Any time that the weather cooperates enough for me to sneak in a round this time of year, you can bet I’m going to do it. Today was one of those days. With my Winter Pass at Echo Falls almost half way finished (it ends at the end of February) I felt the need to get out again today, even though our temperatures are dipping down well below freezing, I jumped on the chance to get out in the sunshine for a round of golf. My hopes for a great round were all but dashed as I arrived at the course to see that holes 1 and 15 both had temporary greens on them. It was a sad to see that even after noon, that the course hadn’t come out of the frost delay from the morning, but at least the team at Echo Falls had a great plan. They shifted the starting hole to 17, which had been in the sunshine for the longest amount of time. So, after a few minutes of loading up the cart, I travelled over to the 17th tee box to start the day off. I ended up playing with a twosome today, which was both interesting and frustrating due to their pace of play, but it was a good adjustment to my normal play speed the last few rounds. I am going to skip the normal shot by shot recap on this round due to the fact that there were some temporary course changes and restrictions due to the weather, but I’ll run down a few highlight holes as a bit of a round-up for the round.
I have to start with 17, since it was the first time I’d really experienced the power of a hybrid from the fairway. Even though I started off with my 2 hybrid off the tee, somehow I made it out to the left rough and was sitting about 230 yards out to the flag. Normally, this would have been a hope and a prayer 3 iron in, but I pulled the 20 degree hybrid and proceeded to hit a perfect laser beam draw right to the right side of the green. On a normal day, that ball would have spun up and stopped almost on the flag, but today, with the greens being a bit more firm (frozen) than usual, it did roll through the green. It was about as solid of shot from 230 yards out as I’d ever hit with a long iron, and this was just my second cold shot of the round. A chip on and a putt that missed by about 3” left me with a bogey 5 to open the round, but I have to consider that a victory on a tough hole in really rough conditions. The 18th played almost straight up at 147 yards again today. My tee shot was just short right of the green in a little “grass bunker” that is the bail out area on the hole. A pitch and a one putt for par and we were back to our normal starting hole. The first had the temporary green about 70 yards short of it’s normal position. I hit a stellar 3 hybrid off the tee, again, reaching about 240 yards, but may have been a bit longer if it weren’t for the frost on the course. I managed to run a 25 yard chip shot onto the temporary flagstick area (though this was not a trimmed area or even a flat one) and took an automatic two putt on it as there was no way to even consider trying to putt through the divots and frost.
I played holes two, three and four in the usual manner, par, par, par. I had a great drive on the fourth hole that found the middle of the fairway about 285 yards off the tee. A 7 iron found an area just left of the green for an easy chip and two putt par. I also had a great approach shot on 3. An 83 yard lob wedge from the left rough found the green about 15 feet from the flag. I missed the first putt by almost three feet, with the green being so much faster than it looked, but I made the return putt without any issue at all. The next three holes were far more exciting, even from a negative standpoint. On the par 3, fifth, I hit an 8 iron off the tee that must have drawn about 40 yards (does that make it a hook?) I started it out straight at the flagstick, but it just kept moving – all the way to the far left rough, about 50 yards from the green. Somehow I managed to hit a pitch that not only found the green, but tracked to about 2 feet from the hole (isn’t that how this usually works – a horrible tee shot followed by a miracle pitch and you still save par?) Then we got to the 6th hole, which I have to say, may be the finest hole of the year for me as far as how well it played. It started off with a 301 yard drive down the right side. I then hit a 178 yard 8 iron downhill to the green. It came to rest about 35 feet from the flag. I waited for the rest of the group to get to the green before leaving my eagle putt about 5 feet short. I was really stressing making the birdie putt, which made it seem like 10 or 15 feet instead of the short 5 that it was, but I managed to roll it in to get back to even par.
By this point in time, the weather was warming up nicely and things were moving along. The run of 7 through 9 all went along at even par. I had a poor tee shot on all three holes, but not bad enough to kill my score. The short 10th played pretty easy as well, though the green was harder than expected. I scooted through 11 with another par before reaching the par 5 12th in two with a Driver/4 Hybrid combo. A two putt birdie was the result and I moved to 1 under for the round. Keep in mind that this is a completely unofficial score since we all took the automatic two putt on the temp green on 1 and would probably have the same issue on 15 coming up. A 7 iron par on 13 was followed by a pitching wedge par on 14. A 2/3 hybrid combo on 15 got me close enough to the temp green there to chip on for another automatic 2 putt (and yes, I laughingly tried for a birdie on that “green” but it was never going to happen.) We wrapped up our round a bit early on the par 4, 16th with a beautiful 2 hybrid/9 iron combo that left a pretty easy two putt for par. All in all, it wasn’t as impressive as my last round, but I played well enough to escape the course with a modified “one under – 69” on this cold day.
I believe that it may be time for me to step back from the white tees at Echo this winter. Really the only serious difference in the holes is the par 3 yardages, but it should make course play about 1-2 clubs longer on approach shots (which I’m currently hitting mostly 9-LW in with so an extra club or two shouldn’t matter too much.) From there, it’s time to start settling on my ball for the season. I’m really loving the new Wilson Staff Duo Soft, but I have yet to find a location that has the new Duo Soft Spin available to try out – plus I’m not sure how much I would get out of them at this point in time with the conditions being what they are. Other than that, unless a magical package shows up from Wilson for under my tree, I think my bag is 100% set for 2018. I may change the driver out for summer time, going to the Fujikura Speeder shaft over the Alidla Rogue, but we will see how it works out over the next few months before making that call. All I can say at this point is that right now, my ball striking is solid, control is good and distance is pretty well dialed in. All in all, it seems like a good winter season so far.
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