Day 3 (Western Gailes, Prestwick)

Dragging today after a suspect night of sleep. Dave, per form, came out fresh as can be after powering through less than six hours of sleep. Sitting down last night over drinks at the hotel bar, Dave, Jeff, and I got into a heated debate after Harrington went to bed (shocking, I know). After I called it at 1:30am (we could have gone on for another couple hours easily), we hit the sack for a 7am wakeup. However, when the fire alarm went off at 6:40am – which many people thought was the loudest wake-up call in human history (yours truly grabbed the handset on the phone and said “are you kidding me with this?”) we all threw on our clothes and went downstairs to be herded into the lounge to wait for the fire department. It was pretty ridiculous as we all had a pretty good idea it was either a drill or a mistaken alarm. Nevertheless, it was pretty funny to see some people bring their valuables down with them, some people come down in just robes, and some guys actually bring their clubs (I loved that they chose their sticks over their luggage by the way). A few jokes flew about Harrington setting off the alarm by smoking weed in his room for his glaucoma, Dave setting off the alarm because he fell asleep in the shower and flooded his room, etc.

After that mess, we drove to Western Gailes to start our day sans breakfast. Not a promising start to the day, but we were hopeful since we had heard from everyone that Gailes was one of the best conditioned courses that we would play on this coast. We had time to down our beverage of choice, me – coffee, Dave – decaf coffee, Ryan – Coke, Jeff – nothing (he’s an ironman folks).

Gailes was tough. Same wind as yesterday, but today there was also rain for the first six holes. The course lays out similarly to Turnberry, but the fairways are tighter and the rough is thicker, which we didn’t think was possible. Immediately everyone but Dave was in trouble. We ended the first hole, a pretty straight-forward par 4, with a 4-6-7-7 score for the group. Deer in headlights. To make it worse, our caddies were betting on us. And giving us shit for our bad shots. These guys were professional caddies that had over 125 years of caddy experience among the group and basically lived on the golf course from a very young age. They knew every undulation on the course and were not afraid to let you know that your shot was a Clark Gable (gone with the wind…) or went into the Love Grass (if you hit into it, you were fucked). Great group of guys though. They have all grown up together (my caddy, the youngest of them all, had married the step-daughter of Dave’s caddy) and knew each other very well.

We were all challenged on this course, but the round ended with some real bright spots. Dave rolled in a sick thirty footer for birdie on 18, which was an amazing score on a very difficult finishing hole. To give you an idea of how tough the course is, Ryan, Jeff and, I were all missing right today, and the final five holes come back North to the clubhouse into a southeasterly wind. Not only were we hitting into the wind but the wind was also pushing all of our shots to the right (helping our misses) a few times OB right into the train tracks. Harrington and I both had shots hit the tracks and bounce back into the course, which was amazing even to our caddies.

After the round, we had lunch and got on the road to Prestwick. The history at Prestwick was some of the best in golf since it’s the birthplace of the Open. They have the original Open belt and a replica of the Claret Jug (the original is in a museum at St. Andrews). We toured the clubhouse and, tired from our first grueling round, headed out onto the first tee box to meet our caddies. These guys are a pretty tight knit bunch as well. My caddy (who had large scabs on his nose and temple from a fall he had taken the night before – “Had a quite a few pints after an alternate shot golf tournament and fell down with my bag still on my back. Thought I might as well just go down and take it, which wasn’t such a good idea looking back on it.”) was the brother-in-law of Jeff’s caddy. He has been a caddy since he was 13 years old.

The first tee starts you right next to the clubhouse, which is a legacy of the course’s history. There are pictures inside of young caddies with bare feet packing the bags of the members pre-1900. #1 is a tight par four that has a stone wall running down the right side that separates the town from the course (remember that we’ve all just come off a round missing to the right…) and with terrible rough down the left. I think I was the only one to hit over the wall, and that was on my approach shot into the green – Dave hit his approach shot into the green and it bounced off the wall back into the rough. He got up and down for a par, I took a 7. Bastard.

The course goes on to give you some of the most challenging and interesting holes we’ve faced so far. They have gigantic bunkers that span the entire length of some fairways. It also gives you some blind shots that you have to aim at markers over hills and hope that your caddy knows where you’re going (they always do). The bunkers are brutal. Both Dave and I had to hit out of the bunkers backwards. I asked Ryan’s caddy why they make the bunkers so tough and he said, “Shit, in your country you can hit a rescue club out of your bunkers. If you go into ours, we punish you.” Very true. Harrington had the round of the day shooting an 81 on a really tough course. His caddy was in his head. At one point, when Ryan had hit a shot short into a bunker, I overheard his caddy say, “I told you 105. You hit it 80. If you would hit it 105 like I told you, you’d be on the fucking green.” The caddy went away muttering about how his bag was having a great round and was about to fuck it up by being a fucking idiot and not listening to him. (**for the record, Harrington went on to make the sand-save of the century by hitting a great shot out of the bunker and draining a long putt). These guys are great!

We finished off the round in the club bar, a sitting room for the men’s club that we had to ourselves which contained some of the best of the clubs memorabilia. Glenkornach for me, saffire and tonic for Jeff, double tonic for Dave and two Cokes for Harrington. Great way to end a great round of golf.

rtn