Wegoblogger #31

5th Hole - 165 Yards, Par 3
The 5th is a sporty medium-length par 3. I love how the tee box is simply a continuation of the 4th green complex. It reminds me of rolling out of bed and being right on the first tee. Wait...they have that here at Ballyneal also. This place is a dream come true.

You'll notice in the next four pictures how the hole is dominated by a little, diabolical bunker right in front of the green. It really messes with your head. The left-front quadrant of the green sits high on a ridge. When the pin is left, you're tempted to try to thread one between the small bunker and the left edge of the green. Miss the green left and you're doomed -- whether you reach the large bunker or not. You'll be faced with a high-touch shot up the ridge to a green running away from you. The prudent play off the tee is probably to the middle/back of the green and try for the two-putt par, but what the heck do I know about prudence? Take dead aim!

Right hole locations are far more accessible as both front-right and back-right sit in bowls that allow for shots from multiple directions. I believe the 5th has more aces than all the other par 3's combined.

4th Hole - 573 Yards, Par 4
Soaking up the view from the 4th tee for the first time is something you won't ever forget. And making that climb up the ridge from the third green to a spectacular view of the Chop Hills never gets old.

More than just eye candy, the 4th is a fantastic par 5. It's reachable in two with a helping wind. You can really bust one off this elevated tee, so feel free to grip it and rip it.

It feels like you can hit it a mile, to the point that the large right bunker looks like it's in play. Unless your Garrett Gordon, the assistant pro, you don't have to worry about reaching it. The left edge of that right bunker is a good aiming point. Anything leaking even a little bit left of center will likely find the left rough or vegetation because of the undulations in the fairway.

If your drive is outside of 250-260 yards to the front edge, your best bet is to steer well clear of the right bunker and just aim down the left side of the fairway, probably 100 yards back or so. Take it from somebody who has yanked too many 4-irons into that bunker...avoid at all costs. I have the snowmans to prove it. However, if you are within 250 yards, it's worth trying to run one up there. With the firm and fast conditions, the ball will roll forever. Hit a low, running shot starting at the left edge of the green and hope for the best.

In between your second and third shots, make sure you walk down the left side of the fairway to check out the pin position on the adjacent 7th green. Stick it in the memory banks as it will be useful information later on. I just love the attention to detail that Doak and Co. built here, giving a preview of what's to come.

The term 'false front' will spring to mind, but there's nothing false about the large uphill slope guarding the green. Yes, if you don't chase it up past the first 20% of the green, the ball will likely roll back down to your feet. It also makes putting to a front hole location an interesting challenge. Jefe can attest to this.

The picture below shows two things. 1.) the magnitude of the upward slope guarding the green and 2.) the bunker that you need to avoid. I did get up-and-down of this bunker to salvage a halve in my singles match against Jefe, but that's an exception to the rule.

Back to 3rd Hole - Go to 5th Hole

3rd Hole - 145 Yards, Par 3
The beautiful 3rd hole may be the most photographed hole on the course. It's also a fun short par 3.

There are a number of options to hit from off the tee; mix it up if you're playing over multiple days. The photo above is the angle shown most in photographs, since the green and hazards are all right there in front of you. That angle is from the right, forward tees, probably 115-120 yards to the center of the green.

Most will play from either the back left or back right tee box, somewhere around 140-145 yards. From the back tee box, the front of the green, which sits in a natural bowl, will be masked by the large front bunkers.

Somewhat surprisingly, this is one hole where I have had some success, so I feel like I can offer some advice worth listening to. See the mound above the 'I' on Jefe's hat in the photo below? That's where I like to aim, using the slope to feed the ball down to most center-to-back hole locations. It's exhilirating to see the ball hit off the slope and go shooting towards the hole. The more you flirt with the junk to the left, the bigger your kick will be.

The next three photos show the undulations in the green. The first photo shows that you can get the same kind of benevolent kick if you aim/miss right, probably a must if the pin is front or middle-right, but I haven't had much success with that (and if the pin is front left, best of luck. Let me know if you figure that one out.) Everything funnels to the back-right portion of the green; anything overly aggressive may wind up in the difficult bunker behind the green. Missing the green long will usually provide multiple recovery options, so be creative!

