šŸŒ The Home of Happy Golf Stories

Does Bearsy shit in the woods? Of course we did :slight_smile: Apart from the football, Barasti was at its best Saturday - absolutely rammed with all the consecutive egg chasing on the big screen outside.

Beano MUST be loaded though - him and his pals actually ordered Pub Grub there :lou_eyes_to_sky:

Oh FFS.

Gonna have to get the Union involved in this one.

Looking after & goofing off with Golfers - no problem.

Acting as Security for a Boy Band sensation in the open air confines of a Golf Course?

Bollocks to that.

^^^^Who the fuck is Niall Horan?

No I havenā€™t Googled him TBH I donā€™t really careā€¦just sayinā€™

In my defence I only heard about him in the first place because he Caddied for Rory at the Par 3 in Augusta a couple of years back. Now seems to be trotted out whenever someone wants to ā€œengageā€ with a ā€œnew generation of golf fansā€ at an event.

Namely all of them

Think I should set up one of those amusing Video Goofing off things around a karaoke night.

Hmmmm

Blimey was November that long ago?

Anyway FINALLY had the bandwidth and time at work to tell the full story of DPWTC last year.

Going to be a busy few weeks but here you go - something to help with insomnia/make a change of MoPe must go posts

https://roadtotherydercup.com/2018/01/16/the-day-the-world-changed-dpwtc-2017-review/

Well what th fuck happened did we win or not ?

Donā€™t worry. You will be getting LIVE updates during the actual event.

In September

(Hopefully the 3rd rate developer will have found an easier way to copy & paste a pic direct from a mobile phone gallery onto here by then - and no I ainā€™t going to have time to do the whole upload it here copy it there thing while Iā€™m posing for the TV cameras)

:lou_sunglasses:

For now all you need to know is I get a trip back to EU next month for ā€œtrainingā€ and to play golf on the actual course.

Which has kinda dumped me in the shit as I fly overnight 13th/14th Feb - so I ainā€™t in town on Valentines Day - which is the 10th anniversary of me & Mrs D_Pā€™s first dateā€¦

#doghouse

1 Like

Oh FFS.

So next week is the Desert Classic.

For decades we had a legend - Bernard Dowling doing the protocol / Marshaling on the first Tee.

His retirement ast year was ā€œa big storyā€

Now that weā€™ve gone all showbusiness, guess who has replaced him.

And, seriously, guess who has been appointed to ā€œlook after herā€ next week. No friction AT ALL at home about this task, no siree.

See Golf CAN have itā€™s moments.

Our new ā€œStarterā€

Page Spiranac

48,000 people entered a global competition to play a round with her, Rory and Nial One Direction Horan.

35% were under 25 females, 47% were under 35 year old males.

Itā€™s tough at the top of Elite Sport

No no no no no noā€¦that is not even an innuendo FFS. :lou_facepalm_2:

1 Like

Oh the humiliation.

Was about to selfie with another Marshal and got photobombed.

Actually heā€™s a good lad had a fun but weird day being Digital Media Content Producers instead of volunteers at Golf. Think Iā€™m all over some chicksā€™ instagram ho hum

Jokes apart today was fun and a major step in the new era. Tomorrow I am working with a dream team - Henrik, Rory and Sergio. #elitesport doesnā€™t get tougher than this

Actually a great weekend. Got really exciting (for golf) and huge crowds.

I have super hero status with the family in Poland having got Niall to sign a with love to xxx for my Niece.

Most epic moment?

Spectator laying flat on his back I go up some people around him and ask the "do you require medical attention lineā€¦

No.

He had actually simply walked into a tree. How do these people get on a plane to get here?

But jeez the woris is so full of snowflakes.

Excuse me sir say I donā€™t tell me what to do is the reply. Boof set of golf clubs hit him in the lower abdomen.

Both were pmsl moments and horrors for the dumfvcks

Meanwhile

I must admit I did enjoy that final round, was good stuff, nice to see Rory nearly back to his best.

And he managed to drop an F-bomb on the live coverage on Saturday too.

1 Like

FFS.

So the original purpose of my trip back was to attend training for Ryder Cup, have a biz meeting with the guys about Mobile & Cloud Apps and see Mum, landing Wednesday morning to annoy Mrs D_P by dumping her on Valentines Day (gotta keep 'em on their toes)

We also were supposed to get a free round of golf at the venue for familiarisation.

Now I had to pull that forward due to work meetings in London.

And discover the current state of the course Iā€™m supposed to play in Parisā€¦

1 Like

Orange balls

2 Likes

Suffering from Insomnia AG?

