Hi, my name is Rooster, and I am an addict.
A golf addict that is! I absolutely love this sport. I have never felt more humbled and empowered at the same time as I feel while out on the fairways. If I can keep myself on the fairway.
I don't exactly remember when or how I started to golf, I know I was about 11, and I know I loved it right away. I took "junior golf" lessions that were put on by our local course. My instructor was a hard drinking, vulgar language using hacker by the name of Robert Sinclair.
Oh, Robert, such a great guy. He had the patience of a saint with us kids, which is suprising, because he is the only man I know personally what had goen through 3 full sets of clubs within the course of one season of golf due to rage induced tossing. There will be more on hm later, and I assure you, it will be funny as hell!
Since my town is remote, I never had much of a chance to compete in any formal tournaments, but I always tried to get come compeitions going with my fellow junior golfers. Honestly, I don't remember any details, but I have the feeling that things didn't always fall my way.
At the age of 15 I discovered girls, and so my clubs went into the shed and collected dust for many years. Seven years ago, right about the time I met my now wife, I took up the game again. This time with a vengance. I didn't have alot of money, and as my origional clubs were at this point rusted and bent, I was able to secure a beautiful set of Adams Tight Lies GT's from my cousin Lorne. These clubs were beautiful! Player style, cavity-back blades, with a graphite tipped rifled steel shaft and tour-wrap grips. They came with a Ping flanged-back blade putter and a sweet Ti-Cat 425cc driver. That driver was incredible. I was easily hitting 275+ yards on my drives (which I am only beginning to match again now), and hit it dead straight every time.
This driver made me look like a hero. I never had to use any of my long irons, as with my drives, I usually had no more than a 7 iron into the green on any par 4. Par 5's were a different matter, so I used driver, 7i, 7i and if I missed my approach, wedge. my game was coming along nicely, and I was running about a 20hcp until the sad, sad day my driver broke.
Now, normally when a club breaks, you can just fit the head to a new shaft and keep on playing. Unfortunately in my case my driver broke on the first hole of my home course. Picture this:
385yds, uphill par 4. The teebox looks out over a creek that is about 20yds wide. I lined up, checked my target and gae it a mighty swing to a full follow-through. The ball launched beautifully and I watched in pride as it climed up into the sky down the left-cnter of the fairway. My pride turned to horror as I then noticed a second, larger object following it into the sky. Oh no! The head broke off and landed with a splash in the creek.
Now you're probably asking yourself this question, so yes, I did go swimming for it. Unfortunately the creek is about 10 feet deep and filled with sediment with a muddy, goose shit bottom. I never found the head, but I got a nice (horrible) fever and chills for the next two weeks. And there was the end of an era.
I promptly bought a new Wilson driver and added it to my bag. I played with my clubs every day for 5 years until they were worn and bent and had to bite the bullet and buy a new set of irons.
Oh, so many choices! I went through so many different combinations of drivers, fairway woods and wedges over the last three years, I can't even remember them all. But I knew exactly what irons I wanted, so I bought them. I am now a Taylormade man! Well, mostly. R9 425cc driver, r7 3 wood, Tour Burner irons, Titelist Vokey 56 wedge, and my same old Ping putter that I have used since I had my Adams clubs.
I am not running a 12hcp, and getting a little better all the time. Except for the occasional blowup. (like the 23 I shot on a par 3 during my club championship tourney on Sunday) For some reason though, I have a relenting fade that sometimes turns into a vicious slice. and that is why I named this section Hello Hazzard, because all the lateral/OB are, for some reason, down the right side of the fairways on my course. Still some tweaking to go!
And alas, since there is now a foot of snow on the ground, I won't be updating this section until I can swing in the sun again. I pray for an early spring!!
