Thursday, June 12, 2008 Chiongbian: Happy Independence Day By Edgar R. Chiongbian Teetime
HAPPY Independence Day Philippines! Instead of moving the holiday to last Monday, we should have kept it today and added tomorrow to celebrate it really well. After all, it is the birthday of our country, least we forget.
There will be small parade today that very few will see because we are all working and the kids are in school. What a state of confusion for the youngsters. I’ve been to many countries and have yet to see them move their Independence Day to another day. Another first for the Filipinos!
Independence day is a very significant event in our history and we should not be confused as to what it means to us. Independence and/or freedom from what! Oh yes madam/sir, the freedom to change what our leaders want and the freedom to stay in power. Change we must but not change what we can’t.
AMO CUP. The first AMO Cup was a great success and a nice deviation from the usual tournament. Everybody was happy, even when the scores that came in were very low at eleven under par. The prizes were great, the hosts and working committee were working hard and very eager to serve the well-behaved golfers.
Probably the only failure of this tournament was that, not everyone got a trophy. And yes that would be a tournament made in heaven and a tournament of all tournaments. Anyway, all went home with something in hand and many others had more. Billy Canedo walked away with the number one raffle prize, and Vic Yuvallos did pretty well with his LCD TV prize too.
But the best prize of all was being able to participate in the tournament.
Everyone had a ball. There was an open bar, and I mean anything you want to drink. There was bottomless dim sum. Never ran out of food and the selection was excellent. I have attended many golf tournaments in Manila etc., where there’s food everywhere but this one takes the cake because of the selection. I’m sure Oly Dichangco and Bambi were hands-on on the menu and that’s why the awards dinner was held at the Grand Convention Center.
Bambi, Albino Gothong’s daughter, said during the awards dinner that she and the organizing committee wanted to emulate a golf tournament that her father would have organized had he still been with us. Simply saying, she wanted a tournament that her father would say looking down from heaven; that is the golf tournament worthy of my AMO Cup. And yes Bambi, we were not disappointed. In fact we can’t wait for the next one!
Don’t forget this weekend is the President’s Cup at Cebu Country Club. Two days of tournament, played in two-man teams. Remember what I said, first day just enjoy and post a good score but the second day you must play your best.
TIGER. Also this weekend is the US Open and Tiger Woods will play for the first time after surgery. We shall see if his bionic knee will perform well or will it still be under the proving stage or test drive. Tiger won on this same golf course early this year and should already know what to do since he posted low scores on all four days then. It will be on ESPN so the majority of us will get a chance to see the US Open Live. And again no more sleep starting tonight.
GOLF TIP. You may already know how to use a fairway wood on uphill lies by tilting your upper body parallel to the slope, by lowering your right shoulder and placing the ball just ahead of the midpoint of the stance at address.
But another important feature of your set up is to make sure your head is also tilted to the right and have a little more weight on your right foot. To avoid hitting the ground first, you should make a narrow stance and allow your wrists to cock early in the backswing to give you a more upright backswing.
Drive your legs toward the target on the downswing. As your weight shifts to the left side, allow your right knee to rotate toward the target. The faster you move your weight to the left side, the greater the clubhead speed, thus more distance.
