(June 22nd) Day 17 - Springfield, TN   drove 311 miles

Because Calvert City CC was sure to be closed on this day due to such a heavy rainfall, I decided to drive to Tennessee and play The Legacy now, instead of on my way back toward home. This means I will be skipping Nashville altogether, but it will save me two days getting home and right now I think that sounds pretty good. I'm sure I'm going to cut a few more of the scheduled rounds out and maybe get tis trip down to 60 days or so. We shall see!

The Legacy is a Raymond Floyd design. Springfield is a medium size town (not too city!) a little north of Nashville. Of all the Tennessee golf courses I had in mind, this is the one I most wanted to play. I've never played a Raymond Floyd design and had a great respect for his talent and competitiveness on the golf course. The green fee with cart was $32.00, quite a bargain for such a nice course.

I was paired up with three other golfers, Jack & his grandson Grayson. Jack lived nearer Nashville & I'm not sure where Grayson lives, but he was going to try out for the high school golf team next year and he is going to be an 8th grader. The fourth member of our group was Max. Max lives in San Diego and while I didn't inquire as to what he was doing in Tennessee, he played college baseball at Auburn. He and Grayson are both lefthanded golfers. It's unusual to play with a lefty, but flat out strange to play with two at once. 

Grayson could pound the snot out of the golf ball off the tee and from the fairway which he was usually in. He could also putt, but decelerates like mad when he has less than a full shot or chip. He is young enough to fix that, some of us are stuck with it. Jack could play a little, he probably should've been a tee forward of us, but I don't think he was worried about his score. Max has a long baseball swing and when we started he was hooking the snot out of every tee shot. 

I was hitting fairways and most of the greens if they weren't too far away for me, and those guys thought I knew what I was doing (we all have good days, to balance the bad ones). Max finally looked at me after losing another golf ball on the right side, and asked what he was doing wrong. He was collapsing his left elbow in his back swing, pretty much every time, and I told him that was the main problem. It took him two swings to figure it out and he thanked me. Later on he was struggling again, mostly with alignment, and I used an Al Crider tip on him about your mind tricking your body when you are misaligned and that helped him too. 

With about two holes to go, he asked me about something else and my answer was you should never try and think about more than two things when you are playing golf. More than that and you will just twist yourself in a knot. Lesson over! Had a great time with those guys on a very nice golf course. The greens were HARD to read & I'm glad Jack and Grayson had experience on the golf course

The drive to Lexington was GREAT. I got on the bourbon trail on the way to Lexington. I COULD have stopped at about 10 distilleries for a tasting on the way up, if someone else was driving!  The road to Lexington also went right by Keeneland Downs, which is where most Kentucky bred thoroughbred yearlings are sold to people all over the country. Kentucky may be the GREENEST state I have ever seen. Near Lexington (and near Paris, KY, home of Clairborne farms and horse pasture after horse pasture after horse pasture. Very scenic!

The Legacy has 5 sets of tees ranging from 6776 yards to 4831. I played the 6133 yard white tees with a course rating of 69.4 and slope of 125. I think everyone would enjoy this golf course, but would benefit from playing it with someone who is familiar with it the first time out.

           Randy’s golf course             ratings           play again               could recommend           Price

Prairieview GC (Byron, IL)                5                   YES                             YES                          $

Wine Valley (Walla Walla, WA)          5                   YES                             YES                          $$$

Dakota Winds (Hankinson, ND)         5                   YES                              YES                          $$

Raccoon Creek (Littleton, CO)          4.5                 YES                              YES                          $$

Brooks Golf (Okoboji, IA)                  4                   YES                              YES                          $$

The Legacy (Springfield, TN)           4                   YES                             YES                          $

Awarii Dunes (Kearney, NE)              4                    YES                              YES                          $$ 

Lake Panorama Nat. (Panora, IA)       4                     no*1                            YES                          $$

Brandon GC (Brandon, SD)                4                   YES                              YES                          $

Viroqua Hills GC (Viroqua, WI)         4                   YES                              YES                           $

Bear Slide GC (Cicero, IN)                 4                    no                                YES                           $$

Rivers Edge (Burley, ID)                   3.5                    ??                                YES                           $

Eastern Hills (Kalamazoo, MI)         3.5                   YES                              YES                           $

Birch Creek (Smithfield,UT)             3.5                    no                       good golfers only!              $

Kimball Golf Club (Kimball, MN)     3                      no                                 no                             $

Buffalo Golf Club (Buffalo, WY)       3                      no                                 no                             $$

Pryor Creek (Huntley, MT)                 3                      no                                 no                             $        Johnny Walker Course (there’s also a Country Club course, but you need to play with a member!)

*1 = would play again if a different yardage was offered, with slope and course ratings





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