Day 7 - The Sound and The Fury


Day 7 – Thursday, August 23 – Ballybunion
The Sound and The Fury

The weather forecast wasn’t good, and we awoke early to howling winds and a light-to-moderate rain. Everyone suited up and put on our game faces as it was going to be a long, arduous day. Our first tee-time was at 7:20 and the rains and winds were steady (30 mph with gusts into the 40’s). The cold rain (and sometimes tiny pellets of hail) were stinging our checks as we were hitting our balls. The balls were giggling on the tees and on the putting greens, and it was not unusual to get hit with a gust that knocked you a bit off balance. The remarkable part of this story is that Paul went birdie-birdie to start the round and ended with a 38 on the front nine – an amazing achievement for playing a course that he only played once 4 years ago and in the most inclement weather conditions you can imagine. Thankfully, the rain stopped somewhere on the back nine. And we were able to finish with only the 40 mph winds to contend with.

[There is a noteworthy side comment at this point, that was coming to light as we played the various course. Caddies are very helpful in giving you directions on blind shots or perhaps telling you when you do not need driver etc. Lining up putts and some club selection can be iffy depending on your caddy. We reminded ourselves that the caddies may be no better golfers than us (or maybe worse) and their ability to gauge the wind or read the line on a putt may be erroneous. All of us had such experiences (recall Ruberg’s experience at Old Head), some more egregious than others. Some of us ignored the advice of caddies on some putts to our own advantage. You can ask Jay if you want more details about a double bogey on 17 due to some really bad advice from a less than mediocre caddy.]

Anyway, we finished the round and had lunch in the beautiful clubhouse overlooking the 18th fairway/green with the ocean in the background. It was sunnier by then and the ocean was a particularly deep, rich shade of blue. The final results are as follows:

Medalist: Paul (80), The Greatest (81), Jay (82) – these are stellar rounds of golf
Everyone else 89 or above.
Team Winners: Blaze, Fisher (again), The Greatest, Saysana
Skins: The Greatest (4), Blaze (2), The Greater, Fisher and Love each with 1

After lunch we went out for a second round on the Cashon Course at Ballybunion, which came with very good reviews. We decided not to torture ourselves playing our own ball (the morning was exhausting enough), and we played a four-man scramble. The winds were still very strong, maybe even a little stronger than in the morning, but there was a pleasant mix of sun and clouds.  Thankfully, we started with two buggies (we say carts) and additional buggies were provided along the way in the round. I say “thankfully” since this course was hilly and strung out with long walks between holes. It was also challenging without caddies since there a wide variety of blind shots [they use white rocks (!!) on hillsides or fairways to mark the direction of your shot, although we had no idea whether we were better off long or short, left or right.

Of note in this round was a par 5 on the back nine that was long and made longer because it was fighting the wind most of the way. The Greatest (if you have lost track, that’s John Jr or The Lesser at one point) hit a stupendous drive followed by an even more stupendous 3-metal with a fade to five feet of the flag, which was on top of a very small tier on the right side of the green. Of course, those slackers (Sr, Jr, Jay, Chan) all missed the eagle putt so it was all for naught. On the same hole, the good guys (Fisher, Ruberg, Blasewitz and Monachino) couldn’t even hit the green in three and had a nasty 20-foot putt from off the green over a mound and onto the aforementioned tier where the flag was. In the surprise of the week, Ruberg stepped up and hit his first putt of the trip for birdie !!! When we got to the 18th hole, the good guys learned that they were up one stroke, but they birdied the difficult 18th nonetheless for a convincing 2 shot win. That’ll be $10 per man please; and Jack won the team game again.

It was 7:30PM by then, and we walked back to Teach de Broc and were thrilled to stay there for another scrumptious dinner.

[Sorry that pictures were hard to come by. I will upload when someone on the trip shares with me.}

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