Quick Two

It was a race against the afternoon thunderstorms today to try to get some kind of practice in before the lightning hit. After hitting about 15 balls at the range for a quick warm-up, I headed back to the the Legends course to redeem myself from yesterday for as many holes as I could get in. Granted, that ended up being only two.

On the first hole, the 374 yard par 4, I teed off with my 3-wood and split the fairway. Good start. I had 132 to the pin, which was located on the left middle part of the green. This distance is sort of in-between clubs. I didn't want to go too short for a long putt, and I didn't want to miss long because I would have gone into the rough behind the green for a tough chip back, so I choked up an inch on my pitching wedge and took an easy swing to put it about 8' below the hole. I missed the uphill, right breaking putt by an inch, but I'm always okay with a par on the first hole of Legends. It's a visually tricky hole off he tee with a skinny green that runs diagonal to the fairway. I see more people mess up that hole than most others on the course.

I teed off with my driver on the second hole, the 548 yard par 5. Prior to hitting the shot, I tried to visualize the ball going to the right side of the fairway, which would give me the ideal angle to the green if I wanted to try to go for it in 2. Also, to help eliminate the left side in the shot I opened up my clubface a little - if I hit it well then I'd get a slight fade, and if I pulled or had a strong draw swing as I've had lately then the open face might help reduce the right-to-left spin.

I got setup, cleared my head, and swung hard. The ball took off straight, reached its apex, and fell to the right with a slight fade to the right side of the fairway. It was pretty cool to visualize the shot prior to actually hitting it. Good feeling.

I got up to the ball and saw that I had 269 yards to the pin. According to the cart GPS the pin was on the right middle of the green and I had about 255 to clear the bunker in front. My lie was an uphill lie with the ball slightly above my feet. I decided to go for it with the 3-wood. I took my time with my alignment - see Notables from yesterday - and aimed for a tall tree on the right side or edge of the green, the goal again being to give myself room on the left so if the ball had draw spin it would likely work out or worst case be in a bunker (as opposed to in the trees). If I pushed it I'd have a chip up to the green for a possible birdie.

Again, got my alignment, setup, cleared my head, and swung hard. The ball took off straight at the target and started to draw left a little just left of the pin. I wasn't sure I caught enough of it, but the ball ended up landing in the middle of the green and rolled right up to about 20' from the pin. The putt for eagle ended up looking like a straight downhill putt.

As I setup to the putt I reminded myself that the greens are slower than I'm used to with the recent aerification and that I should putt for a little more distance than I might normally do. I picked a spot on the green, pictured it in my head, and started the putt. As the ball rolled down I thought for sure I missed because it looked like it wanted to go left. But, for the first time in over a year my eagle putt dropped in the center of the hole! That's only my 4th eagle ever. I was pretty excited about it. Unfortunately lightning and thunder started getting too close for comfort, so I had to take my 2-under score through 2 holes back to the clubhouse and head home when the thunderstorm hit.

I have an 8:15 tee time tomorrow morning on the same course. Even though I only played two holes, I did a good job executing the items I mentioned in yesterday's Notables section. I'll be focusing on the same things during tomorrow's round.

As a side note, I did get a workout in during lunch today. With the amount of golf I play I try to get at least 2-3 workouts in a week to help with injury prevention and core development. The only time I get sore from golf these days is when my mechanics are hosed - usually what's called an early extension where my right side gets too active in the downswing and I lose my spin angle. I usually early extend when I'm not well-balanced,  usually with too much weight toward my toes at address and in the backswing.