Golf for a cause

Mark your calendar's from August 29th through September 1st with a big green smiley face. Put down your gardening tools, and take out your golf tools, and tool-on over to one of over 3000 golf courses throughout our great country, and tee it up for those that can't.

Fighter pilot Captain Dan Rooney...shares like many of you, the love of golf, but he has channeled that love into a grander vision that includes giving back to his country..."Noonan" (the Captain's call sign), thought about his comrades that could not be with him on the golf course, and last year started something big...

...over $1 million dollars big.

He started Patriot Golf Day to benefit The Rooney Fallen Heroes Foundation.

Last year golf courses around our United States of America raised their greens fees by $1. That dollar was earmarked for families of fallen US soldiers killed or wounded throughout our current military operations. This year will be the same...and with your help, even greater results.

This year Captain Rooney will be going back for his third Tour of Duty.

We owe it to him and his foundation to take a couple tours around the golf course. Captain, thank you for your service.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

Online games revisited

In an earlier post, I postulated on the coming of virtual golf.

It's here. To get a sneek-peek at the future...click here.

The World Golf Tour offers a virtual golf experience for all adults of every swing-plane.

The capitalists behind the World Golf Tour pick a golf course (the demo on the site is the Bali Hai golf club in Las Vegas), and submit it to six months of poking and prodding that would make the gopher in Caddyshack proud. Using camera-strapped helicopter drones to scan every blade of froghair...they bring the data back to their workshop which gets rendered, mashed, mixed, and wow-ed...to bring an incredibly immersing experience...even down to the chirping birds.

There are over 100,000 hackers in this uber-golf/social site, and growing. Monthly prizes enhance the user experience...and addiction.

Please remember...however good you may become at virtual golf, don't give up your day job.

...these golf avatars haven't made any real money...yet.


Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

Since always gambling has not been looked upon kindly, whether it is blackjack or poker. However with the advent of online casino and the success of national lottery, all has changed now. More people are participating in various online lottery schemes.

Winter golf in Georgia.

Beautiful golf for the last round of the year. Some courses have more outstanding views in the winter...this course is one of them.

Here's thanking you for reading my rants and raves in 2007, and here's to keeping it in the short-grass for 2008!

JFB

Last good drive of the year

One of my favorite courses: The Frog at the Georgian, a Tom Fazio designed golf course is part of a residential master-plan that is now side-tracked from the tight credit fallout that is being felt in every master-planned neighborhood in the country. This facility (set in Villa Rica) is in between Birmingham, AL and Atlanta, GA...a long way away from civilization. It's gonna be a tough-sell to continue it's growth-oriented plan for the next couple of years. A great place to golf though.

JFB

A new website from across the pond

Interested in golf in Scotland? Go to www.MulliganPlus.com . This site is well informed, and was sent by alert reader Reagan Pannell.

Our site would be of interest to anyone of your visitors looking on Courses in the UK and especially Scotland where we are adding information continually at present.
As you will see, our course directory holds enormous amount of information regarding clubs and courses. If you look at Kingsbarns for example, we have all the information any visitor needs and its all be packaged into a PDF Course Guide that people can download to read, print or share with friends.
We also have a member’s area mainly for UK golfers with handicap calculator, online leagues, scorecard recorder, and a playing finder facility. Over this week we are also updating our members section and it’s presently free to join. We are developing the social networking opportunities of the site, with small individual blog sections for members etc that will be available to be viewed by the public.Recently we also covered the Dunhill International Links Championship and we thought that some sites may be interested in using some images that we produced.
We have full copyright for the images but they must be used in an editorial way and not to advertise a product. Therefore, please visit here and follow the link to view our photography of the event. If you wish to use an image, we ask that a link is added to us within the image and as a caption to the photograph.

Now, I hope that something is of interest to you and more importantly to your readers.

If you have any questions, please get in touch.

Kind regards,

Reagan Pannell

A good walk un-spoiled

My golf buddy, and newly-knighted roving reporter JHB just got back from the 3rd round of the 86th Georgia Amateur Championship.

''It's great to watch Amateur golf as the crowds are sparse, and the ropes do not exist. A nice walk un-spoiled while watching great golf." He said, as he forwarded me his snaps from his newly-minted Blackberry. (He's waiting for I-Phone 2.0 before leaving the crack-berry).

