The Road To Scratch Podcast: Links Golf and The Open Championship History

In this episode Matt and Shane talk about links golf and the history of the sport including the history of The Open Championship and how modern golf can still fit this mold. Shane also talks about his round at the longest course in North America. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Alright, we're back. Episode seven as I play with my microphone.

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Lucky number seven.

SPEAKER_00 0:17

Number seven. That means it's July, because we started in January, as you just pointed out to me. And that means uh the first round of the Open Championship has begun as of today, actually. As of this early this morning for us. Um, also known as the British Open for all of the somewhat golf fans from America. Right. So this is the oldest major championship that we have in professional golf. And it is my favorite. Is it my favorite major? Yeah. I've always liked Lynx golf. Um when I was privileged enough, like lucky enough to go over there. I was talking to my son about this 30 years ago. Yeah. This summer is when I was there. That's the last time I was there. Um 30 years ago, I was there as a young buck, right? Playing with a bunch of guys not much older than us now. Um, and it was it was a it was a life-changing experience for my like golf outlook, it was so cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Um, matter of fact, they're playing at Royal Royal Burkdale this week. Yeah, I got to play that course.

SPEAKER_01 1:24

You played a lot of them over there.

SPEAKER_00 1:25

I we played almost everyone on the circuit. I was actually gonna call my dad today and ask him this because I wanted to talk to him before we got on. I think there's only one we didn't play, and maybe it'll come to me in a minute. But I've played I played Troon, Burkdale, Royal Lith. The year that we went over there, uh, they played at Royal Litham. So we got to be there several weeks before the Open Championship. All the grandstands were up. Yeah, what a cool golf course that was. Um, Muirfield Village, which is no longer on the track. Um Turnberry. Turnberry. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Course, the old course at St. Andrews. I got to play that two days in a row. Yeah. Um, the coolest part about Lynx Golf is like, and this is something I wanted to kind of get into anyway, but the coolest thing about Lynx Golf is just how many shots you have to play.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

Right.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

The way the courses were designed, because they're hundreds and hundreds of years old compared to the modern game.

SPEAKER_01 2:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

Um, especially like we've talked about on previous podcasts with the with the guys, like the creativity seems to be somewhat lacking anymore. Like, there's only like stand up and hit your shot, comfortable with your shot, versus I have to hit this shot. Um, and just looking at some of the past champions and like even the last five, six years, who's won it based on and listen, these courses have everything to do with weather, right? They're designed, yeah. They're designed around pretty severe wind conditions and a lot of moisture, usually, especially this time of year. But uh it's when it dries out and they cut the gorse down and they cut the fescue down. It's the courses aren't that hard if there's not a lot of wind. Yeah. Um the greens have been baffling today, but anyway, it it's a whole different kind of golf. And that's I've I've always enjoyed like hitting the creative shots when I could. Um, and that's why I just this is my favorite championship to watch. Yeah, I want them to see I want to see them hit those shots. So hopefully, it sounds like the wind's supposed to pick up the rest of the week. Hopefully, we get to see that. But um, and I love getting up early and watching golf.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

So yeah, it is a really really special place to have a tournament too, right? Like the where golf kind of started, you know, you've seen all the history. Yep. You know, I think people in America, you know, we're just especially people who are new to golf, probably don't really appreciate that level of well, they how old that really is. Right. And kind of how it all started.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

Right.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

You know, and that's really cool. You've you know gotten to go. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:58

I mean, I still can remember, it's sadly, I can still remember every golf course, every hole. Um, I don't for some reason I don't remember all the holes very well at Royal Brookdale. I was kind of watching a little bit at lunchtime today. Um, and there was a couple holes where I'm like, I don't I don't really remember it looking like that, but again, that was 30 years ago.

SPEAKER_01 4:18

So and for those of you watching and listening, Shane has this uncanny ability to remember if every I could every single course he's played, every hole he can walk it back. It's amazing. It's kind of like a joke with him, it's like Peyton Manning remembering like every touchdown pass he's thrown.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

Maybe not quite that good a memory, but if I could have done that with like tests and stuff like that, it would have been helpful. But I don't know, it just sticks, especially. I mean, over there, it was I think because of the experience too. Yeah, right as long ago as it was.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

Of course, yeah. Um really ingrains in your memory.

SPEAKER_00 4:52

Yeah, I mean, I still have moments like today. I was even thinking, like, oh, I should have should have played that whole differently. Yeah, but you know, we're playing never played it before. Never played before. Um that course, I'm almost positive we didn't have caddies.

SPEAKER_01 5:07

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_00 5:07

So I carried. There's a few courses where I carried, we didn't have caddies, and you know, that's I can't remember exactly all the reasons why some weren't available. Right. I'm sure like I was a very young man, so my dad was paying for all this stuff. Um, so maybe he's just like, I'm not paying for caddy day. It didn't matter to me. Um, it would have been probably a little more helpful on Royal Burkdale, Royal Lithum, I carried, and that would have been helpful because there's a lot of blind shots there.

SPEAKER_01 5:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:34

Um probably about half the courses. We played there, we were there two weeks. Yeah. Um, it would have been it's it's listen, if you go, and I want to talk to you about this even off off air too, is um setting up something for next summer. Yeah. Because if you go, and I'm just saying, anybody that's watching or listening to this, if you go, caddies are so helpful. Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:54

I was just gonna say, I mean, don't some of the places require you to have a caddy?

SPEAKER_00 5:57

Some some do. I remember, yeah, like old like Prestwick was one of them required, I'm pretty sure. Um we didn't I carried a Turnberry too. I'm trying to remember. Troon, we had caddies for sure. That was helpful. The caddies didn't want to go out with the trune. It was like 47 degrees in point rain. Yeah, that's cool. And we just thought that was like, well, this is what everybody does, right? And there's like, nah, man, this is no, you got it, man, you got it backwards here. It's yeah, it's the wind was ridiculous. It did settle down, but yeah, caddies a lot of places are required. If they're not required, and there's available availability, take them for sure. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 6:32

Um, my only kind of experience really on a really you know links course was playing at uh Bandin. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bandon's very comfortable. And yeah, we had caddies, and that I don't know how we would have played without caddies. Right. Like I don't I don't even know where we'd go. Right. You're on the T and you could hit the ball anywhere. You know, it's so open, there's no real fairways.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

It's yeah, I mean, sometimes you have double greens, you have double fairways, and you're just I mean, especially if you're not an avid, avid golfer, you could get lost on these some of these courses. Um it's very confusing, but they were just so helpful too.

SPEAKER_01 7:14

I mean, like as you're you know, it's just so useful to club you and help you, like you know, know where to obviously know where to hit it, but right, yeah, what the line is.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

Yeah, I mean, putting like some of those greens are just yeah, you'd be baffled otherwise. Right. You'd be baffled. Yeah. Uh I mean uh yeah, I mean a good caddy's just helpful anywhere, but over there for sure. Yeah, set it up, pick the right places to go. I mean, that's one of the few times probably a travel agency is still helpful too, I would imagine. Yes, it's using these so there's companies out there specifically geared towards Lynx golf trips. Right. Um yeah, so anyway, I'd like to start really actually. I know we talked about it last year, but let's let's get the yeah, get get it going. By the way, Joe, you're going. I don't want to hear about this. I'm tired of this. Um we'll we'll pick it up, and maybe we'll even we'll yeah, we'll we'll we'll get some we'll get a group group together. But yeah, that'd be awesome. I'd love to go. Yeah, um, maybe we'll go play Burkdale. Yeah, it's a cool course, yeah. Or play where they're gonna play next year. Schedule it so we're there before they play. Lots of places. There's lots of lots of places on the circuit, and there's lots of options, and I don't even know where they're playing next year.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

Some off the beaten circuit.

