FRIPP-OUT 99 Dave Tutelman -- Feb 6, 1999 The clan gathered again on Super Bowl weekend, to recreate the wonderful golf weekend we experienced exactly two years earlier. Of the six of us from 1997, only Chuck Sedlacko couldn't make it. This year's roster: Brent Hutto - The original organizer of this bienniel golfing expedition. David Reiling - Co-organizer, and our host at The University Club. Scott Berry - David's golf partner. Guy "Coops" Cooper David "Thor" Collard Mark Georg Joe Dean Me THE WEATHER: The Thor Effect was in full voice. The Weather Channel wasn't too bullish on our chances, except for Thursday. But it worked out fine. * Thursday - 78 and sunny, as predicted. * Friday - My wife told me after I got home that the radar map showed all of South Carolina as green (rain), except for a little hole in the middle of the state. That was the "Thor clearing". We had warm, sunny weather the whole day. * Saturday - Rain was promised. It was cloudy and windy, threatening rain all day. But it didn't make good on the threat until we were putting out on the last hole. (Of course! Thor effect, y'know.) Then it rained. All night. * Sunday - Still raining when we awoke, and promised all day. Rained during the drive to Cat Island. Stopped when we got to the course. We played in ferocious wind under threatening skies. But we didn't get rained on except for maybe three drops at the twelfth tee. REMEMBERING. . . Can't remember all 100 holes (yes, 100 holes in the three days between 1PM Thursday and 1PM Sunday). But here are the things that I remember... THURSDAY: Charwood. Gorgeous weather, fun course. I played with Thor and Mark. Dead topped my first two shots. Not an auspicious start. But I didn't do that again all weekend (fortunately). The infamous lake+stream hole... You need a 140-yard carry to cross the lake, but stay short of the stream at 200. I hit my best five-iron of the week, putting it almost 190 and dead in the middle of the fairway. We all made it across, but Mark's ball had to skip three times before it hopped onto dry land. (Not the last time we'd see that from Mark, either.) On a straight, 480-yard par-5 on the second nine, Mark hit a big drive with his son's Bubble driver. (Mark had borrowed it for the weekend.) Middle of the fairway (unlike Thor and me, in the right-hand rough). He hit a driver off the deck onto the green. Gave the eagle putt a good run, and tapped in his birdie. The exploit made "driver off the deck" our battle cry for the rest of the weekend. It wasn't anywhere near dark when we finished the second nine, so we played another four holes of the third nine. Since Thor had arrived early and played all morning, that gave him 44 holes for the day... just one short of his personal record of 45 (remember Butlers last April?). Supper at the Hunter Gatherer in the University section of Columbia. A bar with okay food. The waitress started with, "We have five different beers." Each of us got either the local "SC Bitter" or the Guinness-clone "Ye Olde Bastard". Deciding the bitter was too bitter and the bastard not bitter enough, someone (Thor? Mark?) mixed them and pronounced the result just right. For the next round, we asked the waitress for a "Bitter Old Bastard", and pointed out that now she could say, "We have six different beers." We all had good rooms at Days Inn, except for Thor and Joe, who complained about everything about the room. Maybe the staff just didn't like them... FRIDAY: Days Inn has a great breakfast included in the price of the room. Eggs to order, with full trimmings. But Thor still couldn't get it right from them. He asked for a small orange juice, and was told there was no such thing. "But I got one here yesterday." "Well, she shouldn't have given it to you." He wound up with a large OJ and had to pay for it. Wonder where he's going to stay when we come back next year. :-( We met David at The University Club, where he is a member. That is one of my favorite courses in the world. The scale is BIG. Big hills. (Only day I carried my bag; too hilly for a pull-cart.) Big trees lining the fairways. Water in lots of places, and big waste areas where water wouldn't stay. (Hey, gravity and all that.) The fairways aren't especially narrow, but the penalty for missing them is often worse than just rough. Amidst all this "muscle" is the best collection of greens you could imagine. Bentgrass, and just short of bikini-wax. But they run true as an arrow. The result is that it's easier to one-putt here than the other (bermuda greens) courses we played -- but it's also easier to three-putt. We played all three nines. The Black course wasn't open two years ago, so this was our first time on it. At least as good as the Garnet, and better than the Gold IMHO. I carried my bag the first 18, and rode with David the last 9 after lunch. Only Thor (of course) and Coops walked after lunch. On the two par-fives that finish over water (Garnet #5 and Black #9), I went for it with a three wood from over 200 yards. Both pretty good shots, but both splashed. On the hole with The Claw bunker (Garnet #3), I hit one of my best drives of the weekend. It went at the right edge of The Claw, kicked right and rolled to the edge of the fairway. Perfect position. On Black #4, I played one of the few fairways-and-greens I managed for the weekend. 