This shot is looking down from the club house at the 18th green with a view of the 9th green in the background.

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The Georgia Amateur Championship began in 1916 and has been contested at 28 different GSGA member clubs in 20 cities. This year marks the 86th annual event...it all began with 14-year-old Bobby Jones, who captured the inaugural title in 1916 (still the youngest Amateur champion).

This year Ansley Golf Club at Settindown Creek is hosting the Championship. Settindown Creek is considered one of the premier championship courses in the state and has hosted numerous high-profile events, including the Nike TourChampionship in the 1990s, and the 2005 U.S. Women's Amateur won by teen-phenom Morgan Pressel.

On a beautiful, cloudless Georgia day. My friend sat under an old Oak tree with an unobstucted view of 3 holes. Sipping his iced tea in the shade, watching these amateur golfers compete in a legendary event.

Yep...nothing like a day on the golf course. You don't even have to be playing to enjoy it.

You just have to be there.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

He's the daring young man in the....

...helicopter.

That's right, for my Fathers' day gift, my wife (being of sound mind and body), gave me a certificate for a 1/2 hour helicopter ride with Air Atlanta Helicopters at the local PDK airport.

Now, I've never been in a helicopter before, so I had trepidation at first...

...but then I thought of all the MyDailySlice readers who would love to see an aerial view of a famous golf course here in Atlanta! So I donned my headphones and strapped into the copter provided by Air Atlanta Helicopters , and I was off to...

East Lake Country Club

Yep, home of The Tour Championship. This year being of extra importance for the golf tournament as it is the culmination of the FedExCup. It will be held here Sept 10-16th.

Some interesting notes about this course. In 1925 Bobby Jones beat Watts Gunn at the US Amateur Championship at Oakmont. Both Jones and Gunn were members of East Lake during their historic meeting. Marking the only time in history that 2 members from the same club played in the finals of The Amateur.

Okay...I know what you're saying..."that's cool, but...a fly-over video would put this post over the top!"

How's this:

If you're coming to Atlanta and want to do something very cool, rent a helicopter...buzz over the course as well as downtown, and then schedule a tour of East Lake...they have tours on the 3rd Sunday of every month at 3pm.

Tell 'em MyDailySlice sent ya.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

How to increase your carbon footprint

You've heard the expression: "even a blind squirrel finds a nut"? Well from that, one could surmise that maybe the furry little critter embroidered on the fronts of thousands of golf caps at this weekend's US Open at Oakmont is blind. I mean...he's got a golf ball in his paws...not a nut.

After reading the June edition of Golf Digest, I now know that this squirrel is not blind.

Documenting a tree removal program that ultimately disemboweled 5000+ hardwoods from Terra fir ma (in the middle of the night, no less), author Ron Whitten portrays Oakmont C.C. in a fairer light, now that the trees are gone, harking back to the day when course architect H.C. Fownes wanted to have a world class course to emulate the same vistas of his Scottish homeland. I suppose if you look at it from that perspective...they succeeded, and Whitten is correct.

But if you speak to the thousands of natures little creatures...native purple finches, northern cardinals, orchard orioles...they all left with the trees, and probably aren't very cordial: "Damn Chester...how long were we in Florida?...I feel the need to lighten my load...there's the super's car, and he left the top down! Banzai!!!!!".

Did Oakmont replace the trees with birdhouses to maintain the lost ones they removed? I didn't notice any from the pictures I've been seeing. Maybe they will after the tournament.

Folks have been tongue-in-cheek lobbying to replace the Oakmont squirrel with a more appropriate one...like a chainsaw, or instead of a logo...a motto: "I got your carbon footprint right here".

But I think the squirrel is appropriate, and I hope he stays. After all, he found a golf ball...not a nut.

Judging from the tree-less Oakmont, isn't that appropriate?!

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

Girls just wanna have fu-un.

Girls, mark your calendars for June 2nd through the 9th, as American Express and PlayGolfAmerica.com have teamed-up to bring the softer gender closer to the great game of golf.
AMEX cardmembers can participate in free golf lessons from over 100 golf courses throughout the country when the better half plays and pays with their card. In addition to the free golf lessons, ya'll will get 20% off the rate of play.

