It’s good to be back

The COVID-19 pandemic and the resultant lockdowns have led to big changes in everyone’s lives, and a part-time, freelancing golf writer like myself missing out on a few of the golf events that come to the Bay Area is of minor importance; nevertheless, it felt great to walk into the media center for the 2021 Fortinet Championship at Silverado Resort and Spa on Wednesday morning of tournament week.

A golf tournament media center is a busy place; there are always conversations going on and heads bent over the ubiquitous laptop computers. Writers and photographers come and go, heading out to the course to watch a specific player or group of players or to conduct an interview, or returning to transcribe notes, write stories, or process photos. Things quiet down in the late afternoon and evening, especially Sunday evening, when the writers who are on deadline are pounding their keyboards in earnest, thinking fast and typing faster in order to get their stories in on time.

I may not be a week-to-week denizen of golf tournament media centers, but I have spent my share of time in them over the last nine years, and they have become familiar places to me. It began with the 2012 U.S. Open at the Olympic Club—and if that’s not starting by jumping into the deep end, I don’t know what is. Since then I have covered seven more USGA championships: another U.S. Open, at Pebble Beach; two U.S. Women’s Opens, at CordeValle and the Olympic Club; two Girls’ Jr Championships, at Lake Merced Golf Club and Poppy Hills; a Jr Amateur Championship, at Martis Camp; and a Women’s Senior Amateur at CordeValle.

I have also been privileged to cover the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and the First Tee Open at Pebble Beach; the Schwab Cup Championship at TPC Harding Park; and the Frys.com Open / Safeway Open / Fortinet Championship at CordeValle, and now Silverado Resort and Spa.

Along the way I have met, and in some cases gotten to know either as nodding acquaintances or good friends, a number of the prominent names in golf coverage, both locally and nationally—people who cover the game for a living, and from whom I have learned much just by listening and reading their work. It felt strange to be a “new kid” again when I started my side gig as a golf writer, especially after having achieved something like “elder statesman” status in my engineering career, but fresh starts keep a person young, I believe, and I have enjoyed the opportunities I have had to meet those writers whose work I have been reading for years, and to learn from those pros.

Though they have been only a small part of my life, I missed the hustle and bustle of a media center during my time away due to the lockdown. It’s an environment that couldn’t be more different from the engineering-office workspaces I have been inhabited since 1981, and as I come close to bringing down the curtain on a 40+ year mechanical engineering career, I hope to be able to extend my side-gig golf-writing career to semi-fulltime status, and continue to spend time in tournament media centers.

Watch this space over the next four days as I bring you stories and insights from the PGA Tour 2021/2022 season opener—the Fortinet Championship at Silverado Resort and Spa.