I played golf with the Schmidt’s yesterday at Turtle Creek. Bud and Bill are currently 11’s and I’m 12 so it’s all fairly even. We play for big money so I’m not going to disclose the winnings and loses as it may make people uncomfortable.

I’ll get my weak play out of the way first shooting a 90 on a relatively easy course and not losing any golf balls. My long irons have been killing me as I’m topping a lot of shots. Bud shot an 86 missing 2 short putts. I watched a Lee Trevino tutorial on making short putts and he made a comment about how many guys are in the club house saying, “if I just made those short putts I’d have shot a 79.” Not saying Bud does this (I definitely do this), but it’s good to know that nothing has changed through time in relation to the game of golf. Chris, Bud’s mom, shot a 105 and is consistent off the tee and had her flat stick working for a few holes. If she had a go to club out of rough, I’d say she would break 100.

Bill is the main topic of this post as he carded 4 birdies on the round (almost 5 if he made the putt on 18) to shoot an 80. To be in his 70’s and still beating his son and childhood friend is impressive. If I can be better than I am now in my later years, I don’t know how that’s even possible. He plays from the same tees as us, and is better in almost all aspects of the game except for distance, which clearly doesn’t matter. On hole 4 he hit a drive that was too high and fading. The hole is 350 and the ball probably went 175. Bud said he could still get there with a wood, Bill disagreed, I agreed with Bill, and then he hit his shot to 4 feet from the rough. His approach shots tend to land on the front of the green and roll to the pin which is funny to see when you never do it yourself. Not only does he beat us, but I was struggling on the front with contact and he said that it helps him to not swing as hard. I adjusted and on 9 and hit a 4 iron on the green on the next shot. Aside from one topped ball on 12 and a flub on 18, I didn’t have contact issues from that point on.

It’s nice to play with golfers who are better than you even though the handicaps say we aren’t that far apart. If the odds were looking at an 11 playing a 12, Bill would be -1000 every round unless the course was 12,000 yards. A final take from the round was when Bill said after they had Bud, he didn’t play golf for 5 years and when he came back to the game, he didn’t take it as seriously. He played better under with that approach. I’ve always had this tough dichotomy between taking it as seriously as you can to improve and having fun with it. I’ve experimented with both styles and it’s nice to hear someone who plays the game this well feel that free flowing approach is better and how not getting upset never helps.

Lastly, the fact that Bud and I have been friends for as long as we have and are as similar in ability is crazy. What are the chances that the person who grew up behind me has the same interests and skill level? We played the same video games, sports, and were able to be friends for 30+ years without confrontation. I actually can’t remember the details anymore, but I made Bud run home after trying to punch him after a game of John Elway football where I knocked the controller out of his hand while he was speeding around with the cheap play. I’m sure his memory is pristine on this near death experience. As I’ve learned, life long friends are hard to come by and I’m lucky enough to have a few. Since I know the Schmidt’s read the blog, and I have to make sure Bill starts getting the notifications again, they can feel good about getting a positive endorsement from the brass at splittingtens.com. These rounds are a great way to stay in contact and have a good time.