Day Five dawned, once more with beautiful skies, a light breeze and the promise of some interesting golf. Today the Old HB was going to walk the course (7,400 yards!!) with one of the final pairings. Our team leader got the final pairing, our outstanding walking scorer of the first two days (as determined by me and the team leader) got the next to last pairing and I got the third to last pairing of Gene Jones, a qualifier, Bruce Vaughan and Mike “Radar” Reid. They were all at 4 under par.
Previous to this I had put on a coat of SPF50 sunblock the night before, and again in the early morning. Then, at the Volunteer’s Tent yet another coat. I had seen too many badly burned faces and arms over the long week. It worked, and I did the whole day in the sun with no noticeable burns. I know it is preaching to the choir here but there IS a lesson to be learned for our visitors and we who live here.
Punta Espada, reported by DR1’s Bok as a beautiful course, is far, far more than that. So much more, in fact that the folks at Golf Channel were getting calls from the states asking if Cap Cana had painted it to make it so beautiful. I could give you a running hole-by-hole score on the round. It was hot, the breeze was soft and Punta Espada had fewer defenses against these pros. As you have read in today’s press, Mark Wiebe won with a fine -14 total and a nice round yesterday and went from 34 to 6 on the Money List, the pro’s thermometer.
An interesting note was the outstanding round by 62 year old Vicente Fernández who shot a record tying round of 65 on the day and dropped from 65 on the list to 23!!.
Back to ‘my’ threesome. Gene Jones, a Monday qualifier for the tournament, was playing very well, hitting huge drives-way up there-and wonderful approach shots, but his putts were not falling in the hole. Reid misplayed the first hole for a bogie, and first blood went to Bruce Vaughan with a birdie on 3. Disaster struck Jones on the par three 4th hole: His tee ball hit the fringe and went back into the rocks. It was visible, and he decided to play it where it was. His shot hit another rock and bounced back into the water! After a drop and two putts he was not -1. However, like a real professional Gene got a birdie on the next par five. Two holes later another birdie, and on the ninth, yet another! He was back to -4 for the tournament. Vaughan stayed at -5 and Reid recovered from his bogie to finish the front at -4.