My No-Show at the 2011 Minnesota State Mid Amateur Golf Tournament

For the first time in five years, I did not compete in the Minnesota State Mid Amateur golf tournament. Open to 240 golfers, with the top 60 (and ties) making the cut to the third and final round, it's a tournament I've come to look forward to every September.

This year, however, due to lack of consistency in playing frequency, which led to inconsistency in playing quality, I decided to pass. Plus, it was at a couple courses that I wasn't too excited to play - Dellwood Hills and Tanners Brook. I've only played Dellwood, a private course, once, and that was nearly 30 years ago. I've never played the other. Still, from word of mouth, I was OK with missing out. Not to mention I would have had to withdraw because of my back injury (which is still healing well, thanks).

Apparently, I wasn't alone. There were no fewer than 200 entries in the past four State Mid-Ams, but this year, unless I'm reading it wrong, there were only about 160, and several of them no-showed. It looks like a lot of the scores are missing from the first two rounds, but the cut line was a two-day total of 161, which happens to be one stroke higher than my lowest two-day total of the four times I've entered. So you're telling me I had a chance.... (Final Results here)

It's sad to see the drop in competitors, but I'm used to this kind of disappointment. The same thing has happened in bowling and softball locally. The state championship I was so proud to share in just ten years ago no longer even exists. The local Central Bowler's Alliance, which 20 years ago saw about 100 or more of the top scratch bowlers in the state (and some from surrounding states) compete every month. Nowadays, it's typically around 45 during "peak" season.

I'm sincerely hoping this year's drop in interest was for much the same reason I skipped it: apathy about the specific courses, and their less-than-exciting-or-convenient locations.

Next year's tournament will be hosted by Midland Hills and Town and Country. Midland is the home course of my high school alma mater, Alexander Ramsey (now Roseville Area), and the other is where my Vice President at work is a member. So I'll be looking forward to that one, and will try to train weeks in advance in a serious attempt to make the cut.

Both are centrally located, private courses, so there's no reason to expect the same apathy as this year from Minnesota's elite 30-and-over amateur golfers. But as Yogi Berra once said, if people don't want to come out to the golf course, how are you gonna stop them? (He actually said "ball park.")

If they don't come out, at least I'll have a better chance to make the cut, and the free round on a private course that would come with doing so.