Live Update Thread - 2015 Love Is In The Air w/ Cobra Golf

golf4life said:

I guess we're going back. This is how I find out!

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Erky said:

I didn't know anything about Chris as he is newer, so I just made myself a promise that I would swing easy all day and play my own game. It was important to me to play well with Legacy prep going on, and the course was intimidating, so I just wanted to keep the ball in front of me.

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golf4life said:

I guess we're going back. This is how I find out!

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Mrs. Golf4Life said:

This is a common sentiment among the ladies. I myself was once a doubter as well.
See you both next year!

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caeleric said:

i think my wife was a doubter, too, but she knew i was excited about it and supported me. when she told me how appreciative she was that morgan was going out of her way to make her feel included, that was huge for me.

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Erky said:

OK so here's my recap:

Friday:
We were among the last to arrive. Since we missed check-in, GG had our swag back up in their room. We went up to get it, and got to meet Howzat and his lovely wife. We introduced ourselves, then went to drop off our luggage and head to Kobe. I passed Philly V and his wife in the lobby and said hello. Once at Kobe, a lot of familiar faces started rolling in. Shared a few drinks with some THPers at the bar, and then it as time to find our tables and eat. We sat with Bret (Golf4Life) and the now famous Mrs. Golf4Life. In a not-so-unpredictable move, the ladies sat together so they could catch up, which left Bret and I sitting next to each other, with GregDan and his wife forming the other side of our little corner. Wardy rolled in last, to plenty of fanfare and teasing from well, everybody. After dinner, we headed back to the hotel and went straight to Wrecker's to watch the 3rd period of the Lightning game. We hooked up with Gizmo, Canes, Troy and all of the SOs as well as Wardy. Feeling celebratory after a great Lightning win to send them to the Finals, we had a few more beers before going to bed.

Oh, SWAG recap:
Puma ladies/Wardy visor
Puma ladies polo
Puma ladies shoes
Cobra square headcover that you can roll like dice (and it has dice dots on it)
Cobra men's hat
Love is in the Air champagne
Chocolates

I think that's it, but I could be missing something.

Saturday:
I was up around 6 to check out the gym and roam around the resort a bit. My wife needed the car in the afternoon, so Bret agreed to give me a ride. All I had to do was lug the gigantic old school leather staff bag I brought for this special occasion all the way from the parking lot I was in, back up past the pool, into the resort, up to my room to give my wife the keys without waking her up, and then lug them to the Key West parking lot where Bret was parked. We hadn't even hit the course yet and I needed to take 4 ibuprofen.

Our group was Myself, Caeleric (Chris), GregDan and Bret. Bret was predictably smashing the ball. I had some mutual friends with GregDan, so I knew he was going to be a long hitter. I didn't know anything about Chris as he is newer, so I just made myself a promise that I would swing easy all day and play my own game. It was important to me to play well with Legacy prep going on, and the course was intimidating, so I just wanted to keep the ball in front of me. I have to say, GregDan has a really nice, smooth, powerful swing. He hit some real bombs. Where Dan's swing is smooth and powerful, Bret's is more like a violent collision. The results are often them same, with long drives down the middle of the fairway. Their methods are very different. I think most of us struggled a bit off the first tee, which is always a good ice breaker. I hit a 4 wood that was fading a bit too much and sort of lost sight of it. It's never a good sign when you hear a dozen THPers react to the first bounce with "OOOOOOOOH!" as my ball hit the cart path and went onto a hill near the bushes. I got it onto the green with my second shot and made a par, and we were off. It was raining a bit, and the rain picked up during the second hole. Luckily it eventually went away. Caeleric had a nice, smooth putting stroke and put a great roll on the ball that I am definitely jealous of. He was also gaming the Bridgestone DFs, which I am curious about. He hit some fantastic shots with them. He and I both live in the region, so dealing with the heat wasn't an issue. I think our group would have made a phenomenal scramble team. There were even a few holes where all of us played well at the same time. I recall a moment on 16 where Caeleric and GregDan each lost their tee shots, and hit their next shots onto the green. Each of them drained 50+ foot circus putts down a huge hill. Great bogeys. Dan also made an impossible up and down bogey on 13 from waaaaay down a hill by the water.

My wife had to leave for a few hours, so I wandered down to the THP pool chaos. It was like Caddy Day at Bushwood. The best part was when it started pouring, everyone just jumped back into the pool.

Dinner was awesome. That's a great buffet, though I was so into my conversation with TO I am not sure I got our money's worth. TO is a fascinating guy who is very open and honest. It's cool when you get to talk about golf equipment with someone who knows about as much about golf equipment as anyone else in the world. Rachel and JLD were at our table too, and were a pleasure to chat with. When I asked Rachel what her job responsibilities were, she told me "To go drinking with the media." I am polishing up my resume as I write.

