Brian Quackenbush Golf

I’ve had a busy few days. Monday - Memorial Day for people with normal jobs - I got on the road at 8am to drive 5 hours to Rocky Mount, NC.

— off on a tangent —
Memorial Day weekend (and probably most holiday weekends) will henceforth be referred to as “Weekend Warrior Interstate Driver” days. For better or worse, driving 2-8 hours in a stretch is part of my job. I’ve seen the best and the worst. Holiday weekends are the worst. Within 15 minutes of the start of my trip, I was passed by a convoy of 5 cars going about 100mph and then almost rear-ended by an old truck going about 120mph. More than the normal number of drivers seem to throw patience out the window. Speeding, tailgating and passing on the right are a lot more common. I was happy to make it to Rocky Mount in one piece. So, please, for the sake of all the traveling mini-tour pros on the road, slow down, be patient and safe on the roads.

Back on topic. I got to Rocky Mount and played my practice round at Benvenue CC. This is a great, original Donald Ross design from 1922. The layout is challenging and the greens are tiny with a lot of undulation. They’re about to change over the grass on the greens from bent with a lot of poa annua to bermuda (Tif Champion). So, they didn’t do most of their spring prevention and the greens weren’t as good as they were the last time I played. FYI - their cost to regrass all their greens with Tif Champion is $61,000. That’s a lot cheaper than I would have guessed, but they do have very small greens.

I went off at 8am the next morning and just didn’t hit it well at all. I carded one-over 71 and didn’t make it through the Nationwide Tour qualifier. I seemed to stroke my putts well again but missed it close most of the day. So, I hopped in the car for a 3 hour drive to the TarHeel Tour event at River Run CC in Davidson, NC. I didn’t have time for a practice round, but was able to drive around the course and hit some practice putts. This was a nice change from my experience with the staff at Treyburn.

Got a few hours sleep and woke up for my morning tee time today. After a few shaky holes, I started to feel the swing shape Jack Lumpkin and I have been working on and hit it extremely well for the last 13 holes. It was another round of running the ball over the edges, though I can probably lay most of the blame on the greens. I don’t know what kind of stress they’re under, but they’re keeping them so wet that they retain footprints very poorly. My threesome was the 6th group off and the footprints were already bad on the first green. I had about 9 putts that wobbled enough to miss the hole or come up short. This must explain the high scores. 67 was the low round of the morning wave. The course is about middle of the road challenging and in good shape everywhere else. I would have expected lower scores from the entire field if the greens rolled better.

So, I’m sitting in my air conditioned room this afternoon recovering from a long 3 days. Over 8 hours in the car, 2 practice rounds and 2 competitive rounds in 3 days and 95 degree heat.

Bad round today at Treyburn. 81 was almost my worst as a professional golfer. The lesson I had with Jack last week still hasn’t completely come together. I hit bad pull hooks most of the day…but still hit some very good quality shots. The main problem was on the greens. I had 35 putts and hit a majority of them exactly how I wanted to. I had a lot of trouble adjusting to the very fast, grainy bent greens. Since it was my first day on them (no practice round), my reads will probably adjust and I’ll have a good day putting tomorrow.

Given all this, I’m not discouraged. As mentioned, I’m making a change in my full swing that may take a few rounds to fully gel. This happens…sometimes you need to take a step back to take two steps forward. I’m also stroking my putts exactly how I want to. The problem today was simply adjusting to something completely unexpected. For example, on my first hole of the day, I left my 25 foot birdie putt 6 feet short and hit it exactly how I wanted. But, I was severely into the grain and didn’t see it.

I may give the impression that I’m frustrated with the lack of practice round. I received a piece of information on the first tee today that made the actions of Treyburn’s professional staff even that much more unprofessional. In my last post, I mentioned that I was told that players could not even be on the property Monday before the tournament. Therefore, we were not allowed to walk to course, use the range or putt on the practice green. I heard today that the professional staff allowed many players to use the practice putting green throughout the day and actually approached them to allow them to walk the course late in the day. So, through the week, they told players directly to stay off property and then allowed players to practice and see the course when they just showed up. This is completely unprofessional. To me, it meant a severe disadvantage…probably not enough to justify an 81, but a significant disadvantage nonetheless. As I mentioned above, the greens were very fast and peculiar in that they were very grainy. Simply using the practice green the day before the tournament would have allowed me to adjust better to the greens. If I had been able to walk the course the day before, I would have taken a putter and would have putted around the hole locations to get a good feel of how they rolled. Finally, I wouldn’t have had to run around the course this morning before my afternoon round.