280-yard drive in the middle of the fairway, high PW to the middle of the green, and two-putt for par. Gold #5 is a par-3 over a wetlands, which is at the bottom of a big valley. I hit last (really screwed up #4), and the green was still virgin. I put it 10 feet from the pin, and made the downhill 3-foot-breaking birdie putt. After lunch at the clubhouse, Coops offered everybody after-dinner mints -- um, er -- Ibuprofen tablets. After carrying our bags 18 holes on a mountain-goat course, many of us accepted. Our last hole of the day was a par-3. I put my tee shot in the rocks below the green. But I found my ball and it's not in the hazard. Just wedged between a couple of rocks. Next shot a little tap AWAY from the green, to give myself a couple of feet to hit up over the rocks. Then lay a lob wedge way open and try to swing it under the ball. First try pops almost straight up, but it hits the top of the rocks and bounces back. Second try makes it up, and I'm putting. Lying four and -- all things considered -- glad of it. After the round, we took three cars to Fripp Island. Brent's and Thor's cars stopped for dinner and groceries in Walterboro (or Walterbord, according to the postcards at the Longhorn Steak House). David and Scott didn't stop, and were at the condo on Fripp when we arrived. SATURDAY: Windy and a trifle chilly, but no rain. Once I had hit a few at the range, the jacket came off and I was just fine in a long-sleeved golf shirt. I really enjoy Ocean Creek (the Davis Love design at Fripp). Flat (easy for a pull cart), lots of water, and salt marsh on several of the holes. Unfortunately, they're starting to build houses alongside the fairways that they can. So far that's only #17, and there aren't enough holes where there's room for houses to make it as bad as Ocean Point. (I won't play Ocean Point again.) The wildlife (I almost typed "livestock") is another plus for the course. Snowy egrets. Herons. Pelicans. Deer. LOTS of deer. Deer tame enough so "livestock" would have been appropriate. Joe was in his pre-shot routine on #12 when a deer poked up from the salt marsh and climbed onto the teeing ground. Another followed. They weren't much impressed by Joe's swing and the "thwack" of the ball -- at least not enough to stop grazing and flee. The only wildlife I missed were the alligators who were basking on the shore two years ago. Colder this time, so I guess they were in hibernation. I played the course raggedly, barely breaking 50 on each of the first three nines. And we didn't finish the fourth nine. It was getting dark, and we were playing tired. No, I didn't FEEL tired, even walking 33 holes; they were flat, as I said. But we were not playing sharp. Thor talked us into a best-ball, Ohio vs the Rest of the World (Thor and Joe vs Mark and me) on the back 18. On #9, we halved the hole with eights; we were that bad. By #11, we agreed we would end the match at #15; it is next to the parking lot, before the course heads way out for the last three [long] holes. The match was halved when -- well I won't say, but it wasn't pretty.... Funniest hole of the weekend: #11 on our second round. This has water between tee and fairway, then water down both sides for 200 yards. - Thor splashed in the water left. - I hit the fairway on the right side, beyond the water right. But it was still too far right, and kicked through the trees into the marsh beyond. - Joe hit a worm-burner at the bridge in front of the tees, the access across the first water. The ball popped WAY up in the air; seemed like minutes before it came down, but it looked dry. No such luck; it took a huge (and, again, very high) bounce off the cart path. This bounce landed in the lake. - Mark also worm-burned, but missed the bridge to the right. The master skimmer got his ball to skip 5-6 times, it reached a spit of land (yeah!) and bounced across it to the water beyond (oh no!). Two more skips and it drowned. By now we're in hysterics; but we're not done. Mark dropped on the spit of land and went "driver off the deck". The shot was low, but straight and hard. In fact, it was SO straight it hit the 150-yard steel pipe in the middle of the fairway. (Real loud bell when it hit. :-) It caromed straight right, and into the same hazard I was in. When we got back to the condo, someone observed that we could see the ocean from the second-floor deck. This happened about the same time Thor decided he wanted to repeat tradition and "hit balls into the ocean". Observing that there was only one row of houses between us and the beach, he wanted to go "driver off the deck". He had to be forcibly restrained, and he eventually took a club and some balls down to the beach for the ceremony. We went for dinner to the same restaurant at the Marina where we ate last time. But it has changed hands, and is distinctly more commercial and less intimate and regional. Success is definitely spoiling Fripp Island. A few of us had too many beers, and someone pointed out to the waitress, "You don't flag anyone here, do you?" She replied that this is a private island, and drinking and driving aren't against the law, as long as it "doesn't get out of hand". She allowed, "we can't let drunk driving get out of hand, can we?" On the drive back, someone (Mark?) started a theme of, "MADD now has