Golf

Sitting around today watching the second round of the Open Championship (more commonly known, though not officially, as the British Open) on TNT today.

I commented last week on the Friday Feast that golf, like sex, is not something you have to be great at to enjoy. There is definitely a skillset involved in swing, judgement of distance, course, and strength applied, but some of these guys are flat out amazing.

But any one day can be so different. Tiger Woods is considered the best golfer in the world and he has had a hellacious day starting with his very first shot which went into the berm (that's a Scottish creek-like canal). He has made some very good recovery shots, but he is still struggling as he approaches the final few holes to play today.

In perspective. You have "par" which is the number of shots you SHOULD need to complete the course. Yesterday Tiger shot two strokes under par (meaning he did very well). Today he lost those two and has been a stroke OVER par for the two days combined, but currently is back to even par.

Further perspective. They make a cut to reduce the field of players for the final two days of the tournament, ideally to 72 players with people tied included. They are expecting that cut to be at 4 over par. So, if you have not shot within 4 strokes of the ideal, you go home. The guy in the lead, Spain's Sergio Garcia finished his second round at 6 under par. So Tiger currently needs to play the next two days at a minimum of 6 strokes better than Sergio in order to catch Sergio, and that's not saying no one else might move ahead of the -6 during that time too. All with an international television audience on a very difficult course with bad weather (wind/rain) expected tomorrow.

The good news is Tiger is a 3rd/4th day surge player, often coming back when others lose their momentum. Go Tiger!