I also mentioned in my last post that many of us have gotten the feeling that the professional staff is doing us a favor by allowing us to have an event at their course. Now that I’ve played it, I don’t feel that they’re justified in feeling they have a top-level course. Yes, it is a good Fazio layout and the greens are firm and fast. But, they’re also very grainy… something you don’t usually see in bent and is definitely undesirable. Also, they have some kind of disease in their fairway grass that causes brown patches of thin grass. I hit it into several of these today, two of which were virtually unhittable… in the middle of the fairway. Finally, bunker sand is very far from uniform. I made a good swing from the greenside bunker on number 2 and watched the ball sail over the green because there was absolutely nothing under the ball. Yet, there was plenty of sand under my feet.

Well, enough about Treyburn. It still comes down to hitting good shots and making putts…two things I did poorly today. It will straighten itself out quickly.

Oh, forgot to mention…avoid the Howard Johnson in Durham, NC on Hillsborough Ave. This is our “host hotel” for the week and its a nightmare.

Yesterday I missed getting through the US Open local qualifier at Stonebridge GC by two shots. I carded a one under par 71 in extremely windy conditions. I hit it relatively well coming off my lesson on Monday and definitely putted well. However, I missed 8 putts from 8 to 15 feet that were all stroked very well.

So, I had another top 10 finish in 6th place.

I’m at a loss for why the USGA only assigned 4 qualifying spots at our site while other sites with similar numbers of entrants got 6. I know they use some kind of methodology to determine strength of field and assign additional spots based on this. However, giving a site with the same number of players 50\% more spots just doesn’t seem appropriate. The strength of field also seems to contradict the “open” nature of the tournament. I think everybody that is not exempt from qualifying should have the same opportunity…meaning there should be no adjustment for strength of field.

I’m heading up to Treyburn CC in Durham for a practice round on Sunday afternoon. The practice round is two days before the start of the event on Tuesday. This is a prime example of a club that is too big for its britches and is acting like they’re doing the TarHeel Tour a favor by letting us play a tournament there. The club has an outing the day before our event. I can understand this. However, they won’t even let us come out and walk the course the day before. They’ve gone as far as stating that we can’t be on the property. For the local guys, this isn’t a big deal. But, if you’re coming from out of town (like 5 hours for me), then you incur an extra day’s travel expense and need to find somewhere else to play and practice on the day before the event. We seem to get one or two courses like this each year. They just seem to have an attitude like we’re lucky to be playing their course.

I took the weekend off after the last TarHeel Tour event at Sapona CC and am just getting around to updating the website. It was a successful event where I finished third. I put myself into position entering the final round, two shots behind the leaders in solo third place. However, one of the leaders really put it into overdrive and left all of us in the dust. I had a respectable final round 69 where I really didn’t make much despite putting the ball well. In fact, I putted it well on the second nine in the second round and didn’t make much. So, I felt like there was some room for improvement with my long game and didn’t really make a lot of putts over the last half of the tournament. This is encouraging especially considering my lesson with Jack Lumpkin yesterday.

Jack and I reviewed my full swing and putting. He was completely satisfied with the changes I made to my putting stroke. My setup position and stroke look very good. He suggested no changes. In the full swing, he suggested two changes. First, I need to move my ball position forward and my hands back. This is a characteristic of my swing that I will probably always have. I tend to get the ball too far back and my hands too far forward. I also need to shorten my swing. Again, this is a swing characteristic that I will always need to monitor. The way that I shorten my swing is important. Basically, I need to limit my armswing and let my shoulder turn complete the backswing.

