It's That Time of Year Again!
by Pat Sheridan on 04/24/16Has it really been a year since I blogged about the 2015 U.S. Open? I guess it has because we're less than a month away (May 14th & 15th) from the 2016 U.S. Open being held at Putt U in Center Valley, PA.
If you are interested, there's still time to sign up and last I've seen almost 50 competitors are ready to take on the Red and Blue courses at Putt U. If you are interested in what goes into playing a U.S. Open you can go back through my posts from playing in the 2015 tournament in North Carolina.
It was an enjoyable weekend
Unfortunately, it's been months since I've properly picked up a putter so I'm fairly out of practice at this point. I'm also one of the few competitors who haven't made the trek to PA to play at least one round on the courses. That doesn't bode well because the courses look hard and, from what I hear, are hard!
This year's tournament will be 6 total rounds, starting with 2 on the Blue course Saturday morning, followed by 2 on the Red course Saturday afternoon. One more round on each course Sunday morning will wrap up the play. In case you are keeping track, that's 36 holes I need to figure out in about 2.5 days of practice I'll have once I arrive on site in May.
In looking at the positives I see 3 things:
1) The longer holes will likely mean less consistent aces, pushing more people into two putt territory. (Seriously - don't think this is easily aceable.) My tournament weakness tends to be consistently dropping aces so maybe I can hang in there more if my 2 & 3 putt skills are put to the test.
2) A shorter tournament tends to mean people are more bunched up in the standings. A 10 round tournament allows people to separate more with 3-4 good rounds. A 6 round tournament keeps the players closer, which is good if you are trying to crack the top 25 for money.
3) I'm generally pretty good at picking up how miniature golf holes play, which probably comes from playing 100+ courses in the past 15 years. A well maintained, tournament course such as Putt U will also have less variables in the holes (poor design, poor maintenance, etc) so once you get a shot you're pretty sure it will remain that way 99% of the time. Consistency is good.
My goals before I get to the tournament in May are pretty simple - get some putting in! Just like last year we'll be documenting our journey here. If you are interested in knowing more about the U.S. Open or playing in a major tournament in general, don't hesitate to reach out to us. Happy Putting!
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