SPEAKER_00 8:28

There's well, there's there, like I said, there's other courses. Prestwick being one of them. Yeah, Prestwick was, I believe, I'm uh I don't want don't quote me on this. I'm pretty sure it's the first course in Scotland. And it was only 14 holes when it started. I remember this because we look went in the little museum afterwards. It was only 14 holes, they expanded 18, and there's all these myths and legends about why 18 holes of golf, whatever, but um, and it's not because of 18 shots and a 750. We already figured that out, yeah. But it had originally had 14 holes, and that's another course where it's like there's a couple holes that go up, there's a rock at the top of the fairway, and then you go back down. Yeah, um, there's like little walls out there. Um, but I think that was the first course in Scotland, so that's very old. And that's you know, obviously it's not a circuit, it's sort of off the beaten path.

SPEAKER_01 9:16

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:17

We played a couple other ones like that. Most of them were were British open circuit tracks, but yeah, yeah. Yeah. So that being said, it's yeah, I love this type of golf. And I wanted to look up some of the past champions because I was curious about we talked about like the the um just the creativity you have to have, even especially around the greens. Yeah, and the ball is made to roll, right? It's it's made to be on the ground more than it is made to be in the air. And obviously, over here, golf is made the opposite, a lot of carry. In fact, the course I just played was all carry everywhere. Um, but just to keep this in mind the last five years, so like since 2021, um last year was Scotty Shuffler, Shoffley was 2024, 2023 was Brian Harmon.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 10:07

Cam Smith was 2022. Now I found that interesting um because of the way Cam Smith plays golf. But if you look at some of Cam Smith's short game stuff, he's similar to Rory in what he does around greens. Yeah. Open the face, put the ball back, low skippers.

SPEAKER_01 10:24

He's and he putted like insane tournament, I remember.

SPEAKER_00 10:28

Yeah, especially on Sunday, yeah, was unbelievable. Yeah, that was an amazing. He was rolling everything. Yeah, and I mean, he was Tiger-esque inside 10 feet, right? Just nothing missed. He couldn't miss. Nothing missed. And then 21 was uh Colin Morikawa, who that's right, when he was playing well, like it this was like right at the roll of his kind of the edge he had, it was kind of the end of his edge that he was playing really well. Colin was hitting it both ways. Colin was hitting a lot of like knockdowns and stingers and not driver off tease, and he has that ability with his swing, he's gotten away from that since then. But Colin is one of those guys that can play those kinds of shots. Yeah, he's not. I don't think he's as well known for it now because he doesn't do it as much, but if you lot watch his earlier career, he played all kinds of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 11:18

He did, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

So those were the fast last five open winners. Yeah. This is what I thought was cool because of the way they have this course set up this week. They like I said, they cut all the fescue down right before the tournament, which doesn't make sense because the members are playing on that. And it's I mean, that stuff is nasty.

SPEAKER_01 11:34

Yeah, real deep.

SPEAKER_00 11:34

We talk about all this this the all the problems we have, like with how far these guys hit it and yada yada, and how you can make courses, especially really old courses, more difficult. Shrink the fairways, yep, slow down the fairways. These fairways are so dried out right now, balls are rolling 50, 60, 70 yards. So the 614 yard par five isn't playing 614 yards, yeah. Right? The 500 yard par fours they have, they're just rolling forever. And if you miss it, it's not horror. Now, there's been some bad lies, and the wind's supposed to pick up, but I don't know, I don't, I don't know, we talk this all the time, but it's a major championship. I don't want to see 20 under win it.

SPEAKER_01 12:12

Yeah, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00 12:13

Yeah, and they've I don't I just don't think it's prepared. And I wanted to go back and see who was like what the scores were and who won.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:19

And the last fight, Burkdale's, because Burkdale's a tricky, weird kind of course compared to some of the other Lynx ones. But it doesn't look like that's gonna be this week. So the last time they played there was 2017. Do you remember who won then? I do know Jordan Speeth. Speith did 12 under was the winning number. Okay, and then before that it was 2008, Podrick Harrington. And he went back to back. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 12:46

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 12:47

In fact, I think he won four majors in five years or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 12:50

He had a run.

SPEAKER_00 12:50

Podrick had a run. Three over par.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

Three over.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

He won with three over par. Now I do remember that one because that was the year Woods won the US Open and then went and got surgery right afterwards, and couldn't play. And couldn't play in it.

SPEAKER_01 13:04

Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:05

And the weather was ungodly the first two days. Yeah. Miserably wet, whatever. Uh, three over. So I know the weather had a lot to do with that course that that week. Before that, 1998, Marco Mira. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

Remember that win? And again, he was hitting all kinds of shots. Marco Mira putted lights out in that tournament. Even par wins it.

SPEAKER_01 13:31

Yeah. So they really have changed it.

SPEAKER_00 13:34

It it's definitely different. Now, I don't want to date myself, but we've already done that. 96 was the year I played it. Okay. And I just remember being in a lot of that fescue and being frustrated.

SPEAKER_01 13:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:49

The back nine I played pretty well. But the front nine, I remember it was windy, I was loose off the T, and I was chipping out a lot. Like it was really, really thick stuff. So that's kind of how it looked after that. 91 before that, the guy that won one major championship and then literally got the golf yips. And almost I think he retired several years after that. A guy that just like it was the weirdest thing. Like he couldn't. In fact, I think he went back the next year in the open and they played it at St. Andrews. And this guy who won a 91 at Burkdale hit his T ball out of bounds on number one at St. Andrews. And anybody that knows what St. Andrews is, it's about a hundred and five-yard wide fairway. It's a double fairway. One goes out, eighteen comes back. He hit it OB, not the direction you think. He hit it left.

SPEAKER_01 14:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:44

Out of bounds left. So you have to hook that thing a hundred yards.

SPEAKER_01 14:47

That's a huge hook, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:49

Apparently there was a little bit of win, but he hit it OB left on one the next year. Ian Baker Finch.

SPEAKER_01 14:54

Yeah. Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 14:55

He had the driver lip yips like you wouldn't. Like he couldn't play golf. Yeah. He was talking about how there was days he got with his buddies and he couldn't break 80.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Just goes to show you what a mental game it is.

SPEAKER_00 15:09

Something got to him, and he just he did resurrect a little bit, but never to the level he was at when he won. Um, and then 83, our buddy from Kansas, Tommy Watson.

SPEAKER_01 15:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

Nine under in 83.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

9 under fascinating.

SPEAKER_00 15:26

Yeah. 8 under in 91, by the way. So I don't know. We'll see what happens.

