Post # 7: A Post-Mortem and a … “Pre-Mortem”??
It’s been a minute since I’ve been able to put any time into this project — because I’ve been putting time into so many others. Between family “projects” such as supporting the budding stage actress and comidean and disc golf projects like FINALLY getting the sides put back on the Zuca, I haven’t had two seconds to rub together. However, the season has started in earnest, with my last warm-up ice bowl in the rear view mirror; so it’s time to buckle down and get sh*t done.
Like getting another post written and published!
So I decided to kill two birds with one disc and combine the Boulder Woods Ice Bowl post-mortem with the tournament prep for this weekend’s C-Tier — The Stafford Shenanigans at Stafford Woods in Voorhees Township, New Jersey.
Icing the Ice Bowl
The last ice bowl of the season was at Boulder Woods DGC in the Gifford Pinchot State Park in Lewisberry, Pa. This is a course that I know very well, so the tournament prep consisted of simply making sure that I had all of the correct discs, towels, clothes, food, etc. in the car before I headed out. Boulder Woods should be a “birdie-fest, with most of the holes in the sub-300 foot range. Two of the longer holes were split in half, so the course became a 20-hole, par 60 test of your distance control and your putting. I have two “nemesis” holes on this course, the “poke-and-pray” hole #3 and the double dogleg hole #8. Those were the two holes that I was going to focus on.
And I was FINALLY not the only one in my division, as I was playing MP50 with 5 other competitors!
The first round started very well. I birdied the first two holes , #4 and #5a (Hole #5 being one of the split fairways), then rode that -2 for the next 7 hole, with pars on every hole — even the dreaded Hole #8. I grabbed birdies on Holes #12, #16a (Hole #16 being the other split fairway), and #18, then tip-toed through the last 3 holes with pars (even finding a clean line on hole #3) to finish with a 5-under 55. My data table for Boulder woods puts the rating for that score somewhere in the neighborhood of a 961-rated round! Plus it was a totally clean round to boot, so I was pretty stoked!!
After a bit of food from the pot luck lunch, we went back at it, again starting on hole #4. I was riding a 3 shot lead, so I was thinking that I would just focus on staying in the fairway and avoiding mistakes. But apparently, my brain didn’t register the word “avoiding.” After a birdie on hole #5a got me started in the right direction, a missed mando on hole #7 and an annoying “walk-in-the-woods” on hole #8 took me 3 strokes in the other direction! Being +2 on Hole #9 — when I had been -2 on hole #9 during the first round — started getting me a little uptight. Another mistake on Hole #12, and I’m at +3 — 6 strokes worse than the first round. It was about this time when I realized that I was playing tight and trying to force things to happen, instead of playing loose and easy. I got my head back on straight, then parred my way to holes #16a and #16b — both of which I birdied. We made the turn and I birdied hole #1 to get myself back to even. A par on hole #2 brought me to our last hole — the annoying and frustrating hole #3. I promptly tightened up and threw my forehand drive into the ground.
Being an ice bowl, mulligans were available for purchase “on-the-fly” for $5 a piece. And against my norm, I mulliganed that drive — I just couldn’t have THAT be my last drive of the day. With the mulligan, I was able to par the hole, and finish out with an even par 60 for the second round. And, as it turned out, that mulligan gave me the win… by ONE stroke! If I discount the mulligan (and give myself a 1-over-par 61for the round), the round would have been rated somewhere in the neighborhood of a 915 — still over my average, but after the first round it was a bit of a let down.
Positives:
The mechanics are becoming more ingrained, so I don’t need to think about them as much and can focus on other aspects of the round/hole/throw.
Putting was ON!! — especially in the first round. I missed some 20’-25’ putts, but made some 30’-40’ ones, so I was pretty pleased.
Ice Bowl season is over!! Time to move on to the tournaments that have a bit more weight.
Negatives:
Getting tight when there’s a bad shot or a bad hole is… well… bad. I need to forget bad shots quicker.
I’m still having some release angle issues with my forehand drives. I’ll need to address that when I can finally get back onto the practice range.
Ice Bowl season is over!! I could use another one or two to refine my game.
Time for Some Shenanigans!
And, as typical of my time management (or lack thereof) lately, I was never able to get back to finishing this post. Oh well, on to the next emergency!!!