beisenhauer

When I got my Mizuno irons I quit using headcovers. The Mizuno website recommends against it because the cover trap moisture on the club.

I started using GS just a few months ago. I'm currently using a Snake Eyes 655TJ driver, and I built a GS Hi-COR driver for my dad. I'm wanting to try out the Snake Eyes Python XL and the Quick Strike hybrids.

I'd just like to give some quick props to Ernie Els. After a horrific opening round he made the cut on the number and came back for a T7 finish. Aside from Harrington, he was the only player in the field with multiple sub-par rounds. Way to hang in there, Ernie!

Yea. The guy won a major his first time out. Lucky? Maybe, but I won't fault the guy for that. Justin Leonard

I finally finished in the money in my golf league this week (14th out of 15 places paid.) Not only that but I also won a skin which, since we were rained out in the middle of the round last week, was worth double this week. I shot eight over for nine holes, but seven of those shots over par came on two holes. I was one over for the other seven with two bogeys and a birdie.

I played my free samples for the first time last night in my league. Finished in the money for the first time this season and won a skin. It could have been mental, but I'm sure there were at least two shots that would have trundled well past the hole with my regular ball, but instead checked up and stayed near the hole. One saved par and the other got the skin. It was also noticeably straighter off the tee. I consider $45 a lot of money for a dozen golf balls, but if I keep getting results like this, I'll have to consider it.

I collect movies. I haven't counted in a long time, but I guessing the total is somewhere around 400+, not counting TV shows and documentaries. http://www.dvdspot.com/member=beisenhauer

Here's what I do, though I can't say I would recommend it to anyone else (see handicap). I play these like a long chip: stance slightly open, weight on the forward foot. I try to get a little bit of wrist cock on the back swing, but not too much; it's mostly a nice rhythmic arm-and-shoulder swing with very little hands. All I'm looking for is clean contact with a descending blow. One thing I find helpful during my preshot routine for these kinds of "feel" shots is to imagine simply tossing the ball toward the hole with my hand. This usually helps me get a feel for the kind of trajectory I want and how hard I need to hit the ball. Your mileage may vary.

It looks like K.P. will almost certainly have the points to qualify for the team. He's currently fourth on the list, and Tiger doesn't really count. With two more majors before (and a WGC event) there's certainly room to shake up the standings a bit, but I don't see five guys passing him at this point. If he does drop out of the top eight, it would take a huge collapse during the period when players want to get hot if they expect a captain's pick, making him a problematic selection, even with multiple wins this season. As for Rocco, there are still the aforementioned majors and a WGC event left. Good showings in those tournaments would make a good case for him making the team, but otherwise I wouldn't expect to see him at Valhalla.

I believe it was Mark Twain who said, "Before picking up a lost ball, the rules of etiquette demand that the player must first wait for it to stop rolling." Or something to that effect. I've never really had a problem with this, and I only pick up balls that I'm certain cannot belong to anyone still playing the course.

Actually, a 10% increase in shoulder turn should yield greater than a 10% increase in power. Warning: engineer-speak ahead. The amount of energy stored in a spring, which is essentially what your torso is during the golf swing, is proportional to the square of its displacement. Translation: If you stretch a spring twice as far, you get four times the energy. If you turn 10% farther, you get about 20% more power. Personally, I find that if I don't make a full turn, then I tend to swing out-to-in, whereas a full turn allows me to come more from the inside.

Blood, Sweat and Tears - "And When I Die"

After the U.S. Open playoff yesterday afternoon, I was so fired up I just had to run out for a quick 9 holes. Shot a 4-over, 38, which is my best ever 9-hole total and ties my best relative to par. I wasn't hitting my irons very well, but I had a pitch from about 60 yards that I ran up to two feet from the hole. I also drove the green on a par four; back fringe actually. (Scorecard said 303, but I don't think it's that long. Hard fairways too. And a helping wind.)

I love Tiger. I love watching him do what he does. But I was rooting for Rocco all the way. That said, I don't feel sorry for Rocco. There are a lot of guys who have gone up against Tiger and lost: Chris DiMarco, Bob May, etc. Few, if any, have made as good an accounting of themselves as Rocco did this week. He went toe-to-toe for 90 holes with quite possibly the best ever to play the game. He was unlucky in that sudden death started on a hole that didn't suit his game, and he made one bad swing and one less-than-perfect swing in his attempt to recover. That's all. I think once he gets over the initial disappointment, he'll be able to hold his head up pretty high.

