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Scoring at KGNS

Despite being a member of KGNS, the number of times I play there over one year can probably be counted with one hand. It’s such a waste of money each month, and furthermore, now both KGNS and Rahman Putra has put in the F&B fee of RM150 for all members. This means each quarter we need to spend RM150 or else it just gets deducted automatically from our membership fee! So this forces us to eat in the club – both clubs thankfully has passable (not terrible) food so it’s just a matter of playing there once in a while.

Wednesday is maintenance day for the championship course back 9, so for this game, we teed up front nine KGNS agong Course and cross over to the back 9 of the Mickey mouse putra course.

Hole 1: Par 5, relatively straightforward. A good drive, but my second shot with hybrid hooked and was lucky to be alive (not OB). Third shot from the trees with a pitching landed me to the front. Over powered my chip but thankfully hit the flag and trickled to around 6 feet for par. Missed, started with bogey. (+1)

Hole 2: Index hole that needs a great drive. I did not do a great drive and got caught in the trees on the right. I kept my 5 iron shot low and luckily avoided the trees to around 10 feet from the green. I nearly chipped in again to a few inches and tapped in for a Par. (+1)

Hole 3: This is again a straightforward par 4. Hit a very good drive right down the middle, and landed a bit on the rough. With a SAND WEDGE in hand to 100m, I SHANKED the beejeezus out of the ball! Muttering and now on the Hole 2 fairway, I hit my sand wedge to the green and two putted for an utterly unnecessary bogey. (+2)

Hole 4: Par 3, quite a long one. Hit a 5-iron but curled into greenside bunker. Blasted quite a good shot out to around 6 feet, but missed the par by inches. Bogey. (+3)

Hole 5: Supposedly the difficult par 4 with trouble on left water. I stripped my driver down the left and in a good position to get this on the green from about 140m. I opted to chicken out my approach with a pitching wedge and predictably fell short. A mediocre chip found me around 6 feet again from the hole and like the previous one, missed again. Bogey. (+4)

Hole 6: This is a short par 5, but an uphill walk (we were walking today) didn’t do us good. My drive was a bit right, and I hit a good 5 wood — but did not realise there was a fairway bunker smack in the middle of the fairway. So my third shot from bunker out to around 10 feet of the green, and I opted to chip, which wasn’t good and I missed my par, again. (+5)

Hole 7: Another long par 3, which my 5 iron didn’t even reach. It landed at the treacherous spot behind the green bunker which I had to flop over. I didn’t execute great but got lucky as my skulled ball hit the slope and ended up around 10 feet ofthe hole. Missed my par, settled for bogey. (+6)

Hole 8: Straightforward par 4 which I simply murdered the ball. Pitching wedge in hand, again I landed short. I noticed cow grass, my distance suffers. WHY? Chipping was a bit too strong and had around 10 feet again for par, and yes, you got it. I missed again (+7).

Hole 9: The ending hole is a nice par 4 which requires a good drive – which I did not oblige. My ball wound up right, around 10 yards from entering the water. I punched out and from fairway, hit a weak pitching wedge to the front of the green. Chipping? You bet. This time, I hit it ok and had a downhill putt of around 6 – 8 feet. Did I miss my bogey? No, sank in and ended up with (+8) on the front nine. Not bad.

The game could have gotten better if I was just confident with my putting (which I wasn’t). So switch over to the Mickey Mouse course and see what happens.

Hole 10: Almost immediately as a welcome, I pummelled my drive right down the fairway and only had about 70 meters or so left. I controlled my 60 degree to pin high, and only had to navigate 6 – 8 feet for a birdie. I didn’t play enough break and it lipped out. AUGH! Worse par I ever had (+8)

Hole 11: Short par 3, and using my pitching wedge got on the green and routine two putt for par (+8)

Hole 12: Beautiful par 5 with an elevated tee box. Hit a reasonable drive to the left and positioned for my third shot, from around 60 meters. Used again my 60 degrees but this time overcook slightly and had around 15 feet to get birdie. Missed again, so another par (+8).

