Bunker Mulligan "Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry." ~Mark Twain

Okay, I promised a review of the latest golf book, A Golfer’s Education.

Darren Kilfara, an avid golfer and member of Harvard’s golf team, had a terrific idea I wish I’d thought of: Spend a year as an exchange student studying his senior thesis at the University of St. Andrews. He had just spent a semester as an intern at Golf Digest, and had the opportunity to help fund this education by writing several articles for them while in Scotland.

I had read a review on the book after I started into it, and the review derided it as a compilation of shot-by-shot descriptions of Darren’s rounds. It isn’t. Not even close. I can only think that the reviewer isn’t a golfer, and he expected far more culture shock. Much of the book is devoted to course descriptions, from a course architecture perspective, and maybe that was the reviewer’s complaint.

Actually, the book covers Darren’s full range of experiences in Scotland. His social and student life, the relationship with other golfers and Scottish courses, and meeting Heather. He involved himself as totally as he could in student life and the St Andrews culture, playing in a brass band, and on the soccer team.

But, yes, most of it related back to golf and the Old Course at St. Andrews. One thing that struck me was his self-assessment after almost a year. He dreaded being paired with fellow Americans:

Unfortunately, in my quest to disassociate myself from my more obnoxious countrymen, I became something worse: a cultural snob. I came to believe that most Americans were beneath me, and that Scottish simplicity was in all aspects superior to American brashness.

Wow. Does that not define many people, those we simply declare to be America haters?

The book describes golf as a pasttime in Scotland, with course access considered a birthright. Courses, including the Old Course, are treated as public parks with people on picnics and kids throwing balls competing for space with golfers. And yet, there are many Scots who have never played the game, nor care to. Kilfara covers it all. I didn’t come away with a great respect for the author, but a respect for his topic. Worth reading.

One of my Sunday regular partners has his personal web site. The page of interest for most of my visitors would be Golf In the Kingdom, a compilation of photos from his recent trip back to Thailand. He carried his sticks.

I’ve never met anyone who didn’t love Thailand.

Today I started hitting the ball well once again. I’ve been struggling of late, shooting in the upper 80s and lower 90s. Today I was on track to break 80 for the first time in a long time. I hit the ball well, but couldn’t make a putt. I had only three one-putt greens and three-putted twice. Nineteen putts on the back nine were enough to put 80 out of reach–I shot 81.

The weather, threatening early, cleared nicely. We had the omnipresent gulf wind of 10-15 mph, but it is a mere breeze compared to what we’ve had recently. One sure sign that winter is over revealed itself today. Actually, they revealed themselves today. Mosquitoes were out in force. I go through four or five cans of Deep Woods Off! each year, and my can is almost empty. Two or three applications per round make the critters bearable.

I’ve been reading A Golfer’s Education, and will finish it tonight so I can trade books with Bogey. Book report in the next few days.

Hint: I like the book.

I know it’s a little early, but yesterday I got a practice round in. The weather was supposed to clear by two, but didn’t. And I was already committed.

We played in 40+ MPH wind, with a light mist. We were the only fools on the course. It took me eight holes to get a par, but I did manage to birdie the 18th–a first on that hole. It is usually a driver and 6-8 iron, depending on hole location. Yesterday it was driver, 3-wood, and that just rolled about six inches on the green. I sank a 20-footer for the birdie.

Wind is intersting. It’s bad enough trying to read break and speed, but then you have to judge wind effect on the line and distance, and make a smooth stroke while worrying whether you hair will stay on your head.

Of course, the weather is perfect today, and I have other things I have to do!

