The Struggle is Real

Men’s Night is usually a lot of fun.  There is no denying that fact.  However, it usually has it’s less than fun moments.  The time when this is the most frustrating is when you are playing well and then one bad hole gets you.   You are on a roll after six holes and you come to seven and walk off with a triple and follow it with a double on eight and a bogey on 9. 

We regular golfers need not get discouraged because this happens to everyone.  The US Open is this week.  I haven’t watched much of it so far but I have seen several guys lose balls and hit them in places that they should not.  Yesterday, Phil Mickelson missed an 18-inch putt.  No gimmies in the PGA.  Patrick Reed, a former Masters champ cracked his wedge over his knee after chunking a chip.  Ian Poulter was beside a green in two shots and walked off with an 8.  Unfortunately for him, they don’t use the Men’s Night max rule.

No golfer had worse luck than Lucas Bjerregaard who was only 3 over on Thursday as he stepped on the tee at Pebble Beach's par-5 18th hole.  That's when disaster struck.  Bjerregaard hit two drives left into the cove below and then sent a third drive to the right and out of bounds.  He made a sextuple-bogey-11 to plummet down the leaderboard at 9 over.  He also threw his driver over the cliff into the ocean. 

The lesson here is simple.  If professional golfers can struggle occasionally it is only reasonable that we do as well.  In fact, we should accept that it will happen on a regular basis.  If you have three pars in a row and then lose a ball or two on the fourth hole, who cares.  It’s okay to be mad for a moment but let it go as quickly as you can.  You are still golfing on Men’s Night which is better than a lot of things.

And if you run into trouble, don’t break or throw away your clubs...especially your driver.  The professionals who do this can go to the equipment trailer and get a replacement.  If we do it, we have to play the rest of the round with a 3 wood and feel like crap because we just wasted several hundred dollars.

This past Wednesday, we had only 20 golfers which might seem odd for a nice evening in June.  Of course, it was game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals so many Bruins fans stayed at home to watch their team lose to the Blues.  As a dejected Leaf fan, I was not disappointed with the outcome.

Skins went on four holes.  Winners included Norm Verboom / Robin Kimpinski ($81.89 on #3), Dave Gill / Charlie McNabb ($20.00 on #4), and Chris Kimpinski / Jason Neufeld ($20.00 on #6 and $48.13 on #8).  There were no deuces.  Closest to the pins were Jamie McCutchins on #5 and Charlie McNabb on #9.

Low rounds for the evening included Jamie McCutchins (36), Joel Ostash (37), Wes Arnfinson (38), and Chris Kimpinski (39).

There were two holes in ones involving local golfers this past week.  Brad Benton had one on the 9^th hole in Shoal Lake on Sunday and Neuf scored his ace on Friday on a tournament in Killarney.  For Men’s Night, we combined three $1500 hole-in-one pots to create two prizes worth $2250.  If you need the motivation to play on Wednesday, this could be it.