What is your golfing highlight?

[Thomas Patterson]

I have two so far I think

1.  My experience at Ballyneal....the 63 holes I played there were the most fun I have ever had playing this game. Driving up the road and ver the dunes, seeing the chop hills for the first time was an incredible feeling. The landscape absolutely took my breath away, as did the course itself.  I still think about it almost daily. 

2.  Playing a round of golf with my Dad out in CO at Bear Dance.  Just an amazing afternoon, hardly anyone out on the course and we just had a blast.  Golf has brought my Dad and me a lot closer and I'm very thankful for that!

[Mark Woodger]

i love these threads as i really enjoy reading other people special moments on the golf course and what the game means to them.

mine are:

1:Playing St Andrews Old course with my Dad in April this year. They had a few grandstands already built which made it even more enjoyable. The golf was so so but enjoping the round with my dad was great. My Mum and Fiance were on a bench outside the Jigger Inn watching us play 17. I hit a three iron for my second, carried the green and holded the 20ft putt for birdie. To do it with the three most important people in my life watching and to be able to share it with them was and remains very special. Although i am sure they are bored of hearing the story. 

2: breaking 80 for the first time at the Ocean Course Kiawah was a great day.

3: Any round at Deal is a highlight too.

[R_Paulis]

Reading all the father and son highlights, I can't wait until my first (and only) newborn gets old enough to play...

[Brad Tufts]

Wow....too many to mention, so stream of consciousness on the candidates....

Improving HS scoring average from 53.5 freshman year to 37.5 senior year....winning my HS conference tournament...setting a school team tourney scoring record at Middlebury...rounds in the 60s in a college tourney, a Mass Amateur, and a club championship...a round at Cypress Point in 2007...shooting even par at Pebble Beach in 2008...witnessing my dad win a car with a hole-in-one...my own hole-in-one in 2008 at chechessee....slam-dunking a SW for eagle in a tourney to win $450....two eagles on consecutive holes in Idaho...shooting a 5-under 67 earlier this year at Wachusett....shooting 66 in May at Tedesco with my dad and his two friends playing along....playing Shinnecock last fall...3 trips overseas for golf!

I've seen and done alot in my 15-20 years of golf...and it's the possibility in each round of doing something to make the above list that makes golf so great.

[Bill Spence]

Reading all the father and son highlights, I can't wait until my first (and only) newborn gets old enough to play...

I'm right there with you.  I hope my 7 month old will grow to love the game as much as I do.  If so, I believe that my golfing highlights are in front of me.

[Steve Kline]

Mine, so far, has turned out to be beating a guy named Brett Wetterich in a head-to-head high school match when we were seniors, when we both played well. Brett has gone on to play and win on the PGA Tour and be a Ryder Cupper. We played a 9-hole match, and he shot a 33 and got beat by my 32. I still have the scorecard! Steve Kline no doubt played alot of golf against Brett also...I'm sure he remembers how good he was around the Cincinnati area growing up.

I did play some golf against Brett. He was a year ahead of me. I distinctly remember how ridiculously far he hit with a persimmon driver and balata ball (somewhere in the 290-300 yard range). He took a mighty lash. I remember lots of talent but someone who didn't seem too bright. Although I was really shocked when I saw his name on a tour leaderboard the first time.

David - where did you go to school?

[V. Kmetz]

1982 - first official round of golf...putted from well off the green (out of rough) into the cup for a birdie 2 on my second hole ever

1985 - 60 foot birdie putt on 14th green at BB to win a lot of money

1988 - only player in that year's NEAC to make birdie on the 175 yard 4th hole of New Seabury at Cape Cod - which was darn near impossible given both the temp and wind in the low 40s with sno-flurries on the water.  I'm told the stroke average for the hole was over 5.5.  I had to wait nearly 40 minutes on the tee box as competitor after competitor went into the carry marsh that required a 250 yard driver hit.  Before long the play became to play 70 yards right of the hole where you could carry the marsh with a wood.  When my turn came, I was stiff, cold and discouraged...the conditions were eating me up, I was +8 through three holes and in the days before good weather gear, I was encased in sweaters and jackets like the michelin man.  somehow I cracked my best persimmon driver that went about 280 but the wind pushed back onto the green.  I sank the 40 foot putt birdie.  All coaches and players who witnessed it, say it was the single greatest stroke sequence played in any tournament in the history of golf.  Hyperbole for sure, but I'll take it.

