We teed off at 7:50 at Twin Oaks, the sun still golden and low off the first tee, with Ian, Dav, and Joe. You split the fairway with the driver and two-putted for a clean four, and that was the shape of the whole front — nine holes, nine squares on the card, and only one of them a real sweat.
The engine on the front was the approach game. On 3 you took a 5-iron from 196 off the tee and put it on the green — a hole you'd normally play a stroke worse. On 6, from 165 in the rough, you flushed the 6-iron to fifteen feet, the best swing of the morning. On 7 the 54 from 97 landed soft and left a look. The putts weren't falling — short on 3, short on 6, short on 7, a parade of lag-and-tap-in twos — but the ball-striking kept you level, and I figured we were in something good. Even 9, with a thin tee shot that only went 143, you recovered twice and salvaged the bogey. Your note said it best: terrible drive, nice recovery. And underneath it, the truth of the day — hitting it really well, just haven't made any putts at all.
That line was the back nine in advance. We made the turn at +1, and the putter kept costing us. On 10 you hit the green from the tee and three-putted from 43 feet — the one hole on the card where the flat stick alone took a stroke. On 12 a pushed hybrid, a 9-iron that came up short, and we scrambled to bogey.
Then, in the middle of all that leaking, two of them dropped. On 11 you drove it 255 down the middle and, after an iffy wedge into the rough, chipped the 58 to a tap-in for par. On 13 you holed one from twelve feet — a one-putt out of nowhere, the putt you'd been waiting on all day.
Fourteen was the full round in one hole: 279 off the tee, dead straight, then the 50 from 108 to ten feet. The birdie look slid by, of course. From there it was a slow bleed home — bogeys on 15, 16, and 17, each one with a putt left shy or a wedge off line. On 16 you had to chip in from a yard off the green after a muddled approach stretch, which saved it from getting worse.
We walked off 18 at 12:27, par to close it out, 78 on the card, the sun high and the air still. You struck it like a man who shot two or three better. The putter had other ideas. Some days that's the whole story, and today it was.
Hole 9"Hitting it really well, just haven't made any putts at all"