I’m very encouraged by our lesson. Everything is still pretty well “in tune”. I just need to make some small changes. And, the positive reinforcement on my putting changes was very valuable.

I made another donation to the Capital Hospice today. This brings total donations for the year to almost $1,100 and almost $2,000 since I started our partnership.

The TarHeel Tour is off this week, but I have local qualifying for the US Open on Thursday. I’m playing Stonebridge GC in Monroe, NC…a usual TarHeel Tour stop.

I shot 67 today to finish 7th, 3 shots back, in the TarHeel Tour event at Warrior GC. Conditions were absolutely perfect with no wind and moist greens, but the hole locations were significantly more difficult. In fact, the total plus-minus of the hole locations added 46 yards to the golf course. Scores definitely reflected the more difficult hole locations. The scoring average was 0.6 shots higher than the first round when the wind was really blowing and 2.7 shots higher than round two.

My round included 14 pars and 4 birdies. I hit 17 greens in regulation and putted from the fringe on the one I missed, but didn’t have as many realistic birdie chances as in the first two rounds.

I have 3 days off before I head back up to Lexington, NC for the next TarHeel Tour event at Sapona CC.

I shot 64 today in the second round of the TarHeel Tour event at Warrior Golf Club. It was a good round, but it wasn’t the story of the day. The story is the great performance of my entire threesome. Matt Davidson also shot 64 and DJ Fiese shot 60. Today was one of those days where the group just had good “flow” and everything looked easy.

We started on the back nine and got off to a decent start. Then, things heated up on the 16th hole. Here’s our scorecard for the 7 holes beginning with number 16:

Perhaps even more amazing was that the group had only one 5 or worse on our collective cards for the day. Matt made 5 on the 13th hole. Ironically, he made it with his “alternate ball” which he played when he was unsure whether he could take relief from a cart path near an OB stake. If he had been able to count his original ball, he would have made 4 on the hole and the group would have made no worse than 4 collectively.

This is a strange feeling…I actually feel OK about shooting 76 in today’s qualifier. My short game was on and my putting felt very good. I hit it horrendously, but know why. Despite the poor score, I feel like I’m on the right track and am excited about the Tar Heel Tour event this week.

On Saturday I took some video of my full swing and noticed that two of the fundamentals Jack Lumpkin had me working on had deteriorated over the last month. Specifically, I was losing stability in my right knee by allowing it to flex outside of my right foot on the backswing. I was also getting too steep at the top of my backswing, but this appeared to be less of a problem than my right knee stability. I worked on this Sunday and felt good about it going into the round today. I didn’t put any effort into rounding out the top of my backswing, and that’s what got me into trouble today. It just didn’t look like that much of an issue compared to the right knee.

I spent a few hours at the range after the qualifier working on both fundamentals and my ball flight improved dramatically. I am satisfied because working on these two fundamentals gave me the expected result in my ball flight. I have another day tomorrow to work on them before the start of the event on Wednesday.

My putting felt very good…perhaps the best it’s felt since the beginning of the year. A fellow Tar Heel Tour member mentioned something after Thursday’s pre-qualifier that caused a putting lesson with Jack earlier in the year to finally click. I needed to get my right hand on the club in a better position…more underneath than where it was. This allowed me to comfortably place my left hand on the club so that my arm and shaft are in a straight line. Now the putter hinges naturally on plane. This keeps the head square to the line easier and gives me better feel. My putting stats don’t necessarily validate the improvement, but I know my stroke felt great all day and I made a majority of my putts inside 10 feet.

If there was a shining star in today’s round it was my bunker play. I hit it into 6 greenside bunkers and 2 fairway bunkers I made birdies from both fairway bunkers and got up-and-down from 5 of the 6 greenside bunkers. This includes an amazing streak of 5 in a row from holes 14 through 18. I made birdie on the par 5 17th after hitting it into both a fairway and a greenside bunker. I think it would have qualified as a double-sandie in the Balsamo group and probably would have made a whole bunch of points in the trash game.

Dad was on the bag and did a great job as usual. I’m concerned he may have gotten a few blisters raking up after all my bunker shots.