2004 - a beautiful controlled 74 on my favorite course (the one I'll never name)  I've had three scores lower than that, but it was the best I ever played.  My partners played superbly as well and we had a great match.  If my experience of golf was like that more often, I'd be a little handsomer.


cheers

vk

[Simon Holt]

This is almost too hard for me which means I have been blessed.  I am sure many other feel the same.

Instead I will say what I did a few nights ago.  I had been wokring crazy hours for months (still am!!), the girlfriend was on my case and I am trying to buy my first house.  It was all too much!!

At 8pm I grabbed my bag, drove to the gate by the 6th tee at North Berwick and let myself in to what always seems like the secret garden.  I got hit with an empty golf course, a gentle Westerley breeze and my favourite view in golf.  Westerdunes sands all the way down to Fidra.  I played 6, 7, 12, 13, 14, 15, then from the 16th tee to 3rd green, then 4 and 5 to finish.  One last look at Fidra before going back through the gate, locking it and going for a fish supper.  Now that is my idea of stress relief.

[David Whitmer]

Mine, so far, has turned out to be beating a guy named Brett Wetterich in a head-to-head high school match when we were seniors, when we both played well. Brett has gone on to play and win on the PGA Tour and be a Ryder Cupper. We played a 9-hole match, and he shot a 33 and got beat by my 32. I still have the scorecard! Steve Kline no doubt played alot of golf against Brett also...I'm sure he remembers how good he was around the Cincinnati area growing up.

I did play some golf against Brett. He was a year ahead of me. I distinctly remember how ridiculously far he hit with a persimmon driver and balata ball (somewhere in the 290-300 yard range). He took a mighty lash. I remember lots of talent but someone who didn't seem too bright. Although I was really shocked when I saw his name on a tour leaderboard the first time.

David - where did you go to school?

I went to Elder; graduated in 1991. I played quite a bit against St. Xavier guys such as Dan Ryan, Ron Wolterman, Joe Albers, and Pete Kelly. Brett is my age...I played against him in junior golf and such. However, he was held back a year, and thus he was Oak Hills 1992. We won the GCL in golf my senior year (fall of 1990), and that is still the last time Elder won the GCL in golf...we're not exactly a golf powerhouse!

[Scott Szabo]

For me, at least this year, it had to be winning the B flight at the inaugural Yucca this year at Ballyneal.  I must admit to having mixed emotions as I may be the only person not invited back next year since the win came at the expense of my most gracious host!   

[Adrian_Stiff]

As a round - I had an eight footer on the 10th to go 8 under (missed it then had two doubles later so finished -4) I was 3 hcp at the time and it was my first and only 29 for 9 holes.
As a tournament I think 4th in a windy county championship beats any win: 74-76-76-73. Won 3 club champs. Only once finished under par for 36 holes.
4 holes in one on holes over 120 yards or 17 holes in one counting par 3 courses, about 15 other holed fairway shots but never an albatross, holed a 7 iron at the 17th once in a close game to win a match. Twice holed full shots at an 18th.

[RJ_Daley]

"golfing highlight" implies playing highlight.  I can't really point to one personal highlight.  I'm just not that good of a player.  Never had an ace.  Never shot par over 18 holes, not even close... only shot 79 a handful of times, etc.

"golf highlight" implies more of a process to me.  A highlight was the process of trying to develope a golf course/club (even though it failed to come to fruition) getting into the finaincial model and marketting the shareholder aspects, as well as the design process on a specific piece of land - working with an archie, and studying all that I could about golf design (starting from scratch) and then studying course and turf management.  All that as a hobbiest or amatuer if you will, never to become a pro or expert on any of it.  But, the process was a series of highlights and enlightenment, with many rich encounters of golf people of all disciplines and walks of likfe along the way.

I'm still travelling that path in a far more relaxed, 'take it as it comes' process of golf highlights.  I expect more highlights will come as the process goes on, with nothing too momentus of import that it will require a ranking system of specific events.  

[Jim Franklin]

Shooting 67 in my club championship. It was the only sub-par round of the event too and our club has some very good players.

My highlight still has not come yet as I can't wait to watch my kids play.

[Brian Freeman]

More abstract: Standing up on the 7th tee at Dornoch for the first time this May, looking over the course and across the firth thinking how far I had come - both in distance and in my life's journey - in 18 short months, to places I never dreamt I would reach.

I second Dornoch, for me the entirety of it all, 54 holes in 30 hours on two perfect days - the entire round of the Tuesday evening "twilight" special where my best friend and I had the course to ourselves for 18 holes.  On the ninth tee that night, I told myself, "you'll never be farther away from it all than this".

