Inching Closer
Here’s another unfinished blog I dusted off and are now posting for y’all. I started writing it back in August, but only about half of it was written, so I finished it, added some finishing touches, and here it is for your enjoyment!
The past two years, one of my major goals was to qualify for my first USGA tournament. I have yet to do that, but I am inching ever so closer.
About a week ago, I played in a USGA Fourball qualifier with my teammate Sammie. We ended up shooting -3 for our round putting us at second alternate. This was my first time being an alternate after the qualifier, which meant that we still have a chance to get into the tournament in May.
To explain the fourball format a little, basically Sammie and I each play our own balls for the entire round. We play a normal round of golf, and we take our best score from each hole to count towards our team score. For example, on the 16th hole, I ended up with par, but she made a 15 foot birdie putt so our team score for that hole was a birdie. The goal is to not bogey the same holes (which we were very bad at). We ended up bogeying the same hole three times!
We had a lot of fun and ended up playing with Coach and one of my other teammates, Makenna, who were also a team competing in the fourball qualifier. Noah, our assistant coach, caddied for Coach, and two of my other teammates, Macie and Mckenzie, also played in the qualifier, so BG represented well in the field.
Just even holding the second alternate paper felt like an accomplishment because this was the first qualifier I had walked away with a possibility of still going to the national event, something that had never happened before.
One of the funniest moments from the round came on hole 11. Sammie hit a hybrid out to the fairway, while I hit a driver over the trees to leave me with 40 yards left to the green. Sammie stuck her wedge shot to a foot, and I said to my dad, who was caddying for me, “This shot only means something if I hole it”. This was because Sammie was going to make birdie since she had a tap in, which meant we were guaranteed a birdie on that hole for our team score. However, if I holed out from 40 yards, we would take eagle as our team score.
I holed out.
Sammie laughed and cheered, “Are you kidding? I stick it and you do THAT?”
We had a blast, and we are still holding out hope that we will get that call to go to Oklahoma in May.
I have gone from no shot at qualifying for the tournament to now having a card stock paper that says I am a second alternate to a USGA tournament. I am inching closer.
Also as a little added fun to this tournament, Sammie and I realized that our dads both kept our US Kids Golf caddy bibs from when we were 12-years-old. So, one thing led to another and we barely had to convince them to wear them on the day of our qualifier. We even got them matching their clothes, so we looked very professional out on the course.
