Maui: Ah, to be Young

Wednesday I got to play my second round of golf here on Maui. The first round on Monday, at Kapalua's Bay Course, was not as successful as I had hoped. Granted, it was my first time even swinging a club in 4 months, so some rust was to be expected. And while I was a beast on the greens and hit some very good tee shots, it was my fairway game that went south and stayed there the entire morning. The opening 9 was brutal, and the back 9 holes were much better, and I had the chance to close with three straight pars but missed some testy sidehill putts that just were too tough to read. Ended the round with a 97, which by that point I was pleased to have not exceeded 100.

My Wednesday round was at Kapalua's premier course, the Plantation Course, where the PGA Mercedes Benz Championship is played every January. Yeah, that's right, I was playing on a real-life PGA Tour course. The story of this round, beyond the majestic views of the ocean and the challenging holes that make a golfer use every club in the bag, was my playing partners. Steve and Bobby, from Connecticut. Steve is a financial planner (tough times there), while Bobby is toiling away improving his golf game.

Oh, and Bobby is Steve's 11-year-old son.

And he's a bad-ass golfer. I'm not saying he's Tiger. I'm just saying the kid was damn good. 200-yard drives. Flop shots, bunker shots, reading the greens. This kid was crazy good. And not a single ounce of humility in him. Part of it is because he's good ("Yeah, I tried to shape it around that bend in the fairway"). Part is because ... well ... he's 11. His dad did an admirable job of pushing him to succeed and pulling in the reigns when his pre-pubescent emotions got the better of him. By the time Bobby was sinking his putt to double-bogey the 585-yard 18th hole (for non-golfers, that is a LONG hole ... I got par, by the way!), he showed enough moxie to take off his visor and shake my hand.

"Thanks for helping me today, I learned a lot from you," he said. Learned what? How one person can three-putt from 11 feet? How not to hit an approach uphill over a bunker into 45 mph winds? Thankfully, he smiled and told me that I showed him how to hit longer drives and maintain balance through the swing. Sickens me to think how mature he is at 11. I was kicking soccer balls and being a typical 11-year-old idiot. Bobby is testing his skills for a Tour card. Ugh, to be young again.

Of course, my 92 did beat his score. So I have beating an 11-year-old in golf going for me. So that's nice.