Have you attended a Masters practice round?

[golfreggie]

Originally Posted by Fogducker

The MASTERS, is a totally different golf tournament! It's the only golf tournament I eagerly wait to see! I think it's perfect. Something like having the "World Series" at the beginning of the season!

Keep doing it the way you want. You "Old men sitting around the back table" in the lounge have done an outstanding job with both the Club and the tournament!

Fog

What a great way to describe the Masters, like a World Series at the beginning. It fits. Fans drool for the Masters and casual fans anticipate it. I for one, really drool! It is like the best week of the year!

[fitness1]

Originally Posted by golfreggie

It is like the best week of the year!

I'm normally quite glued to it - but, it's also normally the first week we can get out and play here in MI, so it's kind of a toss up! Especially after a long winter like this one has been!

[jseth]

Originally Posted by golfreggie

For the ones who have been there and walked the grounds, is it as pretty as it appears on TV?

It is FAR more... of EVERYTHING... than you see on TV. The gorgeous piece of land it's on, the ELEVATION (I don't believe there is a flat lie on the course; maybe in the clubhouse!), the demands of the shots... all of it.

I got a chance to go to the event in 1999, when Jose Maria won his second. I traveled there from California knowing that I only had a badge for one day, for sure... ended up going 3 of the 4 days! Loved every minute of it...

It's amazing how blase the folks who have badges every year are about attending... on Saturday and Sunday of 1999, it was a bit windy (but warm), and a lot of folks just stayed away, enabling me to nab a badge for the weekend!

Along with the elevation changes, the approaches to the greens were unreal; the shot into #13, for example: from ground level, you can hardly see any of the putting surface - you KNOW there's a green there, but it is artfully concealed from view! #12 was the same way, even from the tee, all you can see is the tiniest sliver of "something" over the bunker.

I know that the course has had more work done to it than Elizabeth Taylor's face, but when I entered the property at the #5 green, I took one look at it and thought, "Ah! Alistair MacKenzie!!!". The course is so obviously one of his, all respect to Mr. Jones.

Even back in '99, the practice rounds were FAR more crowded than the Invitational... they are the only way most folks will ever see the course.

A Master's badge used to be the hardest ticket to procure in all of sport... mine was bar-coded, holographically imprinted and serial numbered!

The ultimate "deterrent" was to be asked for your badge... I still remember the fellow who got me in saying, "If something happens, DO NOT LET THEM TAKE YOUR BADGE! Eat it if you have to, but don't surrender it to the Pinkertons (security)..." Apparently, should a badge be taken due to misconduct, who ever had it originally will NOT get another!

If you love the game and the history of it, GO! At least once... even if it's rained out, you'd still be able to walk around and see the track, with far fewer folks out there because of the weather...

Attending the Masters is one of my treasured memories...

[H165]

No practice rounds, but I've attended the tournament with a member.

Aside from being a great golf tournament, the Masters is a world-class sports event in general.

I can attest to the fact that there is a difference between watching the first albatross ever hit on hole two on TV, and actually being there when it happened.

I'm always tickled when someone comments about avoiding golf during bad weather. Golf was invented in Scotland.....

The badges have changed over the years; here are a couple of mine:

[hairpuller]

I've been to a lot of tournaments--U.S. Open included, but the Masters is one that I'd still give anything to attend. Something special about that place and how they run the tourney. Some of it is a bit archaic, like the announcers not being able to say "fan" but must call them "patrons." Still it's like you are being transformed back to better days.

[golfreggie]

Originally Posted by hairpuller

I've been to a lot of tournaments--U.S. Open included, but the Masters is one that I'd still give anything to attend. Something special about that place and how they run the tourney. Some of it is a bit archaic, like the announcers not being able to say "fan" but must call them "patrons." Still it's like you are being transformed back to better days.

Another oddity of TV coverage is that no "roving" reporters are allowed on the course. All commentary is from booths, not on the course. Still it is a great television spectacular!

