Dear Penthouse Forum: I never thought this would happen to me…

As you may recall from Volume 8, I decided to go ahead and play 18 holes in order to establish a handicap ahead of my very first tourney. Well, the tourney just happened and guess what?

I fucking won.

Not only that, I achieved my first golfing goal: To shoot under 100.

Let’s start at the beginning and go from there. The tournament was a “full flight” tournament, which means that all the competitors were split into different “flights” or categories of player based on their handicap. Since I had a handicap of 37.6, I was placed in the “C Flight” which corresponded to roughly 20 and above.

On the day of the tourney, I arrived an hour early to warm up properly and also to figure out what the hell was going on. Remember this was my first tournament EVER, so I had no clue.

I got a small bucket of balls and hit the range. I focused mainly on the clubs I would be hitting off the tee at first but then I realized I should hit all the clubs just in case. The 30 balls went by quickly. The warmup did its job, though, as I was starting to sweat and I took off my top layer of multiple sweatshirts.

I met up with the tournament organizer and he very kindly gave me the run down and provided me with my official Golf Club baseball cap and beer koozie. I also met my playing partners.

The playing groups were not, as I had assumed, separated by skill level. I had actually been placed in a group with two guys that were in “A Flight” and one guy in “B Flight”.

If I wasn’t feeling enough pressure by playing in my very first tournament, this certainly added to it. However, there was no backing out. I had to make the best of it and do my best to try to keep up with those guys and not embarrass myself.

Due to my handicap, they assigned me to play from the white tees while the other guys played from the blues. That took 3 strokes off my handicap for the day. Another three strokes were taken off my handicap for a reason I don’t really understand (maybe course conditions?) and so my overall handicap for the day was 31. What that meant was that you would take my raw score, subtract the 31, and that would be my net score. That score would be compared to the other players in my flight to determine the winner and points would be adjusted accordingly.

Oh, and did I mention there was a prize purse?

In addition to points, top performers in each flight would win money from the pool. Each player paid $60 for the tourney and the money left over after the course fees were paid became the prize pool.

I had opted for the cart and we were to share carts, so I had an older gentleman playing with me and riding on the cart with me. He was one of the “A Flight” guys and he was a very good player.

We all teed off on the first tee. Well, they teed off first and I teed off last because I was on the whites. This would be the case for every hole regardless of “honors”. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, “honors” means that the person with the lowest score on one hole gets to tee off first on the next hole.

I managed to hit a solid tee shot on the Par 4 first with a Driver onto the fairway of the next hole over. However, I recovered with a beautiful shot over the trees that landed just short of the green. A few strokes later, I finished with a 6, which was my best score on that hole in ages. Moreover, all the other guys started off slowly and the whole group ended up with sixes. Devil’s Hole, indeed.

On the Par 4 second hole, I hit a 1 Iron dead straight but low to the ground. It rolled to the apron of the green. A few strokes later, I had a 5. This was a dream start.

And then came the 3rd hole.

I hit my tee shot off to the right by where a maintenance area was. I was pretty sure it went out of bounds but I hit a provisional just in case. It turned out it WAS out of bounds, but I managed to find three very nice Callaway golf balls that I pocketed for my trouble. Somehow, I got out of that Par 3 with a 7. I was very careful to consult with my playing partners as to how to play it and what the rules were.

I bogeyed the Par 4 fourth and got a 3 on the Par 3 fifth. I hit a perfect shot that landed on the green 6 feet 7 inches away from the cup. That’s one Game Time Decision, for reference. The reason I know this is that there were also Closest To The Pin contests on all Par 3 holes. At that point, I was the closest of all players.

The Par 5 sixth is a long uphill dogleg right with which I’ve had problems in the past. I got out of there with a 7 and moved on to the Par 4 seventh. I got a 7 there too thanks to some adventures in wayward chipping.

The 8th was another Par 3 closest to the pin opportunity and I again hit the green. This time, I was about 13 feet from the hole. I two-putted to get a valuable par.

The traditional closing hole (the course has only 9 holes) is another long Par 5 and it’s the second toughest. I got a Snowman 8 and finished with a very respectable 51 on the Front Nine.

By this time, my play was getting the attention of my playing partners. One particular elderly gentleman was very kind with me and said I would be in the running for the win playing like that. He said the others were like, “where did this guy come from?”

I humbly said that I still had a long way to go and there would be plenty of time for me to come back down to earth. The truth is this was the best I had played in literally decades. I was focused on easy controlled swings and not trying too hard and it was working for me. I just needed to be mentally strong enough to continue doing that for another 9 holes.

A fun wrinkle of this tourney was that the tees were changed after the Front Nine. The Back Nine tees were, appropriately, moved back to make the holes longer.

Somehow, I managed to play even better on the second go-around. I got two pars on Par 4 holes and a Par on the Par 5 sixth (now 15th). I did get another Snowman on the last hole, but I finished up with a 48 for a grand total of 99!

At the end, I stuck around to get a feel for the guys in the club and to find out the results. As I was waiting in the bar for my carne asada burrito, one of my playing partners ordered a margarita. The poor guy behind the bar must have been a rookie as he couldn’t find the tequila. I helpfully directed him to the Patron bottle and said, “That’s tequila” and got my partner a premium margarita for the price of a well drink. He chuckled and thanked me after the guy went into the kitchen to check on food orders.

You need to repay the good karma you get.

At the end, it turned out my net score of 68 ( so close, Scotchy!) was the lowest of not just my flight, but of the entire tourney! I also got Closest To The Pin for my 13 footer. I missed Closest To The Pin on my 6′ 7″ effort by those 7 inches. Insert Deanna Favre joke here.

I also got three skins for my flight thanks to those Back Nine pars. Overall, I am second in the points standings for all members with 110 points (5 behind the “A Flight” leader) and I got $90 from the prize pool.

Yes, I turned a profit.

PROS

Goal of shooting under 100 has been achieved.

Had a wonderful time with very kind and supportive playing partners.

Only lost one ball but found three.

Net winnings of $30 and 2 golf balls.

I fucking won!!!

CONS

I need to continue to work on my game so I can be consistent. The bar has been set high. I need to maintain that level and improve.

No sexy golf cart girls. I’m now thinking they are urban legends or things from earlier times that are no longer allowed.

OVERALL RATING:

I still can’t believe this happened. I never expected things to turn out the way they did. I need to harness this and build on it.

My established handicap has now been updated. It has gone from a 37.6 to a 34.2.

The USGA has officially certified that I suck a little less.

Of course, this means that future tournament wins are less likely. As my handicap goes down, the advantage will be less. I am fully aware that there was a unique set of circumstances that allowed me to get this win and that it will be very difficult to do this again.

I don’t care. It was worth it and it’s an amazing feeling to say you’ve won a golf tournament. Besides, my goal is to get better, not win tournaments. I truly believe the reason I did so well was because of the good players I was playing with. I told them that too. I needed to be pushed and it provided great results. Thank you to them.

See you next time.