Honorable mentions would be: the 20 footer I made on the 18th green to break par for 18 holes my first (and only) time, holing out from a terrible lie for a birdie 3 on the 14th at Cruden Bay, and the 30-footer I made on the 18th to halve the best match I ever had with the same friend as above.

[George Pazin]

Best day for me so far has been the Inniscrone outing day:

- shared a round with Jamie Slonis, Geoff Childs and Brad Miller, all 3 great guys (and Jamie somehow managed to carry me to a victory), enjoyed lunch with Gil discussing the course with the group afterward;

- walked Applebrook with those who stuck around, listening to Gil and Jim Wagner was awesome

- then dinner at Gil's with an even smaller crew, finishing up by sitting on Gil's deck, listening to Gil, Ran, Pat M and Tom P swap stories.



Best two days:

Hanging with the big red head for a couple days, playing Don's course and then Rawls with Don and Lou Duran.



Can't wait to top everything with trips to Wolf Point and Barnbougle someday.

[RSLivingston_III]

Getting my dad to Scotland back in 2000 for his first playing trip there, and getting to play in some events. Amazingly he had been going over for years for work, but never played.

[jonathan_becker]

Sure, I've had lots of great memories playing with family and friends throughout the years, but I look at a golfing highlight as a playing highlight.

The bad - once shot 83 with 16 pars....shot 33-47 in a tournament and the 33 had a triple in it.

The good - shot 64 in 2003 at Shaker Run with a ball o.b....have had 3 attempts in my life to shoot 29, but none of the final putts dropped (5 under for two of those, 6 under for the other).  Although, I have shot 29 once but the 9 hole yardage was 2600 yards.  I don't count that as official.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Jeff,

There are so many good things that have happened to me in golf over the years that I've been playing, unfortunately, I can't recall all of them.

One of them is making an eagle on the 17th hole to get me into a playoff for a USGA Amateur and then getting a birdie on the first playoff hole to make it into the tournament.

It wasn't just that event by itself, but the fact that my father, years earlier, made an eagle on the 18th Hole at Baltusrol to get into a playoff with seven Pros and then he made a birdie on the third hole to qualify for the USGA Open.

Obviously, he was a better player, having qualified for several U.S. Opens and lots and lots of U.S. Amateurs.

The other was being three down with three to play in the second round of North-South Amateur and winning the match by making a 6-footer on # 19.  What made that special was that golfers who won their first two (2) matches were exempt from qualifying for the next three (3) years, and that was a big deal when you were from the north and the tournament was held in early April

[Bill_Yates]

Consulting with the R&A and being inside the ropes for the Open Championship. 

[Doug Siebert]

A tie between making a hole in one on Carnoustie's 16th on my first visit in 1991 and holing a 33 foot putt from the fringe for a birdie 2 on my second visit in 2001.  Lifetime average of 1.5, I daresay I'm the best in the world on that hole!

[Jeff Fortson]

Beating Tiger Woods by 2 shots while playing in the same group with him in the first round of the SCGA Jr. Amateur (70 - 72).  I was 17, he was 16.  We got paired together for the final 18 and he caught me on 14.  I parred the last four and lost by four.  I can take it to my grave that I gave Tiger a run and actually beat him for a round straight up over 18 holes.


Jeff F.

[Matthew Rose]

Playing in a high school match on a terrible golf course on a 50 degree day in the rain, I made my second hole-in-one and broke 80 for the first time in the same round, in competition no less.

Runners-up would be a tie between the other ace and the day my older brother and I shot 61 in a 2-man scramble.

[Brian Phillips]

Consulting with the R&A and being inside the ropes for the Open Championship. 

Bill,

That is pretty cool! 

[Carl Rogers]

On the golf course, this year I shot 71 at Riverfront on June 19.  (I had to shoot that kind of career round against the sandb____er competition in our golf association match play to have a chance of winning).

Aced the 2nd at Riverfront April 1, 2006.

Off the course winning the last Golf Magazine Armchair Architect Contest (fall of 2005) and spending 3 days with TD and Team at the Bay of Dreams.   ... Finding this site and friend Scott Weersing at about that time.

[Andy Shulman]

Shooting 84 on my first trip around the Old Course probably tops my list.  But forget about that.  A 1.5 average on the lengthy 16th at Carnoustie (where I hit my tee shot absolutely on the screws and barely got to the front fringe) is incredible.  Nice going, Doug!