So pull out your finest pink-laced polos, stuff a sleeve or two of pink Ice Noodles in your Coach-appointed golf bag, and head on over to American Express Women's Golf Week to see where the closest participating golf course is for you!



JFB

Want to learn more about credit
cards? There's all kind of benefits like the ones mentioned
here for AMEX members, and visa
cards tend to have benefits too. There is a lot to learn
about credit so take your time and make sure to review all
the fine print about low
interest credit cards and don't get stuck in credit
trouble.

It's a southern thing

I must admit, after the birth of our daughter Wed night, I haven't been able to do much more than walk around in a daze from sleepless nights filled with determining the correct way to dispose of stinky diapers without having to fumigate the house come morning. So when I got to sit down and read today's Sports section in the AJC it was really a treat.

More treats occurred when I read the headlines that were colored in yellow-and-blue, and red-and-black. Yep, looks like the folks up at Sugarloaf Country Club are going to "hunker down for a good old-fashioned Southern brawl." As Larry Munson might have put it.

We have YellowJackets and Bulldogs atop the leaderboard at the South's other golf tournament in Buford GA...the one sandwiched between a season of The Masters in Augusta, and The Players Championship in Atlanta.

Hailing from Georgia Tech: Troy Matteson, and not far behind, just in from his yo-yo-like travails from The Nationwide Tour, and my favorite player: Matty Kuchar.
Then we have, coming from The University of Georgia with the shot of the day: Ryuji Imada.

This will be a fun one to watch as Sugarloaf will be super firm and fast, as we've had no rain in a month. Also, Sugarloaf has one of the best finishing holes in all non-major events.

As for me coming from the great state of Ohio (and a big Buckeye fan), I've learned...

...that Gators will also eat bees and bulldogs...

...so I'd watch out for spidey-man himself Camilo Villegas, who hails from The University of Florida. The greatest sports program in the nation.

Yep, I'm going to sit back and enjoy this Sunday's final round...it's a gorgeous day in The South. The bees are buzzing...the dogs are leashed...and the alligators are sunning themselves in the southern paradise known as Buford Georgia...

And my daughter is asleep. Now Hush Y'all.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

From camo pants to Snoop Dog

In a nod to very good timing, The Nationwide Insurance Company recently introduced a website that focuses on the trials and tribulations of graduates, and current residences of The Nationwide Tour. No longer a mediocre tour with backwater settings, the Nationwide Tour consists of the real rookies...kids that are the raw up-and-comers in golf that really put the spice in the game...and coincidentally, is what the PGA Tour is so desperate in need of.

Team Nationwide focuses on a select group of graduates from the 2006 Nationwide Tour currently competing on the PGA TOUR.
Nationwide also created the site as a springboard to generate fan interest in the Nationwide Tour. Visitors can view player bios, watch videos, participate in contests and learn more about the success of Team Nationwide on the PGA TOUR and the top players competing on the Nationwide Tour.

As an added bonus to checking out their site, Nationwide is also giving golf fans an opportunity to win a trip for 2 to the PGA Tour's 2008 Sony Open at the Waialae Country Club in Honolulu , Hawaii . Fans can visit www.nationwide.com/teamnationwide to enter. One grand prize winner and a guest will receive tickets to the 2008 Sony Open, an opportunity to play in the Tournament Pro-Am courtesy of Nationwide, meet Nationwide Tour graduates, and receive airfare and hotel accommodations for five days along with a complete set of Nickent golf clubs. Throughout the season, 14 weekly winners will also receive Nickent Golf 4DX Hybrids....

...show of hands that don't want to go to Hawaii....I didn't think there were any.

To whet your whistle, here's a snippet from the site. A Q & A with recent winner (and Nationwide Tour grad) Boo Weekly:

Q& A with Nationwide Tour graduate Boo Weekley

Can you tell us anything about how your life has changed since winning the Verizon Heritage?

People want to shake my hand and tell me they enjoyed watching me play. I still approach the game the same way though. I still practice hard. I hope to win a couple more times this year. Every time I tee it up, I’m there to win.

There are a lot of former Nationwide Tour golfers who are experiencing success on the PGA Tour, like Zach Johnson, Jason Gore, Camilo Villegas and yourself. How do you think the Nationwide Tour prepared you for the next stage of your career?

