Silver Baby Championship VIII - day one

early morning breakfast of champions

Silver Baby Cup Championship.  What you need to know:

• It's a golf tournament, in the woods. 
• If you win, you host the next year, which means creating a golf course and hosting 25 or so tents filled with people, for 3 days of festivities.
• If you come, you will be slightly bemused, very amused, and treated to some very dapper outfits.
• You don't need to know anything about golf to attend, play or judge.

Round One: 8:00 sharpish! Handsome hubby on the left.

What else might be helpful:

• This event is high in testosterone, but there is a precedent for a female finalist.  This year, however, she was a bit busy nursing a future Silver Baby champion.
• PBR sponsored this happening. For reals. I'm not entirely sure what this meant, but there were 900 cans of beer (I guess that's what it meant!) and a bunch of swag.
• It occurred to me that there is what I imagine to be an Appalachian Burning Man vibe to this event. Maybe it was the actual burning that kicked it off that is triggering those associations, and there were even discrete factions within the ranks of golfers - the Mulligang, a mafioso clique dressed in Hawaiian shirts...

My golfer and his biggest fan. I love this picture.

Besides the normal golf-type gear (balls, clubs, tees), golfers also carry loppers, saws, and machetes in their bags. They need them.  Lizard, the host for this year's tournament, got some major landscaping done, for free. (Well, he hosted, and though the beer was donated, the event was anything but free...)

The Venerable Head Judge

I was one of the last townies to drive out to this event on Friday, so I let everyone know I was happy to do a late-afternoon errand run for those last-minute necessities. Want to know what was on my list? Have a look:

• 2 bottles of Maggi seasoning to make some drink I never did try but maybe was like a Bloody Mary crossed with a beer? Sounds horrid.
• Six heads of iceberg lettuce
• Ginger Beer
• Speedo, black, men's size 32
• Breast pump, which was being held for me at the Birth Center in our local hospital

Judge and contestant. We think he might have lost
because he was afraid to wade into the brush to fetch his balls.

looking for a ball...

Putter? Check. Driver? Check. Lopper? Check.

Chipping over the fire hazard

I don't know what to say. He's a Cypriot. Does that help?

Ah, the Death Star - my favorite hole!

Snake Canyon - my second favorite hole!
That is Dan down in the weeds, happily chopping away.

Yup, Dan.

Did you notice the Head Judge's sweet skirt and knee-hi's?
How about his grampa's authentic Princeton boater?

Final Hole on the first day - the putt putt. Dan won.

The first day was amazing. Dan won his round, which put him in the second-day finals (gulp!). His score was incredible - 38, the lowest score of the day amongst twenty-four golfers, and he was so happy. Here he is with our fabulous host (Mr. PBR) and an excellent chef from New Orleans who cooked our breakfast every morning, and who offered to caddy for Dan during the finals.  Hurray!!

Meanwhile, some of the other characters of the day...

Yes!! Little Sure Shot, Annie Oakley

our amazing hostess, on the left, ALSO played golf!

father and daughter

another finalist!!

do you see the ball? mmhmmm.

Ani and the babies...He has her finger.

Judge Alice

Stay tuned for Day Two: The Finals...

(If you are hooked, and can't get enough, here is a video our friend James made of the construction of the tiki bar, which was built in Maine and brought to Ohio. Dedication, that's what that is. Dedication to FUN.)