Joe's Place

Time and distance may separate families when it comes to reunions and gatherings, but one thing that seems to be able to unite the male family members is a friendly game of golf.

And so it was on Monday afternoon that a few of my uncles and cousins got together at Meadowbrook Country Club in Ballwin to see one another and find out just how much damage we can afflict to an otherwise lovely course. Things were a bit wet due to recent rains, but we managed to get in a round under overcast and cool-ish conditions.

Our gracious host and resident family golf pro, Mike Carron, laid out a lovely time for us to renew relationships and rivalries mixed in with the distraction of advancing a little white ball around in as few a strokes as possible. A good time was enjoyed by all, and it was great to see my elders actually putting the “hurt” on the ball a number of times.

Yes, we may look like a motley crew, but there’s a lot of love in this group. I can’t wait to get together again sometime real soon.

Theres photos from the day in a gallery on my Photos page so you can see them. Click the thumbnail, click the “Photo” page link at the top or here’s a link that takes you right to it.

Here’s a hearty salute to Phil Mickelson on winning the 2010 Masters tournament and getting his third green jacket. (Nice news story here.) I can’t think of anyone more deserving than him particularly after a very tough personal time last year. Anyone that saw Phil and his wife Amy embracing shortly after finishing his round and later after signing his scorecard could see the culmination of a whole lot of emotion.

Very touching moments indeed, thank you CBS.

By the way, have you ever seen anyone so fearless on the back nine in a final round at Augusta? Who hits a six iron 205 yards off pine needles and in between trees to a water-guarded pin on #13 and sticks it to three feet? (I would have missed the eagle putt too, because I’d still be shaking from the approach shot.) An incredible final round to be sure.

I’ve been a self-taught golfer for my whole golfing life. Mostly because of limited financial resources while raising a family but also due to having some success in golf relative to the amount of effort expended. I always attributed this to being one of those people just born with the natural ability or skill. Now role the tape forward.

Over the past eighteen months or so, that so-called ability has just not materialized into a whole lot more, in spite of the fact I play more now than in prior years. In fact I have felt my game going the other way, worse rather than better. I’ve lost approximately a club to a club and a half in distance and just am not striking the ball as solidly as I used to. So with the beginning of a new golf season, I decided it was time to change my ways and seek professional golf help. Yes, I said it – professional help!

So yesterday evening I went for my very first, paid golf swing evaluation. I went to a place called Golftec to see if some of the same tools that the pros use would help with my game.

They are running a promotion on their 90 minute swing analysis and describe it as a fact-based diagnosis, motion measurement and a proprietary tour player database. Sure enough, they attached a bunch of sensors to me and recorded video of my swings with a 5-iron. Seeing yourself in a video is quite revealing. You don’t look like what you think you do. Here I am.

See what I mean?

The high-tech lesson actually lasted the whole 90 minutes and was very informative and comprehensive. A number of suspect areas in my swing were identified complete with side-by-side comparison with tour pros and an audio critique. Pretty cool. A “lesson plan” was created at the end to help me with practice to correct those items. The program also includes a web site that you can visit to re-view the video and commentary, and lesson as well other useful tools.

All in all, it was a very valuable experience. Although the value will need to demonstrate itself in the form of results. And to make sure I give myself a reasonable chance of improving, I went to the driving range to work on a couple of things right away. I can’t tell you that there were immediate positive results, but I’ll stick with the advice and give it a chance.

In his first public interview after a practice round at The Masters yesterday Tiger Woods appeared calm, cool and well-coached in front of the cameras. As for his golf game, he looked ready to contend.

And in my golf league debut last night I was anything but calm, cool and well-coached or ready to contend. Actually I stunk the place up pretty good. That must be why Tiger gets the big bucks.

The sports world eagerly anticipates two major events this week. One of them is the opening night of the start of the Christian Fellowship Golf League on Monday which involves yours truly, but unfortunately the other news event begins later in the week in Augusta, Georgia and involves a slightly better known golfer named Tiger.

Yes, Tiger Woods will again be the news centerpiece after a long and somewhat sordid absence from the game. This will be a huge sports news story with world coverage, but unfortunately that likely means that the cameras will be absent from the other event which for the first time will be held weekly at The Falls Golf Club in O’Fallon, Missouri.

With all that Tiger has on his plate, it just astounds me that he could even contemplate his return to golf and in the process steal away the major media coverage from our opening night of our league. But while you may not hear much about sixteen men hacking and slashing their way through those nine holes on morning news shows Tuesday morning, if anything even remotely newsworthy occurs, you can read about it here.

We’re in for some mighty good weather this week. We might even hit 80 by Friday. I think old man winter has finally moved on to the southern hemisphere or somewhere else. See ya!

I imagine that there will be a few folks sad to see him go but that’s why it’s called a season. I too will miss it and do you know what I’ll miss most about winter? Two things. Cold water always coming out of the faucet to drink and the beautiful clear blue skies without any haze. (Yeah I know I need my head examined.)

But the good news is that it’s time to pull out the sandbags and snow survival gear out of the trunk and put the golf clubs in! Yes friends I believe golf season has now arrived!