Viewer Mail: Anonymous Writes...

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The following grouchy golf observation was submitted by an anonymous grouchy golfer. I think that all golfers can relate to his story. I sure know that Darren Clarke does!

Shanks a Lot!

A little background - I am a 4 handicap, and over the winter my swing had become "unorthodox". I started standing closer to the ball, with less hip sway etc. The changes were amazing and I started playing some amazing golf. I was getting under par during some rounds, but I was just having a little trouble scoring. No biggy.

Well a week ago it all suddenly went to the crapper. I showed up at the range one day before a round and hit hosel rockets with everything. I headed out to the course and it was as if they were not there. They came and went for a few more days. Then on Saturday, I shanked so many I shot 49 on the front nine of my home course. I came back with a 37, and thought they were through. Next day I hit a few more but nothing bad.

First day of my tournament came, on Monday. I was a little nervous about shanking, but nothing came up, and I was 1 over on the front nine. I hit some more lack luster irons on the back, but nothing major round, for a 43, and an 80. I was very disappointed.

Second day was yesterday. No range at the course so no warm up. I hit a 3 wood right down the pipe on the opening short par 5. I then heeled a 3 wood so bad off the deck it dribbled into the hazard about 30 yards ahead of me. I dropped, hit two shanks, and ended up with a triple bogey. Next hole I hit a driver so far off the heel. Punched out, and had 140 to the flag. I hit another shank, flubbed a chip, and three putter for a triple. I heeled another drive on the next hole, and had to lay up. I then shanked a gap wedge and made another triple. I started with 3 triples. Next hole I actually hit a somewhat flush drive, landed in a divot, hit into another divot next to the green made bogey. I then bogeyed the next par 3. I then made a par on a par 5. Then I made an 8 on a par 3, shanking a few O.B. I ended up with a 54 on the front nine. At that point I almost just through my clubs in a lake and walked in. I decided to forge ahead, and shot a shank filled 40 on the back.

I went and played today and was probably around 50 for nine holes before quitting. I am seriously thinking of just walking away from golf for the first time in my life. I am not having any fun right now.

Viewer Mail: Hottest Driver?

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The following story was submitted by a grouchy golfer named Tom. Tom's tale involves a do-it-yourself golf club customization to one of the hottest drivers on tour, the TaylorMade R7 Tour Preferred (TP). Yes, it is possible to make this driver even hotter. Thanks Tom!

One Sizzling R7 Driver!

Ok, so here's something you don't see every day. My friend (his identity shall remain a secret, as I have promised him that) owns a TaylorMade R7 TP retail driver. While he likes the driver overall, he strongly disliked the tinny sound it made at impact. He decided to stuff cotton into the weight holes to try and deaden the sound. But after doing so, the cotton compacted, and he ended up with about 20 little pea-sized cotton chunks rolling around in his clubhead. It sounded like peanuts in a jar!

What he did next is the interesting part. He deduced that, since there was no way to retrieve the cotton pellets and cotton was flammable, it would be clever to pour a little gasoline into the weight holes and let the cotton soak it up. Then, he could light it and burn the cotton into noiseless ash. Here is where the trouble starts...

I think he poured a little too much gas into the holes because when he lit it, flames shot out about 6 inches from all four holes, scaring the living $hit out of him! He dropped the club immediately and it landed head first onto the driveway (at least he was smart enough to do this highly technical procedure outside), leaving big scrapes on the crown. When he thought that the fire was out, he picked up the driver by the head only to feel the sharp pain of hot metal searing his fingertips. In knee-jerk reaction, he dropped the club again, scratching up more of the clubhead!

After a momentary fit of rage, he collected himself and tried to think through the situation. He decided to play it smart and allow the club to cool off before he picked up the club. Staring at his nicked up baby, he wondered if he could buff out the scratches in the paint. Well, those concerns about scratches soon became irrelevant as the paint started peeling off the clubhead before his very eyes! It turns out that there was still a bit of fuel inside the clubhead that continued to burn as my friend waited for it to cool. The smoldering fuel heated the clubhead so much that it peeled off most of the paint!

But there is a bright side to all of this - the procedure to burn away the cotton worked, and there are now NO more rattles in the head!!! When he phoned me and told me this story, I just about peed myself laughing, which prompted him to hang up the phone on me. I will try to be more consoling in the future...

Golf Grouch Comment: That's one way to smoke your driver! Who knows, maybe an engineer at TaylorMade will read this story and turn it into the next big thing in driver technology: RPD (Rocket Propelled Driver). Tom, tell your friend that he'd better apply for a patent pronto!

Viewer Mail: Wedgehead Writes...

The Grouchy Golf Blog (GGB) welcomes your grouchy golf observations. If you have a grouchy golf observation that you would like to be posted on the GGB, please email it to the address in the sidebar. Remember, all submissions become the property of the GGB. Submissions chosen for publication may be edited for length and clarity.