The Nationwide Tour made me mentally strong. There are a lot of guys on the Nationwide Tour that are really good players who are ready to play at the next level. So my experience playing against those guys prepared me mentally and for the travel.

What was your most high pressured shot ever?

Probably my putt at The Honda Classic – the second put to win, which I missed. I was trying to pick a good line, stay focused, keep my head still and just stroke it and let it happen. When I missed, I took my club and stuck it to the bill of my cap and told myself it just wasn’t my time.

I felt like I rushed myself on that putt. From that experience I learned to slow it down and take my time to try to blow my nerves off.

Is there one piece of advice or technique that really took your game to the next level?

My advice to others would be - work on your short game and your putting, because we all hit it the same.

What would you say to a young golfer who wants become a professional?

Believe in yourself and don’t let anybody tell you no different. If you believe it, you can do it. If you’re serious about wanting to play, trust yourself, trust your instincts and work hard on your short game.

If you had to pick one golfer that you'd aspire to be like, whom would that be and why?

Ben Hogan. I read a couple of his books. He believed that every day you have to practice to be good. Every day you miss a practice you have to put in more work to make up for it. He was a firm believer in himself. He got in a car wreck and they told him he wouldn’t be able to walk again. He showed them when he got back on the golf course again.

Obviously your goal was to make the PGA TOUR, but are there aspects of the Nationwide Tour you miss or remember fondly?

I have a lot of memories from the Nationwide Tour. I haven’t been on the PGA Tour long enough to forget them. We became a family. The Nationwide Tour always took care of me.

Do you still hang out with guys you played with on the Nationwide Tour?

Yes. All the guys who came through the Nationwide Tour, we still all talk and hang out.

Anything that people would be surprised to know about you?

I like rap. My favorites are Nelly, Snoop Dog, MC Hammer, I like all of it – old school, new school. I don’t rap myself, I just listen to it. People can find out more about me if they visit www.nationwide.com/teamnationwide

I'm glad there were no fashion questions for him...oh wait...there were...

...those were deleted.


Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

SEC college golf at your fingertips

College athletes have it made. Take the U of Kentucky golf team (pictured here). Not only do they get to go to school in a great environment, but they get to play golf in not-so-shabby places either. Places like Japan, SC, FL, NV and GA...and that's just this year.
Uh guys...can you donate your frequent flyer miles to me? I'm trying to just get to OH.

Now the whole world can see what it's like to be a SouthEast conference athlete through the athlete's eyes via SECSports.com.

AT&T has just launched the SEC Snapshot, a student-driven journalistic initiative designed to report attention-grabbing stories that often go untold. Student journalists from each of the 12 SEC schools are writing about the unsung heroes and little known storylines of their schools' spring sports teams.
Click on the UK team picture to get the top ten golf tips from the them.
New stories are posted every Wednesday.

I've put the direct link to the SEC golf page (the site covers all SEC sports) at the bottom of my blog so you can follow your favorite SEC team(s) this year.

My favorite tip from the golf team is: 9) "Always have a good understanding of where you can and can't hit the ball on the golf course. "-- Andy Winings, sophomore

Andy, I'm proud to say that I've got a firm grasp on the can't: I know every variety of tree native to the South.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

Mother Earth Day

A long time ago, a co-worker told gave me a nugget of advice in the form of a joke that I've never forgotten.
Q: How do you eat an elephant?
A: One bite at a time.

In the big picture, we are in a losing battle with the environment. The talking heads in Washington and in the media would make you think the crisis will happen tomorrow, and that you'd better plunk down $30k on a Prius right now or you'll be castrated.

But what if we looked at the big picture, and instead of trying to solve the big "elephant" problem today, we started changing little "bites" of our everyday lives to do right by the environment.

Anthony Williams is taking little bites.

He is the superintendent at my favorite golf course: the 36-hole layout at Stone Mountain Golf Club in Atlanta.
Golf Digest and the Golf Course Superintendents Assoc. of America recently awarded him as the 2006 National Environmental Leader in Golf.

On every hole, I've always noticed his bluebird houses...most of them with painted roofs that are logos of college teams. Seeing these bird houses inspired me to put up a bluebird house in my backyard last year.
I put up 1 that housed one bluebird family last year...he's put up 39 that produced 238 bluebirds, 10 nuthatches, and 12 Carolina chickadee...

