96 Holes

Playing 96 holes of golf (5 rounds) in 4 days is pretty tiring :)

I arrived to Phoenix, AZ last Thursday after 10 good days of golf in Palm Springs and checked into the 2 bedroom townhouse I rented from Airbnb in the afternoon. It was good to take it easy, get caught up on doing laundry, and make a home cooked meal. While it was cheap renting a room from someone else's house, nothing compares to having your own space to relax and unwind. 

Hwan and his friend Jai flew in on Friday morning at 11am. They wanted to play as much golf as they can before Jai had to go back to Houston on Monday. I picked them up from the airport at 11am, dropped their luggage off, and headed to our first round of the trip at Lookout Mountain Golf Club. Since I had the Troon Card, I have a 2 for 1 certificate at most of the courses we just divided the total cost by 3. This really helps with the budget on my stay in AZ! 

Friday afternoon was a good warm up for the next few days. We played 36 holes (both North and South Course) Talking Stick Golf Club on Saturday. I had booked the 7:47am tee time in the North Course so we can finish by noon and see if we can go out and play the South Course by 2pm. It was $20 to replay so it was totally worth it. We rested up Sunday morning and headed to the ASU Karsten Course, a Pete Dye designed course. We had booked a 3:16pm tee time and found out ASU was hosting the ASU Thunderbird College Golf Tournament that day. We had to wait until they finished before we can tee off. We finished 18 holes in exactly 3 hours and I think the fast pace really helped my game since I shot my best score ever. 87!

We did a boys night out in Scottsdale on Sunday night and came back to the townhouse at around 1:30am only having to wake up again at 6:30am on Monday for our 7:45am tee time at Golf Club of Estrella. The course was in great shape but the weather turned by the back 9 and we were playing in 30-40 mph winds. I must say, playing in that kind of wind in the desert during the middle of a sand storm is not too appealing. 

I'm resting up today and playing another 36 holes tomorrow. I didn't take as many pictures this time since these past few rounds were a total whirlwind, but I did keep 3/5 score cards to share. Enjoy!

PGA West - TPC Stadium

PGA West - TPC Stadium
Yards: 6408, Par: 72, Slope: 71.5/138
Score: 100, Putting Average: 1.94
Rode in Cart

The TPC Stadium course ate my lunch yesterday. Period. This is probably one of the hardest courses I've ever played and I can tell why they have the Q-School here. The course was designed by Pete Dye, the same architect that designed the Westin Mission Hills course I played on Tuesday, and is considered the hardest course he's designed. There are fairway bunkers and water lining just about every hole so you basically have to hit a perfectly straight shot or you're in trouble all day. The second shot isn't any easier, you basically have to carry it over some water to a very small landing window just to lay up on a par 5. On par 4's the green side bunkers are about 12 feet hight and nearly impossible to hit out of. You also have to carry water on just about every par 3 on the course. If you are lucky enough to hit the green on your approach shot, the green does not hold and the ball will trickle to the back for a 30 ft putt. But hey, at the the course was pretty :)

One thing I do have to gripe about is golf etiquette when being paired up with a stranger. I completely understand if you need to take an emergency call once in a while on the course. We've all had to do that one time or another. But if you are on the phone for about 2.5 hours out of a 4.5 hour round, don't bother being out there. The person I was paired up with was doing just that. The rest of us in the group basically had to wait for him to finish his call before he hit his every shot. Also, be truthful with you score. I just saw you hit the ball into the water on your drive, take a drop, shank your approach shot, and 3 putted on the green. You clearly did not get a bogey so please don't "tell" me to mark that for you. Golf should be an enjoyable sport and being paired up with someone with poor etiquette just plan sucks. Just my 2 cents...

I have 2 days of rest before playing another full 18. My body definitely needs it. Enjoys the pics!

17th Hole, Island Green, 146 yard, Par 3

17th hole from the back

Westin Mission Hills - Pete Dye Resort Course

Westin Mission Hills - Pete Dye Resort Course
Yards: 6158, Par: 70, Slope: 69.6/126
Score: 93, Putting Average: 2.0
Miles Walked: 6.3

Today was the first round of the trip and I played the Westin Mission Hills - Pete Dye Course. I wanted to start of the trip with a fun resort course and that's not too long but has some challenges. A lot of the courses in Palm Springs are designed by Pete Dye including the course I'm playing on Thursday, PGA West TPC Stadium Course. I had the pleasure of pairing up with an awesome couple from Calgary, the Charney's. Part of this trip is to meet new and interesting people and I couldn't have started off the trip with better company.

It's a different feeling walking a course versus riding in a cart, especially a well designed course like today. Most of the time we are so quick to hop into a cart and forget to actually get a feel on the design of the course. Since I brought my push cart with me, I loaded up my clubs on it and walked it today. After being in the nice, cool Northern California climate you get spoiled walking courses in that weather versus the dry, hot desert. I might have to take it slow and get acclimated to walking in hot weather again. Now, I grew up in in Texas where we use to play tennis in the middle of summer with on court temperature reaching 110 degrees. But I'm also not 16 and 120lbs anymore. You can expect to walk about 6 miles and burn around 1500 calories per 18 holes of golf. Given that I've gained a few pounds these past few months, I really need to get back into my normal weight. Besides, I need to get in shape for that 10 mile hike out of the Grand Canyon in about a month.

Today was also the first time I played with my new irons. Getting use to a new set of clubs is like driving your new car for the first time. You know how to drive it but you just don't know how its gonna perform until you've been driving it for a while. I didn't hit them particularly well today but hopefully that will change soon. I did end the round with 3 straight Pars, so that's at least some good news there. Here are the pictures from today. Enjoy!

5th Hole, 508 yard Par 5

 8th Hole, 171 yard Par 3 over water

18th Hole

The aftermath