Awesome news!
Everyone’s favorite Golf Blogger has now “officially” donned the hat of freelance writer. 
I am writing Orlando Golf Course Reviews for OrlandoGolf.com!
I did my first course review out at Shingle Creek Golf Club and you can view it here -
Orlando Golf Course Review – Shingle Creek Golf Club
If you get a chance, read it over and leave your comments. I’d like to know what you think about it.
-Dave
Little Monday Golf Humor for you
A retired corporate executive, now a widower, decided to take a vacation He booked himself on a Caribbean cruise and proceeded to have the time of his life, that is, until the ship sank. He found himself on an island with no other people, no supplies, nothing, only bananas and coconuts.
After about four months, he is lying on the beach one day when the most gorgeous woman he has ever seen rows up to the shore.
In disbelief, he asks’, Where did you come from? How did you get here?’ She replies’, I rowed from the other side of the island. I landed here when my cruise ship sank.’ Amazing’, he notes.’ You were really lucky to have a row boat wash up with you.’ Oh, this thing?’ explains the woman. ‘I made the boat out of raw material I found on the island. The oars were whittled from gum tree branches. I wove the bottom from palm branches, and the sides and stern came from a Eucalyptus tree.’
‘But, where did you get the tools?’ Oh, that was no problem’, replied the woman.’ On the south side of the island, a very unusual stratum of alluvial rock is exposed. I found if I fired it to a certain temperature in my kiln, it melted into ductile iron. I used that for tools and used the tools to make the hardware.’ The guy is stunned.
‘Let’s row over to my place’, she says.
After a few minutes of rowing, she docks the boat at a small wharf. As the man looks to shore, he nearly falls off the boat. Before him is a stone walk leading to an exquisite bungalow painted in blue and white.
While the woman ties up the rowboat with an expertly woven hemp rope, the can can only stare ahead, dumb struck. As they walk into the house, she says casually’, It’s not much, but I call it home. Sit down, please. Would you like a drink?’ No! No thank you’, he blurts out, still dazed. ‘I can’t take another drop of coconut juice.’ It’s not coconut juice’, winks the woman. ‘I have a still. How would you like a Pina Colada?’ Trying to hide his continued amazement, the man accepts, and they sit down on her couch to talk.
After they have exchanged their stories, the woman announces’, I’m going to slip into something more comfortable. Would you like to take a shower and shave? There is a razor upstairs in the bathroom cabinet.’ No longer questioning anything, the man goes into the bathroom. There, in the cabinet, a razor made from a piece of tortoise bone. Two shells honed to a hollow ground edge are fastened on to its end inside a swivel mechanism.
‘This woman is amazing’, he muses.’ What next?’ When he returns, she greets him wearing nothing but vines, strategically positioned, and smelling faintly of gardenias. She beckons for him to sit down next to her.
‘Tell me’, she begins suggestively, slithering closer to him’, We’ve been out here for many months. You’ve been lonely. There’s something I’m sure you really feel like doing right now, something You’ve been longing for?’ She stares into his eyes.
He can’t believe what he’s hearing.’ You mean .. ‘ he swallows excitedly and tears start to form in his eyes.
‘Don’t tell me You’ve built a Golf Course!!!’
One More
WIFE:
What would you do if I died? Would you get married again?
HUSBAND:
Definitely not!
WIFE:
Why not – don’t you like being married?
HUSBAND:
Of course I do.
WIFE:
Then why wouldn’t you remarry?
HUSBAND:
Okay, I’d get married again.
WIFE:
You would? (With a hurtful look on her face).
HUSBAND:
(Makes audible groan).
WIFE:
Would you live in our house?
HUSBAND:
Sure, it’s a great house.
WIFE:
Would you sleep with her in our bed?
HUSBAND:
Where else would we sleep?
WIFE:
Would you let her drive my car?
HUSBAND:
Probably, it is almost new.
WIFE:
Would you replace my pictures with hers?
HUSBAND: That would seem like the proper thing to do.
WIFE
Would she use my golf clubs?
HUSBAND:
No, she’s left-handed.
WIFE:
Silence -
HUSBAND:
‘Oh dear.. *****’
hehe..
Save up to 70% on tee times when you book on GolfNow.com Today!
I’m a little late on posting these and I apologize for that..
As a quick refresher, I’ve been taking golf lessons from a local golf pro named Brendon Elliott. If you haven’t been following along, you can catch up by clicking on the posts below.
Orlando Golf Lessons Week 1
Orlando Golf Lessons Week 2
Weeks three and four focus on chipping and pitching. Not much worthy of note occurred during week three, Brendon spent the time taking video and pictures of my swing from all angles.
For Pitching, we used this sweet new VJ Singh mat he picked up at the PGA Merchandise Show. When I was at the show, I tried the mat and hated it, but I’ve since begun singing a different tune, that thing is sweet!
Week four we discussed the outcome of the previous weeks evaluation. To keep it short, we decided to start from scratch…
Chipping
“Minimum air time, maximum ground time”
The easiest way to describe a proper chip is to treat the shot as if you were putting with a lofted club.
Rest the club head behind the ball with the club face aimed where your shot is intended.
Elevate the grip four inches and move it forward four inches. This will cause your hands to be forward in your stance.
You want to take a narrow stance that is slightly open with the ball a little behind the center of your stance.
The weight dispersion should be 60/40 with most of the weight on the lead foot.
Because of the position of the club, you’re going to “grip down” on the club and because the club rests more in your palms, you can choose either a standard grip or a putting grip.
It is said that using a putting grip is preferred because it allows minimal wrist action which will lead to more consistant shots.
