Volunteering at the Viking Classic

[mddubya]

Ok, I'll post my observations from the Viking Classic on here. I'll be working the driving range each day of the tournament. I was undecided where I wanted to work, finally decided the driving range would be best as I'd be able to observe the pros warming up and see what they work on.

Day 1--

Woody Austin is a funny guy. He was standing right in front of the tent where we were handing out the bags of balls. Him and his caddy were cracking jokes and clowning around the whole time they were out there. He does not take a divot with his irons. He hit 4 bags of balls, 35-45 balls per bag and did not even disturb the grass where he was hitting from. He and his swing coach were working on his ball positioning most of the time.

Charles Howell III is a machine. He had to have gone through 12 bags of balls today at least. He was on the driving range and practice green for well over 6 hours today. He also went way off to the far end by himself, just him and his caddy.

John Daly is skinny as a rail now. He still crushes the ball but good grief, somebody make the man eat a sandwich!

Brad Faxon spent more time between shots than he did hitting balls. He was constantly stopping and having an analyzing session with his caddy.

James Driscoll has a future digging ditches if golf doesn't work out for him. The man was digging perfectly straight and uniform trenches with his irons. Each shot would be placed right behind the previous shots divot, over and over until he would reach the rope boundary of the hitting area. Then he'd just move over 1 inch and start all over again. It looked almost like crop circles, only in a straight line. Perfectly straight like they were laid out with a GPS.

In general, the shot dispersion of the pros is insane. Watching them hit 20 balls with a certain club, you could have gone and laid a baby blanket over 90% of the balls they had just hit. You'd hear the caddy tell one of them how far a flag was after checking with the range finder. Then watch them place ball after ball within 10 feet of it.

The majority of the pros play the ProV1x. We handed out far more bags of them than any other ball. We only had 3 ask for a TaylorMade ball and the PGA or the Viking Classic didn't order any at all. Srixon sent 12 cases of balls, 12 dozen to a case and not one pro requested them. Nike sent 6 cases of practice balls and nobody asked for them either. Callaways shipment of balls is running late and hasn't arrived yet. But only 4 asked for them. The most requested balls were the ProV1x, then ProV1's, then Bridgestone's, but Charles Howell III went through most of those. Every ball manufacturer except Bridgestone stamped practice on their balls. The Bridgestone balls are all Tour B330 S's, without practice on them anywhere. And yes, I will be smuggling a handful of them home every evening,

[FATC1TY]

Hell yeah.. Sounds fun. Grab me some B330-S's... My favorite ball!

[mddubya]

Day 2---


The big news of the day, RAIN !!!!!!!

Frigging Annandale Country Club won't allow the ball picker out on the soggy driving range. Even though there are pros and amateurs alike out there hitting balls in the rain, so guess how the balls get gathered up? Yep, an army of volunteers. My lower back and thighs are killing me from bending over so much. The course only has 4 shag tubes so the majority of the balls were picked up by bending over.

The pros ball have so much back spin on anything resembling an iron or hybrid, most of the balls become plugged.

The Callaway balls arrived today, Tour iX's, nothing written on them denoting they are practice balls,

Handed out 4 whole bags of Nike balls, 3 bags of Srixon's, not very popular.

Several of the players that hit ProV 1x's requested a bag of ProV 1's, guess they are getting ready for the new grooves and know they will need more spin.

I over heard several of the players complaining about the new groove rule. Also heard a couple of horror stories of players who had new clubs built with the V grooves, within the specs given by the PGA. Seems the PGA isn't exactly sure what they want. Woody Austin was saying that Phil Mickelson had some new irons and wedges built, but when the PGA tested them they came back saying they still spun too much. Even though the grooves were exactly like they mandated. This sounds like its going to get very interesting.

[SiberianDVM]

Way cool, mddubya! Keep up the good reports and I'll send you my shipping address for that gross of balls (any brand, I'm not picky).

[FATC1TY]

Yeah, my address is incoming. A dozen will do. Any of them.

[mddubya]

Day 3---


Nice weather today for the Pro-Am. The driving range was super crowded today. At 1st the CC wasn't going to use the ball picker upper and we ran out of all the balls except Srixon's and Nike's. 99% of the players were understanding about the ball situation. A few acted all pi$$ed, but none of the big names that anyone would recognize. I did find it amusing that Woody Austin is playing for Cleveland but would rather hit Callaway or Bridgestone's if his ProV1x's aren't available. He said Vjay hates them btw, but is obligated to play them due to his contract.

Scored a new Adams hat from the Adams rep.

Not a lot to report actually, we were playing catch up all day getting the balls cleaned up and bagged. Apparently we were short handed and kept really busy trying to keep balls out for the players to practice with.

It is almost nauseating to watch the pros hit ball after ball, everyone looking perfect to me. Then hear them mutter they caught it fat or thin, say what? Looked friggin perfect to me. Charles Howell III over heard me saying just that, turned and laughed saying, nope, missed my target by 20 feet. Must be nice when your game is at the level that a 20foot miss with a 3 iron upsets you.

[N.V.M.]

just tweeted from John Daly:

PGA_JohnDaly
Annandale today---won't be able to cut the fairways all week--field real wet & muddy!

[mddubya]

Yep, its a quagmire out there in places. This area has had an unusually high amount of rain over the past couple of months. The ground was already saturated, and there is a 80% chance of Thunderstorms tomorrow.

[xamilo]

Originally Posted by mddubya

My lower back and thighs are killing me from bending over so much.

I'm sorry but this sounds SO BAD out of context...

[FATC1TY]

Originally Posted by xamilo

I'm sorry but this sounds SO BAD out of context...

Why? What did you think he was volunteering for?

[N.V.M.]

postponed til friday. even then...?

[mddubya]

Originally Posted by N.V.M.

postponed til friday. even then...?

More rain forecast for tonight and tomorrow, so who knows? The driving range and practice green were busy busy busy today. But we had to shut it down at 3pm so we could go hand pick all the balls.

[mddubya]

Wow, I knew we had gotten a lot of rain this summer, but even I didn't realize we had received over 25 inches in the past 3 months. Couple that with a cooler than normal summer and it adds up to the disaster that is Annandale Country Club right now. The course sits in a low area, and was built over 30 years ago so the drainage isn't up to par with newer courses. The weather forecast is calling for more rain tonight and tomorrow, looking more like a rain shortened event all the time.

[mddubya]

Day 5-----


Play cancelled again today. And not exactly looking good for the rest of the weekend. Even the driving range was closed at noon today. In fact, if you watch the coverage of the Viking Classic you'll see me and the rest of the range volunteers picking up the balls from the morning session. I'm the guy in the khaki pants, red windshirt and blue hat carrying the bucket and using a shag tube.

I'll be there in the morning at 6am but I imagine they will send us home pretty early. Looking more and more like next weekend for the tournament.