Fast, firm and frozen

[Rick Shefchik]

I realize this post has the potential to arouse more jealousy from those of you who are not fortunate enough to live in Minnesota, but I thought some might be interested to know that conditions here in the past 10 days or so have been fast, firm and frozen. With overnight lows in the teens and 20s, and daytime highs around 40 (at best), the ground game is back in the land of 10,000 Lakes.

Unfortunately, we still don't have the ideal maintenance meld -- and I'm not sure there's anything that TEPaul and an army of greenskeepers could do to remedy the situation.

The greens are essentially frozen below the surface (an aerial shot will leave a ballmark on the green, but only about a quarter of an inch deep), leading to high bounces that send the ball to the back of the green or beyond. But the fairway in front of the greens (at my home course, anyway) remains unfrozen, so -- unlike a British links course, for instance -- your aerial approach shot is unlikely to bounce onto the green, but rather dies on the apron. This makes it almost impossible to get close to a front pin. Today I made three ballmarks within five feet of a hole; two of the shots ended up 30 feet or more past the hole, and the other bounced off the green entirely.

While I despair of a proper maintenance meld before snow renders the whole issue moot, there is at least one compensating factor: balls that are normally foozled into the ponds are now bouncing and skidding across them. It's been hard to lose a ball lately.

[TEPaul]

Rick:

Firm and fast=very good!

Frozen=not very good, except for the occasional foozle option!

[RJ_Daley]

Well Rick, you certainly are showing your enthusiasm.  I confess I am not motivated at all this past week to go out in mid-30* with windchills below freezing.  Perhaps a sign of old age.  Even if like you say, it is darn hard to loose a ball on/in the pond lately.  I have joined the curling club rather than fight the ice, I am willing to let it be my friend. :-/

[Dan Kelly]

I don't remember if Rick saw this -- but he might have:

Two of the past three years, we hardy Minnesotans have been playing golf (or some approximation thereof) till the middle of December. December 16, both years (1999 and 2000), to be precise.

My last round of one of those years was at a course east of St. Paul called Sawmill.

At the fifth hole -- a severely downhill par-3, 150-160 yards, over a pond -- the pin was in the left-center, about 15 feet behind a bunker.

I launched a beautiful 7-iron that landed about 3 feet from the pin, made that characteristic frozen-green dent, and bounded about 40-45 past the hole, up to the back of the green.

No way to get it close to that hole! Or maybe there was!

I pulled my 9-iron, hit a smooth one right on line -- hoping to bounce it off the pond and over the bunker. Down, down, down it came ... BOUNCED off the ice ... over the bunker onto the fringe ... and stopped 2 or 3 feet left of the hole.

Walked up. Tapped it in. Walked to the other ball. Tapped it down the hill ... and it rolled, rolled, rolled, right into the cup.

Longest putt of the year.

A birdie, either way.

That's the sort of thing that'll get you through the winter.

[RJ_Daley]

Dan, I got you beat on the latest round of last year!    Obviously we get your weather about a day later.  I have it on my calendar from last year that I played Dec 17th!  But then I had about 15 rounds in November last year and two as of this date, with nothing insight.  I was seening hoards of those wooly bear catapillars as far back as September, and they say increases in their populations showing up early means brutal winter.

[Steve Lang]

,

Per my one round at a muni on the north side of minneapolis, I remember the locals told me you put tarps over the greens in November to help them survive the winter!

In Rising Sun, Ohio theres a course that used to be open throughout the winter.  They had a coffee can for folks to put donations in at the first tee.

73/45 F in Houston Weds.  come on down!

[Tommy_Naccarato]

What are you guys talking about?

Right now its 10:30pm, 68 degrees in La Habra, and I'm wearing shorts and a tee shirt, contemplating golf this weekend.

[JakaB]

Tis better to live in a long state than a wide one....60 degrees in the golden bowels of the land of Lincoln.

[A.G._Crockett]

It pains my heart to know that guys who love golf as much as you do are going to have to put the sticks away.  Here in GA, we miss days during the winter, not months.  Played in shorts on Dec. 6 last yr., and even wore short pants for a New Year's Day round about 4 yrs. ago!  A frost delay in Jan. or Feb. is a major crisis.  All we have to do is survive some serious heat in July and August to get the golf benefits of latitude.

[redanman]

This was one of the few advantages to Colorado's weather when I lived there, winter golf.  No one on the course, fast and firm and CO was such that the snow that fell either blew off or melted somewhere within an hour of Denver most of the time so there was always SOMEWHERE to play!

Ideal?.....No.  But no one on the course is one of the best advantages of winter golf. Fast play, fast conditions, closed course=free, but none of us EVER did that!

[TEPaul]

AAAH!

All these people from warm and consistent climates are responible for the type of instant gratification thinking that has made many Americans weak and spoilt!

Here in Philadephia we're strong of mind and character as we must have the patience to wait for the natural flow and variance of the seasons when it comes to our golf!

It takes the cold and bonechilling day to make you better appreciate the sunny and balmy day!

Plus these namby pambies from Southern California and Florida will never have the opportunity to see the effects of the well timed foozle as it slides across a frozen pond!!

