Not Yet A Tiger

UK Handicap; 3.3 USGA Handicap; 3.8

33 holes have been played today, and my legs know it.

Summer started with a bit of a blip, having moved all of my clocks forward an hour, I was woken at 5am GMT by the alarm on my new phone (BlackBerry). Unknown to me, they automatically put themselves forward an hour, so my phone had been put forward twice.

The round this morning was the most confident round I’ve had in a while. The stats say that I hit the same number of greens in regulation as yesterday (13/18), but today had 33 putts compared with yesterday’s 38. Those 33 putts today still included a couple of very short misses, but in general I felt like I was going to hole each putt, instead of being scared of them. The end result was 1 birdie, 14 pars, and 3 bogies, giving me a gross 73 and 37 stableford points. So all being well, my handicap will be down to 3.3, and I’ve given myself a bit more breathing space from going up to 4, and officially being a Tiger again (for those not in the know, handicap ranges are associated with different animals; Tigers are 4-9 handicaps, Foxes are around 10-18, Rabbits are around 19-28, although there may be regional variations). The new putter felt a lot better than what is now my ex-putter (which was nowhere to be seen around the bin on the 17^th), with it being around 3 inches shorter, I was able to move my shoulders a bit more, instead of being too rigid.

This afternoon was a first team foursomes match, probably my last first team match for quite a while. I played well again, but unfortunately we lost both our game, and the overall match. Towards the 32^nd hole of the day I really started to feel my legs burn, if you consider that up until that point it’s around an 8 mile walk, carrying around 10kg of metal, it’s hardly surprising. Last year I played 36 holes in a day on 11 separate occasions, this year will be around the same, so I need to be able to last until the final few holes.

An aspect that I was concerned about today, and was inconclusive, was my left knee. I am pretty certain I have a meniscal tear in my left kneecap, all of the symptoms and tests lead towards that diagnosis. It causes me pain in the 24-48 hours after playing golf. It started last August, and in some cases was incredibly painful. Over the winter it eased, however it has started again now that I am playing more golf, and I have several options;

• Do nothing and hope it goes away (not going to happen)
• Do nothing and play in pain (could be very sore in the summer)
• Go to the doctor and take advice, with a view to treatment next winter (not a quick fix)
• Go to the doctor and take whatever treatment is required (this scares me, as I don’t know what would be required, and I don’t want to be injured and unable to play for a long period)

I’ll see how I feel tomorrow, I have nearly gone to see my doctor about it many times, but keep putting it off as I might not like what he has to say, however it is getting worse and I have to think about my long-term ability to play golf effectively.