Hi all
Name - James Bennett, I'm 45 years old. I live in Adelaide (wet mild winters, warm to hot dry summers, slightly warmer/dryer than Melbourne). I play at Blackwood GC (realistically, a Doak 3). The course is 45 years old, with some great indigenous vegetation, but also a lot of introduced pines, cypresses and very tall native gums. Players have walked single file down a number of our fairways for years!
I was Club Captain in the early 90's. I returned to the Committee and have been Course Chairman for 2 and a half years. We are currently in the midst of a Course Master Plan (with Mike Clayton). Our member's information night is imminent, just before Easter. We are a hills course, built on heavy clay. Fairways are santa anna couch, Greens are 60% bent (1019/1020/L93) and 40% poa. We manage a bent/poa mix. membership is a bit over 1300, with annual subs about $1100. About 7 on the course staff.
Whilst I'm quite fit (these days), I had a pacemaker fitted in November. Went to Sydney to the Australian Open to do some volunteer work, plus visit New South Wales GC (La Perouse) and Royal Sydney. Ended up in Hospital, had the pacemaker fitted and flew home. Saw some golf on TV and nothing else (my wife got her 2 dozenCrispy Creme's from Sydeny airport, that was it for the Golf Visit!
).
I play off 7, using Pings these days - never thought I would but I do. My best golf was 20 to 30 years ago (Toney Penna persimmon woods, Ram tour grind chrome irons), playing under 21 representative golf for my State. Highlights were 1978 winning the National U21 teams title, including beating (a young) Frank Nobilo. Also, in 1980 at NSW GC losing (comprehensively) to a very young steve Elkington. He probably weighed 135 pounds then. Still got my old putters from then (1950's wooden putter by East Bros called 'Old faithful', T-Line IV blade putter, Ping PAL and Anser 2, all still used). A good short game offset a poor long game (not overly long). Never any good at carrying the ball, always played along the ground, scrambling.
Best courses played include Royal Adelaide, Kooyonga, the melbourne sand-belt (love Woodlands), NSW and Stockton at Newcastle. Visited Monterey three times, but have never played in the US. Too tight to spend half a years subscription on one game of golf. I loved visiting the area and walking the courses though (a view over the fence of Cypress Point was all I saw there
). The last visit in 2002 was priamrily to go to the USA National Bearded Collie Dog Show, held in Monterey (yes, we have a Beardie, or Scottish sheep dog called Shadow. I can see our next one being called mackenzie
).
Love MacKenzie, looking forward to seeing Raynor, Ross, MacDonald, Colt, Crenshaw etc etc. Also looking forward to some Doak/Clayton about 10 hours away by car (St Andrews beach, Barnbougle).
Sorry if this rambled a bit, probably indicative of me.