...well, he does have a bigger backyard.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

PS: If we all took little bites like Anthony, we would all be contributors to saving the environment. Here's a couple more ways:
1)Buy a travel mug and use it when you go to Starbucks. Not only will you save the landfill from one more paper cup...they will give you a ten cent discount off your coffee!
2)Pack your lunch for work. Not only will you save gas from driving to, and waiting in line at the local fast-food stop, but you won't have the bag and other paper waste to throw in the trash can...which goes into a landfill.

Happy Earth Day!

JFB

Barnsley Gardens (1st round of the year)

These are pictures from "The General" at the Barnsley Gardens resort, 45 minutes north of Atlanta GA in Adairsville. I didn't play very well, but I got "the bugs" out!

JFB

Live Masters coverage presented by AT&T

The Masters programming will offer daily highlights, live tournament coverage, live practice range coverage, player interviews, live updates, and links to real-time scoreboards directly from Augusta National.

Enjoy! Happy Easter everyone!

JFB

My new bag tag

In 1999 I met Mike Last. He was hawking free ball markers and divot repair tools, on a tee box sponsored by his dot-com company LMTT (Last Minute Tee Times) at a local golf tournament I was playing.

Like all dot-com founders back in the hey-day...he was high on enthusiasm and low on cash, but every golf course was his billboard, and he was there to spread his gospel...and I heard it, and signed up.
He had this idea to give golfers (in Atlanta at the time) the ability to find a tee time at the last minute and pay less than full boat to play...both helping the course to fill an open slot, and to help the golfer by giving him great deal. It was good for me (a frugal Clark Howard disciple), as I was playing fantastic courses at half-price, whilst enjoying the fraternity of newly minted LMTT members that would gather for LMTT-sponsored events in the area.

A lot has happened since then.

I recently received an award (the bag tag and VIP extension) from LMTT (now www.LastMinuteGolfer.com), which thanked me for being one of their most active members. Mike and his crew have done an outstanding job of building communities of golfers not only here where LMTT was started...but all over the country...they just signed up their 325,000th member!

You can sign up (it's free) by clicking the LastMinuteGolfer.com button on my blog. You'll then have access to your area courses that offer last minute tee times at deep discounts. Plus, when you sign up you'll get a $10 bonus just for being a friend of MyDailySlice.

Ya know, I still use that ball marker and divot tool. Thanks Mike.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

Brasstown Valley

This is Brasstown Valley. Located in Young Harris, GA.
A magnificent Denis Griffiths layout in the N. Georgia mountains. We played 36 holes that day. The dew was heavy for the first round, as this course is high-up in the Blue Ridge mountains.

We played the Teal tees, which were anywhere from 6400 to 6500 yards (depending on where the frisky turtles (see earlier post) were pointing). I shot 92 the first round, but came back with an 85 on the second round (and collected my dough..thank-you Nick!). There was no humidity, which made it very pleasant.






Brasstown is a mountain resort. Built when Govenor Zell Miller (Zell's hometown) provisioned a construction project within a superfund bill passed by congress. Some call that pork-barrel spending....but after you play the course, you don't mind that your tax-dollars paid for it.

The lodge is mammoth, the service is fantastic, and the course is unbelievable. We used an award that my buddy had won from an earlier tournament, so we played 36 holes for $60 each!

Somehow I think I got my tax money back.

Thanks for reading. Keep it in the short-grass,

JFB

When good tees go bad...

It happened innocently enough. My buddy and I were playing Brasstown Valley in Young Harris GA this week when we came across the turtles, icons of the golf course that (supposedly) stand guard over the tee boxes...

I guess the grounds maintenance crews were feeling fiesty that day...

Reunion was how I'd remembered it. As a classic course that lets you use every club in the bag. I hit 9 GIR which was my highest this year. That, and my eagle 2 made this birthday-boys day! 

I played from the blue tees (6600 yds) and shot 83. Shooting a 37 on the front was sweet, but blowing up on the back with a 46 wasn't. Today I was reminded that the game is 99% mental. Props go out to my buddy John who took this great picture! Props also go out to our new friend Mark who joined us as a single. He helped point out the nuances of the course that I'd forgotten about over the years.