SPEAKER_01 15:33

So it's almost like those really those really higher scores were the anomaly in a way there. Kinda. I mean I well, maybe. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:43

Maybe. I mean, I think as we got a little more modern, they've they've changed things. Like the way that they set up some of the open championships have changed. And I don't necessarily agree with all that.

unknown 15:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:54

Um, I mean, there's nasty stuff out there if you miss the fairway for a reason. Yes. Right? If it's not windy, you can control your ball flight. The course doesn't play super hard, you should be able to hit a lot of fairways, and usually greens. But if it's windy and you're offline, you should be drastically punished. Now, that's why they have pop bunkers out there because the wind, you get in those bunkers, anything can happen.

SPEAKER_01 16:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

But we'll see. I just think I was surprised. I thought 400 would hold up as the lead, and it didn't. It ended up being 500, yeah. 65 by Suter, right? Yep. Yeah. Yeah. So we'll see how tomorrow goes. I did, I was trying to like quickly peek at what the weather is supposed to be tomorrow. It's supposed to be much, much windier all day. Yeah, okay. Gusting up to 30, 40, 50 miles an hour. That could definitely play. The greens were getting really choppy at the end of the day. Um, and I can see guys getting frustrated. That's something that I don't think should they should let go. Like, you got to kind of get a little over water on the greens, right? Even though they're kind of slow, they're just bumping around so much. Water the damn fairways. I wish they didn't cut the fescue, can't grow fast enough in three days to make a difference. But we'll see. I just don't want a 20 under. If it's like eight, nine, even ten, yeah, I'm good with that.

SPEAKER_01 17:14

Well, if the if the weather comes in, it probably could be.

SPEAKER_00 17:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:17

I don't know how much it'll affect. We'll see. But yeah, I mean, if it can just hold everybody at five, six under for the weekend, that'd be that'd be perfect.

SPEAKER_01 17:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:25

But it's a it's a cool course. Um, there's some really cool holes that do require some creativity, but I just I just like watching it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:34

So yeah, I was thinking about the uh conversation that you probably saw that Nick Faldo was having about Bryson. I've caught clips of that. Yeah. It was in but he doesn't he clearly does not like Bryson's game at all. No. And he said that he doesn't think Bryson has any strategy. Yes, which I thought was a very interesting word that he used. And I it it kind of reminded me of our conversation about um, you know, how you know we like to see what you just said, like the shot selection and creativity and stuff like that. Yep. But I kind of thought it was sort of a disingenuous comment because I think Bryson does have a strategy. It's just not I don't know if it matches. It doesn't match the core time.

SPEAKER_00 18:28

Agree. He does have he talks about it.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

Yeah, I mean his strategy is like I'm gonna hit it as far as I can.

SPEAKER_00 18:32

Well, if Pine University has a strategy that ended up working, like there was this whole thing about, you know, I don't care if I hit it in some of the waste areas.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

Yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_00 18:41

Because I know how to hit I've worked, I've practiced these shots for weeks beforehand. So if I'm in the waste areas on somebody's holder, I'm cutting the corner, I'm okay with that. And I know where to miss. And obviously that worked for him. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:55

So I I don't know. I mean, I think strategy is an interesting word to use, and what is in the context of you know, someone who's grown up playing Lynx courses, like he has, I could imagine.

SPEAKER_00 19:07

Well, and Fowlow's the purest of purest too.

SPEAKER_01 19:10

So you compare him, like you have him watch Bryson, who's like I get it, changing all sorts of yeah, things of the game and 3D printing club stuff, right? Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I mean it makes sense. They would kind of not see golf the same way.

SPEAKER_00 19:25

Yeah. Um I don't fully disagree with what he's saying. No, nothing. You know, I mean he's got some valid points there for sure. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

I just thought it was an interesting.

SPEAKER_00 19:37

But I would I would equate that to 40% of the field. Well, yeah, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 19:43

Like exactly.

SPEAKER_00 19:44

And I don't think like we've talked about this, I don't think a lot of these guys have that type of game, and they're just never going to do well because of it. And it's it shows, I mean, the the statistics of these guys shows they're not successful overseas. You you just have to play that course that way. It's just there's no way around it. You can't you can try and overpower some of these courses, and sometimes you on some holes you will get away with that. Um but again, if you're coming into a par four and you have 50 yards left to some of these greens, it's not a good area to be in. Because you might as well put it at this point. Like it just you can't throw a spinner in there, it's not gonna spin.

SPEAKER_01 20:26

There's where your creative creativity comes into play and choosing where to put it. Yeah, even at the off the T or off the second shot or whatever. Yeah. Yeah, it's kind of I you you really just get respect a lot of respect for these guys that can win in any type of course. Right. I mean, I because you because of that, right? Like they can win in the tight, narrow, high trees, yeah, shaping shots, or they can win in wind and right, and you know, just rain and I mean it doesn't, yeah, it doesn't matter then.

SPEAKER_00 21:01

I mean, you look at the two greatest of all time, right? But those guys they weren't the straightest of drivers either. No. Most for most of their careers, they're not Rory. Rory doesn't he he's probably the best driver ever to play the game because of distance and accuracy. Tiger and Jack, they missed a lot of fairways. When Jack was on, he was piping it down the middle. But when he was off, he was hitting all kinds of wild shots just like Tiger did.

SPEAKER_02 21:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:27

And they won in ever on every course and every condition. They just they could adapt, they had the hands that probably no one else will ever have.

SPEAKER_01 21:37

The creativity, the way the way they could visualize I was just thinking that, yeah, see the shot that they wanted and execute it. Yeah. From the T to the butt.

SPEAKER_00 21:46

Yep. Yeah. Everything. And it was and they were always thinking from the green backwards, like if I if this then that, if this then that. Um, and that was that's that's how golf was always designed. And that's how you get better at golf. And that's why these guys are on tour. That's why they're the professionals. On some level, they all do that. But then there's like the next level to that. Yeah. And that's like where the links will show up. Um yeah. And not everybody's gonna play great every week, but but the guys that are gonna have success. I mean, Ricky Fowler's a great example. Ricky Fowler always plays well overseas. Yeah, he's he's done well in the open championships over the years. He can hit lots of crazy shots. He was working with Akshay this week and teaching him a bunch of different crazy Akshay was picking his brain. And there's this cool video of Ricky showing him different ways to hit like these little bump and runs. He even pulled out a three-iron at one point. Akshay's like, what what if I use three wood versus three iron? And Ricky was like, Well, this is why you wouldn't do this. It was really cool to watch. But he's because Akshay was kind of, you know, what if I try this? It's like, dumb, that's not even like that's not in your bag this week. Don't even think about doing that anywhere on any hole. Here's what you do. And it was it's really cool because that's that's how you play well in these on these courses. And I learned that too. Like, I remember before I went out there, I was working with I think I was working with a swing coach, and we were working on hitting flighted shots, and then around the green, like, how do you how do you hit a true bump and run? I didn't really know. Right. And I got to the first, you know, the we played Turnberry the first two days we were there, and I was kind of doing the same stuff these guys are doing now. It's like just rip driver. If I get in the junk, just swing hard and get it out, and then you get around the green, and I pulled out my lob wedge, and I was just trying to flop everything and getting frustrated. And one of the caddies was just like, Well, actually, no, that wasn't. That was when I got to the the next course, which I think was Murfield Village, that's when they're just like, You have to like my dad was, of course, trying to show me stuff, and I'm like, whatever. Right, you have to play these shots.