Anybody else notice that the next new episode is June 17th? Are they skipping this week because of the U.S. Open? Surely they could run "Tiger's Dramatic win at Pebble Beach" one less time.

I've just been listening to a podcast interview with Tom Olavsky from TaylorMade. One of his comments was that they could come out with a new driver about every 3 months, at least in terms of product development, but that the market basically won't bear that kind of product cycle.

$5 for ~45 balls $6.50 for ~75 balls $8 for ~100 balls

Yesterday I made three consecutive birdies (and nearly made four) for the first time ever. I'm not sure whether I've even made two in a row; if I have, I don't remember it, and I think I'd remember something like that. I was playing a two-man scramble with my dad, but on these three holes we used all of my shots. The first was a short par 4, 311 yards, slight dogleg right. All of these holes were playing straight downwind, and it was blowing at least 20 mph yesterday. I hit a hybrid off the tee to about 40 yards from the pin, a lob wedge (Dave Pelz's 9:00 swing with a 60° wedge) to about 8 or 10 feet and holed the putt. Next was a 494-yard par 5, again downwind. Driver and hybrid put me just off the back side of the green. Chipped to about four feet and holed the putt. Third was another short par 4, at 300 yards. I hit a low, stinging driver (not on purpose) which wound up near the bottom of a swale that runs across the fairway but with a good lie. Again I was about 40 yards out. I hit the same lob shot that I had two holes earlier with the same result: the ball stopped about 8-10 feet past the hole, and I holed the putt. I should point out that I was putting first on all of these holes, so I didn't have the advantage of seeing my partner putt first. The only place that probably helped was with the chip shot on the par 5, where my dad played first, and I got see how the ball would react on the green before I hit my shot. The hole following these three, I was on the green in regulation with another 10-12 foot look at birdie, but I missed the putt. My dad didn't. I threw in another "by myself" birdie later in the round, just for good measure. It was a good day.

60°: 70-75 yds 56°: 100 52°: 115 PW (46°): 125-130 9: 135-140 8: 145 7: 155 6: 165-170 5: 180 4: 195

I'm 6'3" and play +1 1/2" (not very long arms for my height), 1° upright. Like others who have posted before, getting fitted was the best thing I've ever done for my game. (Even better than lessons. You have to practice those. )

It certainly is. Aiming left would probably work much better. But seriously, I tend to play with whatever swing I brought to the course that day, with the caveat that one bad swing does not a round make. My normal shot off the tee with anything other than the driver is a draw (of varying degree), so I tend to make sure that I've got room left of my target. (It's the opposite with the driver.) If I slice my first tee shot with a 3-wood, I don't necessarily assume that I'll slice it all day long until I start to repeat that result.

Did you not see Big Break Mesquite last fall? Everyone jumped all over Anthony for essentially the same reason: attitude. Personally, I'm rooting for Kim and Sam.

I've been playing in a league this season, which is my first regular exposure to a competitive situation in a very long time (since high school). I'm appalled at how many people don't know the unplayable lie rule, and the options that go with it. Here they are (all under 1 stroke penalty): 1) Drop within 2 club lengths, not nearer the hole. Note that you can measure with any club in your bag; you can get two driver-lengths even if your next shot will be played with a sand wedge. 2) Replay the shot from the original location, effectively the stroke-and-distance penalty. 3) Drop as far back as you want along a line from the flag through the ball, again, not nearer the hole. This is particularly useful when you're under a tree with a clearing behind you. Go back 10 yards, 15, whatever it takes that you can get a clear shot over the trees. Or drop at your favorite yardage. #3 seems to be the most misunderstood: I've heard at least two people insist that they can drop along a line back to the tee.

You want a playoff? Let's have a playoff! Here's my idea. Three events. First one: the top 144 or whatever from the FexEx Cup point standings. If you miss the cut (or don't play) you're finished. Second event: everyone who made the cut the week before. Top 30 finishers move on to the Tour Championship. And the Tour Championship is 72 holes for all the marbles; whoever wins gets the $10 million. No points reset, just three weeks of do-or-die, play well or go home. Of course it'll never happen, because the likelihood of two or three of the big names not making the Tour Championship would be too high, and the networks would get upset.

Didn't know that. My bad. Thanks.