Catching up

REALLY green bananas at the hotel breakfast

What a week, and how quickly it goes by…

Let me just start by saying, I know I haven’t checked in in awhile, but that is not because of lack of interest.  It’s lack of time.  This isn’t a complaint; it’s just a fact.  Really, it is.

In any job in the sports industry, the saying “9 to 5” does not apply.  Ever.  For all of us, it is grotesquely morphed into “6 to 10 – AM TO PM!!” or “Don’t worry, you’re not going to make it to that”.  But, that is just the way it is.  The people I get to work with, sure we are bummed we miss some of the big time sporting events like the Masters, but, we put on a helluva tournament, so yes, it is worth it.  All the time, all the hard work, the lack of sleep, it’s worth it to see these kids have a great tournament and grab that college scholarship.  Plus, it’s a pretty sweet gig.  On a golf course all day for a week?  In the sunshine and warmth you say?  Don’t mind if I do.  All of you stuck back in the Northwest, eat your heart out!  This is my office every day for the next four weeks : )

Snake on the golf course - I think it's
a water moccasin

I also love the fact that I get instant gratification.  I can see my hard work paying off right before my eyes.  Late the night before, my comms teammate and I are working on pairings.  The software we use creates a list for us, and then we proof the pairings and make necessary changes.  Such as, if there are two kids in the same tee time of hole No. 1 that have the same first name, or are from the same hometown, we manually change that pairing.  We like diversity, and it is also much easier when it comes to scoring to keep the kids’ names straight.  The hard work is printed out, and distributed to all of these kids at registration.  Then miraculously, the very next day, each junior shows up at their designated tee time, they tee off, and play.

Another example is our microsite, the website specific to the event that we are working on.  Our pictures, stories, pairings and results all go on the microsite, and myself and my comms partner are the ones that create, edit and upload all of that information.  It’s really pretty cool to see everything I did myself or assisted with up on the Internet for the world to see.

This week my assignment was photography.  Basically, we have to take a ton of photos of everything for archives, sponsorship uses, website uses, among other things.  My favorite was taking the action shots of the players. 

There is a lot that goes into an action photo, at least in junior golf.  We aren’t allowed to take pictures during their backswing for obvious reasons, and we can’t start taking photos really until they are already in their follow-through.  This limits the creativity aspect, but you do get really good at taking these photos because they are all very similar. 

Also, you are kind of in stealth mode while attempting to photograph these juniors.  You have to park your cart out of view so that it doesn’t distract them, and you kind of have to hide yourself so they don’t notice a gigantic lens staring them in the face.  Instead, they notice a gigantic lens sneaking up on them out of the brush, so I don’t know which is worse.  It doesn’t seem to bother them though.  Probably because we take these photos at every AJGA event, they are used to it by now.  Apparently the parents aren’t used to it.  I don’t know how many comments I got about my failure to hide myself.  Epic fail at stealth mode, but my options of camouflage were limited.

Our route to Plano!

Other than photography, I was able to take a whack at interviewing a public figure.  I had the opportunity to interview Mr. Willie Wood, the first AJGA tournament champion and first Rolex Player of the Year for the AJGA.  Not to mention he played professionally on the PGA Tour for over 20 years, recorded 1 tour win, and over 20 top ten finishes.  I was pumped, and the interview went swimmingly.  Mr. Wood seemed to be more of an introvert, but like anyone, when you get them talking about something they are passionate about (in his case golf, obviously), they become much more animated and talkative.  I was prepared for this too; I had two voice recorders and a video camera, just in case.

Goodman Networks Junior at Traditions at the Traditions Club at Texas A&M (quite the tournament name huh?) was the largest tournament my team and I have worked yet, and we did awesome.  We had a TaylorMade-adidas Qualifier round, a Junior-Am, a practice round, two days of two wave, a final round, 144 players, and 4 days.  We rock and we know it!

Now, we are on our way to Plano to run the Under Armour/Hunter Mahan Championship.  I have been told that we will be able to meet Hunter Mahan and hang out with him for a little bit.  This is pretty sweet in itself, but how cool would this have been if he had won the Masters?  He was among the leaders in the first couple days…AND we are receiving more clothes!  A girl can never have enough clothes : ) I think Max, my teammate, would argue that.  He hoists my suitcase up into the truck every week, and it seems to get heavier and heavier.  Anyways, since this tournament is an Under Armour event, we will be outfitted in Under Armour clothing.  It’s only appropriate, and I couldn’t be happier!

Dallas skyline

So far, I am really enjoying Texas.  We are fortunate enough to be driving to Plano while the wildflowers are blooming.  Patches of bright reddish-orange, bluish-purple and bright yellow dot the grass alongside the highway.  Looks like the photos out of Texas Highways.

 I have also noticed how the South in general has much better manners than the rest of the country.  Most of the juniors who are from Texas call me ma’am, regardless of the fact that I’m only a few years older than most of them.  Random people we see, either in restaurants, on the golf course, at the gas station, stop to say hello.  I have noticed that I am in an overall much better mood, just because everyone is so darn friendly!  I love that.  Not that the public in Spokane isn’t friendly, but let’s just say they don’t hold the door open for you like they do in the south.  Let’s work on that.

We arrived in Plano around 3:45ish, and we had the day off.  Ally and I headed to our private housing accomodations and were we in for a treat.  As soon as we walk into the house, I see University of Texas gear everywhere.  I knew myself and this family would get along just fine.  We met our host family, well, two of them at least.  David, the dad, is in town along with his daughter, Caroline.  His other daughter is a senior at Texas Christian and his son is a freshman golfer at Kansas State.  Pretty sweet.

The Ginger Man!

After we settled in, we headed out to dinner.  We had a bite to eat at the Taco Diner, and then headed over to The Ginger Man for a few drinks.  I was the DD, so I only got to marvel at the beer selection…see for yourself – it was pretty incredible.

We finally made it to the course today, Tuesday, and started to get to work.  We worked hard for about four hours, and then our Tournament Director Katie gave us the rest of the day off.  This course is gorgeous; Gleneagles Country Club is one of 12 courses in the world that has a TaylorMade fitting program.  This is high-tech stuff.  I have yet to see it, but I’ve heard it is incredible.  And, on a sour note, I also heard that the men’s locker room is equipped with a pool, barber shop, bar, and restaurant.  Us ladies?  Well, we do get toilets, so I guess that’s a plus.  Just a hint of jealously here.

After our lovely short day of work, the gang and I headed to IN-N-OUT.  Long time coming, as it has been probably about a year and a half since I’ve been.  I had a chance last spring break, but unfortunately my peers preferred the giant burrito of Chipotle.  Sad, sad day.  Today was worth every bite.  Now, usually I’m not a fast-food eater, but IN-N-OUT is an exception.  I will stuff my face and clog my arteries without hesitation.  Double-double animal style with fries and a chocolate shake please!

Heaven

I’m really looking forward to tonight.  We were able to find lower level tickets for the Mavericks/Sacramento game tonight in Dallas.  Unfortunately, the tickets are a whole 12 rows back from the court directly behind the Mavs bench.  I guess I will have to live : ) I’ll definitely have more pictures of that experience as soon as I can.

Anyways, I have to get working on some graduate applications.  Time is scarce, as I have pointed out an annoying amount, and I need to take advantage of the few hours I have. 

And I have yet to try frog legs.  Will keep you posted on that adventure.