This is a book I need to read: How to Line up Your 4th Putt by Bobby Rusher. Some tips to be gleaned from it are:

* achieve a flawless swing without injuring yourself or loved ones

* score well at night

* find a ball that everyone saw go into the water

* use profanity to maximize earnings on the golf course

* How to hit a Top Flite from the rough when you hit a Titleist from the tee

* How to avoid the water when you lie 8 in the bunker

* How to get more distance out of a shank

* Using your shadow on the greens to maximize earnings

* Proper etiquette when you are playing with a complete jerk

* Crying and how to handle it

* How to rationalize a 7 hour round

* How to make hitting short of the ladies tee look sexy

* How to let a foursome play through your twosome without getting embarrassed

* How to relax when you’re hitting five off the tee

* When to suggest swing corrections to your opponent

* God and the meaning of the double bogey

There will be a quiz.

I didn’t play golf this weekend. I am sick of fighting the wind. I started toward the course this morning in spite of it, but it began raining, and I wasn’t going to fight the wind and rain both. I turned around and came home.

It makes me smile when the television announcers make comments about it being “…really windy out here today. The wind is up around 25 miles per hour.” Here on the south Texas coast, 25 mph is light. Hell, that’s only two clubs’ worth! I don’t worry about the wind affecting my ball. but walking gets to be a chore when you’re fighting a “heavy breeze.”

So, I did some yard work and watched the Match Play Championship with Tiger and Davis. Between rounds I went to Barnes and Noble and found some very interesting reading, including A Golfer’s Education (list at bottom of column, and on the left, and on my page).

But the announcers today were in rare form. They kept reminding us all how tough this shot would be, and how impossible it was to keep a ball on this green, and how soft the course was which makes it really difficult to control the spin…! Now, I really am in awe of the talent these guys have on the PGA Tour. They can make a ball do pretty much what they want…most of the time. And they are realistic in their approach.

Announcers, on the other hand, always seem to be making excuses for them before they ever make a shot. We hear how tough a course is because the greens are hard and won’t hold an approach shot. Today they tell us how tough the course is because the greens are so soft. Everyone knows Tour pros are magicians out of sand, but we are constantly told what a difficult shot this next one is out of the sand.

I don’t know. Are the announcers for golf tournaments trying to build suspense where none exists?

What is it that makes a man (always a man) make an ass of himself by yelling something like that at a golf tournament?

Almost every golfer talks to the ball when playing. “Get outa there!” and “Don’t go in the water!” are plaintive cries heard every day on every course. Some players do it incessantly. I’ve played with guys sporting a 30 handicap who whine with every shot. I want to grab them by the throat and shake them violently. “When most of your shots are decent, then you can complain about bad ones!”

Darren Clarke is standing over a putt that can put away Davis Love III. Just as he hits the ball, some idiot yells, at the top of his voice “GO IN THE HOLE!”

I’m all for encouraging golfers on the course. The Tours are some of the few remaining venues in sport where fans can really interact with players. And from my experience, the players appreciate this. Once the ball is on its way, though, what does this fool hope he can do to help a player?

Nothing. He simply wants attention.

Golf was once the last refuge for fans who restrained their passion for the game. I went to the Crosby Tournament (as it was called then) when I lived in Monterey. There were ropes only to direct fans along paths and keep them from falling off cliffs. There were none to restrain or restrict access to most of Pebble Beach. We all understood the game, and yielded space where space was needed. It was phenomenal. We could walk alongside players and celebrities, and converse with them as if we were part of their weekend foursome. Of course, people knew when it was time to step away and let the player do the job.

Today’s galleries are a boon to the players in the amount of money now generated, but a bane to the sport as a whole. When Tiger first came on the scene, much was said about how his arrival was good for the game because it brought many new people into the sport. I always felt it was good for the business of golf, but bad for the game. Business boomed for a while, but an awful lot of new players showed up on course with no concept of golf etiquette.

This was magnified at tour stops. Golf became the “in thing” for corporattions wanting to do a little entertaining. Lots of people wandering the course with plenty of vocal cord lubricant and no respect for the game is the result.

It makes me sad. I cringe when someone wants to scream so his voice gets on television. Isn’t that pathetic?

What’s worse, I wonder if that scream was just a little early, and actually caused Clarke to miss. As I write this, Love beat Clarke after 21 holes. It might have all ended 3 three holes earlier in Clarke’s favor.