My 6th Round

Okay, well, I've skipped writing about my fifth round. I'll have to fill you in in the next post.

Today, we played 18 holes at New Salisbury Golf Course, which is a 9-hole course. I started off with a bang. Honestly, I teed off on the first hole, and BANG, it went out into some trees down the righthand side. I shot 10 on the first, and 10 again on the 3rd.

The story of the 3rd hole went something like this: I sliced over into the tree line. I hit an iron shot into a tree, it bounced back towards me, repeat. Repeat again. Repeat again. Finally, I got out near the green.

On 4, something amazing happened. I introduced myself to my 7-iron. I honestly can't remember ever using it before. I was able to do with it what I think you're supposed to be able to do with it: I got it up in the air. From then on, I used the 7-iron a lot. I managed to play better than I usually do on the 5th hole there. I shot 8. From there on, I shot 7 strokes for every hole on the front nine. One of those is a par 3, so 7 isn't great, obviously. Still, play was fairly consistent after 5.

On 9, I had perhaps the best tee shot I've ever had, not only did it go straight, but it ended up on the tee side of the a sand bunker 40 feet or so from the green. Then, in spite of myself, I botched my chip shot, and ended up under some trees anyway.

I finished the front nine at 71. That matched my mark from a week earlier when we played 9 on the same course.

Then, we started the back nine. I bogeyed the first two holes. Unconventionally, on the 10th (first) hole. I played all the way down on the wrong side of the tree line, but I got there just the same. The back nine I had 2 bogeys, 2 double-bogeys, and 5 3-overs. 21 over.

That's right, I shot 56 on the back nine, a new best for 9 holes by 9 strokes (because the one I haven't written about, I scored 65).

That makes my total for 18 127. Which is also a new best. Perhaps I'm not so much lousy as just a rookie.

My Fourth Round

Well, before I tell you all about today's 9 holes, I should say, to introduce myself, that I have only played three rounds before today: one 9-hole round, I scored 74 & two 18-hole rounds, 151 and 164.

You can say I get more shots for my money...

Today, was the best round so far, that may be because it was only 9 holes at New Salisbury, after two straight rounds of 18. My comrade knew a group of 3 foursomes playing behind us. They were waiting on more when we arrived, and the course was on a frost delay. Luckily, they let the two of us go ahead.

Their group assembled after we had teed off the first hole, so we felt a bit rushed on the first hole. I shot 10 strokes, and Cooper shot 8. We relaxed after that. We both played the wrong side of the tree line on the third hole. The fourth hole gave me something to brag about: I had a tee shot that went straight! Booyah!

On 8, I got my first bogey! Booyah!

All in all, I started to feel a bit more confident about tee-shots. Most of that may be because of some friendly bounces I got off of trees. On my bogey'd 8th, my tee shot sliced horribly, into the trees. I remember thinking, "I'm playing it, I don't care." When we rode up on the cart to look for it, it was on the edge of the fairway. I'm still not sure how it ended up there. My only guess is that it knocked around just the right way in the top of some trees...

My next two shots from there were gems, too! I used my hybrid (because I really wasn't sure what else to use from there), it landed at the bottom of the hill below the green, right in the middle of the fairway. Then I used a 9-iron to bloop nicely onto the green. I missed my first putt attempt, though.

Cooper also bogeyed that hole, his putt shot was C-shaped, and it went in. We have no idea how. The slope is no where near that severe....

I ended up with 71. A new personal best!