I drew an afternoon tee time on Day 1 at 1:21pm. What do you do before an afternoon tee time? Do you squeeze in some practice, go to the gym, watch a movie, sleep, do errands?? One thing for sure is you get to sleep in. I chose to eat a nice breakfast at the Spot Cafe in Watertown with my brother and my friend Samuel. After gathering my golf equipment and attire and driving to my parent's house, I was left with less than an hour to stretch and eat some more food. We departed for Haverhill at 11:30am. All in all, if you like to arrive at least an hour prior to your tee time and have to travel many miles to get there, the amount of morning time goes quickly.
The weather conditions were close to perfect - temperatures in mid 70s and mild winds in the afternoon. The morning conditions were slightly better because of less wind. Overall, it was a fair comparison of playing conditions between morning and afternoon groups. The course conditions were excellent. Greens were in perfect shape and running around 10.5 on the stimpmeter. I started on the 10th tee, a 181-yard downhill par-3. My 9-iron missed short right and I failed to get up and down for par. Off with a bogey on 10 and then doubled 11. Its painful to start like that!
My brother was caddying for me and my Dad was spectating. It was awesome! After a tough start, I missed an easy birdie on 12 and then hit a towering 3-wood in front of the 300 yard par 4 13th. I pitched it to 20 feet and drained the birdie putt. After parring 14, I made bogey on 15 and missed a short birdie putt (10 feet) on 16, bogeyed 17, and parred 18 for a front nine 39.
On the back side, I started poorly by hitting my second shot into a hazard on 1 (my 10th hole). I made a great pitch shot from 60 yards to save bogey. On the par-4 3rd, I hit the shot of my tournament. My drive went way right into fescue. I was lucky enough to draw a good lie. However, I had a slightly sidehill lie (ball above my feet) and a huge maple tree 10 yards in front of me. The yardage to the green was roughly 135. My brother and I discussed the options. I felt it was best to try to go over the tree. My brother said you can do it no problem. I slightly opened up from pitching wedge and put a full swing on it. The ball launched straight up and barely over the tree, landing on the front of the green, rolling to 15 feet below the pin. It was Tiger-esque. Unfortunately, I missed the putt, but par was still exceptional from that position.
I birdied that par 3 4th, making a slippery 25 footer down the hill. My brother called me making this shot too! The rest of the round included many bunker shots and a great up and down on the par-3 7th (from a downhill lie with patchy grass and mud on my ball). I doubled my last hole to shoot 78, three strokes above the field average on Day 1. My round included 2 birdies, 8 pars, 2 doubles, and 6 bogeys. Total putts were 33.
Looking back on this round, I did not capitalize on the good playing conditions and put myself in a tough position to make the cut.
Thanks to my brother for being a great caddy. He gave me confidence in a lot of my decisions and kept me well energized throughout the round.
Additional Notes:
-My Dad took notes on all my shots and was having a good time, even took a beer to go after nine holes
-Playing partner Russ forgot to bring his driver to the tournament and left ALL his wedges in the car (he figured this out on our 2nd hole and drove his golf cart off the course to get them)...the drama continued with Russ having a ruling issue on the par 3 7th hole...his ball rested on an abandoned, embedded ball in the woods, the ruling did not go his way and he made 7
-Bob 'PGA' Green fired 75, a good start to the tournament
-Defending champ Brian Higgins shot 66 and held a one-shot lead
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