf, wasn't really reflected by the score. This week was probably the best tee game I've had in a year. My driver, 3-wood and 2-iron were all working for me which was a good feeling. I was in position to attack almost every hole which allowed me to be aggressive in a good way. Unfortunately, it was my wedge game and putting that really let me down. Out of 17 shots hit with a wedge over two rounds (PW, SW or LW) only 15 of them were inside of 15ft. That's not very good. And for two rounds, I had 34 & 35 putts respectively with two 3-putts.

It seems like there's always one part of my game that fails to be up to speed with the rest of my game on any given week, so it'll be nice when the time finally comes where I can put together a complete round. The good news is these stats make it very clear as to what I need to work on going forward. I've got until next Friday to get that part of my game back in shape since that is the day I'll be playing in the pre-qualifier for the Zurich Classic here in New Orleans.

Hooter's Tour - Albany, GA - First Round

Score: 75

Well, my game plan wasn't to make double-bogey on the first hole, but that's exactly what happened. I guess I wanted to make it as hard as possible on myself to shoot a decent score. The good news is, I actually played a really solid round of golf from that point on. Unfortunately, having 35 putts didn't allow me to take advantage of all the good shots I hit, and consequently, I felt like I was in a holding pattern all day. Just couldn't get any momentum going. It's disappointing to say the least coming off three tournaments last month where I putted so well. The different grass on these greens combined with all the undulation made it very difficult for me to read putts correctly and get the speed down. Not the combination you want when trying to make birdies. I missed 3 putts inside 8ft on three of my last four holes of the day that could of helped me salvage this round.

Now, it looks like I'm going to need to dig deep for tomorrow cause the cut will certainly be under par....probably -3. But, judging by today's 6 hour long round and my 2:27pm tee time tomorrow, we're probably not going to find out for sure until Saturday....which is when I'm going to have to finish up my second round. That's it for now. Hopefully I can get the putter going tomorrow and crawl my way back into this thing. Stay tuned.....

Hooter's Tour - Albany, GA - Preview

This week I'm playing in a Hooter's Tour event in Albany, GA. It's the first Hooter's Tour event of the year for me so I'm excited to get out there. The competition is a little higher and the purse is a little bigger so I'm looking forward to stepping up my game.

I was able to get in two practice rounds so far, both yesterday and today. My take on it after playing it twice is that it's very fair. It seems like there is room on every tee shot and approach shot to "miss". Not that I'm trying to miss shots, but it provides a certain level of comfort knowing that I don't have to hit a perfect shot every time. There is trouble in spots throughout the course, but they're more of a risk-reward type situations. Meaning, you can avoid the trouble relatively easily by not challenging every hole so I guess I'm going to have to pick and choose my spots on where I want to be aggressive.

In terms of the greens, I think they're going to be the deciding factor this week. The greens are big, undulating, and tricky. I've seen downhill putts that looked lightning fast but were actually slow and uphill putts that I thought were slow and ran them well past the hole. It's hard to find the grain which makes judging the speed kind of difficult. But, I'm hoping that after two days of practicing and playing out here has helped me hone in my speed control and I'll be able to make some putts.

I feel like I've got a good game plan for this week. My swing feels pretty good so I'm hoping that will help set me up for a lot of birdie opportunities. We'll see what happens. My tee time tomorrow is 9:27 off #1.

Well I'll be playing in Georgia soon, but...

it won't be at Augusta National. Next week I'll be playing in my first tournament for April in Albany, GA. It's a Hooter's Tour event being held at Stonebridge Country Club just outside of town. Our plans are to drive over Monday and get ready for a couple practice rounds Tuesday and Wednesday.

Lately, I've been at home going through my daily routine of working out, playing and practicing. I've worked with Brian a few times over the last couple of weeks trying to continue to push my game to the next level. Each session helps to unveil things that need to be adjusted and in doing so I feel like my game is on track to take that next step. I've played some very solid rounds since I've been home while executing shots that I haven't been able to in the past. I'm confident in what I've been working on so now it's just a matter of doing it when it counts.

I still feel good with my new putter which gets me even more excited about playing in this upcoming event. I've got three more days to really groove everything and iron out any last kinks before hitting the road. Once we make it to Georgia, I'll have a preview of the course before the tournament begins.