Under 80
Shot 78 or 79 at Tobacco Road today, one of the most overrated courses I've ever played. 78 or 79 because it depends on whether I would have made a 3-footer on one hole where we were trying to pick up the pace a bit.
I also took another ball off the first tee (which I normally hate doing, but ugh, it was cold and I was tense) and another when a playing partner shouted something during my swing. For about the fifth time that day.
Tobacco Road, or "The Road," is flash and glamour that relies on severe trickery and six or seven blind approach shots from the fairway. I don't mind the many blind tee shots - the fairways are 80 yards wide most of the time - but blind approaches bug me. One or two a round, fine. As many as this course has, well, it's just circus trickery.
Play the course a time or two and you know where to put your tee shots. Play it a fifth and sixth time and you have an idea where you want to come in for your approach and land the ball. But Tobacco Road relies on the fact that it has no membership and players of the "travelling" nature play it once or twice a year. That's how it's "tough." It's pure target golf, except far too many times per round you really have no idea where the target is.
Tomorrow is Mid-Pines. My play's continued to improve after my winter layoff, and the 680s got a bit of a workout today, as did the B330s. Both are solid - I may have to play the B330s after I run out V1xs.
Hopefully it won't rain today.
BTW, I recommend playing Tobacco Road once.
Once. I called it the Britney Spears of golf (all show, no substance) earlier today, but further consideration tells me that's not very accurate. I'll change that... You see, Britney has been done before (I don't mean it that way). Tobacco Road is, if nothing else, something you're likely never to have seen before, and likely something you may never see again. But that alone doesn't make it a good test of golf.
And perhaps that's where I and my playing partner are different. I look for a good test of golf - one that asks for a shot and rewards those who pull it off, while increasingly penalizing those who don't.
The Road has good risk/reward holes (good). The par 3s are all seemingly the same length (and only one over 150, IIRC - bad). The fairways are wide and the conditioning was great for the time of year (good). Pace of play was bad - a real big downside to all the blind shots. 5 hours in a cart with relatively close green-to-tee distances (only 3 took more than ten seconds in a cart).
I realize I'm going against the grain here with my opinion on the course. Everyone and their brother has jizzed their pants over teh course - including the playing partner - but I just didn't care for it. Play it once, then go play something else (Pinehurst #2?) to death.
