Mark WiedmerStrictly as a public service to both the United States Golf Association and the 156 young men who will begin stroke play today in the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship at The Honors Course, I decided to play the lethal layout in Ooltewah a few weeks ago.
You know, just to make sure it was tough enough.
The Honors didn’t make this concession for me alone, of course. It hosted a media day to promote the tournament. And judging by the fact it was held May 17, both Honors brass and USGA executives were obviously aware of the recovery time the course might need everywhere except the greens from our divots and whiffs and all matter of lost golf balls.
And that’s only because the greens, at least in my case, couldn’t have been safer if they’d been guarded by Navy SEALS. By the time I reached them on most holes, the rest of my foursome – WTVC News Channel 9’s trio of sports anchor Dave Staley, all-purpose reporter John Madewell and special services director Sheldon Harrell – were demanding I simply add three strokes to however many swings I’d already taken and “stop holding up the show.”
My futility even forced Madewell to exit after just nine holes in order to make that afternoon’s news broadcast at the station. (Sorry, John.)
So perhaps it’s not true that none of us could hold our own against all these young Turks 18 and younger blasting tee shots 350 yards, holing out from pot bunkers and dropping 40-foot putts on greens that are faster than Usain Bolt.
Staley even emailed the following statement to me Sunday: “Actually, as tough as the course is, it fits my game pretty well. I drive the ball pretty well, and on The Honors, you have to drive well and keep it in the short grass.”
He even recalled a conversation he had years ago with the course’s founder, Jack Lupton.
“As Lupton told me years ago,” Staley noted, “It’s not a tough course if you make your shots.'”
Ouch.
But some of us (blush, blush) don’t make shots. We make divots a backhoe would envy – and more sand tracks than a dune buggy at Daytona Beach. Our Titleists swim with the fishes. The only thing retiring course superintendent David Stone probably fears more than me is the Caddyshack gopher.
That doesn’t mean that my 130 or so strokes (who really counts after you hit triple-digits?), 13 three-putts and eight lost balls shouldn’t concern the Junior Am field.
As the Golf Channel’s Charlie Rymer, a club member and former Junior Am champ, said two months ago regarding this breathtaking and sometimes brutal layout: “This course will scare (the Junior Am field) a bit. You won’t see them laughing and giggling. But it will be fun for them, even if there’s trouble everywhere.”
Of course, Rymer also said: “This is a great golf course for match play. This course is designed to test the best in the world, and it will do that. But even if you make a 10 or a 12, it’s just one hole. And for one lucky player, it will be the week of a lifetime.”
It could be the experience of a lifetime for all 156 young men who tee it up today, regardless of their results, given the course’s welcoming, unpretentious clubhouse, its breathtaking natural beauty and the stunning quiet that permeates the place, often interrupted only by the chirping of birds.
“It’s one of the top 25 courses in the country, and it may be much better than that,” said Rymer, who spent his early childhood just up the road in Cleveland. “I love coming here, and when I leave I’ll be weeping.”
As often happens in golf, after a horrific afternoon for me and the course, my weeping subsided when I somehow managed to bogey two of the final five holes. Emboldened by my improvement, I quizzed my caddie, Eddie Riddell, who has worked at the course longer than I’ve had my naugahyde bag and 30-year-old Ping knockoffs.
“So, what do you think? Is the senior tour in my future?”
Said Riddell, his face an equal mix of bemusement and bewilderment: “I wouldn’t quit your day job just yet.”
But for each of the 156 golfers who dreams of making pro golf his day job one day, might I suggest you spend this week focusing on the late Lupton’s immortal words: It’s not a tough course if you make your shots It’s not a tough course if you make your shots It’s not a tough course if
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.