Comfortable

I've had a great couple days down here at Callaway Gardens getting ready for this week's Tarheel Tour event. Callaway has 36 holes, and we will play both the Lake View and Mountain View courses for the first two rounds of the tournament. I have spent the last couple days becoming reacquainted with both courses. The Mountain View course is the championship course here at Callaway Gardens (and the course on which I will play the first stage of Q-school in two weeks), but the much shorter Lake View course is going to be a fun and challenging venue for tournament golf as well. Both courses are playing firm and fast, and that is something I have not seen before in my time here. Short irons and wedges will be the norm on either course, but accuracy from the tee and precision with short clubs will be required for success this week. The bermuda rough is high, and the greens are extremely bouncy. Birdies will definitely be abundant, and scores will be low, but good execution will be at a premium in all facets of the game. I love these types of conditions, and I'm excited to get started!

I tee it up tomorrow morning at 9:10 on the shorter Lake View course. I feel like many people are going to approach the 6,100-yard course with an I-have-to-birdie-every-hole type of mindset, but I don't think that is the case at all. I'm going to try my best to be very patient and give myself a look at birdie on every hole. I know that a lot of the hole locations are going to be very tucked, and I know that missing the greens on the short-side will not be good with the rough being very thick around the greens. I want to play fairly conservatively off the tee and then hit my wedges a few feet on the safe side of all of the tucked pins. Though I'm not 100% comfortable on the grainy bermuda greens here, I know that if I give myself a lot of good looks at birdie putts, I can get the putter rolling. I'm going to stick to that game plan and trust myself on every shot tomorrow. It's going to be a good day!

After round one tomorrow, I'll move to the Mountain View course for round two on Wednesday. I'll talk more about that tomorrow night. Check back here for a good report from round in the evening.