SPEAKER_01 23:55

Yeah, don't listen to my dad.

SPEAKER_00 23:56

Well, you know, you have to play these shots, yeah. And that's when it was like, and then we had some really good golfers with us, you know, scratch, scratch golfers that are like showing me how to play these different shots while we were there, yeah. And I started kind of getting it by the end of the two weeks. It was like that made sense. I'm like, that's you more than anything, you can see it once you've seen it, like you've hit the chip shot, you understand how that how that reacts, and then you can see it. So when you walk up around the green, you're like, oh, I see this shot now. I know what club to grab.

SPEAKER_01 24:25

That's a good you know, yeah, and that's where it comes from.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

Once you've seen it, done it, it's now in your brain, visualize it better and execute it better, yeah. Yeah, and I'll be honest, I probably should should play those more around here too. I mean, there's just there's more opportunity to play those.

unknown 24:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:40

Um, when I went out and played raindance, there was a few times I act I actually accidentally did one on like the third hole. Yeah, I thought I'd grab my lob wedge, I walk over and I'm like, how do I grab my pitching wedge? Not my this is ridiculous. So I was like, well, this I'm not going back to the cart, so I'm gonna figure this out. And I did, and it didn't turn out great because those greens were wicked fast.

SPEAKER_01 24:58

Um, but that would be an interesting like way to play around, is just pick a handful of clubs and only use those. Only use those the whole time. I mean, we we talked about that with the part three, right? But what about a full round? Like you know, bring a driver, bring a five iron, bring a seven iron, and a nine iron.

SPEAKER_00 25:19

And that's it. Like you just break it up. Those are the clubs you have for the round. Yeah. It'd be interesting.

SPEAKER_01 25:23

I mean, that's what I had when I first started playing golf. I only you only have like five or six clubs. Yeah, exactly. So you're kind of like, well, not that you can hit them very well.

SPEAKER_00 25:31

Well, back when these courses were brand new hundreds of years ago, they had seven clubs. Seven, yeah. Yeah. The mashy and the spoon, and the you just figured out different shots because and that's how the courses were made. Yeah. It was based on the equipment.

SPEAKER_01 25:45

Yeah. So those original links courses was all about keeping it low, running, creativity of weird lies. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:56

How to how to how to play around a course. And you just I mean you're you're hitting a lot of bunts a lot of times. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:02

Not real sexy fades, drawing.

SPEAKER_00 26:06

But I always enjoyed that. I always like seeing that, like, you know, and then it's like it just ground hooks or ground fades. And um, I that's why I think I like this more than anything. It's just I thought that was just cool.

SPEAKER_01 26:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:19

Yeah.

unknown 26:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:21

I don't like I said, I don't have a lot of experience playing those. It'd be I mean, I'd love to get more. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 26:25

And there's and there's like you said, I mean, there's a there's a few around here too. Um we'll pull some courses and go play some of those a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 26:33

More so than yeah, this other standard stuff we have around.

SPEAKER_00 26:36

Yeah, like the course up north is like that. I mean, it's kind of designed that way too. But yeah, there's there's opportunities even here. I mean, and I'm sure most states have some of that stuff. I mean, obviously, Bandon, you got to experience that. It's very similar to Link's golf overseas for sure. But I just, yeah, that's I don't know. I just I've always enjoyed like hitting trick shots almost. They're almost like hitting trick shots. Yeah, yeah. You know, kind of like I'm gonna hit this like low, it's gonna move up, and then hit this at the mound, you know, 150 yards out, and then take over the mound, and it should roll out 50 yards to the green. We'll see what happens. Yeah, you know, yeah. And I've had I saw a little bit of that today, but I I think we're gonna see more of that the wind picks up because this is a course where it really kind of demands that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 27:15

So yeah, we'll see.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

But yeah, it's it's fun tournament, man. I love it. I love it. Yeah, I always like it too.

SPEAKER_01 27:22

Yeah, it's always fun to watch. It's always fun. I like it because it's in the morning.

SPEAKER_00 27:26

Yeah, it's in the morning. You can get up as early as you want. Like it starts at like three if you know.

SPEAKER_02 27:30

Right.

SPEAKER_00 27:30

If you can't sleep, get up and watch some of the open. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's yeah, yeah, it's great. It's pretty cool. But um, well, yeah, speaking of which though, Bryson was playing well today. He finished at three or four.

SPEAKER_01 27:44

Four. Four under. No, three. Was he three? Yeah, he bugged 18.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

Oh, he did. I must have looked at something different. Okay. Um, Scotty was hanging around.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

Yeah, he's like two under, I think. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:55

So interesting field. We'll see. Morokawa was up there too, so he's starting to play well. And this is another course that would fit him if he's hitting it like that. So all right, well, that'll we'll we'll know next month on the podcast who wins. But that this is the last major of the season.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:12

Just based on the fact they've switched around the PJ Championship years ago. So I'm still feeling like I'm trying to get used to that, but I don't know. I kind of like it and I don't like it, but um anyway. Because it's July and then you have a lot of golf afterwards, right?

SPEAKER_01 28:24

Yeah, it feels like they're missing something at the end of the season. Yeah, if only the masters wouldn't miss it.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

They did that for the the playoffs and all that, yeah, for sure. And that's yeah, and then it it it actually opens up a little more room for these guys for the writer cup every other year, too, and the presence cup, and so it kind of fits that that mold. Um I mean, it was kind of nice because we got the BMW out here a couple years ago, and yeah, and they had all that going on after everything was over. So everybody comes out to play it for that reason.

SPEAKER_01 28:54

For that, yep. Yeah, that was cool.

SPEAKER_00 28:56

But yeah, anyway. Um went to the Corn Ferry, yeah, it's right the blue championship got to got to see that. Uh a couple local kids were in it. Right, I heard this was Miles Cool, who my son got to play in several tournaments against him. Yeah, they weren't ever paired in the same group, but one of his teammates was a couple times. Miles is as a heck of a player, and he's going to San Diego State next year. He missed the cut by one.

SPEAKER_01 29:24

Did he? Okay.

SPEAKER_00 29:26

Um, another course that's just super long. Yeah, that's a long one, but wide open. Um, so you can miss it a lot of places. So these guys, again, just hit it as hard as you can and then hit it again. Find it. You go find it and hit it again. They have a 773-yard par five.

SPEAKER_01 29:46

I remember that one.

SPEAKER_00 29:47

And yeah, nobody in the field can get home. Um that is a crazy hole. That that hole, so it's the number one handicap hole at um TPC Colorado. So I hate to admit this, but I got in a little online argument with a couple trolls about this course, and they were talking about how easy this course. I'm like, it's the number one handicap hole.

SPEAKER_01 30:11

They're saying that hole is easy?

SPEAKER_00 30:12

The hole is easy, it's a piece cake.