Hole 13: Par 3 over water and once more pitching wedge found me on for regulation. However, because my partner OB’ed, I had to charge for my birdie putt to beat the other team. I flew it by around 5 feet and didn’t hit a good comeback – 3 putted for my bogey. (+9)

Hole 14: This is actually quite simple to navigate if you can hit fade shots. As such, I decided to use a 6-iron and actually landed pretty good distance, around 130m from the green. Once more my pitching wedge fell short. But I hit a good chip and just had around 6 feet downhill to maneuver for a par. This time, my partner had par also, so I decided to charge to get fringes, but missed the hole and ended up almost the same distance uphill as I started. Missed my comeback for bogey. Double bogey  and another 3 putt (+11)

Hole 15: This is a really taxing par 4 especially if you are walking and lugging your bag. I hit a bad drive that hooked left, hit a tree. I chopped out to around 120m from green and hit a great pitching wedge – pin high, around 10 feet to save par. I didn’t so another bogey. (+12)

Hole 16: The par 5 everyone wants to challenge. I overcranked my drive and turned it left into the woods. I hit a punch out and left with around 130 to the green. Again, I am stubbornly using my pitching for these shots even if knew it would be short. It WAS short but at least on the green. However, I had probably 30 – 40 feet to maneuver and yes, I ended up 3 putting the damn green for a bogey. (+13)

Hole 17: The most difficult par 3 – with around 190m, head wind and uphill. Even with my 5 wood, I barely crawled onto the fringe of the green. I putted to around 4 feet and sank it in for my par at last (+13)

Hole 18: The last hole, I just whacked what I thought was my best drive of the day. Right to left, following the dogleg all the way home. However, it clipped the last few branches of the tree on the left, and in turn left me with an awkward 5 iron punch out. This ended up in the greenside bunker. A reasonable out and two putted to end the game with a bogey. (+14)

This was par 71 course, which I ended up shooting a reasonable 85, which could have been a whole lot less if I had focused. So far, the drive was great, the chipping is improving and overall course management and iron shots have significantly improved. 85 isn’t bad, but of course, they don’t call it mickey mouse course for nothing!

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Finally, A Birdie in Tropicana!

I managed to cram in a few games in KGPA, Tropicana and Palm Garden but eversince my birdie run ended, I’ve gone back to playing golf like a blind wombat high on meth. My game at KGPA was a train wreck and even the easy Palm Garden was no letoff as well. Then came Tropicana, where in one hole, I hit a perfect drive and with a sandwedge and 90 meters to pin, I proceeded to duff the ball FOUR freaking times. FOUR. And I hit the green and did a quadruple.

So, there was not much motivation to go on, really. I was thinking of actually quitting golf for a while. It got so bad that the Palm Garden game I missed I think around five two footer putts. In one hole, I wanted to fling my putter into the rough, but got snagged in my glove and it went spinning into the direction of my buddy and almost killed him. He didn’t speak to me the whole game and told me if I did that again, he is going to tomahawk me myself. I apologised. It was bad. It was not ethical and I am not like that. From then on, every bad shot was just greeted with a wry smile and a look to the heavens and a sarcastic thumbs up and clap to God. I don’t think God likes sarcasm. Because I played even worse and worse.

Things finally began to look up last game at Tropicana. I still missed sitters like two footers, but at least I got back my birdie. And it was on the index 1 hole nonetheless. Downhill perfect drive, took the left water out of equation and with the ball slightly above feet, I managed a pitching wedge to around 8 feet with a downhill winding putt. Perfect putt for me and it went in the hole.

So yeah, I’ve lost count of my triple bogeys and blown holes this year, but hey! I am now on Birdie number 4 for the year! Not bad, considering it’s like One birdie a month.

Next game!

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Birdies Galore

I have recently gone on a purple patch in my golf game of late.

Playing three games previous at Tropicana, Palm and Kota Permai, yielded me birdies in each round. Anyone knowing a 16 handicaper struggles will know that getting a birdie is as rare as spotting a pink hyena doing a riverdance.

The Palm garden birdies were probably the most memorable – two in a row to end the front nine, and for Kota Permai, the very first hole Par 5. Strangely even with these birdies, I still ended up shooting 87,88 and 89 on these courses, showing that gross score improvement is still difficult to come by.

This year, with much less golfing, is turning out overall, better golf. My drives are less wild eversince I decided to shorten my grip to the point of my right hand almost gripping the shaft itself. Another change I did was instead of tackling the green, I am almost always going short of the green. The reason is because I can then approach with a shorter club, and I am not too worried about controlling and can just muscle the whole thing in. I am dropping to a 9-iron now for my 150 meter shots, and a 6-iron for 170 meters. I am not saying I am reaching these distances with these irons, but they are close – even if I drop at 140 meter with my 9-iron, the ball can still roll onto the green without taking those bunkers into consideration.

Where my game need utmost upgrade is in chipping. I am still yipping it like a monkey on opium and I lose amazing amount of strokes due to bad chips, bad punch outs from the woods and overall just horrendous management of these supposedly easy shots.