The swing is very similar to a putting stroke except it involves a slight turning of the shoulders. The swing speed should only be as fast as the rotation allows. It’s very important to keep your wrists silent throughout the entire motion. Keeping the wrists quiet ensures the club head trails the hands into impact.
There are two main elements to any chip, carry and roll.
Carry is the amount of arc in the shot. As a general rule, the larger the arc, the greater the carry distance. The length of the arc is determined by the distance the club head moves back and through. So a larger swing will correlate into a larger arc leading to greater carrying distance.
Roll is the distance the ball…….rolls… The amount of roll to a chip is determined by the amount of loft the club has. As the loft of the club increases, the distance the ball rolls decreases.
Now this isn’t a perfect science, but here’s what I’ve been told about chip shots. Regardless of where you are in relation to the green or pin, you always want to land your chip three feet (one pace) onto the green and let it roll the rest of the way.
To determine the club to use (this is where it gets tricky and i’m still working on this), you need to understand that every club has a carry:roll ratio. See below.
PW 1:1
9i 1:2
8i 1:3
7i 1:4
6i 1:5
Ok, so check this out. you’ll want to divide the number of paces your ball is from your “spot” (three paces onto the green) into the number of paces your spot is from the pin. For an example, lets say your ball is four paces from the “spot” and the pin is eight paces from the “spot.” You want to divide eight by four. So your ratio is 1:2 and you’ll want to use a 9i for the shot.
Hopefully, this isn’t totally confusing…
I haven’t quite perfected the technique myself, but I’ve been practicing since the last lesson and I feel ALOT more comfortable with chipping than I did before. The comfort has led to confidience and I no longer dread the shanks from three feet away like I used to.
As always, I thank the almighty Brendon for imparting such techniques on such a pitiful golfer as myself.
I’d love any feedback you guys have on this, I’ve found it very helpful!
-Dave
Check out some Orlando golf course reviews and if you’re looking to play, here’s a selection of discounted Orlando tee times.
I had the opportunity to speak with Brian Allman from SweetSpotGolf.
They’re a very cool, new club manufacturing company with an emphasis on fun and some big things in the works.
Check it out.
For Immediate Release
Sweet Spot Golf partners with Womens National Golf School
Golf club manufacturer and nationally recognized women’s golf academy join forces to bring a new direction in golf – bringing FUN to the game as part of the solution.
Los Angeles, Calif. (February 23, 2009) – Custom golf club design and manufacturing start-up Sweet Spot Golf announced at this weekend’s EWGA’s Annual Conference a partnership with one of the largest and most well-respected teaching academies in the US, National Golf Schools. Sweet Spot Golf’s high performance, custom crafted clubs are superior in quality and fashion forward clubs are a unique offering in the golf industry and women golfers are taking notice. National Golf Schools is launching their Womens National Golf School making the partnership with Sweet Spot a perfect match for the two companies to join forces and promote golf products and instruction to women, one of the sports fast growing segments.
“We feel strongly that women golfers have not been given the attention they deserve and our intention in partnering with an academy owned and operated by Northern Florida’s PGA Teacher of the year Pat Livingston’s, is to finally give this consumer more of what they want; the game of golf on their own terms and if that means doing things differently to make the game more fun, so be it” said Brian Allman President of Sweet Spot Golf.
Our line of women’s products not only performs as well as any other in the marketplace but they also bring a sense of style and design that allows the golfer to feel like the game has come to them and not the other way around. When looking for a partner with a similar philosophy, Pat came to mind immediately.
The National Golf School Philosophy is to take each person and use what they have to their greatest advantage. “You will never hear a ‘one method fits all’ mentality from our staff of Professionals,” said owner and award winning PGA instructor Pat Livingston. “Learning is best done in a fun, respectful environment and that describes our school perfectly. Combined now with Sweet Spot Golf’s products assist students in bringing out the best in their game. They feel more in control, not just physically, but also because their equipment better reflects their personal style. We are going to have a lot of fun working with Sweet Spot and because of that our students are going to benefit, they’ll have move fun too, which is what it’s all about!”
Mr. Livingston further commented, “Sweet Spot Golf has designed and engineered a unique, well crafted and evenly weighted putter. It’s built with quality and their unique Precision Positioning System allows us to better teach golfers to find their target line and sink putts with style.” Sweet Spot’s new Black and Pink clubs are available in Putters, a 13-degree Driver as well as a Hybrid in three different loft degrees (19, 22 and 25). The women’s line is expected to have a variety of colors available by the summer of 2009.
Additionally, Sweet Spot Golf’s Pink line is a proud sponsor of the National Breast Cancer Foundation. “Women who have seen and tried the stylish Pink clubs have embraced them with enthusiasm because they know that playing with these products means more than just owning a quality golf club” says Sweet Spot Partner and club designer Chuck Parise, “They say ‘I support finding a cure for Breast Cancer.’ It is the Power of Pink!”
Sweet Spot Golf launched the sale of the Pink line of clubs on their website www.sweetspotgolfclubs.com and is currently looking for retail outlets to sell their products. Additionally, they will now be available for purchase at the Womens National Golf School.
If you ask me, that’s a pretty powerful endorsement to Sweet Spot Golf.
When I was talking to Brian, I asked the more obvious question “How do you plan on competing with other club manufacturers” and his response was “We’re not competing with them, only a fool would try, we’re just offering something different.”
Different is pretty accurate I think, whenever you decide to start using Sweet Spot Golf Clubs, you no longer use a putter, you begin wielding an Ax.
Besides the Ax, they also offer drivers and hybrids, both with the Sweet Spot unique design and fashion forward look.
Check them out, the website makes for some entertaining reading
-Dave
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