SPEAKER_01 30:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 30:14

And I was like, it's not. Um, the stats would argue the opposite of that. Yeah. Nobody can get home into any par five where you cannot get home into, you're forced into a situation to hit a wedge close or something else close, as close as you can, and then you have to make a putt. So you're basically getting up and down from wherever it is to make birdie. Otherwise, it's par or worse, right? The second shot at TPC Colorado, the the landing area. So just to kind of preface this so everyone understands, the landing area, after a 350 to 360 yard drive, there's a plaque out there right in the area where most of these drives are landing that says 400 yards to the front of the green. Okay? Think about that.

SPEAKER_01 30:57

Yeah, you're forced.

SPEAKER_00 30:58

The second shot is next to a plaque that says 400 yards. I don't care if we're playing at altitude, by the way, it's lower than here, but it's still at altitude. They're hitting five woods and three woods. They got to carry a giant waist area, cut the corner, to then land it 80 to 100 yards out, to then hit a wedge to a green that is nasty. It's very undulating, almost Robert Trent Jones-esque. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. The ball doesn't hold in certain areas, it will roll off, and you'll have another tough chip coming back.

SPEAKER_01 31:32

Yeah, I think that that second shot on that is the most daunting one. I don't know. I remember we because we hung out at that corner and just watched those guys.

SPEAKER_00 31:41

T-shots wide open. There's no trouble.

SPEAKER_01 31:44

We'll cut it open. Because that waste area was just like it goes on forever. Well, it's a and it's like a canyon. Yes, it's a it's a canyon. It's like this massive. Like I don't know how far down it goes.

SPEAKER_00 31:55

I mean, because I saw some guys in it. Yeah. Yeah. It's I mean, it's 50 feet. I mean and if you catch that, you know, if you don't catch it right, and I watched a few guys you know, cut them a little thin or went too far left, you're toast down there. Yeah, you can't. You are toast. I mean, the wall is as high as the ceiling. Yeah. I mean, it's a cool course. It's a cool course. I there I got to see some holes I hadn't seen at all when I went out there. We got to walk a few different holes. Yeah. Really cool holes. Um, but anyway, that that hole plays over par for the tournament history. 5.03 strokes. And for this week, it played 4.99.

unknown 32:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 32:38

So it's all the trolls that might be listening. I don't know what to say otherwise. Like, if it's that easy for you guys and you should try and qualify and come out and play in the blue championship next year.

SPEAKER_01 32:48

I don't know what they're talking about.

SPEAKER_00 32:49

Because yes, the t-shot's a piece of cake, and that's as far as you get. Go hit a shot from 90 yards on that hole and tell me how to many times you can make a putt.

unknown 32:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:59

That's I think that's that's the thing, is you gotta land a three-wood or five wood in that spot and then hit a wedge in there.

unknown 33:06

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 33:06

That's what makes par fives harder. Yep. So if you get home in two, yeah, they're easy. We can't get home in two. Yeah, when you get home in two, it's a different story.

unknown 33:14

Right.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

Any anyway, it was cool. That course plays over 8,000 yards from the two or Ts.

SPEAKER_01 33:22

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 33:23

It's not It's not the longest course in North America. It's not even the longest course in Colorado.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:32

Isn't that crazy?

SPEAKER_01 33:33

It is. It is. Yeah. It's amazing how long those are.

SPEAKER_00 33:39

There's courses longer than that. Castle Pines is one of them, and they play it all the way back, which they never do even for the when they have tournaments, but it can play at 8,300 yards. Okay. Yeah. I got to play rain dance. You got to play rain dance, yeah. Which is the longest course in North America. 8,463 yards.

unknown 33:59

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 33:59

Amazing. It's actually the third longest course in the world.

SPEAKER_01 34:03

Yeah. The one that's in China.

SPEAKER_00 34:07

So the China the thing with China, which is very interesting, is it's it's at 10,000 feet.

SPEAKER_01 34:12

Is it really? Yeah. Whoa.

SPEAKER_00 34:13

So you think you're playing at elevation here? Dude, that course, if you take it from elevation, is not even playing 7,000 yards.

SPEAKER_01 34:21

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 34:22

Actually, I think they said right at 7,000.

SPEAKER_01 34:24

I didn't realize it was at 10,000.

SPEAKER_00 34:26

10,000 feet. It's it's up in the mountains. In fact, they provide oxygen in the golf carts.

SPEAKER_01 34:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 34:30

Yeah. For people that go play at that. That's nice of them. Yeah. Snow Mountain Ranch, I think is what it's called.

SPEAKER_01 34:36

Maybe Breckenridge golf courses should think of doing that.

SPEAKER_00 34:40

Probably not a bad idea. Right. I wonder how many times that happens. You know, like I'm sure a bunch. Because people fly in and go straight up to play. Yeah. Which that's not smart.

SPEAKER_01 34:51

All the time.

SPEAKER_00 34:52

Yeah, it happens all the time. Skiing too, they do it. But you know, they come in and play golf and they go straight up to all these resort courses in the mountains, and then they wonder why they pass out.

SPEAKER_01 35:01

That's in the golf cart would be a great thing.

SPEAKER_00 35:03

Yeah, and and well, and Matt's mentioning Breckenridge because it's at 9,300 feet. Yeah. So it's not much, it's not much lower than Snow Mountain.

SPEAKER_01 35:11

Nope. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:13

But it's not even anywhere close to it's not it. The longest T-box, I think, is 7,600 yards. So it doesn't play that long, but you're huffing and puffing if you're not from around here.

SPEAKER_01 35:23

Right.

SPEAKER_00 35:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:26

Wow. 8,463 yards.

SPEAKER_01 35:29

Yeah, and you didn't play that bad. I did not play the two or T's. So that's I you played a little shorter.

SPEAKER_00 35:34

I played it shorter. I did not play two. But but some of the holes, as I came in to realize, some of the holes definitely, as we talked about before, play easier from those T's.

SPEAKER_01 35:46

The longer, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:47

There are some holes that don't. They require carries of 330 to 350 yards to get to the fairway. And I'm not talking about if you miss the fairway, you're in the rough in front of the fairway. Your ball is in a canyon, it's gone. Yeah. You have it's like it's absolute carry.

SPEAKER_01 36:03

That's amazing. That's such a long carry.

SPEAKER_00 36:05

That's long. There's a par three of it from the tour tees that plays 270 yards over a canyon. So I mean, it's it's I it's it's long, but it's it's very interesting. Ironically, the designer, so uh Harrison Minshew was the course architect, and then Fred Funk was the consult designer, so he was the one that kind of put this whole thing together. They designed it around all the natural features that are out there. So all those canyons, they didn't, they they just went around them. They just said, well, I'll put a fairway here, and then I guess the fairway starts again on the other side of this, and then the greens end up here, and that's where we're gonna put everything. And and they didn't disturb almost any of that landscape. They just basically just soldered stuff and go.

SPEAKER_01 36:48

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 36:48

So a lot of the holes have very elevated T's, but they also have a lot of like fairways that you know roll out quite a bit. There's a lot of downhill holes. Um, there's a few uphill holes, but most of the long, long ones have downhill, so you have advantage in that respect, too.