Back to 2nd Hole - Go to 4th Hole

2nd Hole - 490 Yards, Par 4
The difficulty of the second hole depends greatly on the wind conditions. Downwind, you might be left with nothing more than a pitching wedge to the green. Into the wind, it's a three-shot hole for many. Choose your tee boxes carefully. I play the most of my rounds from the lower, left tee box, which is the first flat piece of grass you reach coming off the first green. This is probably more than enough if you're playing into the wind. The view of the fairway is masked from this tee box, although you can see a hint of the large right bunker where Doak installed a giant golf-ball magnet just beneath the surface. Take your medicine if you find that bunker.

If it's downwind, march up to the upper tee box, tee it high and let it fly. The back tee is the highest point on the course, so don't forget to look back over the first hole and check out the rugged Chop Hills. From here, you can tell that the fairway is extremely wide, so swing confidently. The key is hitting the ball far enough to take advantage of the big turbo-kick from the fairway slopes.

Like I mentioned, you may be hitting fairway wood into this green. Or you might only have 140 yards left. In either case, the ground game is definitely an option here, allowing you to run a shot up between the two bunkers. Just make sure to avoid the short left bunker, which is at least 5 yards short of the front edge of the green (most likely leaving the dreaded long bunker shot, though this native sand is a dream to hit out of). If the pin is right, you'll be tempted to land your approach just beyond the right bunker and let the backside of that hump feed the ball down to the hole. I'm sure this is the right play, but I've never been able to pull it off successfully. I usually yank it too far right and make double bogey out of the junk to the right. But that's only because I'm not very good. Left is not a bad place to miss either, usually providing a straightforward pitch or putt for a good chance at an up and down.

Make sure to look back up the fairway when you finally reach the green. The sheer magnitude of the slopes tumbling down to the green is impressive and never gets old for me.

A par on the tough 2nd hole will have you counting your lucky charms.

Back to 1st Hole - Go to 3rd Hole

Treating Golf Addiction with an 18-Step Program...

1st Hole - 382 Yards, Par 4

Here's the view from the back tee.  There's more room than it appears from the picture.  The fairway sits at an angle to the tee and dares the golfer to bite off as much room as possible.  The left bunker is a 210-220 yard carry from the tee.  There is a ton of room to miss right -- even a weak fade (for you righties) will likely still find fairway but will be left with a blind second shot.  The preferred line is probably just to the left of that far right bunker.  The aggressive line over the left bunker will shorten the hole, but we'll see in a second why it's not a great play.

[Insider tip: if you're running low on golf balls, just take the straight-line route to the fairway through the native vegetation.  Your ankles will probably get knicked up by the yucca plants, but the bevy of once-hit Pro V1's you'll find will be worth it.  On second thought...don't do this so there are some left for me next time I'm there.]

This is essentially the view from the middle and forward tees, which sit adjacent to the Turtle Bar so you might get heckled if you dribble one off the tee.  I like this picture as it really shows off the ripples in the fairway and the width that you don't see from the back tee.  Like I said, there's a lot of room right. It's a better hole with the forced carry from the back tee, but when you've just finished 36 holes and are about to head off for round three, the direct route to the up tees is awfully inviting.  Just don't dribble one off the tee.

Here's the view further up the fairway.  Find the middle of the fairway and you're probably staring at a good birdie opportunity with wedge in your hand (or punch 6-iron; the possibilities are only limited to your creativity out here).  It's just not that easy to find the right line to get that clear, green-light view.  As I mentioned, right leaves a blind shot.  Miss too far left and you're left with a blind shot as well.  See the slope on the left side of the picture below?  That feeds shots that are too far left down in to a bowl...

...basically giving you the following view of the first of the many beautiful but deadly bunkers.

The green is protected by a couple more gnarly bunkers, one short and left and one left of the green.  It's easy to bail out long and/or right of this green, especially if you had a blind approach.

A couple of views of the green, one from the second tee and another from behind the green.  You'll see that there is room to miss here.  The only issue is the green is tilted from back right to front left, so bailing out may leave one with a high-touch shot coming down the slope. You see a lot of three-putts here from golfers underestimating the run-out on the firm greens at the start of the round.  And yes, I've seen putts roll into the front left bunker.

Go to 2nd Hole

As I mention in my last post honoring my grandmother (please read if you haven't already), I have been working on putting together my blog excerpts and other golf stories into a book. I am thrilled to announce that "One Divot at a Time... (Diary of a Full-Fledged Golf Addict, Volume 1)" has been published just in time for the holidays and is now available for $12.95 in paperback or only $1.99 on Kindle at amazon.com (look out Sarah Palin and Dan Brown, I'm gunnin' for you).



