The Tournament Without a Name

[Bruce Brakel]

Kelsey and I played the tournament which cannot be named yesterday.  Kelsey played in a field of six women after deciding to play women's advanced rather than junior boys.  Alissa and Jenny came to run the popstand.



In the morning we played in mixed groups.  I shot with Kelsey, a junior boy, and an Am 2.  Kelsey birdied the first hole with a 180 foot anhyzer and took the tee.  She wound up shooting 14 over on the 24-hole course in the morning which would have been good enough for the lead in junior boys but was second in Advanced Women.  



In the afternoon the advanced women were surprised to find themselves chasing a little girl.  The leader was counting Kelsey's strokes on every hole, thinking Kelsey must have shaved strokes in the morning.  Kelsey shot the same under watchful eyes and finished second.  It was the leader who shot like she shaved strokes.  She beat Kelsey by 11 strokes in the morning but only beat Kelsey by 2 when they were in the same group.



I shot my way onto the leader card in advanced with a 950ish kind of seven under round.  My first 14 or 15 holes were pretty mediocre and then I got six straight birdies.  



I was so shocked and surprised to be on the leader card in the afternoon, I played like I'd never been there before.  Which is because, hey, I've never been there before!  Playing advanced at real tournaments I never been better than second card in the afternoon.  I finished tied for third but lost the CTP for the trophy.



This tournament cannot be named because our squirrely hosts never came up with a name for it!  And, when they ordered trophies they told the trophy guy, "Uh, yeah, just like the trophies for our last tournament but change the date and leave the tournament name off."  So the trophies all say we played a different course than the one we actually played.



Doh!



These guys are really part of my motivation to do tournaments.  They forgot to reserve the pavillion.  Fortunately it was a cloudless day.  They set up extra holes, one of which used the ball diamond, but oops, they forgot to reserve the ball diamond!  They wound up moving the tee to deep left field and we had to watch for long flies on the tee.



I'm getting pumped for the state finals.  I'd like to play well for my last tournament in the intermediate division.  Well, my last tournament in the intermediate division for a few years I hope.  When I'm on the backside of my game ten years from now i won't have any qualms about moving down.



The popstand did well.  We have enough to get to Peoria and back.  One of our has girls pulled out of the USWDGC but that leaves us with seven players.

[jim]

Go girls! Kelsey's really coming along! Congrats to her, and you!

[jim]

I saw Kelsey throw very early in the year and was impressed THEN!

[CEValkyrie]

Kelsey is going to be a spectacular player if she keeps progressing. Hopefully Bruce will bring here to a DISContinuum Event so all of us can see her throw. If I can i'm going to try to make it to Peoria to watch a round or 2. I sometimes forget this game is about technique & not all power. Watch Kelsey throw & you'll see it doesn't take all power to throw long.

It's great to here you played so well Bruce. I thought maybe you were losing it a little when I beat you on some of your home courses a few weeks ago :)

[Bruce Brakel]

Responding to Brett:



I'm not losing it, Brett.  You're finding it.



Actually, everytime we played singles, and I wasn't running a tournament while playing, I won, except in Grand Rapids, and by then I needed an arm transplant.  Until you've tried playing a tournament while running the thing, you really can't appreciate what a distraction that is.  [Also, the sun was in my eyes, I got stopped by a train, I had a dentist appointment, they lost my tux at the cleaners, and no one told me the river was o.b.]



I was telling Diana, I'm watching Brett catch and pass me like she is with Kelsey.  Hopefully, I can keep Damon in the rear view mirror...



As to Kelsey's outing on Saturday, I did ratings using as ratings generators three pros and two amateurs who looked like they shot their rating relative to each other and the known difficulty of the course.  Kelsey shot an 810 round and a 790 round, truly the best tournament of her life except for maybe Cass-Benton where I have not seen the scores.  She's not beating any of us yet, but she is beating a few rec men at every tournament.  At this one she beat three rec men and tied three, not counting the DNFs.

[damonshort]

Bruce (08-26-2003 09:04 a.m.):  Hopefully, I can keep Damon in the rear view mirror....

Huh? More like roadkill...