Pepsi tour @ Wood Ranch CC

In the meantime, while the Hooters Tour is not in season, I have been playing in some smaller tour events around southern California. Just this last Monday Feb. 12th, I played in a Pepsi tour event at Wood Ranch in Simi Valley. This was a last minute decision to where I just showed up that morning hoping they had room for me to play, which they did. I wasn't expecting much because I haven't been hitting my driver or irons to well, but I have been spending a lot of time working on my putting and wedges. Well all I can say is that the putting practice I have been doing has paid off. I had the best putting round of my life only putting the ball 22 times, this is amazing never before have I done this. So now your asking well how did you play? Well even though i didn't hit the ball great my putting made up for it. I shot 69 (-3) on a very difficult golf course only hitting half of the fairways and only 8 greens. I shot even par 36 on the front nine and then make the turn and shoot (-3) 33 on the back nine. My group was the last group of Professionals so when we came in I didn't have to wait for anyone more scores to come in. I come to find out that I tied for first place and I am going to be in a play off. The last time I was in a playoff was when i played on this summer tour during college and I lost after the second hole, this time it was different. We skipped over the first hole because there were people playing on it and we went to the second hole, a short par 5 that requires you to lay up off the tee. I hit three wood into the left rough and my opponent hit driver in the left rough as well. I am a little behind him and further to the left, I am first to go with 235 yards to the hole. I hit a three iron just short of the green side bunkers leaving me about 40 yards to the pin. My opponent has to hit a cut shot around a tree, which he did not execute the way he wanted to and the ball hooked on him and went into a hazard up by the green. He had to take a drop from the hazard then chipped it onto the green having a 15 footer for par. Now it is my turn to go and I hit a great pitch shot out of the rough that ended up just behind his ball, leaving me to putt first for birdie. I stepped up thinking that I am just going to make this putt and not even give him a chance to tie me. A little more than 15 feet with about 3 inches of break moving from the right to the left, I had a good read on this putt and I trusted it. Boom!! I nailed it right in the center of the hole, one hole and the playoff was over, I was victorious for the first time in a playoff and for the first time as a professional.

Thanks for all your prayer and support, I will be playing another Pepsi tour event this weekend on Sunday and Monday down in Temecula. The results are on the Pepsi tour website and www.pepsitour.com then click on the results hyperlink and you can find it there.

Joe

Results from Ranking school a month later

I just have to say that since I have come home from Ranking School I have been very busy working on my game and on my motor home and other things to get ready to leave for the tour. I promise that once I am back on the road I will be much more diligent about posting. Anyways, back to the results from Ranking school. I could write about a ten page paper on the hole by hole analysis of each round, but for time and for the sake of my readers enjoyment I have decided not to, but to give you a synopsis of each round. For the first round I was nervous, but just wanting to get off to a good start. What I mean by a good start is one the doesn't put me in a hole for the rest of the week. According to those standards I succeeded, I had a good solid round shooting even par 72 only missing one fairway all day. The rest of the stats were good to hitting 10 greens (okay), but only having 29 putts (good). Happy with how I play the first round, but could see much room for improvement, came into the second round ready to go. Things did not get off to a good start for the second round. I started off the second round par, double, triple. Lets just say i was pretty devastated after that, although I was able to realize that this is a 72 hole tournament so there is a lot more holes to be played I came back on the next hole and made birdie. That was just about the last good thing for this round. Shooting 44 (+8) on the front nine, I was trying to do anything I could to keep myself in the game to finish out this round without making a fool of myself. I didn't do much on the back except make a birdie on the last hole to shoot 39 (+3) on the back nine for a 83 total. This round was very frustrating not only because of the obvious, the score, but I had the two worst bunker lies of my life in the same round, during a qualifier none the less. These two bunker lies cost me about 5 strokes alone, which still doesn't explain for all of the high score, but they were both on the front nine making it hard to keep my mental edge sharp. The third and fourth rounds were very respectable shooting 73 (+1) and 70 (-2). The third round I hit the ball well, but I just couldn't make any birdie putts. I only made one birdie through the whole round, but that also means that I only made two bogie's in the round. The last round was great, it could have been one of the best ball striking days I have ever had. I hit 15 greens in regulation (great) and had 31 putts (so so), but more than anything I was proud of myself for how I came back after the second round. My total score for the four rounds was 298 (+10), yeah I know I was +11 just in the second round. What I would give to get that day back, but that is what it is and I know that God has a plan for me and this is obviously in it because it already happened. So now the first tournament is in Guatemala Feb. 26th through Mar. 5th. I will be playing some small tour events between now and then to keep my game sharp. I will keep you updated.

Joe