Tucked into the southwestern corner of the city of San Francisco is tightly packed campus of San Francisco State University, which sits right next to San Francisco's only true mall Stonestown Galleria. Next to both SFSU and Stonestown is the highly competitive public magnet Lowell High School, one of the top high schools in all the state of California. Also down there is the freshwater Lake Merced which is surrounded by four outstanding golf courses. Two of the four are owned by the Olympic Club, one of the courses is the San Francisco Country Club and the fourth is Harding Park Golf Course. Note that it isn't Harding Park Golf Club for you see, Harding Park is one of two municipal golf courses owned by the city of San Francisco. Harding Park (named after President Warren G. Harding who passed away in the city) having the same terrain and flora as its more famous neighhbors is in itself a highly regarded layout. It regularly held professional golfing tournaments through the 1960's but had fallen on hard times during last couple decades of the 20th century. Five or so years ago, a private firm took over the business aspects of the course and brought Harding Park back to its former glory. The crowning moment of Harding's renaissance was its selection as the course to hole the finale of the World Series of Golf last year.
This morning, Scott and I snagged two spots of his friends foursome and we were off the 1st tee at 10:10AM. The morning started gloriously with bright sunshine and I was in shorts this first Saturday in January.
Scott and our two balls safely on and putting for birdie on the par 3 third.
Both of us three-putted the third green. However, the beautiful sun quickly turned to a steady drizzling rain and by the time we were on the 8th tee, it looked like this:
Rain, rain go away.....
We decided to call it a day after the ninth hole. Even though it had stopped raining, both of us had not brought rain gear so we were both soaked. Scott beat me, but I was able to observe some key differences in the way we approach the game. Scott is a firm believer in warming up by hitting balls on the range and practicing his putting. I just show up on the first tee, take a couple of practice swings and away I am.
Scott is a firm believer in yardage. He looks for the yardage markers and paces to his ball to determine the exact distance he has to get to the green. On the green, Scott is careful to mark his ball and squat down to read the line. Well, you can imagine that I'm the complete opposite.
Scott and I both have testy relationships with our drivers. The result is that Scott plays only with his irons. I pull out the driver every single time I can and let her rip.
We are, however, competitive in ability and agree that honestly reporting one's score is of utmost importance for the both of us even with our huge stylistic differences.
This morning, Scott and I snagged two spots of his friends foursome and we were off the 1st tee at 10:10AM. The morning started gloriously with bright sunshine and I was in shorts this first Saturday in January.
Both of us three-putted the third green. However, the beautiful sun quickly turned to a steady drizzling rain and by the time we were on the 8th tee, it looked like this:
We decided to call it a day after the ninth hole. Even though it had stopped raining, both of us had not brought rain gear so we were both soaked. Scott beat me, but I was able to observe some key differences in the way we approach the game. Scott is a firm believer in warming up by hitting balls on the range and practicing his putting. I just show up on the first tee, take a couple of practice swings and away I am.
Scott is a firm believer in yardage. He looks for the yardage markers and paces to his ball to determine the exact distance he has to get to the green. On the green, Scott is careful to mark his ball and squat down to read the line. Well, you can imagine that I'm the complete opposite.
Scott and I both have testy relationships with our drivers. The result is that Scott plays only with his irons. I pull out the driver every single time I can and let her rip.
We are, however, competitive in ability and agree that honestly reporting one's score is of utmost importance for the both of us even with our huge stylistic differences.
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