The reviews are rolling in:

- "It's not total crap." -- Kyle H., California
- "A fine bromance." -- Tom D., New York
- "The best golf book I've ever flipped through." -- Joe M., Iowa
- "When did I become JC's whipping boy?" -- Jimbo T., Illinois
- "Better than half the junk my friends recommend for our book club." -- Lissa W., Illinois

A few more reviews, hopefully less tongue-in-cheek:

- "I'm not sure how you did it but you managed to make reading about virtual strangers playing golf quite entertaining and fun." -- Steve D., Virginia
- "Once I opened the book I couldn't put it down." -- Scott S., Colorado
- "My wife asked me while I had such a funny look on my face, and I told her, 'This book is about me.'" -- Jason H., Kansas
- "Hilarious! It's Caddyshack, Happy Gilmore and Tin Cup tied together in paperback. Minus the stupid love affair between Kevin Costner and Rene Russo." -- Ron C., New Jersey


If you've spent any time on wegoblogger31.com, you know that it revolves around the golf adventures of Jim Colton and his closest buddies, Jefe and his older brother Jimbo. We've traveled all over the world and have played many of the best courses around. But more than just a review of courses and a report of the birdies and bogeys, I've tried to relate to the issues that nearly all golfers face:

- Trying to juggle golf with the demands of family, career, friendships and finances
- The love/hate relationship with this maddening game
- The ebb and flow of the marriage-like relationship between golfers and their closest buddies
- The crazy characters you meet along the way

I hope that at some point over the last four years, I've been able to strike a chord with you, my golfing brethren. If it's not abundant clear already, I love this great game. Probably a little too much (okay, way too much). I'm a full-fledged golf addict and there's not much I can do about it. But I'm pretty sure that I'm not the only one out there.

If you've followed the blog, you'll enjoy recalling trips to Bandon Dunes, New Mexico, Northern Michigan and Colorado/Nebraska, all hopefully tieing in to common themes listed above. Plus there are new adventures and background information that never made it to the Internet (including one chapter that was "too hot for tv"). If this is your first time on this site, check out the Foreword by Jimbo excerpted below. It provides a lot of the context to the book and the inner-workings of our 20-year golf relationship.

So I urge you to check it out. Pass it on to your buddies or give it to them for Christmas (buy two on Amazon or combine it with one of the books on the right such as Anatomy of a Golf Course by Tom Doak and you'll qualify for their free shipping). Post a comment below or shoot me an e-mail at jcolton31@gmail.com and let me know what you think. Who knows, maybe we'll find ourselves golfing together down the road. We're still (constantly) looking for a fourth...


p.s. While we're on the subject of Christmas, if there's a list of Top 10 signs that you might be a golf addict, this has to be on the list: You use bag tags for Christmas ornaments.


Foreword by Jimbo Tang

Clearly, my rate of speed was far greater than what any 12-year-old on roller skates should be traveling at. The blacktop driveway raced beneath me. The blue sky above was a blur. I made a tight turn to the left and suddenly my house loomed before me. I thought to myself, “What have I done? My brother and I are going to die.”

My brother Jeff, a.k.a. “Jefe”, and I had a theory. The last 40 feet of our driveway, just in front of the garage door, was made of concrete. The rest of the shared drive was blacktop, and it stretched up a hill a good 150 yards to the neighbor’s house. We noticed that when on roller skates the concrete slowed us down significantly, as opposed to the smooth blacktop. An important scientific question was then posed: if we climbed to the top of the hill and skated down the blacktop driveway, would the friction created by the 40 feet of concrete stop us before we smashed into our house? There was only one way to find out.

Being the older brother by a year and a half, I went first, with Jefe launching himself not far behind. Halfway down the hill, I knew something was terribly wrong. I had never seen speeds like that in my short life. As I rounded the corner, I instinctively knew the concrete wouldn’t stop me. I flung myself off the blacktop and onto the lawn, narrowly avoiding a tree and wooden fence. I had aborted our scientific endeavor.

Lying in the grass, I turned, fully expecting Jefe to take the same rational course of action. Like me, Jefe was moving at a blinding pace. Unlike me, he kept going. I watched, horrified by the spectacle, but also fascinated. What would happen to my kid brother?