SPEAKER_01 37:03

Right.

SPEAKER_00 37:04

Um, but that's one of those courses where if you don't really understand the layout, you can be like, Am I hitting to this fairway? Or is that am I going this way? Like, what is this? I mean, that's why they have and they have golf carts because it's so spread out you have to ride, but the map will kind of show you. But there's a I mean, there's definitely I want to go back and play again because it's like we talk about all the time. It's yeah, we're playing it once is you're playing it once, you're like, I don't really know where I'm going. I kind of do, but I kind of don't, you know. And a couple times I was like, well, that probably wasn't the best play, but oh well.

SPEAKER_01 37:37

Yeah, what do you you you don't know? Don't know. Yeah, unless you're playing with someone who plays it all the time. Yeah. But even but even then, even even then, you're just kind of like, okay, we'll see.

SPEAKER_00 37:46

And then you gotta execute too.

SPEAKER_01 37:48

Well, then you gotta actually experience it. Yeah, and you're like, oh, that's why.

SPEAKER_00 37:51

Yeah, and that's why, exactly. You gotta be there in that spot. And I mean, there's there were a few times where I definitely didn't I didn't hit it on my line, and the line would have been right. But now I'm like, oh, that's definitely why. As I came to realize later, they have all the decor out there, it's all basically like farmland base, you know, it's all old hay silos and tractors, and they have tractors placed strategically on some of these holes where it's like that's your line. Oh, you want to hit out towards the tractor, you want it, and I came to realize that later, like that's where you want to be. Um so again, going back and playing would be like, oh, this is the tractor I want to hit to this, is the line I want to be on, and it made sense, yeah. Um, and then it's just like you know, depending on what tee you're playing from, how do you end up? Yeah, but really cool course. I mean, it's one I've wanted to play because of the prestige of it being the longest course in North America. Sure. Um, I can tell you if people are thinking about going out and playing there, there's plenty of T's. I mean, you can play less than 7,000 yards if you want. It's not like you have to, you don't have to play those T's. Yeah. So yeah, and you wouldn't. Like there's no need to do that. Play the right T's.

SPEAKER_01 38:59

As Cat Williams says, you don't get anything for playing first. No trophy.

SPEAKER_00 39:04

If you play the two or T's and come in, no one's gonna hand you a trophy. So go have fun. One of my favorite lines. Yeah, it's so great.

SPEAKER_01 39:10

I just found you don't get anything for that. I just figured I just found out no one gives you anything for this.

SPEAKER_00 39:15

So why the hell would I do it? Yeah, it's a very good point. Yeah. Um so we'll make a point to go out there and play it. Yeah, the range was really cool.

SPEAKER_01 39:24

Like the whole the the whole It looks nice. Yeah, just the Yeah, the video you took was cool. Yeah, it looks pretty cool.

SPEAKER_00 39:31

It's yeah, and if you haven't checked it out yet, it's on it's on the Road to Scratch YouTube channel. All 18 holes are up.

SPEAKER_01 39:36

Yeah, oh yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:37

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 39:38

So um what'd you end up shooting at in 11 over?

SPEAKER_00 39:42

Okay. And not all of it was swing based. I mean, some of those greens got me. I didn't know where to land it. I made some bad reads. Yeah, those greens um looked tough. Yeah, I'll tell you what. I mean, I three putted, I got hit driver eight iron on fourteen, if that's right. Um, three putted.

SPEAKER_01 40:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:05

You know, tough greens, and I knew they'd be tough. Yeah, I had some good shots, like some just like around the green, some good chip shots, and then I would miss like a five-footer. And it was just like, God, I executed perfectly, and then I missed the putt. So, I mean, I wasn't I wasn't expecting much.

SPEAKER_01 40:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:20

Um, keep it in play is the name of the game there.

SPEAKER_01 40:23

It's respectable though, if you've never played it before.

SPEAKER_00 40:25

Yeah. And then the first few holes, I was kind of like, I was out before the official first tea time. So, you know, with them letting me do it. And I by the way, I haven't mentioned Swing 365 Colorado, our sponsor, everything behind us, set all that up. Yeah, and huge thanks, yeah. Because that was that's awesome. Hopefully, we can put some more of these together because um it's it's such a it's a such a cool experience. So, anyway, I had to get out before the first tea time and set the pace so no one's waiting on me. Um, so the first few holes I played a little bit faster, yeah. Just because, but whatever. Just want to get some separation, just stay there because yeah, I just want to be able to like, you know, the everything in. Not worry about people, and not worry about like I'm not I don't want to, I'm all it was only be I was playing by myself, so I should be able to. By the way, I played in just over three hours, so right, yeah. Yep, not a problem. So great, but it's so it's playing by yourself is like one of the coolest things ever. I wasn't officially by myself, I had my daughter filming for me, but it was like yeah, I was on a golf course by myself. I couldn't tell you the last time I've done that, you know, yeah, other than like the part threes and stuff, but like being like playing 18 holes by myself, it's probably been I don't know, a decade. Yeah, I can't tell you.

SPEAKER_01 41:39

I honestly don't know if I ever have played all by myself for 18 holes.

SPEAKER_00 41:44

Yeah, that's been a long time something that I wish we could have. There's places here in the States where that's possible still, and like I'd like to have that experience as we as we are, especially as we get older. Yeah, I want to be able to do that more. Yeah, um yeah, just have to buy a course. Well, there's I mean, there's a couple in Florida that are for sale. I don't know if you want to fix one up, but uh there's yeah, anyway. So rain dance, great course. Swing 365 Carl to thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Yeah, it's awesome. What a cool opportunity. Um, and rain dance. I mean, I said it in my video, but thank you. But the staff was great. Yeah, um the director of golf was amazing to let me. I had to come back a couple times to like had some drone issues with uh my sim card got corrupted and then I fixed it, and so I lost some footage and then redid some footage. And anyway, they were super accommodating. That's awesome. Got to get out, you know, before everybody was on the course. And I mean, just being on a golf course when it's closed is pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01 42:43

That's that's even like just look around, there's nobody here. It's really not yeah, it's a great experience.

SPEAKER_00 42:47

Well, it's it was a great experience for sure. Um, yeah, so uh I yeah, going back, I can tell you there's several strokes. I probably I probably could have broken 80, even that playing. It wasn't hitting the ball great, but I could have brought broken 80 had I known where to hit a couple shots and then made a couple more putts, yeah, as we talk about in golf anyway, but whatever. Yeah, um, I mean, it is what it is. I'm not expecting much this season because of what I'm doing with my golf swing. The results are there, the scores are not gonna be there yet. Yeah. Um, I made some bombs. Did you? A couple long putts.

SPEAKER_01 43:19

Nice.

SPEAKER_00 43:20

And a few others that actually lipped out. In fact, I had one long putt for par. Actually, 14 was the, yeah, it's 13, then 14 was the par three down the hill. I hit my pitching which 40 yards left. I'm not kidding. I've like, I'm over an area, I'm like, I'm not sure anyone's been over here. And then hit this flop shot with this horrible lie on at the green, like, just to make good contact. I was pretty impressed with. Didn't bother to pull the pin. It hit the pin. And it was not like it was carrying a ton of space a pace either. It would have gone in.