Also this year I’ve stopped taking in all the statistics on my game and just take in the score. It seems with less calculations on the course and analysis, I am playing better. I don’t care about my 3 putts anymore and I putt better. I don’t care about missing the fairway anymore and I am hitting those fairways. I don’t care about how far I drive anymore and I am booming it. It seems like the less I scrutinise myself, my immense natural talents are now shining and I am achieving my God-given destiny of playing a consistent 16 handicap. Yes. I am being sarcastic.

Also – I have had some emails (thank you) wondering if this blog is ever going to be updated. To be honest, I don’t really have a lot to update on golf. Ever since that Pussycat Woods decided to call it quits and then do a comeback and then decide to quit again, I’ve been more than disillusioned that the game of golf is actually going backwards – which it is. If you look at how Taylormade is struggling and part of it is being farmed out by Adidas, and how Nike has stopped producing golf clubs and how overall, nobody really gives a crap anymore about golf and everyone is into cycling or jogging or swimming or lawn bowling – the trajectory of golf as a popular sport is somewhat declining – even with the yawn fest of Olympic golf not doing it any favours. Of course, this is my opinion based on extensive research of looking at Google for the past 2 minutes.

I can actually see the disinterest in it. In early 2000s, a lot of my colleagues were eager to try out golf. We even set a pool fund and get people together to play golf together, and organised outings to golf clubs like that stinkhole Bandar Utama golf course. We went to the driving range. Of course, the fact that we were all single and there were girls we wanted to tackle also picking up golf had a major impact to our motivations. Especially if you are already familiar with the sport, we can do the “OK, here is how you grip it” and then taking the advantage of holding her hand without getting a slap in the face or a call for harassment. Yup, it was a great maneuver.

But nowadays, when we talk about golf to my younger employees, they just go “meh”. The fact is, we are regressing back to the point where golf is now an old man sport. Because we are, naturally becoming “old men” as we hit our 40s or so. The younger generation doesn’t pick it up. Instead they pick up this strange activity called ‘jogging’. Which is significantly cheaper. All you need are shoes and a road.

So – I suppose, I will consolidate other articles into this blog. I run a blog called Giladad where I write about my travails as a father, but that readership has around 1 person- my wife so she knows what I am complaining about (her).

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The Long Absence

Wow!

It has been ages since my last update. Some kindly souls have actually emailed me wondering if there was a reason for the absence, inclusive:

a) Giving up golf

b) Started another Blog elsewhere

c) Struck by lightning on the course and rotting away peacefully under the trees

As it is, none of the above.

I do have my #2 son and he plays a big part in my limited golf time now. And also my #1 is in school, and we generally start our day as drivers, ferrying one after another – so golf (if any) only can start after 9 am or so and most of my kakis prefer not to do that.

There have been some opportunities to play, and again on some fine courses like Tropicana, Kota Permai, thanks to our credit card. My golf game has yet to improve, but I am feeling OK with it so far. Once, I was struggling massively with my chips but now for some reason it seems to be OK, and now my putts are like bird shit.

Nothing can summarise my current state of golf than a recent game I had in Palm Garden. I was playing pretty normal on my first six (which to say, is not great) – one par, a couple of bogeys and two doubles. Then I meandered to a 47 on my front nine, but managed to hit a birdie on the Index 1 hole. I blasted my driver way left and from the rough, somehow my pitching wedge sailed perfectly to about 1 feet of the hole. Don’t ask me how I ended up with a pitching wedge second shot on an index 1 hole. I must have hit a tree or something and rebounded forward.

Front nine, I went on a crazy tear – birdie, par, birdie, which could have been 3 birdies in a row as I missed a 5 footer birdie putt on my second. So you think I would be playing like a king from there on right?

Nope. Par 5 next hole, instead of laying up which is what I normally would do, I was challenged by one friend to go for 2 on (which is not really possible unless you are extremely accurate, which I am not). One OB and a few hacks later, I ended up with an 8. And from there on, slide all the way into hellhole and ended up with a 46. So, I shot 3 birdies, 4 pars and still ended up with a 93? Man, golf sucks.

Anyway – that’s what it’s been so far – intermittent golf, and I apologise for not writing often – its not because I have given up the game, but it’s just that with the new kid + Tiger Woods retiring, there really hasn’t been much to write about lately at all!

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Summarising 2015

2015stats2

So 2015 has ended, and now 2016 is in but golf is going to be scarce. I suppose this is a good time as any to look back what has been achieved last year.

First of, summary stats above.

