Photographs from the course, dispatches from recent rounds, and occasional commentary on the rules. More to come, as the schedule permits.
Dispatch · Abingdon, VA · 2004
Abingdon, Virginia, 2004. A freshman returns to the team van conspicuously soaked from the collar down. Pressed for details, he offers only that he had bent down to read a putt on the ninth green, and that the read had required commitment. The putt, for the record, did not fall. He did. You wanna try?
The tee →From the Archive · 2006
In the summer of 2006, Goat Hill hosted its inaugural — and, by informal agreement with the county, final — Men’s Member-Member. The dress code was interpreted loosely: vintage cycling shorts, no shirts, and a cigarette count that outpaced the stroke count by the third hole. No trophy survives. Several photographs do, and they remain sealed.
The commemorative tee →Commemorative · USA 250
There is a moment on a reachable par five — ball airborne on the second shot, outcome undecided — when someone in the group is obligated to say it: comin’ home, dude. For the nation’s 250th, we render the moment as it actually feels: a bald eagle, climbing, wings fully committed to the flagstick.
The tee →Dispatch · The Triumvirate Edition
Elsewhere in sport, three is an honor. It hangs from the rafters, rides on a quarter panel, gets stitched into a pinstripe and then retired so that nobody may wear it again. In golf it is what you write down when the first two did not work, and no one has ever proposed retiring it. We have assembled a small collection in its defense. The tally, as rendered, runs to four. We consider that honest.
The collection →