The worst weather I’ve played in…

I spent this last week playing in the Duel in the Desert. A two man, 54 hole event at Paiute Golf Resort just outside of Las Vegas. It is one of the most fun weeks of the year… I just wish it was in May… instead of February. This time of year, you’re not just gambling on the tables, you’re gambling with the weather… and the dealer came up blackjack.

The first day of the tournament was about as windy a day as I’ve played… And I went to school in West Texas. At one point I smoked a punch PW that went maybe 60 yards in the air and by the time it was done it was coming back to me. The balls were oscillating on the greens and it took every ounce of strength we had to carve out a 78 in a two man scramble… Ouch.

Did you know you can share a scorecard directly from the TANGENT Golf app? Just choose ‘Share Scorecard’ after the round and you can add a picture, like this one below. We took it before the wind blew us off the course.

Another great thing about TANGENT… if you select ‘Practice’ for round type, you can track a round like a scramble without it impacting your personal stats or handicap.

There is a lot of great golf on that scorecard, but we made two doubles in a two man scramble. We just couldn’t get the ball on the green with the wind gusting over 30mph.

After a brief reprieve on day 2 of the tournament, day 3 was an onslaught and probably some of the worst weather I’ve ever played in.

That’s me in the cart. It was just below 40 degrees Fahrenheit, blowing over 20mph, and raining intermittently. It would have been a miserable day had we not come prepared and despite the weather, you can see a big smile across my face. That is because we followed a simple checklist…

1. Prepare for what can be prepared for..

2. Embrace the suck.

3. Forgive quickly.

4. Smile often.

5. Don’t forget your caddie.

Prepare for what can be prepared for….

You can’t prepare for everything. Stuff happens… But you can prepare for many things… including weather. We had been looking at the forecast for weeks and we knew it was going to be cold, windy, and potentially wet… So we brought gear to help keep us as comfortable as possible.

Starting with a cart cover… The golf cart became our solace. We could hop out. Get super focused. Quickly hit a golf shot and then dive right back into the cart to hide from the wind and rain.

The weather was ridiculous, but inside the golf cart we were protected from the wind and rain. It kept us dryer and out of the wind. It easily felt 10-20 degrees warmer in the golf cart.

Wear layers

You might not be able to tell in the first picture… but I have a lot of clothes on.

Tights, pants, rain pants.. Thats three layers on my legs alone.

Long sleeve shirt, polo, hoodie, rain jacket… This many layers kept my core dry. Key to staying comfortable for 4+ hours.

Hat, Beanie, hoodie… Kept my ears and head warm and kept the rain off my head.

Being cold is a quick way to be miserable and shivering is wasted energy. I was able to stay warm, which is why I was able to smile 3.5 hours into a tough round.

Gloves…

I had multiple glove options. Titleist mittens that I could put over my hands between shots to keep them warm, but the real winners were the red and black rain gloves you see on my hands from Red Rooster Golf. I keep these rain gloves in my bag just in case and they serve double duty.

You can put both rain gloves on for a little protection from the cold, but rain gloves are critical for when it gets real wet.

With the wind and rain, there was no keeping grips dry. Wasn’t happening. There also was no way to use an umbrella. With 20mph winds, the umbrellas were blowing away or blowing open. Rain gloves were critical to being able to hold a club and Red Rooster makes a great glove.

Embrace the suck…

Sometimes… the conditions just suck. There is no other way to put it. If it weren’t for a tournament… I would not have been playing. I would have been sipping a beverage from the clubhouse watching the rain. So when you have to play… you have two options…

You can complain and whine, feel sorry for yourself and get in a pity spiral that leads to a miserable experience.

Or… You can say, this is going to suck, but lets see what we can do. Let’s hit some golf shots.

One option leads to 4 hours feeling like 10… and the other allows you to still be smiling 3.5 hours into what could otherwise be torture.

And we did hit some GREAT golf shots. At one point, I hit a 6 iron from 135y, up a hill into the wind to 15 feet. It was a laser beam of a shot that came off just as I envisioned.

We were playing alternate shot and made a birdie in these conditions! I hit a 9 iron from 107 into a stiff breeze that landed 10 feet from the hole and my partner made the putt. It was wild. We were high fiving and jumping up and down while the freezing rain pelted our faces. Embrace the suck.

Forgive quickly

The conditions are tough. You won’t be able to play to your normal standard of golf. We made a triple bogey on the second hole of the round.

I hadn’t put the rain gloves on trying to fight through it and slipped sending my ball to a watery grave. My partner couldn’t do much better and we struggled to a 6 on the par 3.

Rather than getting all worked up over a triple on the second hole of the day… we laughed it off. Welcome to alt shot… and parred the next several holes in brutal conditions.

Smile often

There is a connection between your body language and how you feel. A smile can immediately brighten the gloom, whereas a hung head and slumped shoulders can dig the hole deeper. Me and my buddy laughed and smiled for the entire round. While we thought our 85 (in alt shot) was going to put us in the middle of the pack in our flight… it ended up being the lowest score that day in our flight! The smiles kept going long after the round. A simple smile can move your mind to a better place and beat that funk.

Don’t forget your caddie…

Because it was a tournament, we weren’t allowed to use the TANGENT caddie. We ran TANGENT in tournament mode, which makes it compliant by hiding adjusted distances and caddie recommendations. You still get raw GPS distances that help you game plan, but the strategy is up to you.

After using the AI caddie for months, I’ve learned from the adjustments and caddie recommendations. I knew I needed to take much more club than my instincts for the wind. After following the AI Caddie strategies, I knew how to choose appropriate targets and to commit. My strategy has gotten better from using TANGENT’s AI Caddie and in conditions like this… strategy and adjustments are critical.

This year the weather was brutal. These types of round are character builders. The best part of it all is that the next time I’m given a bad hand, I can always look back and say:

“Hey, it’s better than that one time in the desert. If I can handle that, I can handle anything.”

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