The following grouchy golf observation was submitted by a dedicated grouchy golf reader named Wedgehead. He recently moved to southern California and played a golf course that I recommended. Remember, if you play a course that I recommend, prepare to get grouchy. Here's his story of his first round at Los Verdes Golf Course.

Don't Touch My Balls!

Hey Grouch, thanks for the recommendations...I wasn't playing so well but on one of the finishing holes, a long par 5 doglegging left along the Pacific ocean, I hit my best drive of the day. A nice long draw tracing the fairway in a stiff left-to-right wind no-less.

As we left the tee box, two carts come screaming out of the trees way to the right. Seems these knuckleheads were so far to the right we all hit right past them thinking it was clear. I immediately knew it would be a problem as my ball was well up the fairway a good 100+ yds past the 4 guys I was playing with. I tried to tell the guy driving my cart (he offered me a lift a few holes in) to pull ahead to my ball, but he didn't understand. I jumped out and hastily walked up to the groups ahead of us looking for my ball. They were playing a scramble, and I knew it could be confusing. Sure enough, they take off and I yell. One hears and stops, the other goes all the way to green. I give him "the where's my ball?" hand motion and he says "Titleist 2 with a blue dot?", and I say "YES!"

He says he'll get it for me and zooms up the green where he pulls up to the other cart, now 225 away from me, gets my ball, and yells "Here's your ball!" He drops it, and hits it back down the fairway about 165 yds!

Thanks pal. Whaddadick.

I don't care if I did hit "hypothetically" "into them", who the hell picks up a marked, un-blemished PRO-VI from right smack dab in the middle of the fairway? Even the most un-ettiquated duffer has to know:

A) that IS a $4 golf ball, and
B) that is one hell of a shot by that guy coming down the fairway right behind you, and he deserves proper replacement in the general vicinity of where it was picked up.

Hit it back to me??? 60 yds short??? Dick.

Sorry about the long rant, but maybe an article about "when/when not to pick up a ball" is in order for more serious grouching.

Golf Grouch Comment: Wedge, no need for me to write about it, you did just fine. Thanks for the story!

Viewer Mail: Intlvagabond Writes...

The Grouchy Golf Blog welcomes your grouchy golf observations. If you have a grouchy golf observation that you would like to be posted on the Grouchy Golf Blog, please email it to the address in the sidebar. Remember, all submissions become the property of Grouchy Golf Blog. Submissions chosen for publication may be edited for length and clarity.

The following grouchy golf observation was submitted by a grouchy golfer from Hong Kong named "Intlvagabond." It's a great story that we can all sympathize. Thanks Intlvagabond, and may your stocks and golf game go on a bull run!

Golf and Stocks

The sudden realization that I was destined not to improve in golf happened quite inauspiciously at the end of a round in Taipei, almost 10 years after I took up the game. I shot a 108. It was perhaps one of the most indifferent moments in my life. The sense of caring just disappears. There is no more emotional energy left.

It's like buying a stock and watching it drop. At the beginning of the trade, you're all hopeful, you've done the research, and you're ready to get rich. You buy the stock that all of your friend's have recommended you get, kind of like the latest illegal driver by Callaway, and then you start to wait. But it doesn't happen, and then you just start thinking all the time about it. Then suddenly, the stock starts to rise and you start to mentally spend. You think about the new Porsche that you see in the magazines. And illusions of a better way of life starts to appear, the idea of business class over economy - how did you ever handle it in the past?

Then it starts to drop. It goes below your entry price and you think, if it just goes up to where you got in, you'll sell and at least be even. But it never goes back to par, it just keeps sinking. The feeling of sickness at the pit of your stomach becomes more and more unbearable until you have to turn off the screen.

In golf, that feeling is called a quadruple bogey. It’s confirmation that you've blown your round, par is no longer possible for the round. It's over.

When I started golf, my father insisted I take lessons. Best advice I ever got. I supplemented those lessons with magazines, books and videos. I became a student of the game. Ben Hogan's Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf was ingrained in my mind. I patterned my swing after Seve Ballesteros through imported magazines from Japan. They had all these sequential photographs taken at 1/32 of a second. Somehow, through Hogan and Ballesteros, I managed to hit my forged blades straight and consistent (nobody told me I wasn't supposed to hit blades).

It was 1992 and my golf game was about to take a detour... and not the direction I wanted. Fred Couples just won the Masters and every time a tournament occurred it seemed like it was the Couple's swing clinic. He had the smoothest, silkiest swing. It was hypnotic in a rhythmic even tempo'd way.

And there began my demise.

From a Japanese golf magazine CHOICE, I learned that Fred used a MacGregor Eye-O-Matic 845 Persimmon driver (later to a Boom Boom 9 degree driver) - x/stiff flex, Ram Laser Fx Bore thru 13 degree w/ Dynamic Gold X100 steel shaft (borrowed from Tom Watson), Lynx Parallax 2-PW, 56 and 60 degree Cleveland Classic 588 wedges and a Ping Anser 020 putter.

Guess what I got?

