I've been home a week now and that's given me plenty of time to reflect on a most wonderful experience at this year's King's Putter, my first.
First, I want to again offer my thanks to Bill McBride for the tremendous job of planning and organizing the event. I believe there were 31 of us out there and somehow I got the chance to play with 15 different GCA'ers in my eight rounds at the resort while still getting the chance to spend time and chat with everyone else during the dinners. Bravo Bill!
There were so many highlights:
- the competitive fire from my Canadian compadre Will MacEwen, whose deft putting touch and fist pumps during the first KP round at Bandon Dunes (MacEwen & Kirk vs. Huckaby & Bosela) provided great entertainment for us all...that is until he struck the decisive blow on the 18th with a closing birdie to guarantee a 1up win for him and John
- the great interplay between John Kirk and his good friend and caddy Kelly; John is a very strong player and it was a treat watching him and Pete Lavallee play steady golf as they built a 4up lead on me and Gray Grieve at Old Mac. Despite having to carry me on his back through the last nine holes, Gray mustered the energy to make three straight birdies between the 13th and 15th to get us back within one but I’d miss a three or four footer for par on the 17th to let my partner down in a 2&1 loss.
- watching the booming drives of John Moore and the silky smooth swinging lefty Michael Whitaker as they built a 4up lead on me and Joel Lahrman at Trails. Two of the hole wins came after the now famous “Bear Incident”, including an unlikely bomb of a birdie from Moore on the great 13th hole. The light finally came on for me later on the back nine, making two birdies on my last four holes but it was too late in a 3&2 loss.
- finally getting into the win column by sheer force in my singles match against Will, making five birdies in a great round at Pac Dunes, including one on the par 3 14th to close out the match in style.
And that’s just the KP rounds! I had a great time in rounds before, during and after the KP with Bryan Izatt, Joel Zuckerman, Jed Peters, Brad Kane, David Elvins, Evan Fleisher and Joe Perches and absolutely loved the speeches put forth at dinner on Saturday night by Bogey (touching, inspiring) and Joel (informative, hilarious).
I’ve said as much to Bill in private but I continue to be amazed by the great people I’ve met through GCA, with nary a dud in the bunch thus far. I feel like I made 30 new friends last week and seriously can’t think of a better group of people I’d rather play golf with than those I’ve met through this site.
Awesome event and hell, I didn’t even think the weather was that bad!