Tiger Woods played another nine holes at The Players Championship at Sawgrass Country Club Wednesday in preparation for the start of this year’s tournament on Thursday, May 7, 2009.
As he did on Tuesday, Tiger had more trouble off the tee on Wednesday and his disgust visibly showed on hole 18 with slumping shoulders and a grimace on his face. Whether he’ll get his game back in shape for an 8:10 a.m. tee time Thursday is anyone’s guess. Although he has won the tournament once in 2001, he traditionally has not played well at The Players.
On Wednesday, he was paired with Jacksonville area resident Jim Furyk and the two seemed to have a fun time, despite Tigers’ woes off the tee. Tiger did chip in off the green on No. 14 earlier in the day.
To see more photos of both Tuesday and Wednesday’s activities at the tournament, click on the gallery above and select the two Players galleries.
Florida has three of the most scenic golf courses on the PGA Tour and none is more visually pleasing than The Players Championship, the annual extravaganza in Northeast Florida.
Now held the first week in May (7-10), The Players Championship is easily one of the most spectator-friendly tournaments on the Tour and its three closing holes rival some of the more prestigious golfing sites in scenic beauty and viewing satisfaction.
Except for perhaps during the last two hours on a Sunday, you can find a viewing spot behind the greenon the infamous hole No. 17 and easily track your favorite players over those last three holes.
Of course, tracking the world’s most famous golfers such as Tiger Woods or Phil Mickelson is never easy but I did track Tiger one time from a strategic viewing spot behind No. 17, the diabolical water hole that has spelled doom for many championship contenders on the last day of the tournament. Read the rest of this entry »
Ronnie Winter of Red Jumpsuit Apparatus performs in Alabama in December.
I see where the red-hot band The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus is planning a benefit concert to help raise money for band uniforms for Middleburg High School, which many of the group’s members attended.
This is an exciting idea on several levels. It benefits the school, it gives exposure to a worthy cause and it could be the catalyst for other home-grown celebrities to come to the aid of the cash-strapped education system in Clay County.
Consider the possibilities.
1. Country music legend Tim McGraw’s family was living in Middleburg when he was born. Do you think he could sell out the Clay County fairgrounds arena Read the rest of this entry »
(I don’t know who wrote these but they are the funniest lines about golf I have ever read. I choked on a pretzel while reading them. Thankfully, I was able to wash it down with a beer. Thanks to fellow duffer and friend Garland for forwarding them to me.)
Don’t buy a putter until you’ve had a chance to throw it.
Never try to keep more than 300 separate thoughts in your mind during
your swing.
When your shot has to carry over a water hazard, you can either hit one
more club or two more balls.
If you’re afraid a full shot might reach the green while the foursome
ahead of you is still putting out, you have two options: you can Read the rest of this entry »
Lamar is my name and golf is . . . well, golf is a game at which I mostly suck. (My wife the teacher will not like me using that word. It sets a bad example for the kids, she said. I seriously doubt any children are reading this web site, however. If there are and they don’t like me using that word, please let me know and I won’t use it again. I promise.)
Getting back to the subject at hand, Garland Hudson was kind enough to invite me to play in a fund-raising golf tournament for Orange Park Athletic Association recently at Fleming Island Plantation, formerly my favorite golf course. After I butchered it up during the tournament, I am not sure anybody will want to play on it. (Just kidding, Troy. It is a great golf course and I am sure I will be back. When my golf game improves or when pigs, you know, do their thing.)
While Garland is a good friend, I have to question his wisdom of inviting me to be on his team. Read the rest of this entry »
Mark and I are golfing buddies and we try to get out to one of the courses in the greater Orange Park, FL., area at least once a month. Mark is a good friend in that he sometimes plays “down” to my level to make me feel good. A couple of months ago we were tied (I might have been ahead by a stroke, I don’t remember) but he birdied No. 18 at the Country Club of Orange Park while I bogeyed it and he beat me by a stroke.
Recently, we were again at CCOP, only this time with a much different result. Neither one of us did much on the front nine, but he started off hot on the back nine and never let up. When we got to the 18th hole, I noticed that he had parred every hole on the back nine. Being a good friend, I made sure he was aware of it so that he wouldn’t mess up. You know how good friends are. We want our friends to succeed. So I said, “Mark, you have parred every hole on the back nine, so don’t blow it now, OK?”
I don’t have to tell you what he did, do I? (OK, for the record, he muffed the fairway shot and wound up with a bogey for a 37 on the back nine and a 79 for the day. Me? I bogeyed 18 also for a 90. Not bad for me.)
CCOP is in great shape and their weekday fee is only $27, even for non-members. A great deal in my book. Here is a brief video of Mark and I teeing off on No. 13. If you have golf videos or stories to tell, let me know about them.
This giant mastadon skeleton is on display in the Museum of Florida History in Tallahassee.
I accompanied my wife on a job-related trip [for her] to Tallahassee last week. She was working with the State Department of Education on some new science standards for public school teachers.
While she worked, I played. Sort of. I got in one round of golf on Thursday after it had warmed up from a low of around 20 degrees and I visited the Museum of Florida History, which I will tell you more about in a few minutes.
The trip was also noteworthy for renewing acquaintances. My wife visited a friend from high school whom she had not seen in more than 40 years and I met a person I used to work with at the Times-Union, Jim Baltzelle, who is now Florida bureau chief for the Associated Press in Miami. Of course, there was a legislative update session in Tallahassee, so it was natural that journalists would be all over the place. My neighbor Mike Marino was also there visiting with the Times-Union’s new Tallahassee reporter. Read the rest of this entry »
There are two things of immense importance to me (other than my immediate family): golf and spending time with my grandchildren.
Recently I discovered a way to do both without breaking the bank. I had always wanted to take my two grandsons who live nearby to play but hesitated because of the costs involved. If you are like me and exist on a shoestring budget, playing golf is enough of a financial burden without adding two more paying customers to the tab.
A much coveted trophy from the Bass & Ass Tournament. You be the judge as to who won it one year.
By Lamar Thames
(My wife and I have a group of very good friends — the group includes some relatives, too, I might add — who live in Orlando and are known, rather informally, as the Steak and Ale Gang. Members of the group have pretty much gone their separate ways in recent years but we get together on occasion. A gathering of the gang is being organized and in tribute to them here is an account I wrote of an activity the gang used to participate in known as the Bass & Ass Tournament. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed composing it.)
I had heard so many stories about the infamous Bass & Ass Tournament that I was both anxious and nervous about the impending experience when my first invitation arrived.
In essence, the Bass & Ass weekend was an exercise in machoism to celebrate the summer season at the Lago D’ Oro Golf and Country Club, deep in the Ocala National Forest.
The much-anticipated event had been hosted on and off for more than two decades by a trio of Orlando residents who held the lease on a rustic cabin on the shores of Lake Dorr — or Lago D’ Oro, as the Spanish explorers called it because of the water’s deep golden color. Read the rest of this entry »
I was excited to see the email from my friend Mark because I knew it meant he wanted to play golf. For a while we have been using the word Fore in the subject line of our our mails to each other to immediately identify what the subject is about. Anytime I see a Fore from Mark, I know that I am going to get a game soon.
posted
May 6, 2009 by Lamar Thames