SPEAKER_01 43:52

Oh wow. If you would have had the pin out of the pin out, it would have gone in.

SPEAKER_00 43:55

So never, ever, ever leave the pin in, in my opinion, but whatever. Um Anyway, I had some on the back nine, I was rolling some butts.

SPEAKER_02 44:02

Nice.

SPEAKER_00 44:02

Which is encouraging. So, Joe, I know you're listening. Thank you for adjusting my putter. Since you fixed my putter, I have putted so much better. In fact, the day after, the day you fixed it, by the time we got to the back nine, on 10, um no, nine, I rolled in a long one. Ten, I lipped out a 40-footer. So this guy is, he knows the stuff. Joe knows the stuff. Ever since then, I have rolled that putter so much better. That and then focusing on my on my stance or anything, too. But yeah. Just that little bit of tweak made me all the way. Yeah. So go get fit for a putter, maybe. Like have people look at the way you're putting. Yeah. You how do we get mad out there, Joe? Yeah. Maybe we'll make a trip this fall. Anyway, I've just been pleasantly, pleasantly more than surprised that yeah, that's actually that's an interesting thought.

SPEAKER_01 44:58

Yeah, Michael don't pay attention to I don't.

SPEAKER_00 45:00

I mean, as you say that, I'm like, get the right putter and then have the putter bend correct for you. For you, yeah. Yeah. Makes sense. Everybody stands over putts differently. If it's comfortable, it's a big deal.

SPEAKER_01 45:11

Yeah, everybody, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:13

Everyone's different. But yeah, anyway, I can't thank Joe enough for that. That was like, I mean, I literally thought about that the day I was playing Rain Dance, and I'm like, I've putted well ever since. Even when we went out and played the par three, yeah. My pace, once I figured out my pace, I was burning edges. Yeah. Like I I started on my line, and if I misread it, I misread it. That's a whole different thing. But they were rolling true. Yeah. Um I'm just saying, yeah. It I'll get it. But yeah, that's I mean, huge part of the game. In fact, I could have shot worse if I didn't make a couple of those big putts. Yep. Again, if I you know, you can do that all day with a golf tour, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:52

So yeah, that was my experience at Rainbow. Turn it on. It's funny.

SPEAKER_01 45:55

Yeah, I'm glad you got to do that next time. Something you wanted to do for a long time.

SPEAKER_00 45:58

If we can figure out next time where you can come to one of these, love it. That would be awesome. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:02

Yeah, absolutely. Just go experience it. I'd totally love to.

SPEAKER_00 46:06

Yeah. Yes. Did you get to play since our last podcast? You've played some, right?

SPEAKER_01 46:14

No, I just played the part three. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 46:16

I'm going tomorrow to play. You're playing tomorrow at Omni? Omni. Okay. Yeah. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 46:21

So that'll be good. I mean, I've gone on, I've been on the range a lot. Good. So it feels good. Getting there. Alright. Getting better. So feeling, yeah, you know. It's nice to have a few things to work on. Yeah. And, you know, have some a few goals, you know. And that's been fun. So just enjoying starting to feel it's and then you start noticing some improvement. Yeah. You know, here and there. And like you're like the I chipped really well when we went out and played.

SPEAKER_00 46:52

Yeah, you did you chipped and potted well.

SPEAKER_01 46:53

And so I'm I I felt encouraged by that. And there's you know, obviously a few things that are not quite there yet. But but you know, I think getting the grip in and dialed in and getting the my posture better and some other things has really made a difference. Simple stuff.

SPEAKER_00 47:09

A lot of it is simple stuff. But yeah, I mean if you're improving every day, it the scores aren't gonna always show that. Some of the results aren't gonna show that. But if you feel like okay, I've gotten better at this, my grip feels more comfortable. That's an improvement. My posture looks I mean, your posture looks so much better. It's night and day from what it was. So that's improv you're improving your video.

SPEAKER_01 47:29

We all do weird crap, man. This is why this game's so hard. We all just do weird crap. Yeah, you just figure out something that's working and sort of working, and you just stick with it. Yeah, it's not really ideal, yeah. Exactly. So yeah, we'll see what tomorrow's like. I mean, I haven't really played a it's been a little bit since I played a you know full round.

SPEAKER_00 47:50

So well, go chip and plot like you did, and you'll you'll have fun. It'll be fine.

SPEAKER_01 47:55

Yeah, no, I'm not expecting much. I never played there, so I don't know what to expect at all.

SPEAKER_00 48:02

It I from what I've heard, I've never played there either. From what I've heard, it's a really nice course. Yeah, it looks nice. I mean very pretty views and it's in great condition all the time.

SPEAKER_01 48:09

It always looks like good condition. So that'll be fun.

SPEAKER_00 48:12

So that'll be well, yeah. Take some picks and report back. Yeah, yeah, I'm interested to hear about that course. That's one I'd actually kind of want to play.

SPEAKER_01 48:18

So it's been on my I know I been on my list for a while. I don't know, I never comes to think about where to go. I'm for some reason never think about it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:28

I had a friend years ago that was can't say he was a member there, but he he he got on all the time and he invited me a few times and just never could make it work. Yeah, and then he since has moved out of state. But um, yeah, I'd like to go play there too. But yeah, yeah, report back, let me know.

SPEAKER_01 48:46

Lots of good courses around.

SPEAKER_00 48:48

Yeah, for sure, for sure. All right, so I wanted to get to speaking of game improvement. This is something I've been wanting to do for a couple podcasts, and I keep forgetting to do it since it's called The Road to Scratch, yeah. Um, and like tying statistics in because it comes into like especially like short game stuff and like having an understanding of some of the like the data of becoming what what scratch golfers do and what you need to do to get better at golf, I mean everybody kind of has an idea at some level, but it to have an eye-opening set of numbers in front of you where you you're I feel like for a while I was putting a lot of pressure on myself to do certain things much better when that wasn't really what the problem was. I mean, yeah, there's certain things within the golf swing that I had to fix, but as far as like hitting how many greens and regulation to hit, how many you know, fairways you have to hit, like when you go out and play, because you know, our friend Joe, who's a professional golfer, um playing with him in May, and then since then he's played more, and he's I mean, now that he's playing a lot, his game's back, like he's starting to really score. Yeah. Um Joe's always been good putter, good short game. Um, and he's just always been a pure ball striker, like he's just had a natural swing that just always he gets very creative. But I never paid attention to like how many fairways did Joe hit today, and well, you know, sometimes it felt like he wasn't playing great, and then he'd car to 74, 73, and I was like, Man, I thought you shot like 80, and it was like he was in the trees for the front nine, and he but what he does other places is what puts those scores together, and so that was the one thing that I wanted to go through real quick because I think it's interesting to find out, yeah. Um, so scratch golfers being a zero handicap or better, right? The average real score of a scratch golfer is 74.6, okay, which we kind of understood with the index and how it works, right? It's not even par. It's they're averaging around 74.6, which means they can shoot above and below that all the time. They are shooting the 60s, you have to to get to that number better. Greens and regulation, average greens and regulation percentage, 56%.

