I had a great drive to St. James Plantation in southeastern North Carolina on Friday morning. For once in my life, I split up a long drive with twenty minute stops to walk and stretch every couple of hours, so I arrived feeling great early Friday afternoon. Unfortunately, that didn't result in the great feelings for which I had hoped from my back on the golf course. I hit a few very easy full-swing shots on Friday but had a lot of pain and disappointedly limited myself to only chips and putts for the rest of the day. I was fairly certain I would have to withdraw from next week's event because Friday evening is the deadline to do so in order to have my entry fee refunded. I made a call to the director of our tour, and he kindly granted me a one day extension on the deadline. I'm glad he did because I felt a lot better today and was even able to hit some drivers with no pain. In fact, I hit every club in my bag today out on the Reserve Course here at St. James, and after some stiffness and a little pain early in the round, my back really felt good the rest of the day. I never made a full-speed swing, but I was hitting my driver at about 70 percent by the end of the day, and I'm pretty sure that I need continue to do that even when my back is 100% because I was hitting it awesome and it was going very far! I'm excited about that, and, most of all, I'm just excited to be able to make some swings. I'm definitely not going to push my back in the coming days, but I did commit to play the event here at St. James this coming week, so I'm pumped for that!
My sis, Dr. Laura Malnati, is still coaching me back to health. She's been keeping me realistic about what I need to expect in terms of a healing time-table, and she has given me more and more exercises each day to promote healing in my back. I did a great "workout" this morning to get my back moving in a healthy way, and I feel like a couple more days of good work like that will have me back to 100% in no time.
The event here at St. James Plantation starts on Wednesday, so I have a few days to make sure everything is ready. Being here early is a great advantage because the Reserve Course and the Founders Club--the two courses used for the Egolf event--are two of the most demanding courses we play all year, and a couple of extra rounds to learn the nuances can only help. I am ready to have some good practice sessions to re-awaken my touch with my wedges and putter, but all-in-all I think my game was in great form pre-injury and will return quite easily to that. I'll updated you in a day or two on how everything is going, so come back for some good news!
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I need to call on all of you who support me for some "housing help" again. When this event ends next weekend, I will be heading straight to Columbia, South Carolina, for an event at Columbia Country Club. The course is on the north side of town, and is actually in Blythewood, SC, I believe, but it's the greater-Columbia area. If anybody has any potential connections for me there, I would be most thankful. Thank you for following and for your support!
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