A lot happened this week, as y’all will see!

Monday (9/5): My brother and I actually had an afternoon tee time and were planning on playing a quick 9 before I had to leave again, but we unfortunately were rained out.

Tuesday (9/6): Didn’t get to the course Tuesday, but I did have my first interview! 

We had a few pros from the Country Club of Virginia come down and talk to us during class about their facilities and internship opportunities, and everything about them and the opportunities I could have at CCV intrigued me.

So I made an interview appointment for that afternoon, and it went well. I came away from the interview feeling good, and I’ll know in a week or two if I got the internship there!

Wednesday (9/7): Our first player development class was supposed to be on this day (we were gonna work on putting), but like Monday, we had lightning keep us from doing anything. I was planning on hitting balls after class too, but obviously that didn’t happen either.

Thursday (9/8): First PGM seminar was Thursday, and we just talked about cover letters and resumes and how to write them effectively. 

Apparently for the third week of seminar (9/22), we are having pros from the one and only Augusta National coming to give us a presentation. I’m definitely pumped for that!

Friday (9/9): After my last class Friday I decided to go the course and play nine holes. Not getting out much since the PAT definitely showed. I got away with my Mishima on the first few holes and started par-bogey-bogey, but then made a 10 on the fourth hole after losing two balls and it went downhill from there.

I used the rest of the round as a practice round and actually stayed on one green for a solid 15 minutes and worked on short game. What was a failing round turned into a productive practice session.

Saturday (9/10): Yesterday I played my first real scoring round since the PAT. My dad and brother came to join me at King’s Grant, which is a fun par 71 just down the road, and I played the back tees (6302 yds, 71.0/137).

The only part of my game that showed up was my driver. I repeatedly put myself in position to score, but the irons failed me miserably. The overwhelming majority of my misses were off the toe, and I had probably three good iron and hybrid strikes all day. I only hit two greens and couldn’t make a putt. Here’s the scorecard.

The quad on 5 was mainly due to a double cross off the tee and a three putt, but everything else was consistent.

Honestly, to shoot 87 and hit the ball as poorly as I did was encouraging. I clawed out a decent number after one of my worst ballstriking days in a while, nothing close to my best. Did I get lucky with my misses? Maybe. But it’s still promising.

Today (9/11): For the third time this week, I was planning on going to the course, this time to work on just getting back to solid contact with the irons after what happened yesterday.

But this time, the course was closed because we had 2 inches of rain yesterday afternoon and in the early portion of the morning today, so day two of golf team tryouts were canceled and the course and practice facilities were closed.

So definitely not the most ideal week, but a lot of good things happened that I liked. A few things that are coming up:

•This week: The first round of the first major on our tournament circuit, the club championship! All who sign up (myself included) will be put into a matchplay bracket and we will be seeded as follows:

•Exempt golf team members

•Those who’ve passed the PAT

•Those who haven’t passed the PAT.

Not sure if there’s a qualifying portion involved, but I’m excited for it to start!

•Two weekends from now: The club championship at Hillandale, which I have also signed up for. I was planning on going home that weekend to see my grandparents, and that also happened to be on that weekend, so I figured why not?

Might go home next weekend and play a practice round at Hillandale from the back tees (including the back tee boxes on some holes that are almost never used in case the tees are back), but I’ll make that decision as we get closer to the weekend!