Posting on the Whoā€™s still awake thread?

Well, this should cure it for you. The last instalment of ā€œTournament Golfā€ before the real business begins next week in Paris.

Pop Stars, Pin Ups & Social Media.

Oh and a couple of mentions of golf as well.

https://roadtotherydercup.com/omega-dubai-desert-classic-2018-becoming-digital-content-creation-supervisors/

Well that was one helluva day.

Senior Marshal training at Le Golf National. Some pics and some facts and figures.

1st up what a stunningly beautiful golf course it is. And when even someone as wonky as me has to thiink about what club to take off a tee (mainly 3 Wood) it tells me it is a course that wonā€™t suit the big boomers in September.

So I arrived Friday night, checked in to the Novotel that is right behind the 18th green. Typical French managed property - about 2 people working there, travelodge style rooms half with a view half looking at a car park. Luckily I had stopped in Guyancourt and sticked up on booze & munchies).

Saturday we met up had breakfast then into a lecture hall (which will be the main Security/Police station in September) a video from Thomas Bjorn and a panel including the girls who communicate with us, Course Manager big wigs and stuff from French Golf Federation and even top brass from the European Tour (David Garland - Tournament Director).

Lots of stuff was covered but

September

51,000 spectators EACH DAY (Note on days 1&2 there are only 4 matches on course at any one time - so 10,000 + per GAME).

7,500 staff working on site and 1,350 volunteers.

The course is +25 years old so they have refurbished it 7mil euro spent on 8km of new drainage systems, 45 bunkers have been rebuilt.

There will be 14 Grandstands seating over 10,000 people. 15 of the biggest outdoor TV screens ever used at an event.

8,000 Corporate Hospitality tickets (at around 5k euros a day average each ticket)

There will be a stunning ampitheatre on 1st Tee/18th Green with a 6,000 seat Grandstand. 2,200 seats for which have already been pre-sold/reserved.

40% of all tickets sold were to French Nationals, 6,000 people are coming from the USA.

On my side?

Over 1,000 Journalists are accredited - they will be managed by 80 Media Marshals. All volunteers work 1 basic 6 hour shift, so morning or afternoon with a group in my case

There are Meet & Greet teams at the railway stations, park & ride etc - met one of them - retired guy who volunteers for everything like this - hates sport - just enjoys being an anorak I guess.

Grandstand Marshals who will rotate between seeing nothing by managing access and numbers through to standing in the stand itself. Everyone then watches the golf when not on shift.

It goes without saying that security will be solid - lots of layers - and Airport Security was used in Gleneagles so can expect something very similar.

There is no vehicle access to the course, public Park & Rides start 20km from the venue. We have a volunteer park & ride 2km away which iI planned for wwhen booking mydigs for the week.

An insane amount of work has gone into the planning already - obviously the locations of TV Towers/Studios and even the route that Media & families have to walk around the course.

So after ALL of that we were off out onto the course to play a tournament - Greensomes format. I havenā€™t hit a golf ball since last June and played like a drain BUT we didnā€™t come last! I actually smashed some stonking drives on 18th and 12th and (eventually holed some putts!

But what a golf course. It was absolutely beautiful. The way they have created it in a ā€œLinks styleā€ means that almost every hole has ā€œbankingā€ that can take the huge crowds. It is a BIG course to walk and in a lot of cases there is a long walk from green to next tee which will be hard work when we have some 200+ people inside the ropes with the golfers.

It will look amazing on TV in September. I know I wonā€™t play on a course as good as that ever again - could never afford it!

Oh and I only lost 5 golf balls which was a LOT less than most people on the course!!

One of the Par 3ā€™s showing how well suited they are for spectators

The ā€œiconicā€ ā€œcombinedā€ 15th & 18th greens. For us the 18th was a par 5 for the Ryder Cup it will be Par 4. I smashed a stonking drive, partner laid it up perfectly, and I chunked it into the lake. Ho humā€¦

After the prize giving we had a nice 3 course dinner, beers wine beers and I staggered to bed about midnight with a 5am alarm to pack and get to the airport.

Bleagh.

And no Iā€™m not in any of the pictures :slight_smile:

So I take it youā€™ve worked out where to stand for each of the cameras to capture your good side.

Tip: take a spray-can of paint to mark ā€œXā€ on the fairways so you can walk to the exact spot. Weā€™ll be looking for your Sotonians badge. :lou_lol:

1 Like

Iā€™m sorry if Iā€™m missing something here but that green looks a bit pot-marked and fuck me itā€™s sooooo small. :lou_surprised:

The pitch ā€˜nā€™ putt at Riverside Park looks in better shape.