Round 1 of Chandler City Championship

All in all, not terribly bad. I shot 74 with 34 putts. Wow, that's a lot of putts. I had 2 three putts and a four putt today! I'll be updating my "What I play" post with the Scotty Cameron putter, he's back in the bag. Why I keep trying to play with old technology I'll never know. So long blade putter, you're lucky I didn't break you over my knee today. Here we go...

Opened on number 1 with a drive just through the fairway and a PW to a foot, nice birdie there. God this game is easy. Blocked the tee shot on #2 after waiting 5 full minutes for the fairway to clear, had to just wedge it out of this garbage, hit a SW to 10 feet, missed the putt, even after 2 dammit. Hit a great drive and a 3 iron to 15 feet on the par 5 third, two putt birdie, back to 1 under. Blocked my tee shot a bit on #4, but it made it through and past the cartpath crossover, hit a 80 yard wedge 95 yards and lipped out the putt. Blocked the tee shot on 5, pulled the 2nd shot and didn't get it up and down, back to even again. Three putted from 50+ feet on the par 3 6th, made a miraculous par on #7 (it was a long hole, don't ask), great 2 putt par on the 230 yard 8th, then we get to 9. Oh #9. Great drive, laid up with a 6 iron (it went long too) and had about 85 yards to the back hole location. Hit a piss poor wedge in there to about 25 feet, birdie to shoot even on the front, hit it about 4 feet by the hole. Next guy hits his chip shot near my mark, figured I would get a read. Turns out his mark was a bit in front of mine, I hit it too hard through the break, then in a pissed off state about my 3 putt, I missed that one to turn it into a 4 putt. Nice double jackass, out in 39.

On the positive side, hit a good tee shot on 10 (finally!), pulled the 9 iron to the back left, pin is front right. Tentative putt to 4 feet (hmmm, this looks familiar) but actually scraped that one in. Pulled 9 iron on the par 3 11th, and hit a wonderful explosion chip out of the rough, hit the stick and stopped 1 inch away. If the stick was out, I'd have made 2. Hit a lousy driver on the par 5 12th, 250 yards out (I've been as little as 170 yards out in the practice rounds). Hit 3 wood left of the green, up and down for birdie, 1 under on the back. Smoked driver on the next hole, half hearted wedge to the green, and 3 putt from 12 feet because I left the first putt 5 feet short. Oh we're having fun now.

Hit a beautiful 7 iron to the par 3 14th, about 15 feet above the hole, 3 feet short, made the putt. Bombed a driver on the par 5 15th, hit the fattest 3 wood on the planet short right of the green, then a nice safe pitch shot to the middle of the green (yes I was being sarcastic). Managed to 2 putt from 20 feet for par. Great tee shot on 16, just a GW in, hit it to 5 feet and made the putt, back to 1 under for the back. Rope hooked a 5 iron on the par 3 17th into the bunker, my ball was sitting in a depression with a small (fist sized) mound of sand behind it. Hit it out to about 12 feet, not bad really, then missed the putt, back to even for the back.

Here's where the fun starts. Blocked my tee shot on 18, into this scraggly weed / bush, 183 yards out. It was pretty bare, so I figured I could get it out, hit a great 6 iron out of it, but hooked it. It ended up left of the cartpath, almost to the practice putting green. Probably 8 feet above the 18th green, about 15 yards off, pin cut in back, I'm hole high. I actually stepped away from it because I actually said "get it on, don't 3 putt". WTF man, shut up. Got back up to it, hit a great flop that landed just on, ball tracked to the hole, in the cup and back out, stopped about 18" away. WOW I thought I made that one too. 3 over on the front, even on the back, 74.

Now normally, that probably wouldn't be in too bad of shape for a 2 round tournament, except that some guy threw up a 62 today. Remember 7, 8 & 9 where I put up 4, 3, 7? My man went 2, 1, 5 in that stretch, only 6 shots better than me on those 3 holes. Ah well, I'm only 12 shots back. If I can shoot 54 tomorrow, I'm right back in it. Wonder if they'll let me stop at 12?

From what I can gather, I'm about middle of the pack right now, all the scores weren't posted at the time however, so I could move down or up. I'm going off at 7:22, first tee time is 6:15, so I'm not in last place, of course I didn't shoot 62 today either.