SPEAKER_01 51:05

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 51:06

Scrambling, so getting up and down 51% of the time. Driving accuracy, this is the one that I was just like, I couldn't believe this. Between 50 and 56 percent.

SPEAKER_01 51:17

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 51:18

So they're hitting half the fairways, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:21

I thought it'd be much higher than over half the fairways, yeah, which tells you a lot of things.

SPEAKER_00 51:25

Average driving distance, and I've heard this one. You if you're not hitting a certain distance, you can't get there because of just the way courses are laid out. Doesn't matter if it's overseas or not. Average driving distance between 250 and 276. This is carry distance. Okay. Um putting, they average 31 putts per round, which is higher than I would have thought. Yeah. Because I'm pretty damn close almost every round of that. Everything else is different, but 31 putts per round. They three putt one in every 39 holes. That's what I have to get better at. Yeah. So many three putts. So many that kill me.

SPEAKER_01 52:03

Every 39 holes.

SPEAKER_00 52:05

I hit lot I hit greens regulation, and I have more. I have I think I average three three putts around right now. Yeah. That's terrible. One in every 39 holes. Make your putts. Lag putting. Lag putting.

SPEAKER_01 52:20

I was just gonna say, it's not about making your long ones. It's not the 30-footer. It's making this.

SPEAKER_00 52:26

Because that that's the stat that was so from 150 yards in, this is exactly why it's lag putting. They get inside 15 feet from 150 yards 20% of the time. Which means their their dispersion is 30 to 40 feet. Their lag putting is really good. Yes. And here's the big one that I'm like, this is why I want to do this more than anything, because I want this is the elite of the elite. 1.9% of males have a zero indicate zero handicap index or better.75% of females have it.

SPEAKER_01 53:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:01

So you're literally the one percent if you get there. I love it anyway. I love it. That's what those are so I have those in there. I'm gonna start keeping my stats so I can see what I kind of have a feel, but it's really interesting to kind of keep a stats on that. So I wanted to throw that in there because as I'm trying to get there, good things to keep in mind, right?

SPEAKER_01 53:22

And and it's always I think when you watch some of these professional play and how close they can hit it all the time, and da-da-da, you sort of get fixated on some of that sometimes. But when you really step back and see a bigger picture, yeah, like they're not, you know, they're not always like what you think they are, right? But they are doing other things to help them, yeah. Like the lag putts and stuff. Interesting.

SPEAKER_00 53:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 53:48

Cool, ma'am.

SPEAKER_00 53:49

So there you go. Keep that in mind.

SPEAKER_01 53:51

It's like it's like baseball, right? Like the batting average, right?

SPEAKER_00 53:54

Yeah, what do you think about that? Hall of Fame is one and three is a hit. You're you're a Hall of Fame. You're a Hall of Famer.

unknown 54:01

Right.

SPEAKER_00 54:02

You're missing boggling.

SPEAKER_01 54:03

You're missing seven times.

SPEAKER_00 54:05

Yep. Yeah. Hit half your fairways, you'll get there. Yep. So it takes some of the pressure off, but anyway. Right. I thought those stats were very interesting, and that's I'm gonna start keeping track of that as an index more than just the index itself, too, and the scores. I'm gonna see where I'm at with those things. I know the three putts a big deal.

SPEAKER_01 54:23

Three putts, greens and regulation. Greens and regulation.

SPEAKER_00 54:26

A lot of my greens that I miss are from fairways. I know that too. So those two things right there, I'm I mean, I could probably shave three strokes off my handicap right there. Right. Yeah, quickly too. Very quickly. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 54:41

Yeah. Imagine if you just three putted once every 18 holes and stuff.

SPEAKER_00 54:45

Oh my god. Right. Well, even when I'm playing a raindance. Yeah. Um, two, three putts. That would have got me to an 80. Yep. Yeah. One more into 79. Yeah. I make one more butt. Make one more five footer.

SPEAKER_01 55:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 55:03

We'll see. But that's yeah, that's those things are so much more achievable than perception would allow. Yeah, right. Yeah. That's how you see it.

SPEAKER_01 55:11

It's kind of a fun thing to it's like I could do that.

SPEAKER_00 55:14

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 55:16

Doing it consistently.

SPEAKER_00 55:17

Yeah. Anyway, I thought that was interesting. So I'll keep track of that. Yeah, thank you. I just realized I asked if you wanted if you were going to bring something to the podcast tonight, and then I completely derailed you with the whole British Open stuff. No, you're good.

SPEAKER_01 55:32

That's good. Uh we'll we we can do that more next next time.

SPEAKER_00 55:35

Cool.

SPEAKER_01 55:36

Yeah, I think um, yeah. We'll just I'll bring it up.

SPEAKER_00 55:40

And I think we'll I want to bring a couple more stories in. So we'll I'm gonna keep working on guests if you have somebody in mind too, but I want to bring some stories in. Like we talked about some guys that we want to bring on for some golf stories, yeah. Um because there's some like some some deep-rooted like history stories with us and other things. So I like with us, yeah. Well, in general, um, and maybe we'll have a dad's podcast. I think that'd be hilarious. The Jeffries.

SPEAKER_01 56:09

Your dad would bogart the whole thing, man.

SPEAKER_00 56:12

Just gonna say that would be that'd be fun and not fun. I love you, dad. I love you dad. I love you, dad. I love you, dad. And and yeah, anyway. I think Jeff Bailey would have a lot more to say. I still think a uh Uncle Graham and Jeff Bailey podcast would be we wouldn't talk, yeah, but it would be very entertaining. It would. It would very at some point someday we'll get that to work. We'll see. We'll see. That would be great. It'd be a good one.

SPEAKER_01 56:41

Cool, man.

SPEAKER_00 56:42

Cool. Well, that's all I got. That's it. Um, yeah, on my end.

SPEAKER_01 56:46

Cool. Hey, thanks everybody for tuning in, listening.

SPEAKER_00 56:49

Yeah, thank you very much. Appreciate we're here on audio platforms. Any of your uh favorite podcast platforms are on that here on the YouTube channel. Thank you, Swing365 Colorado. Yep. Um, I want to hit some, but I know we gotta go.

SPEAKER_01 57:06

So they probably got somebody coming in.

SPEAKER_00 57:08

Probably got somebody coming in. So he's a busy guy. So this is a very, very great place. Um, use code scratch for 10% off any memberships. All the information is linked in the description in the show notes. Check that all out. Like this video on the way out. Appreciate the sub. It helps us get the podcast going winning and we having success, and we like to do this, and we like talking golf. So it doesn't matter if there's the three people listening to us. It's cool, but we'd love to have more. So be cool to have more. Yeah, we'd be cool to have more. We enjoy it. Uh I enjoy having golf discussions with you and having these talks. It's uh me too. It's always fun. It's a good time. I'm looking forward to it every month. So thanks for being here. Thanks for being a co-host. You bet. Thanks for having me. Have fun tomorrow. Yeah, yeah. Report back next month for us. Um XX Pictures, so make sure you text me. And until next time, we're out. See ya. Thanks, guys.