looks like he could play defensive back...

As seen on the nikegolf website...

loch march - just noticed this...

Friday afternoon at work, and I'm obsessed with google maps again...

Check it out - looks like 'holes' at Loch March in Kanata (Ottawa's west end) have been cleared to the left of the parking lot... I remember hearing about a second 18 there a long long time ago, that never came to fruition. Wonder when these trees were cleared or if there are still plans to build the second 18? Looks like only room for nine, but still...

Also, who else hates the 'new' 18th hole? The old 18th was a great finishing hole, you can see it just to the right of the road the enters LM. Tee was up high on the ridge (by that house - which I think is why they needed to abandon the original 18th). The green was nestled above the fairway and was tucked nicely into the trees...

excellent Golf Town experience yesterday

Wanted to pass this along, and give a shout out to the extra effort made by Jarred at Golf Town (GT) in Kanata.

I played an early morning round at Canadian on Sunday morning, in the wet (the weather wasn't nearly as bad as it looked)... By the end of the round my feet were soaked. I was wearing Footjoy AWDs, which carried a 1 year waterproof warranty. I knew I bought them near the start of last year, a year during which I only played 20-25 rounds. Had I played 50-plus rounds last year, I don't think I'd have been returning the shoes... I'd have felt they had served me well, as I rarely ride, and play in all conditions, and therefore my shoes usually take a pounding... but considering my low-round total, off I went...

As soon as the sales doode at GT, Jarred, who sold me the shoes last spring, saw me, he asked me if everything was ok with my shoes (this, before I mentioned anything, and before he could even see I was carrying the shoes)... This was impressive. I'm sure he's sold one or two pairs of shoes in the past 12 months (he works mainly in the shoe dept)... so remembering me was a surprise.

I soon found out he remembered the brand and color I had purchased. I told him about the wetness issue, and told him I didn't have a receipt. Not a problem, if I had put this on my leaderboard account I was told - which I hadn't. (My GT peeve - why do the cashiers not ask you if you're a leaderboard member when we make a purchase? I've noticed this a few times in the past year - I've either had to bring it up, or I forget to - It is my responsibility to do so, but... anyway, kinda odd).

Off Jarred went to dig for my reciept in the non-Leaderboard archives. After about 20 minutes, he came back with my reciept, from, as it turns out, May 15, 2005. Before he showed me the receipt, he asked me if I remember buying anything else that day - I did - a dozen ProV1s, and an Ashworth pullover or some such. This, for him, confirmed that the reciept was mine, and we were good to go. $129.95 worth of validated credit was mine.

Since I love to play in the rain, Jarred recommended, and convinced me to move up to a pricier shoe at $189... Adidas Tour Metals, which carry a 2-year warranty. I know that GT will simply return the returned shoes to Footjoy for reimbursment, but it was the extra leg work to dig up my specific reciept that really impressed me.

Kudos to GT and specifically Jarred, and his manager.

is there a market for...

a mid-price public facility in the west end of town?

I ask this because yesterday, when trying to think of where to book an early morning weekend round for myself and my playing partners, I became frustrated by the lack of options for those of us in the west end, who don't wish to drive across town

Here's my thinking - keeping in mind that Loch March doesn't open until the 25th. When open, certainly it's an option, but at $65, I'd rather play Eagle Creek for 10 more.

What I'm talking about is a Graham Cooke-type | Emerald south nine | Cloverdale | Anderson-type track, priced at between $45 and $55. Not a Greensmere, which I think is stretching itself a bit too thin by building its second 18 without paying as much attention to its first 18 as it should.

Not a semi-private facility (Greensmere) that makes it tough for us non-members to get an early morning weekend tee time. Not Canadian, which also has members, and which while I enjoy the three (or four?) re-styled holes on the west 18 (holes which make you feel like you're playing a course completely different than the other 14 / 15 on the course btw). For $51 at Canadian, I kinda expect more - a course of more length (if you so desire) and of more intelligence - see the short par four 12th.

With Anderson links coming soon to the east end, perhaps I getting jealous of the options you folks have out that way.

I'd dearly love to be able to find a 200-acre parcel of land, have the financial wherewithall to purchase it and build a course with greens close to tees to keep up the pace of play (ie, Mississippi GC), and run it. There would be no memberships, but you have to have an index under an arbitrary number I set based on my mood for you to play it, and you must walk and carry / pull / push. No carts. Pace of play 3 hours 30 minutes, max. Over and above the handicap index restriction, there would be a Masters-like arbitrariness imposed on those who play or who attempt to play the track. You'd be banned for not playing ready golf. You'd be denied access to the course for showing up wearing golf sandals or greg norman-type hats, or for attempting to smuggle beer in your bag. It's golf, not a bar. Go drink your face off in some dive bar if you must, but you won't be turning my track into a Coors-lite commercial. Oh, and because there will be no 'cart girls', there will be honour-based watering stations every three holes. A loonie per water bottle and a loonie per banana.