[Gitfiddlemann]

Originally Posted by hairpuller

I've been to a lot of tournaments--U.S. Open included, but the Masters is one that I'd still give anything to attend. Something special about that place and how they run the tourney. Some of it is a bit archaic, like the announcers not being able to say "fan" but must call them "patrons." Still it's like you are being transformed back to better days.

Poor Gary McCord. He was forever banned from the grounds and broadcast booth (not sure if he is even allowed to attend privately) some years ago for his infamous "bikini wax" comment, referring to the condition of Augusta's hallowed greens.
You're not allowed 3 strikes there. One is all it takes.

[jseth]

I love how the members run the Invitational with such an iron fist... for decades, the Masters wasn't even run by the Rules of Golf... sure, they used them as guidelines and followed them in most cases, BUT the Tournament Committee ALWAYS has the "Final Say" in any rules dispute or infraction!

When I attended, if you ran from one spot to another, a Pinkerton security man would stop you and request that you NOT run... or else he's have to ask you for yor badge! Even standing on a portable chair to see over the heads of folks in front of you was verboten...

Easily the most smoothly run and executed large scale event I've ever attended. I have done production managing for many events; smaller to mid-size (from several hundred to several thousand people), and I was astonished by how smoothly the Masters is run. Even the young people piking up the litter were amazingly motivated and effective... the cups and all the eating accoutrement were all dark green, so they blended in well, until one of the pickers could get to it!

The food and merchandise were incredibly low priced... the overall effect was a subtext of "We welcome you to our place... we don't need to make exorbitant amounts of $$$ from you... and Monday, you will be GONE..."

Just a magical, wonderful event... I was so thrilled to finally see the front nine, as the back nine was all we saw on TV up until a decade ago. Hole #4 was my favorite place to watch... mid-longish par 3. On the final day, I watched the field go through that hole and there were only a few pars, mostly bogies and "others". A brutal green to hit!

I loved how they did not have rough, and I knew that Bobby Jones wanted it that way. A bit dismayed when they began growing a slight bit of it.

I caddied for ten years at the Cypress Point Club, another course designed by Dr. MacKenzie, on the Monterey Peninsula. A lot of the members were also members at Augusta and I got fairly friendly with many of them... enough so that when the Committee began making the course play very tough (not many birdies or eagles), I actually had conversations with a few of the members about how that ideology veered far from what Bobby Jones wanted the Invitational to be... I mean, what would the Masters be like without ROARS on Sunday from all the great shots and scores being made? The back 9 on the final day is one of the most riveting happening in sport, in my mind!

I wish they'd show the entire tournament like the Open (British) coverage; dawn to dark, every day! As it is, I am always glued to whatever coverage is offered....

Now you guys have me all jacked up for April!

[Gitfiddlemann]

I caddied for ten years at the Cypress Point Club, another course designed by Dr. MacKenzie, on the Monterey Peninsula. A lot of the members were also members at Augusta and I got fairly friendly with many of them...

Yes, Alistair MacKenzie is/was definitely a bridge between both coasts in this regard. My wife's cousin from CA actually got to play Augusta a few years back. (Her family belongs to another MacKenzie design club in California.)
She sent us "Eat your heart out" photos the day she played there:
On the famous 12th:

Teeing off at the 16th:

Needless to say, it was a thrill of a lifetime for her and her husband.

Yes, the Masters. A special week at a special place!

[fitness1]

Originally Posted by AndreF

Yes, Alistair MacKenzie is/was definitely a bridge between both coasts in this regard. My wife's cousin from CA actually got to play Augusta a few years back. (Her family belongs to another MacKenzie design club in California.)
She sent us "Eat your heart out" photos the day she played there:
On the famous 12th:

Teeing off at the 16th:

Needless to say, it was a thrill of a lifetime for her and her husband.

Yes, the Masters. A special week at a special place!

Now that is a total dream there......I just want to walk it. I think if someone told me I could play it, I'd die of a heart attack on the spot!