Hey guys! As promised, here is my first post documenting my journey to becoming a member of the PGA of America! In this blog I will focus primarily on my golf game, but I will also go a little bit of what we went over in class when I feel it’s appropriate. For example, the Qualifying Level test is scheduled for October 6, and when I get my results I will post here.

For this first week and a half or so (Aug 12-21) I will only go through highlights on the golf course. In class it was mainly just introductions.

Aug. 13: I played an eight-hole 3v3 scramble with a few guys. Unfortunately we lost but it was great to be back on the course.

Aug. 14: I decided to walk 18 holes this day, and I think I already posted it in What’d You Shoot Today. I shot a 91. Won’t get into a lot of detail, but it was just a rough start and I just couldn’t get anything going.

At the end of the day, I wasn’t thrilled but being only my second time walking the course I wasn’t exactly upset either.

Aug. 16-17: Both these days I walked 9 holes but didn’t keep score. I just hit some practice shots trying to get to know the course before my PAT (more on that below). I probably would’ve shot around bogey golf playing my first ball though.

Aug. 18: I finally decided to do some much-needed range work, and I spent about 30 minutes just trying to find some consistency in my swing. After finding nothing I went to one of the pros and scheduled a lesson for 11:00 the next day.

Aug. 19: Friday was a big day. In the morning I had the aforementioned lesson, and I found out something.

I learned that I am hunched too much over the ball, and that my most common miss (hitting it thin) comes from that swing fault. Over the course of the lesson I put down a few key things about my setup (he didn’t even touch my swing):

•Feet slightly more than shoulder width apart. I also lose balance on a decent handful of swings, and this definitely helps with that.

•Drop my back foot back slightly. Apparently I’ve always had an open stance, which has led to a lot of slicing the ball.

•Ball positioned in the center of my stance. I’ve always had my irons about 1/3 of the way back, and it’s always seemed to work for me. This is a lot better and also leads to more distance.

•Push my butt out slightly. He said this would give me more room to swing as opposed to standing straight up.

Then that afternoon, we had our Welcome Back Scramble, which was essentially 17 fivesomes (2F, 1So, 1J, 1Se) in a scramble except for the rule that whoever’s shot was used did not hit the next shot. 

There isn’t much to say about this outing. I predicted the winning score would be -11 (it was actually -9) and that we would shoot -8 (we actually shot -4). I could probably count the number of good shots I hit on one hand. It was a fun day though.

Unfortunately I haven’t gotten any golf in yesterday or today, because yesterday I figured I needed a day off after playing/practicing six days in a seven-day stretch. Today I was planning to walk 18 holes first thing, but the course and practice facilities were closed around 8:00 due to weather.

Now I’m going to talk about the upcoming PAT. The policy is that unless you’re sick, you’re taking the PAT. The good news is that this one is spread out over two days, so we’re only walking 18 holes each day.

My goal in this PAT isn’t super optimistic because it’s my first one, but I honestly want to post something around 170 for the two rounds. I know I’ll be feeling pressure on the first tee but I know the course well enough by now so im feeling pretty good.

As for future plans for this blog, I’m planning on posting every Sunday, and for now I’ll set it so it doesn’t actually post until 9PM in case I had something going on and couldn’t write until later in the day.

Stay tuned for Week 2! I’m considering making two posts to the blog next Sunday: one for Monday-Friday and one solely dedicated to the PAT.