The World is Focusing on

Torrey Pines

I had the rare opportunity to take a day off work and focus on it myself yesterday. I've had very few experiences where I was able to experience first hand the transformation that happens to a place when it becomes the center of Major Media Attention. Some of the 49er football games were like that; the playoffs at Candlestick Park in the late 80s. The Earthquake was like that too but there was an awful lot of other more important things to think about then so I wasn't quite so aware. The US Open is an event that's on the World Stage -- pretty heady stuff. Paula and I went to the practice round on Monday and checked it out.

They closed the North Course entirely and are using it to service all the needs of the open. Play is on the South Course exclusively. Parking, corporate tents, lots and lots of generators, little carts of all shapes and sizes, all of this is on the North Course. I'd never parked my car on a fairway stratling the ruff before, now I can say I did it at the US Open. I'd played the South Course once before so I was a bit familiar with the layout but I didn't recognize much at all; grandstands everywhere, scaffold towers, cranes with cameras, and who knew the traffic would be so bad -- not the foot traffic, we expected that, but you couldn't spit without hitting a golf cart (and the variety of them was staggering) and it was usually right on the bumper of another cart. I'm guessing that this will thin out during competition and that there's just so much to get done that they are pushing it to the very last possible moment. There were quite a few crews painting things and that is certainly something I'd have thought would be done long before.

The big stars had already had their practice rounds early and I got there late so I didn't see any of them, but it was still very impressive to watch the pros that were there. Over 8000 golfers apply to be in this thing each year. The ones that make it are the elite from around the world. I really had no idea how much of an international event this thing is.

Here's the really cool part. I just found out that I'm likely going to get some tix for Sunday. If I get them, pics to come.