Geez, I seem to have digressed into my personal pipe dream / fantasy. My apolgies. But I think you know what I'm getting at. I'm in need of a new west-end option that will allow me to get my fix while getting me there and back home within a four to five hour window so as not to turn my wife on me for good.

That is all. Do I ask too much?

jack and arnie are ticked

Augusta National continues to screw with its layout and design. In a recent article on GolfDigest.com, both Jack and Arnie, who I think know a thing or two about what makes a good golf course and what makes one suck the life out of you, rail against the recent changes.

Here is the most telling quote regarding Jack's feelings towards the recent changes...

"They've totally eliminated what Bobby Jones tried to do in the game of golf," Nicklaus says. "Bobby Jones believed golf was primarily a second-shot game. He believed that you should have enough room to drive the ball onto the fairway, but if you put it on the correct side of the fairway, you had an advantage to put the ball toward the hole. He wanted to give you a chance to do that shot."

Also, check out the photo included here (you can click on it to make it bigger). It clearly shows how different the course is today from years gone by.

What is most interesting to me is that Jack and Arnie aren't ticked that the course is longer, but that Augusta National has completely compromised the shotmaking / personal strategy element from the course.

best website by a golfer - patperezgolf.com

Shipnuck did a golf/web story this week that brought the following site to light... to be honest, I always thought this guy was a complete wack-job, but now I'm having second thoughts. Doode is hooked up.

Be sure to turn on your audio - classic tracks auto-play on his site. I might get me one of them t-shirts, or maybe even a new lid.

Viz --->

Most athlete related blogs rot. Mainly, they are vehicles their PR agencies use to spout the politically correct party line, all in the best interest of course of their client.

As you can see from this gallery, this seems not to be the case with Perez's site.

comments turned off

At the request of a certain individual, the comment feature has been turned off on this blog. This protects me from comment spam (which populated some of my posts ads), and protects me from me, and protects others from me. Consider yourself protected.

pgatour.com sez Ames is still tropical by nature

The flag for Trinidad and Tobago still flies beside Steven Ames on the pgatour.com leaderboard. Interesting.

I've always had an issue with Canadian media outlets touting this guy as Canadian. I know he's become a Canadian citizen and all, and I'm sure he's proud of his new citizenship, but I wonder if he personally considers himself Canadian, or is this new-found nationism being foisted upon him by Canadian media outlets?

Besides, as recent as 2003 Ames played in the WGC World Cup, under the flag of Trinidad and Tobago.

flagstick.com redesign

I'd been hearing through various sources that Flagstick Magazine was redesigning it's online property. Being an Ottawa-based publication, I've been visiting the site for the past couple of weeks in anticipation of the new designs unveiling.

It's up now, and while more pleasing to the eye than the previous incarnation, it's not an improvement. There are two big usability mistakes being made on flagstick.com. They are:

Splash page?
Ick. Why force me to click to get to your content? To present an unnecessary barrier between the user and the content is a no-no.

Buried navigation!
Once you get past the splash, the navigation for the site now resides in the lower right corner of the design, within a dropdown. The location of the nav is counter intuitive, and creates another barrier between the user and the content - one should not have to click to open a dropdown to be able to see the taxonomy by which the site has organized it's content.

Now, as for the content, I heard a Flagstick representative on Kevin Haime's radio show before Christmas taking about how he wanted flagstick.com to be the defacto resource for golf and golf course information in Eastern and Central Ontario. I was expecting to see a myriad of course profiles a la ottawagolf.com, but was disappointed to see only four profiles of Eastern Ontario courses and none for Central Ontario.

Also, the tag line under the Flagstick Online banner says "The Internet Resource For And About Golfers In Your Region". Ok, but what region? Istanbul? Togo? Oompaloompaland? I know it's for Eastern and Central Ontario, and so do readers of the magazine, but how does someone know who isn't familiar with the area Flagstick covers? Then again, maybe Flagstick has plans to broaden its coverage base...

As for ottawagolf.com, it's been around 1996 and is run admirably by Dan Kilbank. While the site is begging for a redesign as flagstick.com was, the content contained within overcomes any usability concerns by miles. It's the first place to turn for course information, photos, openings, closings, and course condition discussions. The forums make a real difference on ottawagolf.com. The lively and freindly banter keeps you coming back to the site day after day.

The nice thing about the web is that it's not paper. Navigation can evolve, and content can be added. Here's hoping that flagstick.com is merely a work in progress and becomes a valued site for golfers in Eastern and Central Ontario, and that ottawagolf.com sees what flagstick.com has done, and uses their redesign as a springboard for a revamp of its own, taking lessons to heart along the way.

long overdue

After many months, golfsmack is back. An overwhelming lack of motivation and desire to write anything creative or opinionated of any sort is slowly lifting from my shoulders.

Watch this space for fresh content, to be supplied on a more frequent basis in the coming days, weeks, and months.