My Golf History

It all started when my wife presented me with a golf set on our anniversary in 2008. With my brother-in-law (also Ajay), who was already into it, I started practicing in early July at a nearby driving range - Pin High Golf Center. Once a week (or two), we would drive to the range after work and hit some golf balls. Initially, the instructions wouldn't even make sense to me. How my swing was? Where my club should be when I swung back? Where I should place the ball? I just focused on hitting the ball. It helped understand the instructions later. It was good that my brother-in-law made sure we practiced hitting practice on the grass, and not on artificial ones. It gave me a good feel of hitting the ball in natural surrounding.

After a few weeks of practice, we decided it was time for me to play some real golf. So, August 22, 2008 late afternoon, I go to Sunnyvale Muncipal Golf course with my brother-in-law. We play the white tees. My first drive ends up in water. So, I take a drop and continue. I finish the first 4-pqr hole with a double bogey. At second hole, I am nearly out of bounds and finish with a triple bogey. As I continue, I realize how important it is to be consistent in this game. Nevertheless, I finish a few holes with a single bogey. In the end, an average of double bogey (although we only finished about 12 holes for the lack of time). I found out that my drives tended to slice or push and my putting needed some work. Next Friday, it was lot easier to understand the instructions at the driving range. I work on my putting and slice although I admit, I still couldn't figure out how to fix it. Instructions still didn't make all the sense.

Next Sunday, we are back for a round of 18 holes, this time we play all of them. I make my first par at hole 7, a par 3 hole. Most of the times, it was the drives. A shot to the right and then the rest are focused on getting the ball back on track. Most of the holes, ball just zig-zags to the hole. Some of the holes are just frustrating enough to finish. I end up with triple bogeys and even more. At the end of the day, I am +38 but feeling good about finishing. Beer helped much of the course.

After another round of practice, I am headed for another round of golf, this time a back-9 at Palo Alto Municipal Golf with a friend., Sanjay. It's early in the morning on Sep 18 before 7am and a back-9 is a good way to play and get to work in time. There is however dew and chill to contend with. I take my jacket but realize this is not the best outfit. A sweater is a better bet. And of course, your pants will get wet so shorts are better bet if it's not too cold. Or carry a spare pant for office. Anyway, the play is better and I mostly do single bogeys, a couple of double bogeys and a hole where I had a hard time. Overall, it was very satisfying as I ended up with a score of +13.

With this, I got hooked to the back-9. For one, they finish in about couple of hours so you can play them on the weekdays before office. And they are easier to get. You don't need to book them in advance. We (Me, Sanjay, Ajay and another friend) played next at Summitpoine Golf Course on Saturday morning, 9/27/08. This course was hilly and difficult, with some holes not even visible at times. Most of the times, fairways were sloping to one side. There were enough hazards to contend with. Many double-bogeys but I was happy to do couple of pars - one at par 5 hole 15 and another one at par-3 hole 16. At hole 18, I ended up going uphill out of bounds multiple times. I ended up with +15 on this tough 9 holes. My slice problem still didn't leave me.

My last 9 holes was in Foxtail Golf Club in Rohnert Park with Monu.This place has two courses - North and South. We played at South course and first 9 holes early in morning on Oct 11, 2008. I practiced my drives, hybrids and pitching the day before to fix the issues. So I got to pretty good start, messed up the second hole badly, almost did a birdie (ended up with a bogey) at hole 3, managed successive pars at hole 4 and hole 5. My tee-shots and hybrids still had some issues and I ended up with triple bogeys on some of the holes. I ended up with a score of +14 at the end of 9 holes which was a definite improvement from previous ones (except one at Palo Alto).