We were told to speak when spoken to unless the pro is talkative. Tyler isn't so much. He's pretty good, rather intense, but got rattled by the Marshal telling us to hurry up or we'd be on the clock - unfairly as it turned out and another Marshal apologised later. A couple times he beat himself up (loudly-ish) over a missed shot. He edged two (three?) holes on putts. I figure he left 3 strokes on the course because of that. He finished 1-under.

8:20am tee time, I had to be there an hour early, it takes a half-hour to get there. Anyone who knows me knows I'm serious when I do anything as serious as walking 18 holes before noon. The morning was cool to start but warmed up quickly, though the grass was wet for the first nine at least. Lovely day, but long - 5 hours on the course, at least half that in wet shoes.

Still, I went to the range after, hit 6-dozen balls and pondered the experience. What stood out most is Tyler being rattled vs the pictures on his bag. It seemed to me that he was missing a tremendous amount of mental leverage from those visual talismans, and though they may be there as passive good luck charms, they would be an excellent active tool for centering one's mind.

Golf is both mindful and mind-less. Mind-less in that it's a body activity - it must become part of one's body, no matter how much the mind understands it. Ask a nerd who's all mind, like me. :) Golf is mindful in preparation and strategy, but also mental calmness that lets the body do its job - the ability to push aside the last shot or what the Marshal said and find clarity for a new start on a new hit. The last shot has been shot. Like rolling dice, the next numbers come up as though the previous never did.

...

Well that was a brutal day. A stoppage for a looming thunderstorm that interrupted us on the 3rd green, then a 4-hour rain delay wait after. The course was wet again and the humidity went to 99% and we slogged through wet grass and damp us. Tyler just couldn't read his putts, rimmed at least 3, and missed the cut by 1 stroke. I winced each time, poor guy, he was just snake-bit.

While that's real disappointing to most of me, my feet are rather grateful - holy crap they took a beating. My trusty deck shoes failed me on the first day in the wet, and a pair of CAT-branded outdoor shoes did likewise. The latter are trash now.

Not only Tyler missed putts by a smidge - it's a feature of the pre-Tour nature of golfers at this stage. That and shot management. As I am finding with my own fumblings, there are two important targets when acquiring and exercising any skill: 1. knowing your abilities and limitations, and 2. applying them reliably.

Sunday I took a bunch of pics, to practise some action shots. They look like any that could be found from any tourney, but this one is the only one worth showing:

My First PGA Caddying Cheque

The money will buy me 14 buckets, enough for 2 weeks of afternoons, but it's more about the George Plimpton experience of it all and something for my life scrapbook.

In fact, for some activities like carrying a tray of fine malted beverages or tasty snacks it's better to let the Cerebellum do its job managing the muscles in your arms and wrists while the Visual Cortex takes care of getting you to your hungry/thirsty guests - your Visual Cortex is much too fast providing feedback for your Cerebellum and the muscles in your arms to keep adjusting. Too much mind for your body.

However, golf ain't toting beers - you need to keep your eyes on the ball. Despite knowing and thinking I was doing that, and still progressing fairly well, I was suspicious because I thought I was too busy doing everything else to remember seeing the club head hit the ball. I just trusted that I did. So, for 2 large buckets (about 14 dozen) I slowed down and made sure I saw the ball get hit. Usually whenever I focus on one part of my swing lots of the other parts go to hell as my weaknesses are exposed. That's learning. Since I was pretty decent with the rest of my swing already it didn't take long to feel like an idiot for all the bad shots that preceded me paying attention to this one detail.

Duh! Once I got a handle on that little wee detail... I'm not half-bad! All my prior nerdery paying attention to making a good swing with my body got properly connected-up to my eyes and my shots were straighter, more repeatable, and even longer.

- - -

Found another worthy training reference: Perfect Golf Swing - a review of teaching methods and biomechanics, definitely nerdly, lots of material and analyses. I read a little bit about something before I go to the range, but not enough to get all messed up.

Tyler Aldridge, the fellow I caddied for at the ATB Financial, finished tied for 6th (9 under, his best score of the season) at The Syncrude Boreal Open the following week. Must have found his putter (or had a useful caddy)- Congrats! Next up, the Dakota Dunes Casino Open in beautiful Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

The range is bordered by a fence and some rolling hills, which makes it hard for a truck-pushed ball-picker so it's necessary for Jesus or someone to walk the range perimeter and knock balls in to where the picker can get them.

Lately I have been tending to go there later in the day, to avoid being irradiated quite so much by the high afternoon sun shining through clear prairie air. Come July, as much as I like to be outdoors recreationally, I become rather blasé about summer and care less about being out in the sun. So, I go to the range after rush-hour traffic has thinned, when the air is still warm but softer, and the sun less intense.

One Saturday evening, Jesus asked if I would have some time to help him by clearing the perimeter. Free balls - who could say no?

So I grabbed my pitching wedge and headed out over the grass, hit about a hundred balls on the flat, inclines, declines, picking different targets, trying different stances, whiffing fewer and fewer, not caring if I did, just approaching, addressing, and hitting over and over and over. The day had been hot, and as it cooled the humidity rose, especially out on a big grassy field that had been soaked by multiple rains in the weeks before. So I was hot, soaked sweaty from the hitting and the humidity, and had crossed into a new zone in the evolution of my swing. I had the swing in my body and not so much in my mind.

• Eyes on the Whish
  On the mat, there's only the ball to focus on, and our tendency is to follow the ball with our eyes as it's hit, which tends to be too early. Hitting off grass, the eye can focus on seeing the 'whish' of the grass rising up as the ball is hit, keeping focus on where the ball was for a little extra to keep the shoulders square to the ball. This worked wonders for me.
• Loose Wrists Sink Chips
  Hitting a ball off some field that isn't groomed in any way other than having the grass cut made me fear jamming my wrists from whatever was in the grass, especially on the hills, so I kept my wrists looser and let the club do its work.
• Easy Does It
  There were a lot of balls to clear, and I'd already hit a couple buckets and didn't want a hard work-out, so that suggested leveraging the physics of my swing rather than physical force. Fear of jamming my club into the grass reinforced this.
• Approach, Address, Hit
  Balls were spread thickly and thinly in spots, and it's amazing where people can slice and hook them. Where they were close together it was possible to take a step, set up and hit ball after ball. Where they were spread farther apart each shot was more like from a fairway.
• Matter Over Mind
  Less thinking, more hitting. As I progress from over-thinking nerd to natural swinger, getting my mind out of the way is becoming a good thing to do. I dawdled at first, like I do on the mat, but as I saw Jesus clearing with the picker I thought he'd finish before me so I stepped up the pace and trusted what I'd practised for so long on the mats and coupled with the items above hit A LOT better, reliably, for the first time ever.

Since that evening I've helped Jesus a few times - he appreciates it and I certainly do. I even clear during the day when I wouldn't be in range of any wild hitters. I take a different club out and even lost my fear of hitting with my fairway woods. I swing and hit differently now, on or off the mats, even to the point where I can concentrate on one particular part of my swing and trust the other parts will hang together naturally.

I did take the fundamentals of the Hogan book from PM to heart, and finally have a swing I can rely on, though I have to say I still either don't get the swing in my body, or my mind still gets in the way.

My swing hasn't been tested except on the range, which is enjoyable enough, but it'll be time to test it on the course, and start the most-expensive part of the activity: course fees. $30 for 9 holes low-end buys a lot of range balls, but without the challenge and variety and proof that I'm any good at the actual activity.