Nice pic of Paula Creamer, the word “blind hole” gets a whole new meaning!

Wednesday, 01. August 2007
19.15 Eurosport, PGA Tour, Canadian Open
20.15 Eurosport, European Tour, Players’ Championship of Europe
20.45 Eurosport, LPGA Tour, Evian Masters
21.45 Eurosport, Golf Club

Saturday, 04. August 2007
13.30 CNN, Living Golf
19.30 CNN, Living Golf

Sunday, 05. August 2007
09.30 CNN, Living Golf
15.30 CNN, Living Golf
20.30 CNN, Living Golf

Today I was rooting for Gary Birch Jr., followed his round from hole 10 to 18. Gary is of british descent, but has a german passport (portrait on welt.de (german only)). I got to know him last year on our GC St. Pauli club championships, he is also member of the club. He normally play the Challenge and EPD tour events, but received a wildcard for the Deutsche Bank. With solid rounds of 73-70-72 he started in match five this morning, not as early as yesterday where he had to start at 6:40 as a single player.

After ten holes, Gary had dropped two shots, but then put the foot on the throttle. Birdies on 12, 15 and 18 put him on -2 for the tournament. His second shot on the par 5 15th was the best shot I swa from him. He narrowly missed the eagle put, but saved the birdie. After the round he told me that a couple of other players read the green as he did and every one of them missed the hole as the ball didn’t pick up the break everybody saw there.
He was pretty satisfied with his performance and is looking forward to the Russian Open he will be playing next week.

After watching Garys round I met Denis, the author of Foremenblog.  We followed Rory Sabbatini, watched some balls get wet on the third hole and then joined the flight of Charley Hoffman (what a freakin’ haircut).

Before it started to rain heavily I left Gut Kaden and watched the final of the tournament on the warm and dry couch of my in-laws. As Oliver Wilson said: “I’m desperate for some sunshine, I can’t take any more wind and rain.” There is absolutely nothing to add to that!

I walked the round with Tino Schuster on saturday, he started the round three under. Made a stunning start with par, birdie, eagle, birdie, shot the front nine in 30. After making birdie on 11 he was the sole leader of the tournament for a couple of holes. Here he is passing the leaderboard on hole #12 with his name on top.

He ended the round in nine under, mingling with the big guns in the top 10.

Today the Deutsche Bank Players Championship went underway at Gut Kaden in Alveslohe. What better day to present to you the course the pros play in the next four days (well, maybe only two days for some).

Gut Kaden offers 27 holes, playable in combinations A, B and C. The championship course for the Deutsche Bank Players Championship is the C, A combination and this is what we played last friday.

Slightly elevated over the driving range you’ll find the C1 teeboxes. The par four isn’t the hardest to play, a dogleg left with bunkers guarding the left and right side of the fairway around the landing zone. My four iron found the left side of the fairway and rolled into the rough a little short of the bunker. I had 135 meters left to the green, but the thick rough let me forget all thoughs of attacking the pin. I cleared the bunker ahead with the wedge and landed my third shot on the green.

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Bugger, had the chance to play an invitational tournament there, but couldn’t arrange it on short notice. So I sat in my meetings and thought “Why am I here and not in the bunker?”

Still made it to the evening event, though. Didn’t help my game…

Wednesday, 25. July 2007
20.15 Eurosport, US PGA Tour, U.S. Bank Championship
21.15 Eurosport, Golf Club
21.45 Eurosport, Golf Club
22.15 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship, Audi Shoot-Out

Thursday, 26. July 2007
17.30 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship
22.15 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship

Friday, 27. July 2007
17.30 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship
22.15 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship

Sunday, 28. July 2007
15.00 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship
21.15 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship

Sunday, 29. Juli 2007
15.00 DSF, Deutsche Bank Players Championship

Edit: more tv coverage of the Deutsche Bank Players Championship

Never, never, never ever have I been beaten by a course in such a severe manner like yesterday. Gut Kaden showed it’s teeth! I will not share my scores with you, als you will lose all respect. But I will be back with more after some mental recovery!

The day before the tournament I went out to Gut Kaden to play a little practice round, as I have never played the course before. Joined by two other After-Work-Golfers we played a nice evening round. I only messed up two holes, bogeyed most of the rest and parred the par5 17th (best bunker shot of my life with a seven iron from the fairway bunker). So I was pretty confident for the tournemant.

Warming up on the range the next day felt ok, balls flew straight but that should change as soon as we went onto the round. My flight path formerly known as draw had turned into a nasty hook that I wasn’t able to get rid of for the whole tournament. Almost all my drives found the fairway but then bounced left into the rough. At the beginning I tried to play it from the (thick) rough in direction of the pin, but in most cases the ball only advanced a couple of meters, leaving me another shot from the rough. So I started chipping it sideways onto the fairway. Not sexy, but helpful.

The only club I could rely on was my lobwedge, that saved me some strokes around the green. I practiced these shots in the last weeks, funny enough that I could play them better from the rough than from the fairway.

All in all, I made only three greens in regulation and on these I three-putted, so not a single par on my scorecard. On the other side of the scale I had to note a 10 two times, nines and eights were there too. Pretty frustrating! A lot of work for my pro, definitely!

The course was in a great condition, fast greens and challenging rough, ready for the pros for the upcoming Deutsche Bank Players Championship. Actually, we were the last players allowed on the championship course. The atmosphere was great, with all grandstands and leaderboards already set up and prize cars ruddered into position:

More pics over in my flickr! set.

The first Royal Benzinger was a really fun and cosy golf tournament where mostly people from the music and entertainment industry got togehter to give it a whack at the little white ball. This year, the second edition of the RB is the offficial golf tournament of the Popkomm.

Venue for this years tourney will be the GC Prenden, a course I really like. The date is the 22nd september this year, the day after the end of Popkomm.  The earnings from the tournament will benefit the Sage Hospital in Senegal.

So wether you are in the music business or just like to hang out with these whackos, this tournament is yours to play. Get all further informations from the tournaments website.