Shooting your age or better

Here’s a nice golfing story. Last week Jay Hudson did a Butch Carlstadt…shot his age or better. Jay is a youthful 81 years of age and shot an 81. How Jay achieved that 81 is pretty remarkable. On the front nine, Jay birdied hole number one and then Jay birdied ten on the back nine. Hole one and ten are the same hole…front and back nine. To par number one is an achievement. Number one is rated as the third most difficult hole on the Little River course. The green challenges a golfers’ putting skills with breaks and speed. Jay birdied the hole twice. He went on to sink another birdie on number eight and then eagled hole number five. If Jay was playing in the Stableford format he would have accumulated 20 Stableford points on those four holes. What a great round Jay. Congratulations!

Jay was accompanied by golfers Shelly Howarth and Terry Ramos and Peter Marcovich. And guess what last Sunday, Easter Sunday, Terry Ramos went on an Easter egg hunt on hole number seven hit his six-iron, and found that Easter egg ball in the bottom of the hole. An ace! First-ever for Terry. Witnesses to the hole-in-one were eagle man Jay Hudson, Peter Marcovich, and Rick William. Golfers Cindy Ellis and Jim Ellis playing nearby heard the roar of appreciation for the ace but thought the group was yelling four. Terry fulfilled his hole-inone obligation by buying a round of drinks. Congratulations to you Terry. Nicely done.

Recently I brought a friend, Kam Herod, to the driving range. Kam had expressed his desire to hit some golf balls and learn the game. Kam had never played golf before. We got a bucket of balls and went to the driving range matts. I pointed out several standard golf swing approaches: proper grip, head down, turn those shoulders, keep that left arm straight, things like that. Kam hit one here and there topping a few but also connecting nicely too. You don’t learn the

swing hitting one bucket of range balls. We got another bucket and went back to the matts. Bill Brekhus, Ty Ashby, and

Jason Carmichael appeared just having finished a round. I pointed over to the three and said aloud so they could hear me, “What would you tell a guy just starting to learn golf?” Ty responded, “Get the heck out of here before you get hooked and it’s too late?” Bill strode over to the matt beside Kam and asked Kam if he was athletic. “Have you played sports?” Kam said yes. Bill demonstrated an athletic golf stance, feet apart, arms hanging loosely, body bent slightly at the waist. “Without thinking so much about your swing rely on your athleticism.” Kam took some more swings and hit some very nice shots. Not every shot is nice but some 130 yards nine irons down the middle. Two teaching forms: Teach the mechanics or give it over to the body.