It's Your Posture, Stupid!

I snuck out of the office today to meet with a golf pro that I am friends with. He was going to bend my irons so that they fit better for me. As he was fitting my clubs, he commented to me that I have a good golf swing and am hitting the ball well but if I improved my posture, I probably wouldn't need to have my clubs bent. I had been choking down on the club a lot which created a situtation where I had very little space to move my arms and body through my swing. So, I choked-up on the club shaft, straightened out my knees a bit and stuck my butt out so it looked more like I was getting ready to perform a squat in the weight room. This created a more "athletic stance" and room for me to get my hands and body through the swing. It immediately made a huge difference. Instead of the club striking the ball toe first, I was consistently striking the ball flush and getting better ball flight with a lot less effort. This has been the single best piece of advice that I have received from anyone regarding my golf game. I need to practice this new stance so that it becomes "second nature" to me, but it will be worth it. This probably won't shave a lot of strokes off my game immediately because I'm going to have to readjust my yardage with each club, but I've come to the conclusion that sometimes you have to take a step back in order to take 3 steps forward. I was also told that this new stance will help alieviate my back problems in the long run which is good because after two rounds last weekend, my back was killing me!

Poker Tourney

I just finished playing in the Online Blogger Hold 'Em tournament at Pokerstars. I finished 1025 out of 2247 players - a little better than the middle of the pack. I was short stacked and had a "fuck it" moment and went all in with a pair of 2's. I had hoped that it was enough that nobody would call or I would get lucky and hit a set. Unfortunately, I had a caller and he had 2 over cards which he paired on the flop and that was all she wrote. It was frustrating because out of the 9 seats at the table, only 4 of us were there actually playing. Everyone else was "sitting out" and just letting their seats be blinded off. I'm not a big fan of playing online because I feel like you lose some of the most important aspects of poker like being able to read the person and their mannerisms as they check, call, bet, play with their chips, etc.

Tomorrow my friends and I start our year long WSOP tournament where we'll send the best player over the course of 12 individual multi-table tournaments to the main event at the WSOP. I finished 8th out of 27 last year and had a very strong finish the last few months so I'm hoping to put it together this year and maybe find myself playing with the big boys out in Vegas next year!

In other news, I played a couple of rounds of golf this weekend with the new set of irons. Although my score isn't showing it, I'm striking the ball much better - getting the ball in the air and pretty straight 95% of the time. My short game is where I'm accumulating all my strokes though. Putts for birdie or pars quickly turn into bogey or double bogey holes. I've decided to dedicate myself to practicing at least twice a week for the remainder of the summer.

Drive BMW's for Free and Raise Money for Breast Cancer Research

I took a day off from work today and went to the local BMW dealership to participate in The Ultimate Drive to help raise money for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. Basically, they have all kinds of different BMW models for you to drive on a 18 mile open road course. For every mile you drive, BMW of America donates $1 to the foundation. I drove the 5 series sedan, the 6 series convertable, the new 3 series sedan and the Z4 roadster - 4 cars total and raised $72 for breast cancer research. Certainly, it's not a lot of money in the overall scheme of things, but consider this - in doing this event for the past 10 years, BMW of America has raise almost $10 Million. That's a sizeable chunk of cash in the fight against cancer. They're doing this all over the country and are probably coming to a dealership near you. Go check out their website and register online or simply show up and register on-site. It's a worthy cause and I guarantee you'll have a blast while you are there!

http://www.bmwusa.com/bmwexperience/EventsandPrograms/UDSK/

Make sure you take the time to drive the really expensive cars like the 650 coupe or convertable or the 750 sedan. They don't normally let the "average joe" get behind the wheel of these models - unless of course, you have around $80,000 to burn!

New Irons Baby!!!

So I got a new set of irons the other day. Taylor Made RAC OS irons. They're sweet! For the first time in my golfing career, I am actually able to pull the 4, 5 and 6 irons out of my bag and get the ball airborn and relatively straight. I've been playing with the equivalent of wrenches the past 10 years, so it's really nice to be able to play with a set of clubs that actually do what they're supposed to do! I still need some practice swinging them, but after two days (one in a scramble tournament and one on the range), I'm already feeling more confident about my game.

Golf - A Great Way to Spoil an Otherwise Fine Day

I had the single most frustrating round of golf this past Saturday. I have been having trouble hitting my driver for the past couple of weeks which is annoying to begin with. So, I switched to my 3 wood which was money for the front 9. However, my short game was utter crap! I was 2 and 3 putting like it was my job. I posted 3 8's in a row - or as I like to call them, dog balls! By the time we got to the 15th hole, my 3 wood had left me and could barely get off the tee. It was by far the worst round of golf I had played since I took up the game. Despite that, I made some great shots that make me want to play this Saturday more than anything! I swear, this game is an evil mistress!

World Blogger Championship of Online Poker

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker!

This Online Poker Tournament is a No Limit Texas Holdem event exclusive to Bloggers.

Registration code: 3097101