Jefe approached the house, the concrete barely making a dent in his speed. The garage door was open and our mom’s car was parked inside. With outstretched arms, Jefe managed to maneuver himself to the side of the garage door, where he slammed directly into the house. Remarkably, Jefe was unhurt. Three things immediately became clear:

1. Our “blacktop to concrete friction transference theory” had been proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt, to be false.
2. Jefe was a madman.
3. He had something I didn’t have.

And so it went that way for much of our childhoods. I was willing to take risks, do crazy things, go to extremes, etc., but Jefe always went one step further. Especially when it came to golf. I loved, and still love, the game. As a kid, I played almost every day in the summers. But Jefe wanted to play all the time – rain, snow, sleet, freezing temps, early, late, any time of the year – it didn’t matter. The kid was beyond passionate about the game, much more so than I. We still played rounds together, but it was clear that Jefe needed someone more like him. He needed someone who was willing to skate full speed into a house without flinching.

Enter Jimmy “Utter Butter” Colton. (If you ever see JC swing a club, you’ll know why I call him “Utter Butter”). Not surprisingly, in his mid-teens, Jefe got a job at a local mini-golf course named Stone Creek. There, he met Jim Colton, who also thought working at a putt-putt course was the pinnacle of life. And just like that, Jefe had met Robin to his Batman, Barney Rubble to his Fred Flintstone. Jim Colton was, in effect, the Jefe of Geneva. Or, perhaps, Jefe was the Jim Colton of St. Charles (at the time, Geneva was essentially a neighboring backwater town to St. Charles). The two clicked instantly.

Jim Colton was the same age as Jefe, on the golf team like Jefe, played pick-up hoops like Jefe, and like Jefe, did everything at full speed always going one step beyond. He was, and is, a nut. Both were excellent golfers. Both are ultra-competitive. Both had an extreme dislike for, and a propensity for getting into trouble with, authority figures at golf courses. They had a mental list of everyone that had ever crossed them. They believed that Chili’s was fine dining, that Dairy Queen was perfectly acceptable for a first date and that golf was the very fabric that held the universe together. As expected, the two became best friends, thick as thieves. They hung out together, had bloodlust matches after closing at Stone Creek, and of course, played golf with one another anywhere and anytime.

Golf meant playing anywhere from the local goat track to eventually some of the finest courses in the country. They took a road trip to Augusta National for a Masters practice round. They set up a makeshift driving range in the 10’x12’ dorm room they shared for two years at the University of Illinois. Eventually, each stood up in the other’s wedding and watched each other start families of their own. Just like Snoopy and Woodstock, the bond was unbreakable.

Fast forward ten years. After an odyssey of my own which included time in Australia, the start of my career, and the beginning and end of a tumultuous six-year marriage, I returned to the duo of JC and Jefe. Not much had changed. They were still hypercompetitive, golf-crazed lunatics. However, it was no longer a duo. It was now a triumvirate. The Triumvirate.

Golf trips ensued to places like Georgia, Alabama, and Michigan. Wisconsin, New Mexico and points beyond. While on these golf binges, Jim and Jefe had the innate ability to sniff out any DQ within a 20-mile radius. Without fail, we visited. There was also the uncomfortable nightly ritual of having to watch them climb into the same hotel bed. Undoubtedly, it was after a day of 36 holes where they lobbied for 18 more.

It was clear I wasn’t like either of them. And I was more than okay with that. I quickly realized that I had become the voice of reason – the only sane mind in the room. When left to their own devices, this sort of behavior was acceptable. But today, approaching mid-life, they had different responsibilities: wives and kids, mortgages and burgeoning careers. I decided that it was my job to get these two guys back to Illinois in one piece. Someone needed to save them from themselves.

It was around this time that Jim began to chronicle these events and experiences on his blog. He wanted to capture, if possible, the joys and frustrations that a life in golf inevitably fosters. He wanted to share the funny stories and the unique characters met along the way. Mostly, he wanted to explore the friendship of the Triumvirate through golf. These rough sketches eventually evolved into the handsome volume you now hold in your hands.

Not long ago, Jim asked a group at Ballyneal to provide one word that best described him. Both Jefe and I were up first and instantly responded with “obsessive”. Having thought about that response for some time now, I realized I was wrong. A much better word, a word that truly captures what he is all about, is “passionate”. He is passionate about what matters to him: his wife and kids, his faith, his friends and golf. I trust that you’ll see that passion throughout these pages. I have no doubt that if Jefe and I had known Jim on that day from our childhood with the roller skates, he would have rolled right down that hill and seen it all the way through. That is just who he is.