Archive for January, 2010

Guess That Hole Contest – Officially Open!

The Guess That Hole Contest is officially open!  Go to the Guess That Hole page to read the rules and submit your entry.  The winner gets a free green fee for a foursome at a top-notch golf course in the Houston-area (over a $200 value)!  Share with your fellow golfers and good luck!

(Don’t forget to sign up for future contest notifications.)

iSwing App-ilicious

A friend of mine sent me a link to the iSwing app last week.  The website looked a little confusing, but it only cost $4.99, so I decided to try it out.

In short, it’s an iPhone app that you can use to record your golf swing and then analyze it.  It allows you to play back at multiple speeds and also to draw lines to see how your swing lines up.  Here’s a picture I downloaded from the website that shows how the lines show up.

Another cool feature is the program automatically produces an image which breaks out your swing into an image sequence.  I used that feature this weekend and recorded my wife’s cousin.  This is like one of those swing fold outs in The Golf Digest.

(The actual image is about twice as big, but I had to shrink it to fit on the blog.)

It’s hard to argue with $5.  It’s kinda cool that you can control the video playback in 3 speeds, but there doesn’t seem to be a way to export it.  The ability to draw custom lines seems neat, but it’s also hard to make them line up exactly the way you want them because once you draw the line, you can only delete it, you can’t move it.

To be honest, I’m torn.  Part of me likes just shooting straight up video from my iPhone that I can just email to my computer.  Because the price is so cheap, though, it’s worth downloading and checking it out for yourself.

Golf Cart FAIL 2

Wow, here’s another wicked golf cart snafu (courtesy of failblog.org).  I hope that guy made it out alright.  Wonder if he finished his round…  (thx to Brian G. for submitting)

Smokin Joe’s Driving Range

Gotta give a shout-out to Joe Pogge who tees it up every Saturday morning at 7am on 610 Sports on Smokin Joe’s Driving Range golf show.

Smokin Joe gave HoustonGolfNut.com a couple of plugs this past weekend and yours truly is scheduled for a radio interview on Saturday, January 30th.

Give Smokin Joe some love and make sure to tune into his show the next time you’re on your way to hack it up on a Saturday morning.

Hard to Win with Double 9′s

Yesterday, I played in the 1st Little John Golf League event of 2010.  (Actually, their first event of 2010 starts in 2009, but that’s a different story.)

The setting was Bear Creek – Masters Course. If anyone looks all the way back to the beginning of this blog (a soft launch last March I think), I played an LJGL event there which almost caused me to quit playing golf altogether.

My 1st shot of the tee was into a hazard!  Luckily, it was a par-5 and I was able to save a bogey, so that felt good.  The next 2 holes, I sculled 6-irons from the fairway and couldn’t save bogey either time.  Then I bogeyed 3 out of the next 4 holes and thought I was starting to put something together, until another 6-iron (which has been my go-to club the last month) screwed me on the damn par-3 and I dunked one into the water!

(One of the dudes in our group, Travis, trying his best Vijay Singh par-3 Masters impersonation, dunked 3 tee shots and suffered through a 12 on that hole.  One of the best meltdowns I’ve ever seen, but this kid was a monster with a driver in his hands.)

On the back-nine, I proclaimed to make the Bear Creek Masters course my bitch, barely missing a par putt on 10.  That’s when the golf gods puked on me and I carded a 9 on hole 11… and then again on hole 13.  Hole 11, I made a bad decision (I’m not talking about the decision to even show up) by trying to clear a tree with a 9-iron when I should have punched it under.  (I was in good company because my cart-partner, Randy, was nailing more trees than Woody Woodpecker.)  Hole 13, I pushed my tee shot OB.  Both holes, the bad snowballed into worse and I didn’t come close to recovering.

On the back-nine, I had 1 par, 6 bogeys, and 2 9′s.  Take those nines off and I’d have been in good shape.

So this morning I look and even as poorly as I played, I ended up in 3rd place.  I lost the tie-breaker, though, because it’s based on the net score on the highest handicapped hole which, coincidentally, turned out to be one of my 9′s.

I didn’t deserve to win, so I’m glad I didn’t sneak into any money with that round, but I’m closing in.  I think the next tourney I’ll play with them is in 4 weeks at The Golf Club at Cinco Ranch, where I’ve scored a 94 and 95 the last 2 times I’ve played there.  We’ll see if I can keep those scorecard killers off of my card next time.

Keep Your Golf Balls Clean!

If you have dirty [golf] balls that need cleaning, check out this very important message from Axe.

Atascocita Golf Club Shuts Down

Read an article on the Chron today from Todd Hveem: After seven months of trying to sell the property, owners of Atascocita Golf Club decided to shut down the 27-hole course on Dec. 31.

I never played there, but apparently it was a private course, but was purchased last year by a holding company that opened it up to the public while searching for a buyer.  There’s about 400 houses surrounding the course that are concerned about property values of their homes.

One commenter writes: “I lived on Inwood CC for 17 years. When it closed it became what that guy in the story feared: ant farms and trailer parks.”

The official Atascocita Golf Club statement is posted on their website.

Golf Cart FAIL

Here’s a couple of redneck idiots flipping over a golf cart.

Use the Body, Not the Arms

I found this drill from Ireland’s no.1 golf lesson instructor, Barry Power.  His website is http://www.bpg.ie.  The focus is making sure to use the body, not the arms during the swing.  The drill looked pretty useful.

Tiger Woods Hiatus Until 2012?

Just read a couple new tidbits on Tiger Woods today.  Apparently, Tiger posed shirtless for a Vanity Fair spread next month as reported by USA Today.  I guess that’s news for the ladies.  (No offense Tiger, but I don’t give a shit about that.)

In other news, according to an article published today in Marco News (never heard of that before), Tiger partied it up in NYC at the Trump International Hotel on New Year’s Eve with 20 bottles of vodka, 15 cases of Red Bull, and a “leggy” blonde” who’s not his wife.

That article also reports that Tiger’s wife told friends that she received $300 million for Christmas and was giving golf up until 2012!

I really hope that isn’t true.  I can’t imagine Tiger taking off two full years.  It seems probable that Tiger will be back at Arnie’s tourney for a Master’s tune-up.  If he cheated on his wife so much, than it’s hard to argue that she is a higher priority than his life’s work of being the best golfer in the history of golf.  Two years on the PGA Tour for Tiger is probably about 10 victories and at least 2 more majors.

Mark my words, he’ll be teeing it up within 90 days.