Birdie!!

Finally I got a birdie I deserved. I was playing with my brother in law last Friday at Sunnyvale Municipal. Front nines were pretty bad. No pars, bogeys, bogeys and bogeys and I was +16. Then came the 10th hole. A week before, I was close to doing an eagle here and ended up with a par. Wind was favorable, right behind us. As I hit the driver, I knew it was good hit, better than the last week. As I reached the ball, I realized this was almost 300 yards. Favorable wind had really paid off. Only 230 yards were remaining. I knew I could reach the green (based on last week's experience). But, the front group was still at the green. Waiting was getting to be impatient. I don't know if it was their presence that prompted it, but my hit went right off the green, although it went the distance. Otherwise, I could have been looking at an eagle opportunity. In any case, I still managed a good chip and got a great 6 foot putt to seal a birdie.

Good thing is that I followed it up with 3 pars and ended up with a +9 with back nines. Under 100, but still it was exhilirating.

18 holes at Sunnyvale Municipal

Since the next week is looking to be rainy, I wanted to go for a game of golf on Friday. Looking at the weather in the morning, it looked like a gone case. But, then my brother-in-law called around 1:30pm that the sun had come out, so off we go to play golf.

And we got lucky, indeed. Most of the people had backed out so there were very few players. We decided to rent a cart so we could play fast. With no-one ahead of us, we could play as fast as we could. And with no-one behind us, there was no pressure. We started at around 2pm and had less than 3 hours before the sunset. But without practice, I was off target with slices and pulls. Still, I managed to survive with a bogey on most holes and a par. No birdies, no eagles, no hole in one. My putting was good, pitching and drives were pretty bad. But, overall, I am satisfied that my ratio of single bogies & pars in the overall score has increased.

Going forward, I need to fix my drives again. I fixed my slice before by moving the ball to the front heel but it is giving an unnecessary flight. Looks like my swing plane now is gotten better. On the contrary, I have a problem with my irons. I am ending up with slices meaning my clubface is opening up - out-to-in swing. It might be that I am trying to get more distance. Or this is because my body-turning is now on track. I am getting longer shots albeit inaccurate. So, I need to visit the driving range again.

I could get 150-160 yards with 7 iron so that's an improvement over 120-130 yards earlier. Although my 5-iron is still falling short of this distance.

18 holes at Deep Cliff

Last Friday, I went to play an executive 18 hole golf course at Deep Clifff, Cupertino. I was a little skeptic about playing an executive course before this. However, this turned out to be a very pleasant experience. Holes ranged from 100 yards to 350 yards and provided ample practice for short play. We started around 8am while the temperature was still freezing. Some of the holes like #2 were so close that we really weren't sure if that's where the putting green was. :) We started off to a bad start loosing a number of balls to the water hazards and the creek running through the course. But, pretty soon, we were competing to see who would make a birdie. Nevertheless, that was still a challenge for all of us. We got close to it with lots of par but no birds. In fact Gaurav missed his chance twice while Sanjay was still trying to shoot birds on the tree :) It was fun and I look forward to going there again, soon.

More practice games

Have been busy lately to update my blog. In the meantime, I played a few more back 9s - some at Shoreline and another one at Summitpointe. One thing I realized was that I was slicing the ball. I checked out golf.com and found some nice videos. Another person playing at shoreline gave a nice tip to fix the swing plane. I spent some time practicing the changes to my swing and voila, my slice was cured. Of course, I have different issues now. But, it was heartening to have 2 pars and single bogeys for most of the back 9.
Last game at Summitpointe was heartening and dissatisfying at the same time. While my slice was fixed, driver shots got up or down and lacking distance. I did hit a couple of shots that got me close to doing a birdie and then my pitching fell apart. But, Summitpointe has a very narrow fairway and lot of hazards. One of the problem was judging the distance since this is also very up and down course so I was still happy I lost only one ball to a water hazard.
Next steps, focus on pitching and making contact with the driver. Thanksgiving is coming and I plan to do a whole 18 holes with my friends.

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).