SAFEWAY INTERNATIONAL 

SUPERSTITION MOUNTAIN C.C.

APACHE JUNCTION, AZ 

My player this week is Clarissa Childs

Sunday: Played a practice round with Ashley Winn and was totally impressed with the course. The Superstition Mountain Country Club  is a jewel in the desert. Well manicured fairways and greens, good length, perfect rough and deep penalizing bunkers situated in an absolutely gorgeous setting. There a quite a few holes with subtle elevation changes and greens set into hillsides which will give every player a challenge.

The layout may be a challenge to spectators also. There's a bit of a walk between holes and a sharp eye for cacti and creepy-crawlies is a must. 

Monday: Clarissa gave me the day off so I worked for Tom Leach, Safeway honcho, and made this week's rent money. The Safeway people are one of the best when it comes to taking cage of the caddies.

Tuesday: We were the second alternate for the pro-am so we chipped on the back nine ahead of the first tee time. A few hours of practice and we were done for the day.

Yesterday, Tom gave us a it of an interesting piece of info. Moon Valley, the course we have played in Phoenix for many years, is being converted into a housing development. No more course just houses. No wonder we had to move.

Wednesday: A scheduled 1:00 practice round turned into just range duty. We're first out of the box tomorrow so a late practice didn't make sense.

The USGA is here checking player's drivers to see if they conform to their "trampoline effect" standards. I watched as Clarissa's drivers were put to the test. First they mark the center of the driver's face and clamp it in the measuring device. A weighted pendulum is then released and strikes the face. This is performed from 3 different distances and the findings are fed into a laptop which calculates the result on a graph and indicates pass or fail. We passed on both along with all the other drivers tested.

The rough was topped off today today but this will be the last time. It was 5-6 inches deep around the greens which seemed unfair. The first time is 7:15 due to the lack of daylight but they still might not get everyone finished.

Thursday: Started the day sleeping through my alarm!  Many thanks to my roommate for giving me a shake. Unfortunately, it was all downhill from there.

Oooooeeee! These greens are pure. Hit it much to well to wind up +5 for the day. Started slowly and got to three over early but brought it back to +1 until the 14th hole. A bad tee ball and a slipshod decision to hit it out of the hazard gave us a double bogey. We both thought it was the correct play but in hindsight, a pitch-out would have been more desirable.

Scores look low with the cut looking like +2 which is the same as last week. This is remarkable considering Superstition Mountain is a much better course. Need to bring it tomorrow. I know it's in our bag. Just have to find the right combination.

Friday: Two over ends our week early. Hit it much better this time around so there's light at the end of the tunnel, and it's not a train!

Kudos to Safeway for hosting another stellar event. Great crowds, beautiful venue and everything run first class. Next year's plans are in the works and expansion of corporate tents and fan amenities are on the agenda.

 This will be the last year for Kellog-Keebler to host the Chicago event so  Safeway is stepping up to the plate and taking over. Looks like the LPGA has cornered the supermarket market.