After dinner, we headed to Trader Sam's, which is a new bar at Disney's Polynesian Resort. For reasons I won't get into, we had to park elsewhere and ride the monorail to get to the Polynesian. We had to stop at the Magic Kingdom to take on passengers just as the fireworks had finished, so it was cramped. An older lady in a wheelchair was loaded onto our monorail car and proceeded to vomit all over the floor and other patrons standing nearby. Needless to say, they evacuated the monorail and it took us forever to get to the bar. Once there, we hooked up with GregDan and his wife and the Wardys. It's a cool bar with strong theming, special effects and a lot of interactive stuff. I think we could have stayed there all night if they would let us. Lucky for us, the trip home was much more uneventful than the trip there.

Sunday
I woke up at 3:30 AM with stomach issues, and never got back to sleep. To top it all off, my wife started coming down with a cold. We packed up our luggage and headed to the course. I hit about 5 balls on the range before giving up and trying to see if I could get my wife to practice putting. I don't think I am a very good instructor. At any rate, we hit the course with G4L, Canes, the 3 wives and Adam from Golfweek with Rachel from Cobra/Puma. It was cool to hear them talk about golf through different perspectives. Rachel ended up getting distracted a bit during the last few holes because a Puma guy (Kjeldsen) won the Irish Open and she had to snap into work mode a bit. G4L's wife Lee is a blast. We played with them last year at LIITA and were fortunate to do so again. Canes and his wife Christina were awesome, of course. She is as quick on the trigger as can be. There's no way she ever stood over a putt for more than 1 or 2 seconds. She sunk long putts on the first 2 holes.

On the third hole, the beverage cart came by, and since we hadn't eaten, I guess my wife bought a Clif bar before coming to the green. She hadn't even unwrapped it yet, but that didn't stop a crow from snagging it and flying away.

The THPers in my group struck out on the free driver hole. It's funny, because my whole group hit that green and I think made par the day before. I suppose things are different with a driver on the line. Adam hit one close, and Rachel somewhat begrudgingly 2 putted for him to win a driver and put a small dent in her budget, I suspect. Golf Industry: 1, THPers in my group: 0. I later asked Adam a few questions about being a golf writer, and he gave me some insight as to maybe which players are fun to cover and which players are boring interviews. Sounds like there are a few golfers on tour with more talent than intelligence, and I will leave it at that.

We finally made it to the finish and headed in. Lots of people were leaving, but a few of us ended up deciding to go to Buffalo Wild Wings. When we got there, it was closed, so we went to Ale House. Jitzy didn't check his PMs so he didn't make it, but Troy, Wardy, Bret and myself all made it with our wives.

Closing:
All in all it was an amazing event. If I had one regret, it's that I just didn't get to spend enough time getting to know more people. Tanker, Sudseh, Emart, PhillyV, David Winchell and many others that I had brief conversations with, but didn't get to spend as much time as I would have liked. The people are always what makes THP events special. Josh and Morgan did a great job as always, and you would be hard pressed to find a better combination of hotel and golf than Gaylord Palms and Waldorf Astoria. And as predicted, JB and GG know how to pick restaurants.

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Mrs. Golf4Life said:

Even coming out of the sand.....

....the boys lined them up nice for us this timeQUOTE]

Yeah, that wasn't as bad as Gizmo's, but the lie was a lot worse than it looks...And no, I did not get it out on the first try.

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Mward said:

I saw/heard of a few lies like that over the weekend. Nothing you can do but just get it out or to a flatter part of the bunker. Just brutal unlucky

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jitzy said:

Or guys could of done like Toad and scared the ball out of the bunker. He hit a ball so hard into the bunker that it should of been plugged, instead it looked like the magic bullet and ended up on the green. Kinda like his Jesus ball that walked on water.

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emart2173 said:

At the airport...MCO sux. 3 hours or so from now we will be back in MD. In a way I'm happy to be heading home but sux to have to leave and not have more time to hang out with a great group of people.

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jitzy said:

It does suck, I woke up this morning sad we weren't all gonna have fun again today. It was great meeting you guys though.

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GregDan said:

Goodbye Florida... until next year. Had a blast. thanks everyone for another amazing time!

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emart2173 said:

It was a pleasure meeting you guys as well, wish we had more time together to talk and get to know each other...hopefully we will get that soon.

just found out we have a weather delayed flight, could be another hour or more...hopefully less

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T2GRN18 said:

Nasty thunderstorms up here buddy.

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T2GRN18 said:

Nasty thunderstorms up here buddy.

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Mward said:

Nasty thunderstorms going towards Orlando too.

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