My fundamental, flat, elbow-tucked-in back swing now became an upright, outside-in take-away, looping, flying-elbow back swing. Of course, in reality, I had no where near the timing, eye-hand-coordination that Couple's did.

But I tried.

For a while, whether it was the energy of youth or just not knowing better, I got away with it. My score hit a low of 89 and I was truly happy.

But it was short lived.

Just like stocks, my score took a turn, and I was back into the high nineties.

Viewer Mail! Jorge writes...

The Grouchy Golf Blog welcomes your grouchy golf observations. If you have a grouchy golf observation that you would like to be posted on the Grouchy Golf Blog, please email it to the address in the sidebar. Remember, all submissions become the property of Grouchy Golf Blog. Submissions chosen for publication may be edited for length and clarity.

The following grouchy golf observation was submitted by a grouchy golfer named Jorge. I think that many golfers can relate to his story. Thanks Jorge!

Big Fat Golf Uniform Wearing Moron

There is this this particular guy who practices at the same range I do. The parctice area is not in a nice neighborhood, and is just as casual as it can be. However this guy won't show up to work on what I will generously refer to as his 'game' until he gets his pants ironed, shirt pressed, shoes shined, and visor aligned to perfection.

The short game area at this range is really quite small and can only handle two or three people working at once on their greenside fundamentals. Even with just three people you have to be careful not to interfere with the others there. The big fat golf uniform wearing moron likes to go to the short game area with a duffel bag of balls and stand in the most inconvenient place and chip approximately 100 balls at a time. Then he slowly fetches all 100 of them, moves 3 feet, and starts chipping them again. he likes to pretend he is the only one working in the short game area. When I go there and work on my short game I take 4 balls and move around frequently from pin to pin and to different lies. It's really hard to work with him there simply because on the rare occassion he hits one close to the pin you have to sort through all 100 of his balls in order to find the 4 you are working with.

I have grown to really dislike this guy.

Just yesterday evening I went to hit balls in the early evening. There is a gigantic staff bag set up next to where I make my hitting station. This staff bag is full of a brand new set of Titleist Blades and Vokey Wedges. Good looking clubs. really.

So I hit 8 or 9 balls and warm up. The ground is saturated with water so you have to really keep still and work hard to get good contact and not get splashed. Then out strolls the staff bag owner with a gigantic bucket of balls.

It's the big fat golf uniform wearing moron. He has apparently bought another set of clubs (titleist blades) and has a deluxe new titleist visor as well.

So I am just hitting little shots at a flag about 130 yards away. I am tired and had a hard week and have not worked real hard on golf lately. I am just hitting little 3/4 shots and enjoying the feel. So my boy next to me reaches into his gigantic coffin bag and pulls out a shiny new Titleist blade and starts taking chunks out of the earth the size of a small dog and the ball is quite literally going every bit of 22 feet. Oddly even though the ball is going only 22 feet it is going right, left, topped, shank. My boy had no ball control even at 22 feet. I am kind of happy now watching the big goon struggle. I am about to ask "Hey, you and I ought to go tear up the short game area after you are done with your bucket". But I resist.

I keep switching targets and building a new alignment station and I am hitting lots of balls off of tees because the ground is so very wet. Next door the visor king keeps switching clubs and with each switch his ball striking gets poorer. His searing 22 foot 3 irons are replaced by soft floating 12 foot wedges. His clubs and outfit look so good though. All the "playas' at the range stop in to see him and drool over his new clubs. He gives them the spiel about how workable they are and how easily customized they are due to their soft forging. How the shafts took 3 extra weeks to get installed due to his specs. He refuses to hit any balls in front of his friends, always wandering off to get a water, or to chat with someone else. Then when they depart he comes back to his station and starts again with his wombat practice routine.

Eventually his frustration seems to get the best of him and he disappears into the pro- shop (I guess I can call it that) for a much needed rest. I have about a dozen balls left and have been really pleased with how well I was swinging. I am out of things to work on and I don't want to waste these last 12 balls.....

There is a floodlight on the right side of the range about 160 yards out and 40 feet up. I decide to just hit 6 irons and see if I can hit the aluminum frame of the lighting rig. Maybe hit the actual bulb.....

So I start aiming out to the right and it would be rude if I had a neighbor on the range, but he has gone inside to align his visor and talk swing weights with a homeless guy. So I just start firing right over the wombat's station. And being arrogant and unfriendly has caught up with me because the third ball I catch fat. Like fatter than the wombat has been hitting them. The real bad part is the immense spray of grass, mud, and sand was blocked by wombat's golf bag and Titleist beach towel. Like, brown projectile vomit all over his gear.

I quickly switched targets, finished up, and headed home. I passed wombat as I returned my basket and gave him a nod. I feel awful about it, but no way was I going to use my lucky golf towel to try to clean up his equipment.

Visor wearing prick deserved it anyway.

Next time I see him I am going to hand him some little packs of M&M's and remind him to say trick or treat if he is gonna wear a costume. That moron could not play his way out of a wet paper bag.