something to be reall mad about; they can't start a chapter on Fripp." "Well, I bet Fripp Island has a chapter of MAOOHDD." (That would be Mothers Against Out Of Hand Drunk Driving.) By the time we reached our street, we were all laughing so hard we drove right by it. David, right behind, also missed the turn. We turned into the circular driveway of the Beach Club to turn around and go back. David followed. Brent said, "Let's see how anxious David is to follow us," and repeated his circuit of the driveway. The second time around, David didn't follow us. At least I don't think he did; we were all laughing so hard I couldn't be sure. The moment had all the feel of a college fraternity "road trip". At this point, it was raining hard, and had been since we left the course. All night, the rain and wind howled. But we had three great days of golf behind us. SUNDAY: Three cars, three waves of golfers. 1. Thor and Joe had to catch their plane in Atlanta, so they had to get off the course well before the rest of us. Mark joined them, and the first threesome was on its way to Cat Island to start before eight. 2. Brent, Coops, and I intended to play -- or at least see if it was playable. Not promising, but who knows; Thor is already playing there. We left to get there at 8:30, still well before our appointed tee time. 3. David and Scott had no intention of playing golf in "ski weather", planned a leisurely buffet breakfast at the Ocean Point club, and said they'd check in with us later. When we arrived at South Carolina National, we were only the third car in the non-employee lot. The first was the Thormobile, and they were out on the course. The second had just arrived. Most important, the rain had stopped. Not pleasant, perhaps -- damp, dark, and furiously windy -- but no rain and not unbearably cold. Sorta' what you'd imagine of Scotland in summer. :-) The first hole was right into the the teeth of the gale. I was so unnerved that I completely whiffed my tee shot. I was fine after that, and had a rather good day of ball-striking, except for a really bad lapse on #6 and #7. That might have been due in part to seeing an apparition after my first shot on the sixth. A cart approached, and we were greeted by a pair who were dressed for the Arctic. David and Scott want to see if we were REALLY crazy enough to play golf in this weather. David was wearing a quilted parka, a ski hat and earmuffs, and big ol' mittens. I found it really funny, because at this point, I was down to a sweater (no windbreaker, no rain jacket) and had taken off my winter gloves. Other things worth remembering: We pretty much had the course to ourselves. At the turn, we waved through a twosome in a cart, and that was the only group we ever saw ahead or behind. On two par-threes, I hit exactly the shot I wanted, and still splashed well short of the green. - On #4, it was misjudging the wind. I allowed two extra clubs, and hit it on the screws. Wasn't even close to clearing the water. - On #16, I remembered how overstated the yardage marker was two years ago (man, was I PO'd), so I took a swing for 30 yards less than the marked 110. They must have re-measured, 'cause I splashed about 25 yards short. My re-tee was a full swing, and on the dance floor. While I wasn't hitting my woods all that well, my irons were right on the button. I was even using my 5-iron off the tee on par-4s, where I needed to be accurate. On #12, "a dog ate my homework -- honest!" We had hit our approach shots and were ourselves approaching the green. A big, playful golden retriever bounded out of a yard behind the green. He ran to each of us and charged/sniffed/barked -- obviously wanted to play. Then he ran onto the green, picked up my ball, and carried it to the top of the mound behind the green. Put it down and lay next to it. Anytime I moved in his direction, he picked it up again. As I putted out with another ball (for my par), his owner called from the back porch. He left the ball, and ran away as quickly as he had arrived. Next hole, a par-3 over water, I knocked it stiff and just missed the birdie putt. Next hole, I hit a drive way right OVER the mounds that bound the fairway. My following shot was even worse, crossing the road to the right and ending in the downslope of a roadside ditch. I didn't see any OB stakes, and the scorecard said nothing about the road being OB, so I decided to try to play it. Hit a full-swing wedge, and it hit the green and held. Missed the par putt by only a couple of inches, and tapped in for a most unlikely bogey. Brent had suggested we compete the back nine: Coops against our better ball. Turned out to be a fair piece of handicapping. Coops won, but not until the seventeenth green. And the match kept us fairly focused. I've never seen Brent play as well, and Coops was driving further and straighter than I can remember. And I'll never forget Coops' stiffing what should have been a sucker pin on #16 to go dormie-2.) And I played my best-scoring nine holes of the weekend, in spite of the wind. All in all, a wonderful weekend. Thanks again, Brent and David, for organizing it and inviting me. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Google Home - Advertise with Us - Add Google to Your Site - News and Resources - Language Tools - Jobs, Press, Cool Stuff... ©2001 Google