The most damning stats here is the 91.21 average gross. This is just not good enough. I wanted to set out last year to break 90, but in 39 rounds played, I only broke 90 15 times, which is a poor 38% while only breaking 85 in 2 tries (both times at Mines, incidentally). I suppose the only good news is that I only broke 100 twice – once in Seri Selangor and the other one recently in the blow out in Nilai Springs. Otherwise, it’s mostly 90 – 95 scoreline. In fact, it took me 6 games into 2015 before carding an 86, and in first 10 games, only broke 90 twice. The good news, is that, in the last 10 games, I broke 90 on 6 occasions. Granted, these were played at a lot better courses compared to the first 6 games and I didn’t have to tackle Seri Selangor in the last 10 games. My fairway hits are also low, but it doesn’t really matter because in some games, I can hit all the fairways but still fail miserably in scoring, while the opposite is true, whereby I miss all fairways and still score pretty well. My GIR is up, which is good, and at 2.56% par breakers, it means I had my share of birdies also.

2015stats1

 

A further break down as above.

I recorded 18 birdies last year, of course, the best coming from the recent Mines game where I hit back to back birds. Overall, I have around 4.5 pars per game, which technically is just not good enough. I should be comfortably averaging around 6 – 7 pars per game. The encouraging fact is that my iron games has improved a lot. My par 3 is being played a lot better, and has highest conversions of pars and play to only +0.96. Which is great. That means, if I can work out my par 4s, I should be playing a steady 15 – 16 handicap, as opposed to a very unsteady 16.
2015stats3

Finally – horses for courses. It’s pretty obvious my favourite courses also happens to be the best courses – Glenmarie Valley and Gardens, and Mines. Of course, Bangi has to be there since it;s such a short course. Kota permai, Sungai Long are played around 90, while Palm Garden, around 91.

So there you have it. 2015 has been filled with some pretty amazing shots (2 birdies in a row for example) and some pretty crap ones (10 greens in regulations and 6 three putts), and as I approach 2016, new father of 2, I don’t expect too much gametime. Whatever game I have, hopefully I can learn how to take those opportunities and break that darn 90!

Happy hacking everyone.

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Worst Game but Yet…

serisel

Golf is strange.

This is the final conclusive statement that every golfer, whether hacker, amateur, buaya, professional or Tiger Woods will agree to.

I had my worst game this week – a 99 in my old haunt Seri Selangor. You would think that I would be hoping mad over the game but only – I thought I hit some of the best shots of my life in that game, coupled with some of the most retarded short game and putting ever experienced.

1) We teed off at Seri Selangor back nine first. It’s always better, because the back 9 of Seri Selangor is narrow like Kate Moss, although not as flat as her. So once you have warmed up, you can really drive like a King once you cross over. At least that’s how I prefer it.

2) I shot 49-50. Which is really weird, because I played really well on the back 9. I can probably hear some guffaws, but the stats is there – I drove as well as I could and the only two bad drives I had which ended up left was on 4th and 6th, both of which I put regulation on.

3) The front 9 (Hole 10 – 18 here) was just a massive cock up of epic proportions, especially when I started teeing off with my stupid 3 wood on the 16th and 17th. For 18th, my drive found me around 190 meters away from the hole (where the pole was, for those who know Seri Selangor). It’s a par 5 that all of us invariably tries to two on but messes up 99% of the time. This time around, I wanted to just land in front of the green, so I hit my 7 wood. Honestly, it was probably my best 7 wood shot of my entire life, because it went high and long, with a slight draw, and landed on the front of the green and rolled all the way to the back fringe, around 15 feet from the hole. Eagle? Yes, guess what – hello retarded 3 putt!!

4) The cock ups after great shots continued in the back 9. First hole, great tee shot, lousy 9 iron behind the bunker and flop right into the bunker. 3rd hole lousy first shot into the water, great 3rd tee to 5 feet and a wonderful retarded putt that misses for bogey. 4th hole great 6 iron recovery from the woods for regulation and three putted AGAIN. 5th hole, a booming drive that left me around 170m to green on a par 5 and instead of hitting a six iron, I opted my 7 wood which hooked into the water. HELLO!!

5) By far the worst was the 6th hole. I ended up in the woods with a very tiny opening which I hit my 3 wood second shot, probably the best 3 wood I hit. It landed around 10 meters from the green, but required a flop shot, which I deftly executed with the best 60 degree shot I’ve hit in my life to 3 feet from the hole. Birdie? Nope. 2 putt. From 3 feet. HELLO?!?!

6) After that, the entire will to live on left me and I just plugged around the final 3 holes with double bogeys on each, without any more resistance to the cruelty of crap shots after crap shots in my game.

I suppose the take away is this – that I *can* hit some amazingly super shots in my golf, but continuously following up with some of the most stupid shots immediately after. I suppose there’s still some positive there.

Hack ON!