RIGA Public Links Championship

RIGA PUBLIC LINKS CHAMPIONSHIP

Tournament golf is different. I guess I’d be a much better writer if I could paint you a better picture, but I just shot seven strokes higher than my worst round on a course I know fairly well. Everything about Triggs Memorial in Providence, RI was a little different today. The rough was a little thicker and the pins were tucked slightly in a few places, but the wind wasn’t blowing like it normally does, and the tees were moved up a little from where I normally play. But the score is the score, and my score was a robust 97. I shot 97 on a day I putted well, Lord knows what I could have posted today.

A few positives came from this experience. I hit my first tee shot after someone announced my name, that was interesting. Even though no one in my group hit the first fairway, the fact that my first tee shot never got above my head made mine stand out a little. After two holes I was one over despite two skulled tee shots and three skulled approached shots. A great pitch to two feet saved bogey on the first, and a miraculous 7 iron that stayed about 10 feet off the ground but settled five feet from the pin for an unlikely par on the second had me feeling conflicted. I would have gladly taken a nine over round no matter what it looked like, but my blind luck couldn’t last. Several blocked tee shots later it was looking like a long afternoon.

Saturday went smoother for the most part. With no expectations or pressure, and very few people still on the course my ball striking dramatically improved. I struggled to convert scoring chances and still found ways to card big numbers, but it wasn’t until the final holes when things really fell apart. A few poor decisions coming in led to a poor 91, but a six stroke improvement is something to build on going forward.

All in all the tournament will be put down as a learning experience, one that I am in no rush to relive.

But the nature of competitive golf is completely different from casual weekend rounds, and one lesson I learned and relearned over the 36 holes is the importance of confidence. Confidence in club selection, confidence in the putting line, and confidence that no matter the lie or the trouble between you and the hole that you are going to put a good strike on the ball. When the latter is lost so is the round, and unfortunately I lost that somewhere around the third hole of day one at Triggs.

Once we as competitors allow doubt to creep in we’re finished. Unbridled bravado can be a good thing sometimes, no more so than in the middle of a poor stretch of holes.

Next time I card consecutive double bogeys I am going to convince myself that anything worse than par is unthinkable, trust the swing, and make a par. The game gets complicated because we let it, something I take to an extreme-a chorus of swing thoughts from backswing to finish. A little better mental game would have taken a dozen shots off my card over the two days.

The experience forced some separation from the course for a week or two, and some separation from the blog for a few weeks to refocus. I’m happy to report I enjoy golf again and the scores are coming back to the pre-tourney level.