[A.G._Crockett]

TEPaul,
I'd submit that it is a different kind of toughness.  First of all, when its 102 degrees, with 98% humidity in the summer every day for eight weeks, you are taking your life in your hands every time you play!

Secondly, we DO play in "cold and bonechilling" conditions in the Sunbelt--its just that bonechilling to us happens at around 40 degrees!

Many of us natives believe that by far the biggest mistake we ever made in the South was air conditioning, since it has made it possible for vast numbers of Rustbelt refugees (I won't use the Y word here) to come here and clog our roads and, more importantly, our golf courses.  "Spoilt" indeed!

[Dan Kelly]

It pains my heart to know that guys who love golf as much as you do are going to have to put the sticks away.  Here in GA, we miss days during the winter, not months.  Played in shorts on Dec. 6 last yr., and even wore short pants for a New Year's Day round about 4 yrs. ago!  A frost delay in Jan. or Feb. is a major crisis.

A.G. --

Isn't that a direct quotation from one of Clifford Roberts' membership soliticitations to his Wall Street buddies, way back when?

If he hadn't been such a good salesman, no one here would ever have heard of Martha Burk!

[Doug Siebert]

A.G. Crockett,

If you play when it is as low as 40 degrees, you already play in colder temperatures than I ever do, and I live in Iowa.  Not all of us who live in colder climates have lost brain cells due to frostbite and think playing on frozen courses is neat.  Though I did think it was pretty funny when on a (very) rare 55 degree day last January I played with my dad and he bounced one over a frozen pond.  There were some balls laying on it, I always wondered if anyone was dumb enough to risk walking on it to retrieve their ball.

But damn I hate it when southerners exaggerate about the heat down there.  It gets every bit as hot here in Iowa and even up into Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, etc. as it does down in the deepest south, it is just more consistently hot over a longer period down there during the summer.  And there ain't no such thing as a "102 degree 98% humidity" day.  You may think it feels like that, but down south at 100 degrees it never exceeds 50% humidity (this equals 118 degree heat index, 78 degree dewpoint)

From watching the weather maps over the years, I have to conclude that South Dakota has it the worst.  It gets up over 110 degrees during the summer, with heat indexes as high as 130, it gets down to 30 below or worse in the winter, and they have more snowfall than about anywhere that doesn't have mountains or lake effect.  No wonder you never hear about any great golf courses built in South Dakota

[redanman]

There were some balls laying on it, I always wondered if anyone was dumb enough to risk walking on it to retrieve their ball.

With the extremes of temperatures in Colorado, the ice can get pretty thick and I have seen more than one idiot go after such balls, but never seen one fall in.

[JakaB]

Last year I hung from a tree trying to hit my ball back into play off of a frozen pond...after three wiffs I finnally hit it further out on the lake...my friends were screaming for the tree to break just so I could bust my ass.  I don't ski and really prefer winter golf even if I did.

[Steve Lang]

Wind chill.. heat index, rainfall, ice, snow, or mud.. don't we all have some weather obstacles to overcome in our pursuit of golf?  Exaggerations or not!

Who cares what par is, when you have the parka's hood over your head and you're using those driving range type rubber tees and those old orange balls from the garage bucket..  or when you're carrying a 20 oz gataorade bottle and are filling it up every three holes, plus carrying a cup of ice in the summer heat?  

There is an undisputable fact, oops, FACT,.. when a golfnut decides he has the time and ability to physically play golf, he is like to do just that.  And we all do what we must to survive.  Isn't this a part of Golf Course architecture?  How are we traversing over land?

Don't hate me because its going to be 72°F this afternoon in mid-November & I'm leaving at noon to play.. Whether it reminds me of a golf outing I had in Alaska in July, or Ohio in May, I appreciate the seasons as much as the next guy, but that doesn't make me want to trade my 120+ rounds a year in TX for 4 dozen up north.

Anyway, we're having a cold front come thru next week and its going down to the 60's..  Time to trade in the shorts, now where's my old long-johns?

[A.G._Crockett]

Doug,
Forgive my hyperbole and poor meteorlogical/math skills.  How's about if I refer to 2 months in the South where the temperature is 102 and with the wind chill it feels like 99?

[Scott_Burroughs]

Doug,

Well-said about the truth on heat and humidity.  Every time I try to tell someone the real truth about it, they gloss over or even get perturbed, because I just robbed them of a summer complaint/excuse that's it's too hot.

However, playing in 40 degree temperatures and walking-and-carrying ain't that bad.  Layers, my friend.  I don't even wear a jacket.  I wear a glove on both hands, instead of just one.  It's golf!


Tom I,

The "excuse" that putting away the sticks for the winter is a "natural" ritual and is what northern folks prefer is hogwash, IMO.  Jealousy, I say.  That's one of the main reasons I moved south, to play year round and rarely have to worry about driving in ice and snow.  Why do so many Yankees/midwesterners/Canucks go to Myrtle Beach/Scottsdale/Florida/etc. in the winter?  Why do so many Tour players come from warm weather climates?  You can play year round.

Sure a few Tour players are tokens from cold weather climes, but they're more the exceptions.  Lehman from MN, Stricker from WI, Sindelar/Hulbert/Sluman/Levi from NY, Faxon from RI, Nicklaus/Cook from OH.  Now list off the Californians, Texans, Floridians, etc.