Only my second time to the states and it didn’t fail to amaze me. It was everything I expected, from the 60 year old taxi driver who didn’t know what currency we used in england to the ridiculous amounts of burgers that were served! Andrew Cooley and myself were treated like kings all week from everybody at sea island… Thanks to them guys and what a great place.
I had two practice rounds on the ocean forest course and they we’re in different conditions which was great. The First day was calm and sunny and I was wondering what all the fuss was about, and then it blew on the second day and I decided to keep my mouth shut! I got everything done I wanted to do in terms of my preparation and was ready for the battle come friday.
Friday came and with it a 15-20 mph wind… I knew this was going to be a very stern test for all areas of my game! I shot 4 over par, finishing with two bogeys. I felt a little hard done by as I really deserved more out of the round, hit some great putts coming in but just kept shaving the edges… The green reading was already becoming a slight issue.
Onto the second day where I played my best golf, tee to green all week. My iron play in particular was really under control. But again a disappointing bogey on the last and a one over par 73 left me thinking what could’ve been… Especially as the conditions were favourable. But still lying in 12th place I believed there was a chance to give the leaders a scare. (As my playing partner proved the next day!)
Third round and nice conditions again, felt really confident about my game. Gave myself some good looks early on but nothing dropped and nothing really got going, but a birdie at 11 got me to one under par and a chance to push on, but unfortunately a poor 3 putt on 12 sent me back to level and then I lost a bit of connection between the body and arms and hit a few shots left coming in. I must say, I tried hitting a couple of heroic shots from trouble and they just didn’t come off but I told myself to go for it and see what happens… This time it wasn’t meant to be and a double bogey, double bogey run on 16 and 17 sent me way down the leaderboard. A finishing 77 wasn’t what I wanted but I’d seen enough in the first 47 holes of the tournament to know how much I’d improved over the winter in key areas of my game.
A highlight of the week was Andrew having a hole in one on the 17th… Great choice. All in all a great experience and I’ve learnt from the week and am sure I’ll improve for Portugal next week.
Would also like to wish Tom Lewis all the best in Dubai this week, I’m sure ‘the major’ will play some great stuff!
Look forward to ‘blogging’ again!
Eddie Pepperell
