Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Utah Collegiate Shootout

Sunbrook Golf Club
St. George, UT
10-17-09
Par 72 6,781 Yards

71-73 144

All the Utah teams except BYU were in this one, so it was fun to play the locals. I was feeling pretty confident with my game going into the tournament, and I've got a lot more comfortable with college golf. It was just a one day, 36 hole tournament, so you had to move fast if you want to play well. I finally got off to a good start in a tournament and birdied my first hole, the par 4 fifth. This was a million times better than starting off with double like I have the last couple of tournaments! The first round I kept it pretty consistent and was around par the hole time, and I got one towards the end to shoot one under. My ball striking wasn't great this round, but I made everything I looked at, and had people laughing at how many long putts I drained for par. The second round was the opposite. I started out par birdie, and then missed two four footers in a row on the next two holes to get back to even. I played the round similar to the first, as I stayed around par the hole time, but I did it differently this time. I hit the ball awesome, but just couldn't get the putts to drop. I bogeyed the same hole that I birdied the last time around to shoot 1 over instead of 1 under. Although I was fairly dissapointed that I didn't take these rounds lower and get my first top 5 or something, I am happy that I've continued to improve. My course management has improved a ton, and I'm even learning how to make birdies by laying up on par fives. Our teams also doing better, as we shot our first under par round as a team 285, and were leading after the first round. We dropped back the second round by shooting 292 and got 4th. I ended up finishing 14th out of 49, which means it was my best showing yet. I'm excited for california next week, as it's the final tournament of the fall season. Hopefully I can keep improving and get a top 10 or better!

Friday, October 9, 2009

Wyoming Desert Intercollegiate

Classic Club
Palm Desert, California
Par 72 7,305 yards

My Scores: 79 71 76, 226

This was probably the hardest course we have played yet, and the wind was blowing pretty good for the first half of the first round, but besides that I just hit some bad drives that cost me some bad scores. I played six holes over par for the tournament, and played the other 12 even or under so as you can see I wasn't too far from playing well. The six holes that got me were all because of my drives. I drove the ball pretty well for the tournament, but for some reason my ball always found the water on these holes no matter what I tried. This course had a ton of trouble on it and it demanded some good drives that unfortunately I just didn't produce. My game is tightening up a lot, but still just a few steps from where I need to be to compete every tournament. I have improved every tournament thus far which is really nice though, and I'm planning on continuing that next weekend with some good play down in Saint George. I finshed T-43 out of 92, so for the first time I finished in the top half of the field. The most important thing I learned in this tournament though, was how to make my bad holes into bogeys and not doubles. I made 3 doubles the first round, but rebounded nicely when I was put in the same situations. Also, I had my first under par round in college golf!!!

Purple and Red Invitational

Valley View Golf Course
Layton, Utah
Par 72 7,147 yards

My scores: 74 72 80, 226

I got off to a horrible start the first day, and was 5 over through my first 6 holes, but then I really brought it back. I was 3 under with 3 to play in the second round, so one under for the day which felt pretty good, but I bogeyed my last three to go back to 2 over. The last day it was extremely windy, and I just didn't have it. I bombed my drive 0n the first hole, a relatively short par 4, and only had 65 yards in. Thinking birdie, I shanked my second shot in to the hazard and proceeded to make double from there. That pretty much summed up my day though as I could never get any momentum, and made double on the last to shoot 80. As poorly as I played the last day, I still took a lot away from this tournament and got some more experience under my belt. I'm really learning how important course management is on these tougher courses, and I have to learn how to miss my shots in the right spots. I'm close to figuring it out, but I just have a little too many dumb mistakes in my rounds. If I can figure out how to eliminate these, I'll start contending for the wins and not trying to beat half the field for once. I got T-45 out of 71 so I definitely improved a lot from the last tournament though.